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Fruit of the mailroom
, said the ancients. Or, to put it another way, don鈥檛 yuck my yum 鈥� a precept Feedback does its best to live by. After all, what one person enjoys eating is none of another person鈥檚 business. Provided, as a former 快猫短视频 office regulation once had it, that it doesn鈥檛 involve reheating fish in a communal microwave.
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Occasionally, though, others in the great wide world are less enlightened than we are. Or, perhaps, the gustibus turns out to be disputandible after all.
An example of this kind crossed our desks recently courtesy of The Times, which reported that a post office in the Bavarian town of Schweinfurt had to be evacuated when a foul smell began emanating from a suspicious package.
Twelve workers apparently required medical attention, and the police and fire brigade were summoned to deal with what was taken to be a customs-cleared chemical weapon.
Fortunately, as it turned out, the source of the odour was a batch of four durian fruits.
Without straying too far from our guiding principles of good taste, Feedback can confirm that the durian has an aroma that is apt to trouble the uninitiated. We have, indeed, reported on its remarkable potency before.
In 2018, we wrote about a suspected gas leak, which prompted the evacuation of 500 people from a Melbourne university library, being ultimately traceable to a single rotting durian.
Parpetrators
From one foul smell to another, now, as The Guardian reports that an Austrian man has been fined for farting in the direction of police officers in Vienna.
Eager to dispel the impression of heavy-handedness, the police were quick to clarify that this wasn鈥檛 a wind breakage of the casual, accidental kind, but 鈥� to crib The Guardian鈥榮 translation 鈥� 鈥渁 massive intestinal wind apparently with full intent鈥�.
So what offence does that count as, Feedback wonders 鈥� possession with intent to distribute?
Whale fail
If nothing else, you would think that the saga of Boaty McBoatface would have taught public relations teams a valuable lesson. If you decide to let something鈥檚 name be chosen by a popular vote, then prepare to never be able to say its name with a straight face ever again.
The latest victims of this trend are the city elders of Florence on the coast of Oregon. Having decided to crowdsource the name of a new park, they opened the vote to residents and let the people speak.
What they spoke, apparently, was that they wanted the new green space to be named Exploding Whale Memorial Park. Odd, certainly, but not entirely random.
In November 1970, it turns out, a decomposing 7-tonne whale that had beached near Florence was deliberately blown up by local officials, resulting in what a local news agency referred to as a shower of blubber chunks. Presumably, this will be the first experiential attraction of the new Exploding Whale Memorial Park.
Have Bean
When it comes to a crisis like covid-19, the World Health Organization can use all the help it can get. Which is why, no doubt, it partnered with the biggest superstar at its disposal for its latest public service announcement. Do we have to name them, or is their identity so obvious that we needn鈥檛 bother? Oh all right then, fine: it鈥檚 Mr Bean. You know 鈥� Mr Bean, the oddly lovable klutz played by Rowan Atkinson who was a staple of nineties terrestrial television as well as noughties in-flight programming.
It is an odd choice, isn鈥檛 it, to pick the world鈥檚 clumsiest man to handle its most sensitive crisis. You would think that whomever the WHO (or should that be WHOEVER the whom?) chose would have a personality more well-suited to the task.
But perhaps Feedback is passing judgement too soon. It has been several years since we last clapped eyes on Mr Bean (whether on land or in flight) and who knows what he has been up to during that time? Perhaps he has devoted himself to acquiring a PhD in immunology (part-time, no doubt, in order to accommodate his rigorous schedule of gurning). Dr Bean. Now there鈥檚 a name that inspires confidence.
Where in the world
It seems to us that, over the past few months, Feedback has namechecked every individual, living or dead, whose name had any kind of link to their profession, residence, hobbies or fate. Which is no doubt why our readers have taken to branching beyond nominative determinism in people to exploring nominative determinism in places. God help us.
鈥淚 thought you might be (slightly) amused to know that the fertility clinic which opened in Wickford, Essex a year or so ago is aptly named 鈥楤ourn Hall鈥�, 鈥� writes Tony Budd, while regular Feedbackee Barry Cash points us to the long and storied history of police stations around the world supposedly located on 鈥淟etsby Avenue鈥�.
We look forward with ever mounting pleasure to our upcoming secondment to No More Nominative Determinism Crescent, N0 RLY.
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