Cream Tea Wars

Ancient hostilities across the Tamar are being resumed as a coalition of Devon producers applies to our masters in Brussels for "protected designation of origin" status for the Devon cream tea.


Apparently diplomatic efforts intensified at the Devon county show recently when a vast eight foot scone was unveiled with an entire marquee devoted to the bid.


Of course those of us who know about these things appreciate that the Cornish cream tea applies cream on top of the jam not the other way round like its inferior cousin across the river. And the folk in Devon have no chance until they learn to measure in metres and not feet and inches.


So the Cornish should have nothing to fear and indeed might welcome armies of euro flushed bureaucrats from the directorate for food purity (cream tea division descending on their hotels cafes and restaurants for some all expenses paid samplings of the local product.


I know of one gentleman who made it a personal crusade to test out the Cornish fare year by year and here he is polishing off the last few crumbs of a modest two metre scone back in 2005. 


There is of course the Tardis cream tea which is known throughout the galaxy and only just a parsec behind the Tardis apple cake. There has never been any need  for any protected designation for these delicacies. 


Only a padlock on the cake boxes to stop maraudng French tutors scoffing the lot before you can say "bon appetit"! 

The Green Gates of Mordor

If you think school budgets are under pressure think again. We now have automatic gates across from the Tardis, opened and closed by unseen hands, as vehicles seek to enter and exit Fortress Doom, otherwise known as Coppice and Langley Schools.

We celebrate 30 year in the Tardis this weekend and it is only now that the powers that be have decided to complete a ring of steel around the school site across the road. Like Sauron and the Black Gate of Mordor it is a toss up as to their purpose: to stop the teachers and children getting out or to keep us marauding residents from getting in.

And what a performance of drilling, grinding, banging,wiring, painting, head scratching, more drilling and more wiring before it was all finished. Teapot even took pity on the  workers out there one day and fed them with tea and Timelord's special biscuits (whilst at the same time noting the secret codes which control these contraptions)!

So I confidently expect that after a few twists to recalibrate the sonic screw driver that the gates will open and close at my command from our control room overlooking the spot. It is a moot point which will occur first. A confrontation between the gates and the refuse wagon or the imprisonment of the head's car over a weekend. Milk deliveries have already been left forlornly outside the gates with lonely pintas hoping to catch the eye of the first teacher gasping for a pre-school cuppa.

Truth is though that like its Tolkien counterpart the Gates do not secure all the means of entry. So any Hobbit out there who wants to find his way in knows where and who to ask.