Huddersfield Daily Examiner 30 March 1917
They did awful things with beer supply during the First World War. They introduced licensing hours to control when people could drink it, they nationalised a brewery to control how it was produced; and when all else failed, they doubled the price of it so people couldn't afford it.
Doubling the price of beer may sound like a bad dream, but doubling beer prices whilst there is a severe shortage of potatoes is the stuff of nightmares. Cauliflowers and Swedes I can well live without - indeed I have done so with no harmful effects for almost seventy years - but potatoes, in the form of chips and crisps, are essential, to not only my life, but the life of any sane human being.
The Omnibus Man-Catcher must count as one of the great missed opportunities of modern times. Forget inflatable bags and strengthened steel cages, a large elastic band stretched in front of vehicles to gently catapult them out of danger on busy roads is an ideal solution to the challenges of road safety. In this age of driverless vehicles, perhaps it is time to return to this idea.
I work on a very busy A road with lots of traffic all the time. There are two zebras and a pelican plus several pedestrian refuges. Does anyone use the crossings? No. Do they wander into the road at random? Yes. Do they get run over? Mostly not but I don't know why not. But the elastic band thingy might throw them in front of one of the many passing police cars. Just been signed off work for six weeks though so won't have to stress over the maddened pedestrians for a while.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if you could write a witty piece on any three items from any old newspaper? I'm guessing you could. We share a common love of potatoes.
ReplyDeleteI too love the spud and we have lots of critters who might benefit from that band...
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