Column 8

Sydney Morning Herald

Saturday May 3, 2008

We are asked to plug many events here at Column 8 and we usually politely decline or that would be all we'd have space for. But, being deeply and unashamedly carnivorous, we make an exception for Peter Walsh. "Greetings from Casino in northern NSW," he writes. "Just a quick reminder the Beef Week is on soon in town, May 27 to June 3. Sample the beef, olives, macadamia nuts and much more." Oh, yum ...

"It was bemusing to read on the front page of Wednesday's Herald that Derek Robson, of the RSL, told Kate Sylvester's Australian Fashion Week models that 'They need to take a good hard look at themselves'," writes Richard Mahoney, of Larnook. "One would have thought that was something they'd already be good at."

Warning! Stand back! Ghastly can of worms being opened. "Regarding Ken McCallum's query regarding kilometre marker posts and the RTA having a problem with the so-called devil's number, 666," Ken Jackson, of somewhere in Scotland, writes, "I may be wrong, but it's not likely that the RTA has that in mind. For a few years now, it's been known that the devil's number is actually 616. Six hundred and sixty-six was the result of an old translation error, which came to light when a 1700-year-old papyrus copy of the Book of Revelation was deciphered by a research team from the University of Birmingham. I'm sure that such an illustrious organisation as the RTA would have swiftly acted upon that." We reserve the right to pull the plug on this topic at any time.

We may at last have a definitive explanation for the ten-past-ten display in watch ads (Column 8, Wednesday), from Basil Johnson, of Weston, ACT. "10.10am is etched in my memory," Basil writes, "as the time that great train, the Flying Scotsman, drawn by a huge Pacific engine in its green livery, set off from Kings Cross for Edinburgh in the late 1930s. A stirring sight indeed!" All is revealed: the first symmetrical ads for watches were designed by a trainspotter.

We won't be letting go of the "phrases that baffle foreigners" topic for a while, it seems. "Years ago when we ran a school boarding house we ran house dinners," recalls Brenda Spencer, of Darlington. "All the students had a job for the evening, and it so happened that one of our senior Asian students was to be in charge of filling the urn and turning it on. He came to us with a worried look, bearing his dictionary, and read aloud, 'An urn is a receptacle for the ashes of one's ancestors.' "

"With it being such a busy time of the year," writes Lance Newsham, of Annandale, "I was wondering where the term 'deadline' came from. Why such a morbid term? Is it due to the fact that if you don't reach the line, you end up dead?" Well, in fact the expression comes from ... Good God, look at the time! Sorry Lance. We'll get back to this next week, but right now we've gotta go or something appalling will happen.

Column8@smh.com.au(no attachments please).Phone 9282 2207 fax 9282 2772. (include name, suburb, daytime phone)