Reporter’s Diary

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34104, 17 March 1976, Page 3

Reporter’s Diary

Leaving soon THE GODWITS are getting ready to leave the Estuary and start their long migratory journey to Eastern Siberia. Miss Norah Finn — “the Godwit Lady” of Mount Pleasant — visited them at high tide at the week-end and found a large group in “going away” plumage. The males were distinguished by their brickred breasts, and the larger females by their pale grey under-feathers and brown backs. “They all look fat and in splendid condition for that long-distance flight,” said Miss Finn. “I wondered as I looked at them through my binocular which would decide when to go, and which ones would go to Siberia and which to west Alaska. 1 wish 1 could go with them — in a plane of course." She recommends anyone who is bored or fed up with life to take the South Brighton bus to the terminus and walk down to Tern Street at high tide to see the assembled long-distance flyers. They might hear the godwits making their special Northern Hemisphere call. Murder

BOILING crayfish alive need not be a prolonged, cruel process, according to one who is practised in the art. He says the quick way is to grasp a crayfish by the shell, making sure that the legs and tail are pointing away from you, and plunge its head into boiling water. It still sounds gruesome, but the unfortunate crustacean is said to die instantly. The method has been handed I down from one Akaroa fisherman to another for generations. Hot stuff YESTERDAY'S story about the Aranui dump jogged the memory of a certain senior Christchurch journalist about an episode back in the 19505. He went one day to a dump at Marshland and deposited some unwanted things, including a diary which contained lurid accounts of events in his university days. He threw the diary on to the pile and went home, but decided to go back to the dump with more stuff. When he sot back he •found an §lder'v scavenger

reading the diary with eyes positively bulging and breath coming in short gasps. The journalist made himself very scarce and has since applauded the practice of council authorities in having relics of the past buried promptly. Cate! ALSO scavenged from those who relished yesterday’s story about the city dump — a true tale about a man who took a raffle ticket in some poultry in an Auckland bar, and won a very large “dressed” seagull. Last act

THE curtain has, rung down successfully on the recent centennial celebration to mark the arrival of the first settlers in Marshland. The organisers are able to hand to the school committee at Marshland more than $2OO for the purchase of books and equipment for the new library. The funds represent the balance after accounting for the day’s expenses, and include donations from the Waimairi County Council and the firm of Macfarlane and Growers, Ltd. An item in Reporter’s Diary which recorded the disappearance of a grower’s six bags of potatoes used for the races pricked one person’s conscience. The grower received in the mail $3 and an unsigned note of settlement. Price of pain INFLATION has hit Britain’s top boys’ school: the pupils of Eton are feeling the impact on their back pockets in more ways than one. Traditions still rank high at the school, and one of the oldest is that when a boy is about to receive six of the best the punishment is prolonged by sending him out to buy his own cane. The thought of doing a bunk once outside the gate would certainly not be playing the game, and so generations of Etonians have dutifully trudged along to the barber shop which is the traditional stockist. The famous canes now have more of a sting than ever — their price has doubled to about 56 cents. The barber’s wife, Mrs Janet Gillard, said: “We normally order

batches of 144 and get through about half of them every term. When the last lot came, we found the price had doubled. I don’t know why, we were just told it was inflation.” The pupils regard the .canes as something of a status symbol, and in the days past would use the handles to play ping pong hockey in the corridors. Sadly, however, such jolly times are gone for ever — the modern bamho.o canes have no handles and can be put to only one end use. Survival

“SURVIVING in Christchurch” is the title of a litle booklet produced for students by the University of Canterbury Students’ Association orientation committee. It is not about how to get along at the university, but how to survive in the city. The booklet advises on flatting

(tenancy agreements, bonds, giving notice), women’s problems (abortion, contraception, etc.), buying food, sexuality, the law, and drugs. Perhaps significantly, the section on “dope” is more than twice as big as that on any other topic. It tells students what physical and psychological effects to expect from smoking or eating cannabis, what traps to watch for when buying it, how to grow it (“a long and scary process”), and what the Narcotics Act is all about. Reprieved ABOUT 20 motorists, including those in one particularly damaging motorway accident, had blood samples taken on Friday evening when they got to hospital. But no-one will ever know which highoctane samples came from which drivers. Someone forgot to label the samples.