Reporter's Diary

Press, 20 July 1977, Page 2

Reporter's Diary

Knickpr nicker

A CHEEKY panty pincher has made one inner-city flat dweller so fed up that she has decided to move house. In two raids he (not “she,” surely?) has stolen 18 pairs of panties from her washing line — 11 the first time, about six weeks ago, and another se,ven on -Monday night. He took three bras the first time, but left them alone this week. The worst part of it, the victim says, is having to part out good money for • more briers. Total value of the missing garments is about 866. The next worst part was giving the police the extremely detailed descriptions they seemed to require — “black frillies,” ‘‘black and orange stripes.” “floral,” that sort of thing. The insurance company wanted to know too. Now she has decided to find her sole remaining pair of knickers a new home. Exaggerated

BRIAN Harman, a Christchurch lawyer, has been regularly feeling his pulse this week to prove to himself that he is still among the living. It was “Law Talk,” a publication of the Law Society, which set off this peculiar behaviour. It says he is dead. Mr Harman denies it, but he thinks he knows how the mistake happened. His father, Annesley Deßenzy Harman, died a month ago, and it appears that “Law Talk” has mixed the Harmans up. The son’s name is Annesley Brian Harman. He was admitted to the hat in Christchurch in 1955, as his death notice says. His father was admitted in 1924, retired in 1973, returned to work the next day, and kept working until a week before his death. Once the surviving Mr Harman became used to the idea of being considered dead, he could see the advantages of it. “It is a way of getting off all the committees I’ve been trying to get off for years,” he said yesterday.

.4 come-back?

NEVILLE Pickering, the former Labour Mayor of Christchurch, may enter the political arena again. He has been approached to contest the Labour nomination for the marginal Western Hutt seat, at present held by the National member of Parliament Mr B. J. Lambert. Mr Pickering is now a member of the Local Government Commission, and belongs to the Western Hills branch of the Labour Party in Western Hutt. He represented St Albans in Parliament from 1957 to 1960, and says that some Labour members have urged him to make a come-back. Nominations for the Western Hutt seat open in September. Liquid lunch WINE buffs will be invited to pay $2l a head to sample something special from the private bins of leading New Zealand winemakers next month. On August 11, the Australian wine connoisseur and author, Len Evans will host the first of several New Zealand lunches on behalf of “Hospitality,” the magazine of the hotel and catering industry, at the Limes Room in the Christchurch Town HalL Only 100 places will be

sold, and the winemakers have been asked to dig out some of their most exclusive vintages for the occasion. The wines wi’l not be quite so exclusive as the ones Mr Evans opened for a recent dinner party in Australia. The 12 guests, including the Prime Minister (Mr Fraser), paid $2OO a head for the charity dinner, and sampled dusty old wines dating back to the nineteenth century. One was much older — a halfbottle of Rudesatimer Apostelwein 250 years old. It cbst $450, an extravagance which Mr Evans justified with the words, “It’s my money ... I just wanted to taste the wine.” Tut tut

TREMBLE for the sports editor of the “New Zealand Herald.” He is bound to have raised the ire of the Auckland feminists with a sub-heading in an account of a local athletics meeting. It says “Women s five-man team: ...” Missing crutches WITH the ski-ing season in full swing, the orthotics department at Christchurch Hospital is busy handing out crutches to take the weight off dozens of broken legs and dislocated joints. An idea of the quantities of crutches issued by the department can be gained from the “missing” list. In the year to the end of March, 645 pairs of crutches, valued at $7520, had not been returned. The year before was even worse—Boo pairs missing, worth $9300. Only 400 pairs of crutches disappeared in the 1973-74 year, perhaps because of poor ski-ing conditions. The hospital asks for a $lO deposit, but patients rarely have the money with them. Bills are sent out, and the department now 7 has had stacks of them back, marked “return to sender,” but not many $lO deposits. What happens to all those crutches when the users recover the use of their legs? Mr Mervyn Hitchens, head of the orthotics department, suspects that they are just thrown into the back of the wardrobe or under the bed and forgotten. He knows what one was used for, however. The police brought the mangled re-

main of it round to him and said it was the weapon used in an assault. Smoke signal ABOUT 8 a.m. each weekday, say some of our readers, a large puff of smoke erupts from the top of buildings at the northwestern corner of Cathedral Square. On still mornings, ash floats down to the pavement. They blamed the Australian Mutual Provident Society’s new building, but the boilermen there replied a bit indignantly that their boilers were non-polluting devices. They were recommended by the Health Department, and even attracted tour parties of admirers. Try the Government Life building, they suggested. It was good advice. Mr J. S. McNeil, manager of the Government Life office, checked with the custodian and confessed that the culprit was the building’s incinerator. It was started up early each morning to bum waste paper from the various offices—including confidential material from the Inland Revenue Department which had to be destroyed. “It should be all over by 8.30 a.m. or 9 a.m. each day," said Mr McNeil. — Garry Arthur