Don't forget your mobile!

At first glance I thought this was a very sensible sign. It is posted near the entrance to an abandoned lead mine in the English Peak District.

I had just been down the mine. It is now a tourist attraction. For a few quid the operators will take you a couple of hundred feet below the ground and give you a long boat ride through a low, dark, dank and narrow passageway to a natural cave way below the surface of the beautiful English Peak District in Derbyshire's Pennines.

The area is popular with tourists and hikers. Of course it is only reasonable to warn the hikers that if they stray from the trail they may receive an unexpected opportunity to take a shortcut to the deepest reaches of the mine, bypassing the booth at which other tourists pay their admission fee.

If you will be visiting the Winnats Pass in Derbyshire and find yourself suddenly at the bottom of an abandoned mineshaft, please call 01623 646333. Oh, by the way, don't forget to take your mobile.

Literate Dogs Welcome

It was a perfect summer's day in England. Perfect in the sense that it hadn't rained for almost an hour.

I stood on the shore of Lake Windermere in the English Lake District marvelling at the peace and serenity of this most beautiful corner of my birthland.

On the odd occasion when the Sun peered out from behind the angry dark clouds in the sky, yellow rays of sunlight glinted off the surface of the water as it rippled gently in the light summer breeze.

Suddenly out of nowhere, an RAF Eurofighter jet roared down the lake then lifted its nose, lit it's afterburners and in an attempt to drill a six inch hole through my skull, made the second loudest noise I have ever experienced (see footnote) then disappeared over the horizon as quickly as it had arrived.

Assuming that World War III had just been declared and that we would all be dead by teatime I decided to grab a spot of lunch.

As I left the hostelry in which I had enjoyed an excellent sampling of the local food and beer I saw this amusing sign. I wonder how they were able to determine whether dogs were entering the premises under false pretences?

Footnote: The number one loudest noise I have ever experienced was self-inflicted. I parked my car at the end of a runway at Toronto's Pearson airport and wound down the window while Concorde was taking off directly overhead. I regained my hearing three days later.

Another Silly British Sign

As Blighty's blog readers may already be aware, I collect silly signs. And the best silly signs are to be found in the home of the English language - Great Britain.

This sign is one of my absolute favourites. I found it outside a jewellery shop in Chesterfield, Derbyshire. It would seem to indicate that the shop's proprietor operates some kind of extortion racket.

"Deposits will be taken", not "deposits may be left" against any item. Apparently customers are not offered any option - deposits WILL be taken. "And can be paid off in instalments". What? The deposits can be paid off in instalments? What kind of scam is this?

If your future travels to England include a visit to Chesterfield, take great care - it's a very dangerous place. Even the parish church has a crooked spire - no kidding!

British Silly Signs

Some people are blessed with the ability to write a coherent phrase or sentence. The rest, it seems, write signs. Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in the home of the English language - the United Queendom.

It gives me great pleasure to read the works of signwriters. The daily stress of living simply melts away as I fold over and guffaw at their blunders.

Alright, some signs are genuinely inspiring. I'll share some of those another time. Others inspire nothing but bewilderment. The best ones abuse the rules of grammar or reveal the confused state of mind of their authors. Today's example was discovered during a recent visit to the rainy home shores of the Angles, Saxons and Celts.

"Dead Slow Hoot" it proclaimed. We can all guess what the author intended, but the word "hoot" is so unusual in Canada that I added the sign to my growing collection. The wicked pedia defines "hoot" as the cry of an owl. I can drive slowly, but I am afraid my owl impersonation is not very good.

Apparently "hoot" is also sometimes used as a slang word for cocaine. Perhaps the sign should have said "drive with speed".

CCTV Surveillance

I wasn't impressed. I had been on TV before. Prior to being swept out of the corporate world by yet another downsizing I had received an invitation to be interviewed live on a Toronto TV station.

I was quite excited - and a little apprehensive. Then they asked me to perch my buttocks on the uncomfortable corner of a desk in front of a camera that also served as a monitor. I could see what was being broadcast in the monitor in front of me. I gritted my teeth, ignoring the pain in my rear end and focussed on the interviewer's questions. The real star of the show was the interviewer who was actually in another room. We never saw each other except on the screens in front of us.

Now, visiting my native Britain, and with the urge to answer the call of nature, I was faced with another opportunity to appear on TV. But why, I thought, would the British public be interested in my visit to the closet of convenience when Canadians had been regaled with tales of my achievements in the corporate business world?

I looked at the sign again. Where I had read "the entrants to these toilets are under CCTV surveillance" the sign actually said something quite different. It was actually the toilet entrance that the British public were interested in seeing. So I thought there must be a grammatical error in the sign.

Then I remembered the collective nouns which the British embrace so dearly. For example, when referring to the English national football team they say "England ARE doing well" (rarely actually) instead of "England IS doing well". So then "entrance" must be one of their collective nouns ...

... continued on page 94.