26 May 2003

on 26 May 2003 at 08:00

Statistics – how you can help

Statistics show that readers of this page are in the top one to six per cent of the country.

Unfortunately I cannot reveal where these statistics come from or what exactly was measured, but I think you will agree that it must show we are all pretty intelligent.

It may also show that we will believe anything that has figures in it. You probably already think that the lower figure is more accurate. If it were climate change, of course, it would still be the lower figure, but everyone would pretend it was the higher figure –that just shows how flexible we are.

It will come as no surprise to us, therefore, to find that we are in a perfect position to help the Government, lottery organisers and scientists – and that we are able to do this at a stroke.

Why should we bother with these fringe groups?

I am surprised you should ask that, since it is clearly our duty in Norfolk to help people who cannot make their minds up, or who have already made it up wrongly, or who have very little mind at all.

Some of you may have noticed that lottery games are proliferating at an alarming rate and getting less and less comprehensible. This is clearly pointless, confusing, and a waste of everyone's time.

At the same time, significantly, the Government cannot decide whether it can get away with plunging straight into >Europe without asking anyone if they want to come too.

And it can be no coincidence that simultaneously Norfolk has been selected to take all sorts of exciting measures to reduce carbon emissions, which as everyone knows, are dragging the sun towards us. We can put lids on our saucepans, for instance, or turn off the lights.

What we, as readers of this page, can do to help, is simple. I am going to introduce a new lottery game that will replace all the old lottery games. We will replace all those boring numbered balls with a completely new set of balls.

Each ball will contain a statement about Europe or the environment that is either silly or highly contentious. Happily there are thousands of these to be found in the newspapers daily. Many of them are passed off as facts and taught in schools.

Everyone who takes part in the new lottery will simply have to choose six balls that contain correct statements.

Unfortunately, the odds against winning this new lottery are still spectacularly high. But all money raised is going towards a new charity dedicated to maintaining the critical faculty of the population as a whole. I am sure you'll agree that this is a more than worthwhile project, and a desperate need.

Bizarre letters

I see that Steve Hounsham of Transport 2000 is pursuing his fantasy campaign against me in a stream of bizarre letters to the editor. Just in case readers of this page are in any doubt, I have no connection with the Association of British Drivers, and readers may make of its website (at www.abd.org.uk) what they will.

Mr Hounsham may like to dwell on Socrates' remark that “when the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser”. No, I am not a member of the extremist Socrates Club either.

Gulls at home in new mews

Reader Mik Hancock of Swaffham is concerned about the number of mews springing up in various places across Norfolk. He writes: “I was led to believe that mews developments by definition were yards or streets originally used as stables but latterly converted to dwellings.

“From where I write, two come to mind that cannot fit into this category – Church Mews and Barlow Mews, brand new houses that have nothing in common with stables. Admittedly the access to Church Mews is through Pit Lane, a row of terraced cottages that are converted stable dwellings, but Barlow Mews is on the site of a former factory.”

This is clearly a matter of some depth and complexity, but Mr Hancock is equal to it. He reminds us shrewdly that “mew” is also another word for a seagull. Perhaps, he suggests, Swaffham was sea-girthed in the past – possibly during a time of climate change – and many seagulls congregated there.

“Or maybe colonies of wild cats roamed the area, and the sites are named after their cries? Or perhaps the sites were covered in the feathers of moulting hawks?”

Readers who admire Mr Hancock's thoroughness, etymologically speaking, may feel compelled to agree that one of these ideas is bound to be correct. The only other explanation is that “mews” sounds expensive, and that's clearly ridiculous.

Poetry offer: must end eventually

Thousands upon thousands of readers have asked me when this column will appear in book form. Apparently they would like to throw it into the sea, but newspaper does not sink well.

I am sad to say that this is unlikely to happen in the near future because of global warming, but eager readers now have an alternative: they can buy my book of poems, Mist and Fire, which is published this month. My poetry has been described as “lousy as your lousy column” by one alert visitor to my website at www.back2sq1.co.uk, which gives you a fair idea of the quality. It is also almost entirely not funny.

If, despite this, you would like a copy, the book is available from me at the modest cost of £4.50, post free. Cheques should be payable to Tim Lenton, and definitely not to anyone else. The cover pictures, by Norfolk artist Annette Rolston, are worth the price on their own, which would probably have been a better idea.

12 May 2003

on 12 May 2003 at 08:00

Sorry, overbooking just isn’t acceptable

If you want a relaxing, restful holiday, don’t fly anywhere. You are quite likely to have a problem – and that problem will not be terrorists, it will be the airlines.

A couple of weeks ago, my wife and I flew from Norwich International to Amsterdam with KLM. As air journeys go, this is as straightforward as it gets – but it proved totally beyond the wit of the airline to organise it properly.

When we checked in 90 minutes early at Schiphol for our return flight, we were told it was overbooked, and our seat “could not be guaranteed”.

This was related as if overbooking were some kind of cosmic phenomenon beyond the control of human beings. In fact, of course, it is just the airline being greedy. Someone – possibly elves or fairies – had booked 61 people on to a 50-seater plane.

The airline does not think this matters. After all, the unlucky ones could be put on a flight to London the following morning and be driven back to Norwich – all at KLM’s expense, including cash compensation and a night in a not uncomfortable hotel.

We refused the flight to London. When I travel from Norwich to Amsterdam and back, I do not intend to go anywhere near London. Eventually we were put on a flight the following afternoon, 20 hours later, to Norwich.

As far as KLM was concerned, it was all over. Problem solved. As far as we were concerned, it meant we had to find KLM Arrivals at Schiphol, which meant we had to get on the end of a long queue at passport control (and that, believe me, is extremely annoying when you haven’t been anywhere).

They fixed us up with a hotel shuttle bus, which we also had to find and which was crammed full and got stuck in traffic.

How can KLM justify overbooking a Friday night flight by more than 20pc? If I paid for a new sofa to arrive next Friday, and next Friday the company rang up and said they had taken cash for 50 sofas when they knew they only had 40, I would be extremely upset. Why should KLM think I will not be upset with them?

And I was not alone in my anger. There was the Norwich family who had left Houston 30 hours before and had been split in two, the man from Siberia, the woman from Johannesburg, the woman who had missed three meetings and the man who needed to be in Bucharest. Among others.

It did not help that our luggage was missing when we reached Norwich, and that the taxi rank was empty.

Bad luck, you say. Indeed. But the result is that I am put off flying, and I am put off Amsterdam. KLM calls itself smugly “the reliable airline”. Presumably an unreliable one would drop you by parachute somewhere at random.

Could someone out there be firing whales at us?

Fresh from his investigation into close encounters with aliens, noted Norfolk explorer Richard ‘Volcano’ Meek has been developing theories concerning two whales being found dead recently – one in Stiffkey and another in Terrington.

His first hypothesis was that these could be aliens who had miscalculated the size of parachute required in the earth’s atmosphere.

The absence of parachute shreds put a rather large hole in this idea, however, and he now feels that a more likely explanation is that scientists have been working on a massive new 200-megablubber bomb. If so, there would obviously be a sinister porpoise – and we all know that the United States is using dolphins in warfare.

Mr Meek reminds us of the well-known artillery technique of bracketing: one shot above, one shot below and then one on target. Since we have had whales in Stiffkey and Terrington, he estimates that the actual target is Bircham Newton. Suddenly, it all makes sense.

You never know when you’ll need Latvian

Fruit-farming is getting much more specialised than it used to be. I see from an advert in the EDP’s JobSearch that a Norfolk company looking for two supervisors and a manager requires not only managerial skills and experience, but that the applicants “must be fluent in Russian, Latvian, Polish and English”.

I am intrigued to know how many people possess this particular combination of abilities. Perhaps it will precipitate a rush by fruit-lovers for joint honours degrees in Russian, Latvian and Polish at the UEA: I understand that there has not been much call for such a degree up to now.

Mind you, I can understand the need for fluent foreign language speakers: there is so much room for misunderstanding. While in Amsterdam, for instance, I noted that the hotel lift was made by a company called Schindler, which made me reluctant to use it, since it would clearly be Schindler’s lift.

I was also a bit taken aback to hear the intrepid Henry the Navigator translated into Henry the Sailor during a canal trip (our canal trip, not his).

Visitors to our own country could easily be confused by a document entitled ‘Daft Lowestoft Cycling Strategy’. Even more so if they travelled by train and heard over the loudspeaker that “very slight refreshments” were available. This did turn out to be “various light refreshments”, but that could be hard to detect if you were Russian, Latvian or Polish. Or even English.

Some good news, though. I am informed by a correspondent that the ‘Waitree’ mentioned last time is in fact Hingham’s answer to rural signposting. Which I suppose explains why it was spotted in Yarmouth.

This unspoilt site is the last place for caravans

Local democracy continues to gasp for breath in North Norfolk, where district councillors still find it necessary to overrule the advice of their officers and the wishes of local people.

As a result, land at Hanworth, a secluded, delightfully quiet and so far unspoilt part of the county, is likely to be infested with 100 caravans on a site created by a farmer.

As I have already mentioned on this page, this is just about the last place you would want to place large numbers of caravans: it would create a hazard on nearby roads and intrude into the peace of the countryside.

No amount of repositioning of the buildings will compensate for that, and questions of drainage and environmental impact still go unanswered.

I hope the change in the make-up of the council following the elections will bring members to their senses at last.