Requiem for a cheerful flower

OVER the last few months Cooks House corner roundabout, Windermere, has been transformed from a boring roadmarking to a “magic roundabout” thanks to a tiny sunflower seed which planted itself in a crack by the lamp post and steadily grew into a four-feet-high flower.

Tom Pratt, who lives near the roundabout, tells me that the flower cheered everyone up until a week or so ago when “an assassin parked his small 4x4 in the nearby layby, looked furtively round then brought out a penknife and decapitated it.

“Go and buy your loved-one a sunflower from the local florists,” says Tom. “If a minor miracle occurs next year and another sunflower revisits the crack, please leave it to give pleasure to all amid the passing traffic.”

Amzanig Rsaecreh

I AYWALS knew Cmabrigde was an azaming palce.

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is that the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Amzanig huh?

Prague bound

HOWEVER much the three political parties on Cumbria County Council may bicker over cuts to services and hikes in the Council Tax there are a handful of topics on which they always see eye-to eye.

One such subject is freebies – which is why Labour leader Coun Stewart Young, Conservative Coun Kevan Wilkinson and Liberal Democrat Coun Lawson Short will be jetting of to Prague for three days next week for the North West’s fifth European Conference, designed to help build relationships with new European member states.

The little jolly will cost us £2,500 in travel and subsistence allowances – still what does a few pence more on the Council Tax matter one way or the other?

Statistical nuts

JOURNALISTS know that an excellent internet source for farming statistics is: http://farmstats.defra.gov.uk/cs/farmstats_data/MAPS/nuts3/nw_map.asp?nuts1_id=2.

It will also yield the following technical information: “The Region Levels describe four geographical subgroups defined by NUTS (Nomenclature of Units for Territorial Statistics); NUTS Level 1 = Government Office Region (GOR); NUTS Level 3 = County/Unitary Authority (County/UA); NUTS Level 4 = Local Authority (LA)” You couldn’t make it up....

Earthy awards

I HAVE always thought there was a certain earthiness about Young Farmer’s Clubs, but the report of Grayrigg YFC’s annual meeting in last week’s Westmorland Gazette enhanced that view considerably.

Among the trophies was an award for “the best male member”.

So how did they judge that then – a full Monty routine in the village hall perhaps?