SMH COLUMN 8
Contact: Column8@smh.com.au
Column 8
''Urban myth or not?'' asks Chris Kearney. ''If I email Column 8 from my home computer I often have my comments published, but if I send one from my smartphone, like I am now, I never get published. Why is it so, as a famous professor used to say?'' It isn't so, Chris. It's an urban myth.
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While readers are busy with their intriguing plastic bag/water/coin fly repellent experiments (Column 8, Tuesday), Alasdair McDonnell, of Glenbrook, tells us that the ''Full Throttle Diner, on the Great Western Highway at Hartley, uses this very system on their verandah. When I first saw them I thought they were an emergency measure used to douse accidental motorcycle engine fires, but no, they are there to keep away flies. They seem to work effectively.''
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''To think I spent hours on the weekend taking up trousers (a job I loathe with a passion), when all I had to do was leave them on a train for Ruth,'' writes an exasperated Barb Taylor, of Wollstonecraft (Column 8, Monday). ''I wonder what train she catches should I need to do this again.'' Greg Brash, of Jiggi, asks: ''Which trouser leg was pinned shorter? If it was the right one, then the gentleman was preparing to ride his bike to work rather than catching the train.'' A sceptical George Manojlovic, of Mangerton, is having none of it: ''Yeah, sure Susan. Ruth took the trousers home, shortened the leg, then took them back? Now you can pull the other one!''
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Our call for a more imaginative, poetic vocabulary for weather forecasts last week brings this recollection from Fiona Allan, of Ngunnawal: ''I just wanted to pass on my favourite weather forecast of all time, which we heard on the radio when holidaying with our children in Scotland in 1989: The announcer promised us 'wee patches of sunshine, peeking through the gloom', which pretty well summed up the day.''
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''What's the bet that the advertising agency responsible for the misspelling on the huge Glebe Island silo will say, if pressed, that it was definitely intentional,'' asks Gary Jackson, of Georges Heights (the Samsung ad ''separately'' fiasco, Column 8, all last week), ''and that their client is very happy with the extraordinary interest thus generated?''
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The discussion about the difference between a recluse and a hermit rolls on (Column 8, Wednesday). ''I suspect that the difference between a hermit and a rich recluse,'' writes Allyn Sayers, of Ryde, ''is that the recluse can pay people to tell others to leave them alone.'' Murray Hutton, of Mount Colah, points out that ''when you're rich, you are the town eccentric. When you're poor, you're the village idiot,'' while Maxine Hamilton, of Lithgow, suggests that there is a similar difference ''between celebrities who have children from previous relationships, and peasants who have children by different fathers''.
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Insects are becoming media savvy, according to Lyn Harris. ''Since the bushfires, we've noticed that whenever a television interview takes place in the fire-affected areas, the sound of cicadas permeates the air through the interviewer's microphone,'' Lyn tells us. ''Almost immediately we hear cicadas outside our house start singing along. Quite obviously the cicadas at our end hear the cicadas on television and decide to join in. Is this happening everywhere, or just in Oatley, where we live?''
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''Lady Robinson had another claim to fame,'' we're advised by David Griffiths, of Kurrajong (Vice-Regal affairs in the Sydney of 1876, Column 8, Monday), ''by having a railway carriage named after her, one of only two named carriages in NSW. At the time a deluxe sleeping carriage imported from the US, it is on display at the Rail Transport Museum at Thirlmere as Instruction Car FZ909.'' An anonymous reader advises that many years ago in Crown Street, north of William, there was a large structure bearing the name ''Sir Hercules Robinson Terrace'' complete with busts of the Great Man. Can this be verified? More importantly, is it still there?
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''The cicadas have been in full voice for some time,'' notes Philip Cooney, of Wentworth Falls, ''but we heard that other familiar sound of summer, Greensleeves, for the first time over the weekend.
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''What a load of wimps your Column 8 readers are,'' hurrumphs Jennifer Whaite, of Oatley, ''complaining of bogong moths and grasshoppers in their underwear. Many years ago my husband pulled on his pants and let out a truly agonised yell. The culprit was a particularly vicious looking orange and black bug, one which we had never seen before. Or since, for that matter. We captured it and took it to the museum, where the appropriate expert looked at it and said: 'Oh, yes, an assassin bug.' ''
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Column 8 can announce that, after Saturday's Sydney Harbour Snark Safari, and scrupulous and exhaustive analysis of the data thereby acquired, Port Jackson can be declared ''Snark Free''. MostlyâŚ
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''The uninspiring behaviour of our politicians puts me in mind of an expression favoured by my mother,'' recalls Tim Parker, of Balmain. '''He's the kind of fellow who'd put the empty ice tray back in the freezer' was her ultimate put-down for a selfish cad. What other pithy descriptors do readers have to describe self-serving, venal behaviour?''
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There are more theories concerning the origin of the phrase ''cut the mustard'' (Column 8, Tuesday) than varieties of the condiment itself. Here's one:
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''Everyone knows the expression 'ants in your pants','' writes Geoff Gilligan, of Coogee, ''but yesterday I experienced a Sydney variation; after taking in my washing and putting on my undies, a bogong moth flew out of them. Have other readers experienced similar creatures in their undergarments?'' Column 8 certainly has, and it is (how best to put this?) a unique sensual experience, both intriguing and deeply disturbing all at once.
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Cruise news you can use: The Column 8 Snark Safari is going full steam ahead on Saturday, and the weather forecast bodes well for a successful hunt - Boojums and Vanishings notwithstanding.
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''Has 'to all intents and purposes' been added to the meaningless phrase list?'' asks Joanne Lloyd, of Watsons Bay (Column 8's mission to construct the ''Great Pyramid Hyper-Sentence of Twaddle'' before Christmas, since last week). ''By the way, aren't purposes 'more or less' intents? Moreover, what does 'by the way' add to the meaning of, well, anything? Or 'moreover', for that matter? Or 'for that matter' as a matter of fact? Etc., ad infinitum …''
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''In the Herald's Thursday classifieds, under General Auctions,'' reports Chris Piper, of Lane Cove, ''I read the following: 'Deceased Estate - collection of Baker light [surely Bakelite!] Floor Radios and Grammer Phones [surely gramophones]'.'' Not necessarily, Chris. Bakers often work at night, while a grammerphone is a device for correcting syntax in real time - but not spelling, clearly.
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''With the introduction of daylight saving last Sunday morning, our clocks were advanced by an hour,'' writes Daryl Jordan, of Denistone.
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''The name is new, and so is the logo on the deckhands' polo shirts,'' concedes Gary Jackson, of Georges Heights, ''but little else has changed on Harbour City Ferries.
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''Oh dear!'' wails Robert Silvestrini, of Fairfield West, ''all this talk about 'neither here nor there', 'in and of itself'', etc has resurrected a particular irritant of mine, namely 'each and every', as in 'each and every one of us'. Surely 'each of us' or 'every one of us' would suffice?'' Indeed, there so many of these overblown phrases that we're considering constructing the least comprehensible, or at least the least sensible, English sentence by stringing them together. Something along the lines of ''The matter, in and of itself, should concern each and every one of us - to describe it as being neither here nor there is just so much piss and vinegar.''
