I was amused by the story of the man
banned from his local pub for flatulence, not only because I had had baked beans for dinner and was guilty of the odd anal eruption myself as I read about it in the pub, but also because it reminded me of Terry from "Time Gentlemen Please," who was a similar inability to control his sphincter. In this non-smoking pub world the fart does become even more offensive than it once was, but it seems that it was as much the sound as the smell that was offending the patrons of this particular establishment. It was the flagrency as much as the fragrency that was offending people. But if a man can't sit in his favourite bar, openly and noisily farting then surely the world has gone mad. You don't see Phil Daniels doing it in the Queen Vic though, which I think is a shame. Be nice to combine the two characters.
I also had a good chuckle or two over the reappearing disappearing canoeist. If you are ever going to fake your own disappearance, then probably best to avoid getting photographed standing next to your wife and beaming with delight. At least put on a wig or a funny nose or something. But best just to duck out the room, perhaps arguing that you belong to a religion which believes a photograph will capture your soul. But to stand there smiling.... it's as flagrant as farting in a pub. Also if you're going to use the old canoe accident route to disappearance, probably do it on a day when the sea isn't as calm as a millpond. The whole escapade sounds like it's shaping up for being a great comic film. If only Reggie Perrin hadn't got there first.
Next to me in the pub as I was reading the papers were a group of three young women, who spoke for a good 30 minutes about going to the bingo. They hadn't even been yet, but had had the idea to go and were very excited about it. They weren't even going tonight, nor had they made plans to go, but they still seemed to get a disproportionate amount of delight from the idea and the conversation about it went on forever. They kept returning to the same comic conceit, and the humour of it did not seem to pall for them, of all shouting out "House" together, when they hadn't actually achieved a house. They seemed to think this would be brilliantly funny, though I suspect the other people in the bingo hall might not agree with them and that they might find themselves quickly ejected. But they did the joke at least four times during the conversation (and no-one hates a joke being stretched to its limits and beyond more than me).
I found their inane and shrieking conversation as offensive, if not more, than an old man farting loudly at the bar. But then I was a comparatively old man, farting silently at the next table, so maybe we were even.
