Reporter’s diary

Press, 27 May 1985, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

Out of action THE LIVESTOCK Improvement Association is advocating some pretty extreme measures these days. A stern paragraph from its bulletin, headed “Use of bulls”: “No bull other than a vasectomised bull shall be run with the herd during the period in which artificial insemination is being used, and bulls in the possession of farmers must be safely padlocked.” The motions A READER informs us that when he recently advertised the position of junior clerk at a certain Christchurch hospital, one of the “applications” was a neatly and correctly addressed envelope containing four pages of blank paper. Since he doubts that anyone would be silly enough to put four sheets of bare paper in an envelope by mistake, he can

only presume that the empty job application was sent by a young unemployed person who would like to stay unemployed, but wants to convince someone, parents, possibly, that he or she is doing their level best to find a job. “Look, mum, I keep sending away all these applications and I never get a reply ...” Tagged NEW ZEALAND’S famous “hairy berries” can now be individually tagged with self-adhesive labels identifying them as genuine kiwifruit. In a trial conducted last week for the New Zealand Kiwifruit Authority, the challenges posed by kiwifruit hair and rough skin were overcome, and more than one million fruit labelled. The idea of individually labelling kiwifruit is to assure the consumer that they are buying the genuine fruit grown in New Zealand,

not a mere substitute put in the New Zealand display box long after the originals have gone. Honour among thieves WE HEAR that a car was broken into outside the rooms of a South Island rugby club, noted for its rough-diamond element. Rifling through the contents of the vehicle, the culprits came on a rugby jersey and other personal belongings of a young player who had just joined the team and was showing considerable promise. They hastily put everything back, made good the damage as best they could, then went back into the clubrooms and made a full and frank confession to the owner of the car. “Very sorry, mate. If we had known it was yours ...” All at sea CUNARD’S flagship, the 67,000-ton Queen Elizabeth 2, will become the world’s most exclusive grandstand

when it joins the flotilla of liners following the America’s Cup yachting classic off the coast of Perth in January next year. The ship will set a special course for Perth’s port, Fremantle, carrying yachting enthusiasts mainly from the United States, which lost the cup to Australia after an epic struggle last year. British spectators keen to watch proceedings from the liner’s decks will be flown to Australia in the supersonic Concorde airliner. Another seven or eight passenger liners, acting as floating hotels, will have arrived a month earlier in time for the America’s Cup qualifying rounds. Instructions THE LATEST addition to the Regimental Orders of the Sultan of Oman’s‘'defence force reads: “All ranks using vehicles in front of regimental headquarters and messes are to park their vehicles in the correct direction, not in the opposite direction, due to the vehicle be ready for moving without coming back.” Now,

there is an order in the highest military tradition: clear, concise, logical. —Peter Comer