SPEND THE CASH ON PATIENTS

Friday, May 2, 2008

Alex Dyke with his Volvo P1800, which may have been used in The Saint TV series.

THE VIEW FROM HERE - By Alex Dyke
THIS week the hospice wrote to ask if I would present medals at this year’s Walk The Wight. I can’t believe they don’t remember my radio outburst last year.
Medals! I thought they were for war heroes or record-breakers, not for strolling across the Garden Isle.
People should support the hospice by walking in memory of a loved one or for what they feel in their heart.
I would rather the cash spent on medals went on patient care, because surely that’s what really matters?

SAINTS PRESERVE US, IT WAS QUEEN VIC
I GREW up in Shanklin. In my teens a rumour persisted that TV and movie star Roger Moore had a house in Wootton.
I was a huge fan of The Saint. For years I tried to discover the secret location of the great man’s Island home but failed.
No doubt, had I found him, the police would have arrested me as a stalker.
Rumour had it he occasionally drank in The Fishbourne Inn. Another was that the house was called The Outlook.
Despite these snippets and others, the trail always went cold. Recently, I met Johnny Goodman, producer of The Saint.
He’s still in touch with Roger. One e-mail later and I had it from the man himself: ‘Isle of Wight? No, not me love, that was Queen Victoria'.
Mystery solved.

JUST BUY A TICKET
I HEAR the IW Council is, at last, calling a halt over the IW Festival weekend to Freeloaders Bay at Dodnor. Good, it’s about time.
Those cheapskates manage without bathroom facilities (yuck) start camp-fires and leave a trail of litter. Inevitably it’s you and me who pay for their clean-up.
Why can’t they just buy a ticket like the rest of us?

COLD SHOULDER
WANT to get rid of an old fridge? What are the options?
The council could take it, you could squeeze it into the boot of your car and head for Lynbottom or maybe you could pay for a skip.
All good ideas but you could do what a friend of mine did recently. He left his old fridge outside his house overnight, hoping someone would take it.
When this failed after three nights, he put a FOR SALE sign on it, saying £30. Next morning he glanced out to see it finally gone.
• Charlotte Hofton is on holiday.

SPEND THE CASH ON PATIENTS

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