Icebergs and Potholes

Hi Everyone

This week, our news has been dominated by a BBC reporter who had been working in a London police station with a special camera and microphone over a period of a few months. What he uncovered was a catalogue of misogynistic and racist behaviour, with some officers enjoying inflicting pain and humiliation on people. Now, almost ten of those officers are being investigated from just one police station. After a fifty year working life,I think that you could find similar extreme talk and opinions in almost any workplace setting. From my experience, they were very much in a minority, just as it is no doubt in the police force. Unfortunately, officers in the police force have a special responsibility to act with impartiality and fairness at all times. When you then consider some of the people that they have to deal with on a daily basis, I think that they have to be almost superhuman not to have strong opinions about the world around them. The officers in question will rightly be disciplined, with a number of them losing their jobs and pension rights, but I think that you have to have some sympathy, as they were just unfortunate enough to be the tip of.the iceberg.

You will know by now that a constant topic of conversation in the UK is potholes. I learned this week that possibly the birth of the pothole was here in Stoke-on-Trent. Apparently, the early potters in this area about three centuries ago dug clay out of the roads to make their pots, and that is why we call them potholes. It is a story that has been told for generations in the Potteries, but how much of it is true?. The word pothole today conjures up images of burst tyres, bent wheels and angry drivers, but its history goes much deeper, and the tale does indeed have a strong link to North Staffordshire. The link between the pothole and the local area may not prove to be true, but it is a powerful piece of local folklore rooted in truth, as the people of Stoke on Trent did suffer from broken roads due to clay digging. I suffered a pothole for over twenty years, well not exactly a pothole, but a manhole cover set lower than the tarmac road just in front  of the Fruit, Vegetable………shop. My bedroom was just above the manhole, so every few minutes my peace would be shattered by a bus, lorry or car rattling over the manhole. I never complained to the Senior Partner about it, as she probably never knew it was there, as she never went through the shop door into the road. 

Following the dreadful and disturbing events at the Jewish Synagogue in Manchester this week, Netanyahu said “weakness in the face of terrorism only brings more terrorism. Only strength and unity can defeat it”. His “strength” means the rocket, bomb, bullet and starvation, which rarely solves anything in the long term. Of course, the world would be a much safer and better place without it, but the only way to defeat terrorism, in my opinion, is by negotiation and an acceptance that, although we might not like each other, we have to coexist side by side. We have an example of that just across the water in Northern Ireland. His way just promotes terrorism of revenge generated by the next generation of young men.

Just a Thought:

What happens when a policeman goes to bed? He becomes an undercover cop.

Today my friend warned a driver about a pothole.Does that make him a trip advisor.

What do Israelis use to find information? Internet n’ Yahoo.

Brian