SENSE AND NONSENSE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 71, Issue 219, 15 September 1928, Page 14 (Supplement)

SENSE AND NONSENSE

RANDOM REFACTIONS

BY EOBEBT MADILL A girl friend of ours is jgoing to marry a very brilliant youngL man who not only got several prizVs for spelling at school, and has won a\ halfcrown in a “.Snippets” competition, but who can fill up his cross-yvord puzzles straight away in ink. J believe that he also came out tlhind', with honours, in the Classical Tripos at Cambridge, only there’s nothing! «n that. She seems as proud of him, when she shows him to people. |as though he were a pedigree Pomeranian terrier. \ In one way I am pleased to see \r. The average girl will choose a ca\ only after exhaustive tests, but she\ will pick out any sort of husband with her eyes closed. She never asks questions about his possible secondhand value, -whether he is fast, or comfortable, or how r much he will do to the gallon. Nevertheless, I question whether it is wise for a girl to marry a very clever man. He may find out too much. He is likely to suggest that she doesn’t organise her job properly, and to draw up a schedule for her to work to. And what if he comes out into the kitchen to analyse the number of vitamins in a square foot of suet pudding? Worse than this would be the fact that he would al ways be in the right, and- there is no sense in having a husband to whom you can’t occasionally say, “I told you so.” Besides, it is the wife’s task to mother him, to heal his wounds, to pat him on the head, and tell him that this nasty old world ought not to have hurt him, but he must bo a brave little man, and not cry. Of course, he is supposed, to protect her —against burglars—and bulls, nnd spiders, and mice, and other wild animals; but she is the real protector. She warns him against the East wind that will blow through his cotton underwear, and against the friends who try to borrow money from him. Wherefore, on the whole, the perfect husband is somewhat of a chump. But it doesn’t matter much. All men are fools, and the cleverer he is at science and mathematics, the bigger idiot he will probably be in ordinary affairs. And if he ever gels above himself, leave him to look after the baby for an hour. When you come back, even if he is a Senior ; Wrangler, he will be quite ready to acknowledge your superiority. His Good Turn One day last week the man next door was leaning against his fence watching his ■wife mow the lawn. Now I don’t exactly agree with those cannibals who make their women do all the work, but it seemed to me that he deserved a little encouragement, so I asked him how he managed to persuade her, whether it was with a whip, or the promise of a new hat.

It transpired, however, that when he —like a fool —offered to do it for her, she shoved him orf. because she had read in some newspaper that exercise would, keep her weight down. As I watched her I noticed that the mower needed adjusting badly—it was my mower, by the way, which they’d borrowed—and when it got hold: of a clump of grass it either tore it out by the roots or else the wheels locked and it slid along, cutting two long grooves in the turf. After halt an hour, that lawn looked like a field where tanks had been manoeuvring, and that poor woman coulifl only get the contraption along with violent jerks, while it rattled and shrieked for want of oil. After she had reduced herself about a cubic foot she, went, in to see about tea, and I suggested to George that if he wanted to do his good deed for that day, as he did when he was a boy scout, he should find: a spanner and an oilcan and put the mower right. I don’t know if I mentioned it, but it’s my mower, and I only lent it to him so that I could get that done by somebody else. Well, he sat down on the grd-s with that machine, undid a nut with the spanner, knocked all the skin off his knuckles tightening it up again, then put his finger into the works and turned the wheels. As I txplVncd, he must have improved mattcTs. or else it wouldn’t have cut him so severely, but he got quite peeved with it and- assaulted it with an oilcan. During tea his wife apparently made up for what she had lost, and she came out like Joan of Are. Mark you, she didn’t know that her husband had been fiddling with that mower. She still laboured under t*ie impression that it wanted pushing. So she got hold of it. and pushed it. She got her weight behind it, stuck her toes into tho errass, drew a deep breath, and- PUSHED. And that mower, having been oiled for tho first time since it was made out of old milk-can*, was so grateful that it went clean across six feet of grass I’kc Boadieoa’s chariot, cutting a swathe through the dandelions and daisies two feet wid-e. It wen*- riget on, straight through the carnation*, if ducing thrnn to a sort of chopped salad, finishing up by assassinating a scouting party of delphiniums. As the man next door said afterwards, it’s no good trying to help some people. They don’t appreciate Swat That Bluebottle As the poet said when his shirt blew off the line in the garden, and he found a slug trying to put i'; on, there’s always someth’ng. If over we got the *ort of summer we think we ought to have, bu 1 - which "**o never li had, we should be pin/iK d by .pillions nn,, millions of riiebetil- s. Calliphora Erythrocephala. the common bluebottle, is so-called because ho is usually green, and nothing like a bottle, and he is better known by several otb r names we can’t mention in a respectable paper. He is net quite as largo as the Austin Seven, although he buzzes louder, and his chassis is fitted with , six legs instead of four wheels. According to tho scientists he is a very dangerous creature anil carries germs. But even before we knew this, nobody ever liWfcd the bluebottle, although he doesn’t sing, nor doos ho lunch off your dress coat, like a moth. I think it must be because he buzzes

in, and wheezes round, and generally behaves as though the place belonged to him, and his personality is so over-powering that you’d fee! crowded with one bluebott 1c even in the Albert Hall. He’s as objectionable as those very health; r people who buzz in and talk lov dly when you, want to sit quiet alnd sympathise with yourself. i Apart from being able to fly, which he does beautifully I when he sees a rolled-up newspaper,/ he is able to walk upsiide-down lon the ceiling, which, as you may Ycmember, so much upset the famous yjoung lady of Ealing. He does this* because each of his six feet is provided with a sort of rubber heel thait acts as a sucker. It used to be threught that he glued himself on, but he/is too artful to do that now. If he Idiifl he would leave fingerprints, and /before long they would take him tfo Scotland Yard in a mo’or-car and /keep him there five and a half hours! making inquiries into his past lifje. Fc dees not live very long, not so long, rnyway, as/ 1 e would if he wc*e fitt.-d with a rilencer, and tebody knows \uiie lc|v he buzzes. Tie is not supposed to J have any brains, but he must have.! because when you chase him witly. one of ,those wire things fitted wifth a handle he always buzzes about i/n front of tho clock or the most valuable vdse in the room. Ic is our solemn duty to destroy this pest, anfli one way is to set a trap for him. i You can bait this with beer, for the j bluebottle, being very common, has J very low tastes. Unlike a night/club girl, he wouldn’t give a/tmank you 'for champagne. But ptisonalfly I should think that the one th ni in the world that would, lure him intJ a trap would be a bald head. Our grand/fathers used a flypaper, which consij ted of last week’s newspaper cover ed with a mixture of resin and c( istor oil. The insect used; to stop to read tho leading article, w’ith unfortunate results. Which only shows you ’ how dangerous it is to read lea/lir/g articles. But the /only certain way is to hit him with it good hammer, if you can get somcbojdy to hold him while you do it. /