Will nobody save Geronimo? My llamas are in despair at the death sentence meted out to the chocolate alpaca whose plight hit The Timeslast week. He tested positive for TB four years ago but his owner, Helen, baffled by the government’s misuse (she says) of the test, is sure this was a false-positive because New Zealand-born Geronimo, aged eight, was never exposed to the disease, only tuberculin injections.
Now she’s been ordered by agriculture bureaucrats to have him put down. Word spreads among camelids, and even llamas (who view alpacas with the disregard a wolfhound would feel for a pekingese) feel solidarity with the blameless Geronimo (“First they came for the alpacas . . . ”). Vera, our matriarch llama who turned 12 on Monday, is distraught.
But seriously: when we had Ben put down because he’d learnt to vault gates, it was heartbreaking because he wouldn’t come to the man with the gun until I, whom he trusted, called him. Humans on death row were sometimes reprieved, so why not Geronimo? Mightn’t “Boris steps in: 11th-hour rescue for alpaca” help revive the PM’s sagging ratings? Couldn’t somebody have a word with animal-loving Carrie Johnson as intermediary? I vow never to be horrid about our prime minister again, if only he can save poor Geronimo. Over to you, Boris.
It’s, like, over
You probably remember that a decade ago almost every second word from the lips of anyone under 20 seemed to be “like”. “So she walks in, and I’m like, ‘Where have you been?’ and she’s like, ‘I bet you missed me’ and I’m like thinking, ‘She’s like got a nerve . . .’” and it annoyed grumpy old men like (oops) me. But have you noticed it’s dying out? Nobody in the train carriage last week could avoid overhearing a smartphone conversation where two girls were (like) still doing it, and it felt (like) they sounded (like) really dated. I must find something new to harrumph about: maybe people on trains don’t hold phones to their ear any longer but put them on “speaker” so (like) the whole world can hear.
Our lovely local
Last week the Duke of York in our nearby village of Elton reopened, and on Friday I was there. The brick outhouse has been replaced by a new yard and inside loos; and (some might say a little the worse for wear, because we could walk home) I joined some ladies from Bolton in a hopeless attempt to play darts. The mood was joyous. I’m pleased to report that the whole interior has been repainted — exactly the same colour as it has been since about 1953. As they don’t say at the Duke: plus ça change . . .
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No release
Last Saturday I wrote about the plight of thousands of prisoners still incarcerated indefinitely although IPP (imprisonment for public protection) was abolished, but not retrospectively, nearly ten years ago. I described one case: of someone I called “David”. David did not know about me or my plans for a Times column. I’m sorry to report that I’ve just heard that earlier last week he attempted suicide.
My friend Carl, who visits him, says there’s a comforting remark among prisoners bemoaning the attitude of an officer they think is picking on them: “At least he/she can’t stop the clock ticking.” Such comfort is uniquely unavailable to an IPP prisoner. Officers can indeed stop the clock ticking by, in effect, vetoing any appeal for release. Since I wrote, I’ve heard from Donna Mooney about a campaigning website called Ungripp, and a Twitter platform, @forgotten_ipps. Donna’s late brother, an IPP prisoner, killed himself.
Executive class
As you may reflect, reading my notebook this week, I can get a bit wound up about things. A summer spell in new places and new climates is called for. So Sunday morning found my partner and me on a Ryanair flight from East Midlands to Barcelona, joining the “hordes of British tourists” apparently heading abroad and facing (on return) quarantine unknown. Hordes? There can’t have been 40 on a plane seating nearly five times as many. Perhaps half were British. It was like having an executive jet all to ourselves.
