Reporter’s diary

Press, 6 March 1989, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

Thanks, Christchurch EVERY so often, charming appreciations of New Zealand and its people find their way to our desks, so that we can bask in their warmth while writing about murders, political squabbles and other meat and drink of daily newspapers. An “Open Love Letter” sent by “Two Yanks from Southern California” catalogued a list of good deeds performed by Christchurch citizens. There was a camera shop assistant who went the extra mile to get a lens cap retainer for their camera; a restaurant manager who rescued them when they lost the keys to their car; a Mrs Brown who answered all their questions patiently; a supermarket delivery boy who took time to explain why the apples were not in good condition; and a Merivale couple who adopted the couple for an

evening meal, Kiwi-style. Even fellow strollers and joggers who waved a greeting as the couple walked through Hagley Park every morning helped make Christchurch a place they will remember with great affection. Lean cure FROM the “Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin,” a fortnightly publication for doctors and pharmacists, comes this correction: "MANAGEMENT OF SERIOUS PARACETAMOL POISONING” (December 12, 1988). Under the section on encephalopathy we said the patient should be nursed at 30-40 degrees. This referred to the angle in bed — not the temperature." Multiplication poll A NEWS agency report of an opinion poll in the “Belfast Sunday Life” shows that 47 per cent of Northern Ireland’s Roman

Catholics wanted a united Ireland, while 57 per cent preferred to remain British. All very commendable to see in these apathetic days of low electoral turn-outs, that a 104 per cent poll is possible. Come again? ACCORDING to a report on Radio Sussex, funerals in the county are the most expensive in Britain. The reason, amazed listeners were told, is the high cost of living in the south-east of England. Right on queue IF you thought life was dicey for stray dogs in Korea, things are getting tougher there for queue pushers. As from now, anyone pushing, shoving, or even worse, jumping a queue will be fined $9. Think big, make small IN a profile that appeared in “Punch” magazine of

Lord Young, adviser to the British Prime Minister, Mrs Margaret Thatcher, Lord Young had this to say: “The way to increase the number of small businesses in the U.K. is to start with a lot of successful big businesses and vote Labour.” Was he thinking of the Commonwealth at large, we wonder? Homing in on ancestors “FAMILY history, particularly that of others, is often very heavy going for librarians,” says the museum librarian, Josie Laing, in her six-monthly report to the Canterbury Museum Trust Board. “It is lightened by the excitement of a searcher who shouts: ‘l’ve just found my grandmother in the file’ or another who complains ‘no-one has done my family history,’ and the perennial ‘have you got my gynaecology?’ ” —Jenny Setchell