Spirit of the age and the way we live now.
Spirit of the Age
Bath: Trainees at a college for nannies can now study martial arts classes to make them better able to foil kidnap attempts on their charges. Norland College’s nannies (pictured) – the choice of royals and celebrities – can also learn to drive at speed in all weathers, and manoeuvre prams away from danger. The Bath college says it is responding to the needs of wealthy modern parents.
Essex: Triangular flapjacks were banned at a school in Essex after a pupil threw one at another child’s face. The incident at Castle View School in Canvey Island led to a review of the “texture and shape” of the snack; now catering staff can only serve square or rectangular flapjacks. The Health and Safety Executive derided the decisions as “half-baked”; others pointed out that a triangular flapjack actually has fewer potentially hazardous corners than a square or rectangular one.
London: London’s first “cat café” is due to open in 2014. Lady Dinah’s Cat Emporium in Shoreditch will allow its customers to stroke and play with the cats, for a fee. An attempt to tap into a Japanese craze, the café has been inundated with advance bookings. However, rescue centres have refused to donate any of their cats, so the café’s owner has appealed to the public to hand in strays.
Cambridgeshire: A school in Peterborough became the first in the UK not to have a single pupil who speaks English as their first language. The 440 children at Gladstone Primary have 20 mother tongues between them, including Czech, Portuguese and several African languages. However, teachers have devised a number of strategies to cope with the challenge – including a “buddy” system with English-speaking children at nearby schools – and they seem to be working: the school received a “good” Ofsted rating this year, up from “inadequate” less than two years ago.
Midlothian: A library in Midlothian began holding free pole-dancing classes in a bid to increase visitor numbers. “Love Your Library Day” in Dalkeith also features “booky table tennis”, in which players use library books for bats, while other Midlothian libraries laid on head massages and an Xbox challenge.
Glasgow: A firm specialising in delivering hangover remedies to the booze-loving residents of Glasgow received so many orders on its first day’s trading in June that it had to close early. The Glasgow Hangover Service employs a team of drivers to deliver fry-ups, Big Macs, painkillers and Irn-Bru to Glaswegians who are feeling too “fragile” to leave the house.
Derbyshire: The unspoiled Derbyshire village of Hayfield provided the perfect backdrop for the BBC’s drama series The Village, set in the early 20th century. However, producers were unable to cast its residents as extras because of all their piercings, tattoos and fake tans. Only one in ten of the villagers who volunteered were deemed suitable.
Cambridgeshire: A rural vicar received an anonymous complaint from one of her flock for sporting a bumper sticker bearing the slogan “WTFWJD?” – “What The F*** Would Jesus Do?” The Reverend Alice Goodman, who oversees three parishes in Cambridgeshire, refused to repent, saying: “‘F***’ is not a blasphemy, it’s a vulgarity.”
Swansea: A Swansea primary school felt obliged to postpone its sports day for its youngest pupils because there was dew on the grass. Although the day in July was one of the finest days of the year, parents of three to five-year-olds at Pennard Primary School were told that an overnight sea fog had left the grass “very wet and dangerous”.
Cardiff: The Welsh government was found to have been offering careers advice to would-be strippers and escorts. On a section of the Business Wales website – soon removed – job hunters were told that stripping and lap-dancing paid about £232 a night, and were a handy source of cash for out-of-work actors, models and artists. “Some strippers will remain in underwear,” it advised, “but others may become completely naked.”
The way we live now
Saying “thank you” is becoming a thing of the past. According to a new study, four in ten people prefer not to use the phrase because it is too formal, while 13% consider it “old-fashioned”. Preferred phrases include “cheers”, “cool”, “nice one”, “wicked” and “boom”.
First builders were told to stop wolf whistling; now their greasy diets are under threat. Construction firms that sign up to the Government’s Public Health Responsibility Deal will offer their workers health checks, and low-fat alternatives to fry-ups. Officials hope it will change “bottom-baring, overweight builders” into “hands-on, well-oiled machines”.
The days of parents singing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star to lull their children to sleep appear to be over. In a survey of 2,000 parents, 64% of those who sing to their children at bedtime said that they tended to favour chart hits, such as Robbie Williams’s Angels or Bruno Mars’s Just The Way You Are, over traditional lullabies.
“Thinking outside the box” and “going forward” – as in “we must consider our sales strategy going forward” – were voted the most hated examples of management speak this year. “Let’s touch base” came in third in the poll of 2,000 managers. The survey found that such jargon is used in two-thirds of offices, but that a quarter of managers consider it a “pointless irritation”.
