Spring is here and the ice cream van is around and it is playing "Whistle while you work" to attract the childen. It's surprising to hear it because that song was popular when I was only 6 or so and rushing out to catch my friend, the ice cream man, who went by every day about 3 o'clock.
It strikes me that nobody whistles nowadays, but they used to then, particularly builders as they slapped brick upon brick or window cleaners up their ladders or postmen or boys on bicycles or men cutting their garden hedges. (Women didn't whistle, and girls were encouraged not to. "A whistling woman and a crowing hen is good for neither God nor men") It is tempting to think people were happier then - and perhaps that isn't so far from the truth, because it's quite difficult to get your mouth into the right shape if you're unhappy. It's not my imagination that whistling has just faded away. After all, I don't think anybody would even think of writing a song with that name nowadays - it wouldn't click with anybody.
This blog is a plea for common sense in public policy. Our leaders don't seem to have any. They just make daft rules for us to follow. We need to assert our right to use our own good sense instead of ticking boxes which can only say 'yes' or 'no'.
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