Ten years I've been doing this now. Hard to believe I know, but there it is. April 1990. I've re-read all the previous 100 issues and have been unable to find a single word of wisdom, so I'll not start now. 10 years. That's about 1,200,000 pages printed. 60,000 staples stapled (and quite a few that weren't). 300 million words printed. About 48 crosswords. Over 1 million adverts printed. Nearly 3 kookri kornas submitted on time!
So, the vicar is to be known as the rector. The vicarage is to become the rectory, etc. What I want to know is will the Old Vicarage become the Old Rectorate? We have decided to run a ‘Name the Rectorage’ competition for the name of the new vicarage as “the Rectory” is a bit ‘old millennium’ isn't it? As a place where lost souls can be set on the right path we thought that ‘Di-rectory’ might be appropriate, or for lost souls damned forever to purgatory why not the ‘Cor-rectory’? As the vicar, sorry the rector, is such a wired guy, how about Tony's suggestion of the ‘E-rectory’. Entries on a postcard to “The Chairman and Chief Operating Officer of the Vicarage Naming Committee, namely Tony Dilnot, Berridon” please - though I have to say that with the quality of the entries we've already received, such as ‘E-rectory’, you'll be up against some fairly stiff competition!
Why is it - as Bradworthy is classed as a major settlement in the Devon Development plan - that we don't get an onDigital signal? - that British Telecom is not going to bring us ADSL? - that Cable & Wireless, NTL, Telewest, and the rest, are not wiring us up for Cable or high speed internet access? Is this a major settlement or not? If we are not going to get even half decent services (which we're not) from both the public and private sectors then we should be downgraded to a minor settlement.
This month's cover was yet another Wine and Wisdom tablecloth doodle. Sometimes, when the questions are too obscure, the Bradworthy News team attacks the tablecloth with remarkable vigour. Little skill, but vigour. Oh, yes. Vigour. The deadline for the 101st Bradworthy News magazine is likely to be missed by most people, but I'll mention it in passing. Twenty-eth. Items, articles, photos, drawings for inclusion to the editor, the New Editorage, Lower Village, etc (tel. 241748, fax. 241167, e-mail. grobble@bradworthy.com). Please.
And finally, are you ready for 5th May? Forget the millennium stuff. Once every 6,000 years the 5 ‘naked eye’ planets - Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn and Mars -, plus the sun and moon are in alignment. This may put such stress on the Earth that the poles may shift and there will be monstrous floods - with tides hundreds of times as high as normal. Even better, the sun and moon will be in line on the other side of the Earth, so we'll be able to see all the stars getting closer and closer together. Scary stuff!
Disclaimer: Don't blame me if the end of the world is nigh. I only make the predictions, I'm not responsible for them, any more than I'm responsible for the utterings and mutterings of the collected contributors.