Keir Royale

I’m a fan of lateral thinking puzzles, and now my children like them too.
You know the kind of thing – a man, a puddle of water and a measuring tape.

The children were reading them out to each other, when Ben was offered this little gem…

A man and his son are in a car crash. The father is killed and the child is taken to hospital gravely injured.
When he gets there, the surgeon says, ‘I can’t operate on this boy – for he is my son!!!’
How can this possibly be?

If you don’t know the answer, stop and think.

If you do…

I remember a time when I found this a tough one to answer.
But Ben (who’s ten) said –

“The dad’s dead, so the surgeon must be his mum. What’s so hard about that?”

What a star, unsullied by the preconceptions of a previous generation.

It seems my hard work and indoctrination has had some impact since the day he said on the way to school –
“But a woman can’t be prime minister.”

Having recently metamorphosed into a civil servant, it’s sometimes hard to remember that this is what I now am.

Or, at least, that it’s what I spend my working hours doing. I do try to maintain some kind of out-of-hours life.

And now my daughter has shone a piercing beam of light onto my new life.

She was explaining to me the functions of her latest creation… multiple space vehicles made from carefully folded coloured paper, which all interlink and fire off rockets at Baddies.

“This is where they fire their rockets from,” she told me, “and this is how they fly as fast as light.”

And as she zoomed them around the kitchen, she explained why they needed to fight: –

“They’re working for the Civil Service War.”

An interesting take on my new life.

In which Blog Fodder leaves the comfort of his own home and gets very cross…

It’s gratifying to know that the stable doors at Exeter Airport are still firmly bolted.

It’s more than two years now since they were closed with a resounding clang after British authorities arrested 24 people in an alleged plot to blow up US-bound planes using explosives disguised as common liquids.

The Jihad against lotions and potions remains as vigilant as ever at Exeter, as I discover while waiting to board a flight to Jersey.

The super-smart X-ray machine discovers a small cool-box in my hand luggage. The tiny freezer block inside is quickly confiscated because it poses a potential terrorist threat.

The tub of margarine represents another suspect device and it, too, is whipped away.

I am permitted to keep the bangers… calm down, it’s only a packet of chipolata sausages.

Blimey, I’m thinking, whatever next?

It doesn’t take much of a rise in temperature before a bar of chocolate becomes a gooey mess and therefore a potentially lethal device.

Still, at least I have the consolation of knowing that the hi-tech snooper apparatus isn’t really up to the job.

The other cool-box in my bag remains undetected.
Inside is the terrorist twin of my former freezer block, a half-pound of Sainsbury’s deadly unsalted butter and a fiendish packet of Frubes.

Despite the arsenal in my hand-luggage you’ll be relieved to know that the plane landed safely, although by then the sausages were looking a bit iffy.

Blog Fodder

I don’t suppose many people have spotted any similarities between Brixton (South London, not Devon) and Jersey (Channel Islands, not USA).

I’ve lived in both places (and quite close to the alternatives in Devon and USA too) and I can tell you there is at least one.

It’s not that Jersey’s beaches are replicated in Brixton market; it’s not the striking similarity between the Barrier Block (where I lived for a few months) and the Waterfront.

No – it’s the drivers.

If you were to take a short trip down Brixton Road, past the tube station and then along Stockwell Road, you may opt to indicate your intention to turn left.

Well if you did you’d be on your own.

Indicating in SW9 is a sure sign of a lack in the cojones department.
A sign that you’re a namby-pamby, lackey of the Peelers, who feels it necessary to signal your intentions.

It is not the Brixton Way.

No, the Brixton way is to lurch dramatically across the road in front of mere law-abiders, to pursue your innate right to swerve about all over the place in your BMW until everyone else gets out of the way.

The Jersey Way is not dissimilar.

There’s less lurching perhaps, and markedly fewer BMWs (the island’s drivers seem to prefer Porsches and Mercs) but there’s a comparable lack of indicating.

There is, on the other hand, a lot of pulling up short to veer onto the nearest pavement to pop into a shop, as walking more than five steps from car to retail outlet is anathema to your true Bean.
I know this, as it’s an impulse I have to fight myself.

There are, however, differences in driving attitudes – the main one being the average approach to a T-junction.

Pull up at a main road on any street in central London, and you sit there whistling until you decide to risk your bumpers.
You just have to grit your teeth and stick your car out into the oncoming traffic until someone is intimidated into letting you out.

It may seem foolhardy, but it’s the only way you’re going to get out of the minor road before midnight.

Drive like this in Jersey, especially with English number plates, and abuse is all you’ll get.

In Jersey, commuters motoring down main roads at a top speed of 40mph with 3 or 4 cars pootling along behind them, will happily stop to let out a motorist waiting at a T-junction.

Had the main-street commuter not stopped, the waiting motorist would have had to sit a mere 5 seconds longer before being able to exit the minor road without disrupting the journeys of 4 or 5 other people.

But this is another example of the Jersey Way.

It may not be logical, but it’s quite sweet – as long as you’re not one of the 3 or 4 motorists stuck in the queue, who are forced into politeness when you’d far rather bully your way to work.

And don’t get me started on parking.
I think the photo above speaks for itself.

I’ve blanked out the number plate to spare any red faces… although I’m not sure that Range Rover drivers have the capacity to feel embarrassed.