THE especially observant will have divined that these columns are increasingly accompanied by snapshots taken by their author. Since open acknowledgement is infrequent, there are two further ways of gleaning photographic evidence.

The first is that the pictures are pretty awful, the second that any human beings inadvertently in the frame have been ordered to remain immobile.

There was another in last week's Gadfly, one of several taken to illustrate a note on England's most scenic roads and used the size of a matchbox.

The Darlington and Stockton Times, a paper with a proud tradition of handsomely handling its leader page pictures, did rather better. A photograph of the lonely road from Middleton-in-Teesdale to Brough held prime position and, beneath it, a Mike Amos by-line.

"I saw your name and nearly rang the photographic department to see if there'd been a mistake," said the kindly old editor.

A very long time ago, the first reporting by-line we ever had was for a Northern Despatch story on the closure of Ferryhill railway station. A picture credit in the D&S was a happy reminder of that thrill.

GIVE him a column inch and he'll take several country miles, of course - a walk last Friday evening along the wonderful little back road from Redworth to Royal Oak and then down the A68 to West Auckland.

The first bit's probably three undulating miles, and with verdant views in all directions. Just one vehicle, and no other walkers, seduced the sun-blessed solitude. And all this just two miles from Shildon.

Possessed of a digital camera and of a desire to make hay, we essayed five or six further shots - one of which may hit today's column.

There is bad news for the D&S Times, however: it's the only one that was in focus.

IF it's been a bit steamy over here, a thought for Mel Carter and his colleagues on Kharg Island, in the Gulf. The solution's a five-hour lunch break.

Mel, Darlington lad, works on oil installations out there. When 15 people went down with heat-related illnesses at the weekend, the gaffers called a cool-it meeting.

"For 15 of the desert-dwelling locals to suffer heat stroke it really must be hot," he says - temperature at 120F by day, 89 at night and humidity almost 100 per cent.

The map which Mel sends, however, suggests that few places in the Gulf were warmer than Gravesend.

In view of the "extremely high heat and humidity", the claggy Khargs decided that the working day would start at 6am and end, if there's enough light, at 8.30pm.

Lunch break would be from 11am-4pm, posing just one problem for Mel and the other expats. "There's not a single pub in which to enjoy it," he says.

LAST week's John North column - there won't be one this week, for reasons to be explained later - told the remarkable success story of Vectis Auctions, run from Thornaby by Bryan Goodall.

The company, which specialises in toys, also publishes Collectors Gazette - without an apostrophe to be seen.

"It's a gazette for collectors - you don't own it, so it doesn't need an apostrophe," argues a column by someone called Swapmeet Pete.

Pete clearly had a 1960s grammar school education. "An English teacher once told me that you never saw bad grammar on a corn flakes packet, but that was before the advent of packaging from China," he writes.

The apostrophe's misuse is so widespread that it should be abolished, adds Pete. Much the same argument is used about drugs' legislation. We'd hang onto both.

THE correspondent who prefers to be known as That Bloody Woman points out, meanwhile, that a new housing development is under way behind Darlington Arts Centre - the former teacher training college - on land attached to the drama centre, formerly Arthur Pease School, and next to the Sixth Form College. Instructively, it'll be called Scholars Park - "but wouldn't Scholars' Park," she asks, "be a little more in keeping with the theme?"

A RARE snub for Durham Cathedral, which failed to make the top three in a poll in which listeners to the BBC Radio 4 "Sunday" programme were invited to name the place in Britain they found the most spiritual. Neither, from the top ten, did Holy Island.

The Avebury Rings in Wiltshire were supposed third, Iona second and Walsingham, in Norfolk, first. Euston railway station, nominated by Rabbi Lionel Blue, appears not to have had any other backers.

Walsingham, itself at the end of a rather pleasant steam railway line, has both Anglican and Roman Catholic shrines.

Didn't that seem odd, they asked the Rev Philip North, administrator of the Anglican shrine and a former curate in Sunderland and Vicar of Holy Trinity, Hartlepool.

"It is a scandal," said Fr North, "a seeping wound in the church." And so, throughout the ages, it is likely to remain.

COMPARISON in the column a couple of weeks back of the respective merits of Durham and Yorkshire folk leads David Walsh, in Redcar, to Fowler's Dictionary of Historical Slang. A "Yorkshire present", it says, is "a gift neither wanted, desired, needed nor appreciated."

....and finally, the younger bairn has just flown out to watch football in Italy and Liechtenstein and places. Return fare from Leeds/Bradford to Milan was around £70.

His dad was also on football business yesterday, a rather less relaxed all day meeting with the FA - which is the reason there'll be no John North column tomorrow..

The "open" standard class rail fare from Darlington to London was £157. The colleague who travelled on the same train from Durham paid £170.

The day return fare from Durham to Darlington is £4.90, meaning that the dubious privilege of a crowded early morning journey on the same 15 minute stretch of the route costs almost three times as much.

How on earth can GNER justify it? As Mel Carter in his hot spot might suppose, more from the discomfort zone next week.

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Published: ??/??/2003