Thibault

I notice that the web booking "form" has a charge of £5 for a standard seat.  Does this mean that passengers have allocated seats?  What happens if a passenger does not book a seat - do they have to stand? Is this simply a way of obtaining an "extra" charge on top of the price of the crossing?    

I would be very interested to know if the smelly tablets work as we have just discovered a loir (we think it is only one or perhaps two) in the grenier.  I gather they hibernate for up to seven months - does anyone know when the hibernation starts?  We won't be back at the house until end November so I guess we will "miss" it/them for the winter. We tried a humane trap with an apple but it didn't take the bait!! I have also been told that smelly mothballs will deter fouines.  Does anyone know if that is true?  

A complete non-story, recycled as part of the shock-horror education genre, I'm afraid. I only wish I could believe you, Dick!  I have been marking examination papers for some years now and the results of "literacy teaching" are only too evident.  Some candidates already write in "text".  The report brought back memories of William Tyndale School (boy, that dates me!).

It is reported in today's Times that QCA (Govt's Curriculum watchdog) is considering whether in the future, children could learn how to send text messages and surf the internet rather than read books and write essays uynder radical proposals to reform English lessons. The idea, it would seem, is to make English lessons reflect the impact of technology on the way people speak and write.  Lessons should take account of the new language of text messaging and the effect of the internet on reading skills. The proposals in Meeting the Challenge represent a fundamental rethink of the teaching of literacy............. In the same paper, the CBI and other employers are complaining that most of the young people in work cannot speak properly, write correctly nor cope with basic maths.

Is it frowned upon to go into, say, Atac with a Carrefour bag for life?  I have a picture in my mind of racks of bags for life from various supermarkets in the boot and a customer choosing the "correct" one for that day's shopping!