Peter Rhodes: Tolerating the intolerable

A CHRISTMAS prayer. This glorious high-pressure spell of weather is passing, making way for storms by the weekend. Some poor devils will doubtless wake up on Christmas Day to find their roof missing. Lord, in thy infinite wisdom and mercy, make it someone else's roof.

WITH the party season in full spate, my ukulele and I have been wrestling with I'll See You in My Dreams, the 1920s classic, as performed by Joe Brown at the end of his gigs. Brown is so cool, so laid-back and so utterly at ease with audiences who clearly love him, that he makes music look dead easy. In truth, he is a brilliant musician. I found his arrangements online and discovered that his version of I'll See You in My Dreams contains no fewer than 26 chords. Some pop groups have built their entire careers around three or four chords. I have promised myself I'll crack it by Christmas, but possibly not this Christmas.

CAN you imagine anything more un-British than requiring people to swear an oath of loyalty to Britain, as proposed by the Communities Secretary Sajid Javid? He says an oath, to be taken by all public officials, would ensure they accepted basic British values such as democracy, equality and tolerance. Yeah, right. Or it might just indicate that they want the job and are prepared to jump through any hoops to get it. As for stopping radicalism, any swivel-eye jihadist will tell you that it's perfectly permissible to cheat and lie to the unbelievers for they are filthy, worthless kuffir. Anyone dim enough to think that an oath would keep a suicide bomber out of Westminster is probably unfit for public office.

AS for "tolerance," as espoused by Javid and most other politicians, do not confuse it with the real thing. Any dictionary will tell you that tolerance means the ability to accept behaviour and beliefs that are different from your own. That is no longer good enough. Today, we are expected not merely to accept such things but to embrace, applaud and celebrate them and assure each other that they make a wonderfully vibrant society. And if you dare even to whisper that you hold different views and abhor certain practices and you worry that our "vibrant society" is actually a Tower of Babel, the thought-police will be at your door pretty damn quick. In the 21st century genuine tolerance is quite intolerable.

I TOLD a sailing mate that I enjoyed sailing in order to get somewhere or achieve a task, rather than mooching around aimlessly. I like sailing with a purpose. He said once in Bantry Bay he found himself sailing with a dolphin which is similar to a purpose.

YESTERDAY I mentioned the 1992 flight into Sarajevo which was probably my scariest assignment ever. By way of therapy, the day after I got back, the features editor sent me to review an organ recital at Lichfield Cathedral. The contrast was beyond words. From bombs and bullets to Bach and bliss, in 24 hours.

A READER (only one, mind you) said he enjoyed last week's Christmas-cracker joke. So here's my favourite. Two snowmen in a garden. One says: "Can you smell carrot?"