Reporter’s diary

Press, 15 February 1986, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

Helping hand AN AKAROA-bound Railway Road Services bus had to stop short recently When it developed a throt-tle-linkage problem. The nearest garage was a long way off, and the driver needed specialist tools to make the repairs. After about 15 minutes, a passing motorist stopped to lend a hand. He produced a tool kit that had an array of tools. One of them was just what the bus driver needed. That was not the only coincidence. The tool kit had been handed down to the motorist, lan Buckley, by

his father, who had been an engine driver for the New Zealand Railways. Hiding A CHRISTCHURCH woman decided that the state of curtains in a bedroom had got past a joke. They had not been cleaned since she moved into her house several years ago. She took them down and took them to the cleaners. When she picked them up this week, the cleaning firm asked if the drapes had been in the house before she got there. They asked if she recognised something they had in a plastic bag. It was a diamond ring. She recognised it straight away. It was a cherished family heirloom that she had pinned into the curtain lining years before, after the house had been burgled several times. The police said that that was one place the average burlgar would not look. The ring had been out of sight and out of mind for too long, and she had forgotten about it when the curtains came down. The woman, at the dry cleaners said the police had told her that the safest place for rings was on her fingers. Stress-proofing THINGS get unusually hectic down at Nuts, Bolts and Screws a couple of times a month, with all the telephones ringing at once and queues of customers out the warehouse door. The company's manager had heard a Wellington psychologist talking about ways to deal with stress, and decided to have the entire staff attend a stress-proofing

seminar conducted by the psychologist later this month. River football RECENT stories about the Avon River soccer match brought back memories for a Christchurch man who used to play the game in his home town, where Shrovetide football originated in the Middle Ages. Stan Robinson, a retired Canterbury United Council planner who grew up in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, said that anyone who lived there was eligible to ply in the matches, held on Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday. Those from one side of the Henmore River played upstream, while those 1 from the opposite played downstream. The game started in the middle of town, with water mills about a mile and a half on each side of the centre as the goals. Games were rowdy. They were not confined to the river, but spilled over into nearby streets. Shopkeepers took the precaution of boarding up their shopfronts. The ball was covered with leather and filled with cork. Mr Robinson’s brother had the honour of throwing up the ball to start a game in 1984. In 1928, a match was named Ashbourne Royal Shrovetide football in honour of the man who threw up the ball. He was the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VIII. Twice unlucky ONE OF our Rangiora reporters had more than his share of bad luck with cars on Thursday. First, his car was converted and rolled over, as reported yesterday. Since he had

an evening meeting to report, one of his collegues offered him his Mini to get home to Christchurch. As he was gojng through a green light at the junction of Cranford Street and the Main North Road, a car turned and smacked into the front of his borrowed car. The reporter went for a check up at Christchurch Hospital, but the Mini is in for a longer period of recuperation and repair. Cover charge? WE HAVE heard about undercover policemen at rock concerts, but this is taking it to the extreme. A man telephoned yesterday to ask if there was to be a cover charge for the police at the Lancaster Park Dire Straits concert next month. Our report on the new concert venue yesterday said that “Either the park’s big mechanical covers would bei used, or tarpaulins would be laid over the police.” Seems a bit harsh. The tarpaulins will actually be laid over pitch. Coffee, too A .MAN who was out wandering through the Christchurch city centre with a woman friend the other day decided it was time for a coffee break. They saw what looked a likely place across Armagh Street, but it was not Until they got halfway across the street that they realised the Cavalier Lounge was not the kind of lounge they wanted. You’ dan get a cup of coffee there, but you have to have a massage to go with it* —Stan Darling