THERE are those, I’m sure, who imagine that being an editor is glamorous and exciting. So let me tell you about my visit to the chip shop.

To save any embarrassment, I won’t name the chip shop but it’s in Darlington, I go there once a week, and I enjoy the banter with the girls behind the counter because they’re great characters.

Last week, I went in and asked one of them how she was doing. “Terrible,” she replied, and proceeded to stick her jaw out and grimace in a way which showed she had no bottom teeth.

“Oh dear, what’s happened?” I politely enquired.

“The dog ate ’em,” she moaned.

“What do you mean, the dog ate ’em?” I asked.

“It jumped up and knocked the glass over and scoffed ’em,” she explained before adding: “I’ve got a bill for nearly £300 for a new set but I’m not paying it – I’m gonna wait til they come out and they’re going straight in a bowl of bleach. Do you want scraps?”

I didn’t want scraps, as it happened, but I instinctively knew this was a great story. It’s not every day a dog eats a set of false teeth.

“Please can I put it in the paper?” I pleaded.

“If you like,” she agreed and I went back to the office with my fish and chips to boast to the newsdesk that the boss had landed a world-beater.

A news hound was briefed and a photograph arranged for a few days later of the disgraced pooch and his fed-up owner.

On the day in question, I was on a train, heading for London, when a call came through from the newsdesk to say the picture was off. My chip shop lady was having cold feet and would only talk to me.

And so it came to pass that, between York and Doncaster, I busted a gut trying to persuade a woman in a chip shop to have her picture taken with a dog which had gulped down her gnashers.

No matter how hard I tried, she wouldn’t be talked into it, and the bemused passengers in coach D must have wondered what on earth was going on.

Oh yes, it’s glamorous alright.

I WAS delighted to receive a lovely letter last week from the evergreen Mary Butterwick, founder of the Butterwick Hospice.

Mary wanted to say thank you for the bouquet of flowers we’d sent on her 90th birthday. She’s still going strong and still acting as an inspiration.

We’ve had our fill of re-makes of Batman, Superman and Spiderman. If ever they get round to Wonder Woman, they need look no further.

SOME strange things are uttered in the midst of a news conference...

“Colin Firth has pulled out of Paddington Bear,” declared our news editor on Thursday.

The mind boggled. I was mightily relived to discover it is a film.

STANDING at the traffic lights, on my way to Sainsbury’s, in Darlington, last week, a complete stranger passed and said: “On your way to get your salad, Peter?”

I was. And I’m quite worried.