Peter Rhodes: More spooks

HUMOUR is a strange thing. It seems to work best when someone else comes a cropper, especially if that person is in a position of authority, and a delicate part of the body is involved. A North Country accent helps, too. This week, a police inspector in Burnley is reported to be recovering after being bitten on the bottom by his own police dog. Sniggering yet?

RESERVOIRS in England and Wales are said to be full to overflowing. That's how it was back in the spring of 1976 when, according to rumour-control at the time, some water-company experts decided they had rather too much water and decided to let some go down the sluices. Then came that unforgettable drought. Water: it's precious stuff and they're not making any more of it. Save it.

IF you ever doubted the need for more grammar schools, as proposed this week, look no further than Google where you will find thousands of references to "grammer school" including this query from a lady on Mumsnet : " Would my dyslexic child thrive at grammer school?" Proberbably.

AFTER Tuesday's item on Spooks (BBC), a reader who reckons he knows about such things (there is always one) says it is perfectly possible that MI6 has access to a satellite which can detect humans through 30 ft of concrete. If this helps you sleep more soundly in your bed, then by all means believe it. But if a satellite can penetrate ten yards of rock-hard reinforced readymix and see within, why are some hospitals reporting that X-rays and ultrasound cannot penetrate a few inches of fat on some obese patients?

TALKING of which, something called the Waste Resources Action Programme says pubs offering serve-yourself carveries should give diners smaller plates to reduce food waste. I can't honestly see that curing our national epidemic of gluttony. I recall an enormous family on holiday in Spain. The globular parents and wobbly kids never used full-size plates at the hotel buffet. Instead, they picked like sparrows at tiny portions they collected on side plates. When you first saw them, you wondered how such delicate eaters could attain such girth. And then you realised that they were never out of the canteen, and the table next to theirs was piled high with columns of little plates and piles of uneaten food they had taken but did not want. The wolfing and the waste was astonishing. Curing eating habits like that doesn't depend on the size of the plates but the strength of the will.

AND back to spooks. MI6 says it will use its old tactic of recruiting new agents by "tapping up" suitable candidates. Worked awfully well at Cambridge, didn't it? Goodness knows how many old spooks confide to each other at reunion dinners: "You know, I was tapped up at Cambridge by Philby." Or maybe they keep quiet about that.

STILL in academia, some Cambridge students recently objected to "cultural appropriation" of national dishes (Jamaican stew, Tunisian rice, etc) on their college menu. A reader writes to tell me he has recently discovered that shepherds pies do not contain real shepherds, and to whom should he complain?