Janauary 2022 | Page 26

Jottings from previous page
Asian hate crime and police discrimination .”
Varsity ’ s editor Isabel Sebode said Cambridge students expected not to be upset . “ I don ’ t think people nowadays necessarily get any more offended than previous generations ,” she added .
And after having ensured that this generation of students are never offended , we must also ensure that we do not exhaust them unnecessarily . The headmaster of Malvern College in Worcestershire said last month that handwriting is “ too tiring ” for the modern pupil .
He claims that youngsters who are used to keyboards find themselves unable to “ express their ideas so proficiently ” when forced to take up a pen when they sit an exam . “ Handwriting has largely disappeared everywhere except for school ,” he explains , “ making it seem very antiquated to still be going into an exam room with a pen and paper .” ( Split infinitive there , Headmaster !) Typing , he believes , boosts “ fairness and accessibility for all .”
Meanwhile , an American academic has received funds from a British charitable trust to teach actors about sexual ethics . She claims that scenes in which male characters fail to ask females for consent could be “ potentially triggering .”
Hailey Bachrach , who works at the University of Roehampton in London , says her three-year programme of workshops will highlight the issues around consent , rather than just ignoring it . She says that in Shakespeare ’ s plays , female characters , “ basically never got to consent to sex or marriage . It just happened , despite the fact that often they ’ d repeatedly said no .”
Her project , backed by the Leverhulme Trust , will find performers from the Royal Shakespeare Company and The Globe being taught that Richard III woos Lady Anne without getting “ an actual yes ,” while , during an encounter between Henry V and Princess Katherine , she says “ everything but an actual yes .”
Launching the “ Shakespeare and Consent ” project , Ms Bachrach said that Shakespeare ' s “ glossing over ” of these issues could be problematic , especially as female characters are often smaller roles given to younger actors .
Council capers
The residents of Blackthorn Close , a quiet residential street in the Berkshire town of Wokingham , were surprised at the end of November when they found parking tickets on cars parked outside their front doors . After all , there were no yellow lines painted along the kerb , were there ? Well , no and yes .
It is true that there were no lines there when they parked , but between then and collecting their vehicles later , double yellow lines appeared along the length of the road . Not only that , the lines stretched underneath all the parked cars .
It appears that the contractor hired by Wokingham Borough Council sent workmen to paint the lines . To ensure the job was done properly , the workers
showed remarkable initiative by bringing along a crane to lift each parked vehicle off the ground , paint yellow lines under it , and then set it down again .
Once the job was complete and the workmen disappeared ... guess what ? Yep ! A traffic warden appeared and slapped a ticket on each vehicle which was now breaking the law , a scenario which the Council described as an , “ unfortunate coincidence .” OK , we believe you .
To make things worse . the Council says it cannot simply cancel the tickets and that each car owner must go through the hassle of appealing the fine . How about fining the contractor for failing to warn about the pending work and for moving vehicles without the owners ’ permission ?
Meanwhile , Pamela Holmes recently took delivery of a new lid for her hot tub at home in the Derbyshire village of Burton . It came in cardboard packaging , roughly 1.3 metres by 1.3 metres , which she left on the grass verge outside her house for her son to pick up and take to the rubbish tip .
Guess what happened next ? Yep ! A council jobsworth turned up at the door and accused her of fly-tipping . A nosy neighbour had apparently reported the offence .
She was given a £ 400 penalty notice and a warning her that if she refused to pay the fine within four weeks she would be taken to court and liable to a maximum fine of £ 50,000 . Pamela said she was “ spitting feathers ” and wondered why anyone would think she had dumped packaging with her name on it outside her own house .
While the Council was within its rights as the incident took place on public land , the incident has been described as “ disproportionate ” on social media . Readers complained that the council leapt into action on her within hours , but “ takes days to do anything about ‘ proper ’ fly-tipping .”
Taking the cake
Entrepreneurs the world over are noted for spotting a business opportunity and exploiting it to their advantage . So , we predict a bright future for Christian King from Sydney , Australia , who found himself in a exactly such a situation and took full advantage .
Christian is four-years-old and his father , Kris , now regrets the day when he handed his son his mobile phone to keep him amused for a few minutes . Christian promptly logged on Uber Eats and placed an order for some of his favourite goodies .
His shopping list included two tiramisu cakes , two mushroom cakes , a chocolate log , eight or nine 1.5 litre tubs of strawberries and cream , a double dolche gelato ... to a total of 99 items including a personalised birthday cake .
The receipt which arrived with the order ran to 30 pages , according to his dad , who did a double take when he saw the total bill of A $ 1,139 ( more than € 700 ).
Christian ran for cover in his bedroom while Dad threaten to cancel Christmas in their household , but luckily Uber Eats agreed to refund the lot once the lad ’ s entrepreneurial exploit was explained to them . Dad Kris said , “ He ’ s back in the good books and Santa is coming again .”
Meanwhile , a Manchester restaurant which is used by the UK ’ s Just Eat on-
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