Crossword Clue

Two girls, one on each knee? (7)

European English Language

The EU Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union, rather than German which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a
5- year phase-in plan that would become known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy.

The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k". This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.

Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.

By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensibl riten styl.

Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

Flying pigs

As an ex-microbiologist who did a little genetics: I wonder of the swine flu virus combined with the bird flu virus:

Pigs Might Fly:??:

Friends Reunion

Dick and Sally Sutton invited Dave and Margaret Thompson and Chris and myself to their new bungalow in Costock, Nottinghamshire for the weekend.

This was a mini-version of a reunion of some of the people who holidayed together 42 years ago. We have regular reunions, in fact there have been as many as TWO since 1967

One notable non-attendee was John Bricher (and Helen) who made some lame excuse for not joining us. Can't remember exactly what the excuse was but Chris and I made an effort and travelled all the way from Leicester which is 20 miles away and Dave and Marg were heroes for driving 200 miles. (For those not privy to the details, John and Helen live in Adelaide, Australia).

We had lunch in the excellent local pub, the 'Generous Briton' . The lunch was notable for the violent dispensation of diet coke.... I'm saying no more......

An excellent grand buffet in the evening was accompanied by much conversation.

Dick's Laptop wouldn't connect wirelessly

Ater many hours and no sleep Mike managed to fix it

Saturday

Someone threw a jam butty at Mike ... I'm not saying whom

It was showery and windy but we braved the elements and looked around the Trent Lock River Trent / Canals junction.

We then went to Trent Lock Golf Club, had a few drinks and then hit 100 balls with various degrees of success.

Mike missed a crucial turn torwards Costock and was somewhat late in arriving at Sally & Dick's.

(Whilst all the above was occurring, Leicester Tigers were winning the Cup, by beating London Irish by 10-9)

On Saturday evening, we went to an Indian Restaurant in Keyworth. There was a vast amount of food, sometimes not the same as expected. For example the Begam Behar was like a Tandoori Chicken Masala and Sally's chicken Pasanda was a very tomoto based dish, unlike any Pasanda we have ever seen or tasted.

After post-prandial drinks back at Sally & Dick's we retired to (bunk) beds.

Chris and I had to leave early because Mike had arranged to take Keith Kenyon to Mallory Park to see motorcycle racing.

Before we arrived home, Maggie 'phoned to say that Keith had been and was unwell and wouldn't be able to go to Mallory.

All-in-all an excellent weekend, the only missing bits were John and Helen.

John did email and offer to buy his round!

Kinky First Time

Don't worry; it only seems kinky the first time.

Twitter

I'm on Twitter, as http://twitter.com/SaintSteven

As I'm a newbie Tweeter, please Tweet me as I want to investigate further.

Ta. Mike

Twitter

I've joined "Twitter"

Are you a "Tweeter" i.e. are you "in" Twitter?

Legal?

Is it legal for a man in Belgium to marry his widow's sister? *

In The Times 5.5.09 and from Einstein's Riddles, Paradoxes, and Conundrums to Stretch your Mind, by Jeremy Stragroom, Bloomsbury.

Can Swine catch Human Flu?

As there are more cases of "human" influenza than there are of "Swine" flu, shouldn't pigs be worried that they might catch our version

Sunderland supporters? Not!

At the Sunderland v Everton match the published attendence was over 41,000. At the end there were "half that number"*, many of whom were Everton fans.

People were seen leaving the stands with 20 minutes remaining.

Sunderland were losing, but only by 2 goals to nil.

Surely a team in the position Sunderland are in this season, need all the support they can get. Players must respond to the attitude of the crowd. To see so-called supporters deserting them can do little good and may be detrimental to the prospects for next season.

I initially thought I might receive some adverse comments to this blog from Sunderland fans, but they probably stopped reading this some time ago and went to bed, or the pub!

* Quoted by the Sky TV commentator

Swine Flu? Not Swine Flu? What was it then?

Numbers of deaths from Swine Flu in Mexico have been reduced!

What did the victims die from then?

There is an opportunity here for a second pandemic.

Also an opportunity for more media hype.

I'll be accused of being cynical, but I am sympathetic to those who have died and their families, People do die from influenza and there are outbreaks of influenza.

Paris to Expand: Nearer to the UK

On April 29th 2009, President Sarkozy of France announced a plan to expand Greater Paris all the way to the English Channel *. It involves a corridor from Paris to Le Havre followng the River Seine with a fast rail link.

I'm somewhat surprised and alarmed.

What would a Frenchman want to expand northwards (OK strictly north-westwards)?

• It's colder the further north one goes
• Much of the wine is in areas to the south of Paris.

There must be an ulterior motive: invasion perhaps ?

Should us Brits block the Channel tunnel's exit from France, leaving the entrance to France open?

What do you think?

* Reported in the Daily Telegraph April 30th 2009

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/2080999/Nicolas-Sarkozy-plans-for-Grand-Paris.html