Reporter’s diary

Press, 31 July 1986, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

Curiosity satisfied MOG’N’BOG, as a name, fascinated us. It was clearly the name of a correspondent’s home, in Hoskyn Road, Klrwee, but just how, or, why, left us boggling. The owner, Mrs Wendy Wills, explained that it was a concocted npme with Cornish origins. Mog (or moggie) meaning cat; and bog, meaning small house. She

lives with a cat, in a small house at the bottom of a garden. Simple, when you know. Copper trials IF NEW ZEALAND’S smallest coins, the Ic and 2c pieces, are withdrawn, that will end the game of pass-the-copper which is being played with increasing vigour on Christchurch buses. Most

drivers are extremely patient when presented with what looks like the booty from a child’s piggy bank, but a long, hard day can weaken their selfrestraint. On a Papanui bus not long ago the driver took the money after an argument, then picked it up and hurled it into the gutter beside his bus. However, the game gets played both ways. Passengers who look meek, or even just polite, are likely to find their change comes as a handful of “shrapnel.” The only thing to do with it? Pass it on as one’s next bus fare, of course. Fair fare

ALTHOUGH bus drivers for the C.T.B. are instructed to accept any legal tender, under the Decimal Currency Act, there is a limit to how much copper coinage they have to accept. Up to 20c worth of 1c and 2c pieces is legally within bounds, and up to 50c worth of 5c pieces. A mixture of 20c and 50c may be used up to $5. We have been unable to verify it, but we heard that there is a shop in Christchurch which refuses to deal with any copper coins, and its prices are set accordingly. So perhaps copper coins will disappear anyway, by natural selection. Top secret SINCE a new brand of flavoured sparkling mineral water in 275 ml bottles came out some months ago, a Christchurch man has gurgled his way through about a dozen bottles of the stuff each week. He rates the drink “delicious” but the bottles “a curiosity.” Someone in the design process has come up with

an interesting place to put the instructions for opening and closing the bottle top, on the inside of the top, where they cannot be read until the top is removed.

Official confirmation WE CAN ALL relax — it is now official that the sun sets in the west. A frustrated crowd, and harassed cycling officials at the Games velodrome were confronted with the possibility of more delays to the cycling competition after heavy rain. The wooden track was soaked once again, and officials at one stage were thinking of rescheduling the 4000 m individual pursuit for a second time, reports the Press Association. The problem, the crowd was told, was with one end of the track which was taking a long time to dry out. That, announced the frazzled official to tremendous applause, was because the sun was setting in the west. Now we know. Cumbersome luggage UNLIKE THROWING events in the Olympic or Commonwealth Games, a pole-vaulting athlete may use his own pole. Keeping in mind how awkward it can be to manoeuvre even an umbrella, imagine the transport problems of the vaulter with his 4.8 m fibre-glass travelling companion. John Pennel, the world recordholder, found his airline had neatly solved the problem of how to fit his. pole in the baggage compartment: by neatly cutting it into tidy' 1.2 m lengths, i r —Jenny Clark