Reporter’s diary

Press, 12 January 1987, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

FredJy gesture A ST ALBANS resident sent us a contribution for the Let’s-be-Nice-to-Freds cause. Mr Mcllraith heard this poem more than 60 years ago, when clever Freds were apparently more like Smart Alecs. “Clever Fred came home from school the first halfyear, as learned as learned could be; At first he said to his papa, “You see two apples on the plate? I will prove them three; One and one makes two, and two and one makes three.” “Just so,” said his papa, “what you say is true; So I take one, mama takes one, and the third we leave for you.” Flower power BRIGHTLY coloured book marks advertising the Christchurch Floral Festival were a “refreshing” inclusion in the rates demands recently. Several readers have commented that it makes a change to receive something a little more useful than simply a throw-away large sheet advertising events in the city. The festival will run from February 27 to March 7. Calendar competitors INEFFABLY dull calendars have been popular this ywr, going by the L._

response to our quest for “The Most Boring Calendar of 1987.” Frontrunners at the moment include a number from tow firms, milkmen, and one market gardener, all of which are stupefyingly unsightly if they have a picture at all. A hard one to beat is from a suburban grocer, which is a single sheet of heavy paper, topped by a magnificently dreary photo. Most of the frame shows brown bricks in a muddy liquid, edged by uncut grass. The north view of a south-bound duck at the very comer is probably meant to be the focus of attention. Why, we are not sure. Recycling ON THE OTHER hand, a calendar of beauty CAN be a joy forever — providing you keep enough. One reader, fond of his 1981 decorative rattan, hand-painted calendar, had kept it on the wall, in spite of family. protests. But, he smugly told his scoffing family, the 1981 dates and days are exactly the same in 1987. The next time our reader can use his 1981-1987 calendar will be 1998, but he suspects the wallpaper may need replacing before that Bad news, however, for budget-minded people who have saved 1972 calendars: thaljtoar-

ticular formula (of the 14 variations) has been used only three times this century and will not be needed again until 2000. Safe timber HIGH LEVELS of arsenic in water tanks concerned a number of people recently — especially in the Gisborne area where long dry summers reduced the water level in tanks and raised the arsenic concentration in the water. But timber water tanks are no longer being roofed with arsenic treated timber, and an alternative treatment based . on copper naphthenate has been introduced. So safe is the new treatment that for a 70kg person to be affected, they would have to drink more than 250,000 litres of undiluted condensate from a roof of copper naphthenate-treated timber within a 24-houf period. Figures of speech LAST WEEK the Press Association reported that “surgeons can inflict deep psychological wounds on anaesthetised patients if they make cutting remarks during operations.” We would also warn Count Dracula not to make any biting remarks during HIS , operations.

— Jenny Feltham