What’s in a name? I found out hard way...
DESPITE Sigourney Weaver having a life and death battle to save planet Earth from the Alien that erupted from John Hurt’s chest, most blokes in the UK would welcome contact with extra terrestrials.
Oxford University research revealed 65 per cent of men and 47pc of more cautious women would want to reach out and, metaphorically, exchange a high five, six, seven, or whatever digits were appropriate, greeting.
If alien beings contacted Earth, 39.4pc said they would prefer scientists to be in charge of what happened next, rather than politicians, who got 14.8pc of the vote, which is slightly reassuring. After last
SILLY place names raised a smile or two and a response from Allen Jenkinson. “Reference your piece on strange, slightly tongue-incheek, place names.
“There’s The Land of Nod near Holme on Spalding Moor, and Slack Bottom near Heptonstall, where the writer Sylvia Plath is buried.”
Slack is a hamlet that has both a Slack Bottom and a Slack Top. Which sounds unfortunate.
Allen added advice about dealing with cold and flu symptoms after I confessed I had been afflicted and recommended: “Several large doses of whisky and Green Ginger. It doesn’t do anything for the cold or the flu but, after a while, you stop caring.”
Dr Bill Armer picked up on the name of Penistone which, he says, as well as a town, is also a surname.
“When I was a bobby in Huddersfield in the 1980s, a young female colleague had stopped a driver with that surname and, with red face, recounted her embarrassment when she wrote down his driving licence number.”
Which is, of course, the first five letters of the driver’s surname followed by various digits and letters.
Which reminded me of when I was catching a sleeper train from Karachi to Lahore in Pakistan. As part of the booking procedure at the station, passengers had to write their name on an A4 sheet of paper which was then displayed in the carriage window, so we could find our berths.
Four of us had taken our seats – two Pakistani chaps and a Palestinwife Maria’s theory that David Icke was right and the world is already run by alien reptiles.
The Seti Institute in California ian student – when I noticed a crowd of men on the platform pointing and laughing. The ticket inspector entered the carriage and asked if I was Mr Kilcommons. I said I was. He turned to the crowd and pointed at me and they a cheered and waved. I smiled and waved back. He then showed me the A4 paper upon which I had written my name hastily in block capitals the day before. I had unfortunately extended the first line of the D in Denis making it a P.
“Tell me,” said the inspector, “is Penis a popular name in England?”