By James Leavey
It's all looking good, if you're a suicidally-minded pessimist.
Two Antarctic shelves with a combined area of more than 3,000 square
miles have just fallen into the sea. I understand that neither event
will affect global sea levels because the shelves were already afloat.
But, hey, what a great time to take up surfing.
Meanwhile, Tony Blair has decided to send 1,700 British commandos to
face 10,000 al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan, shortly after his Home
Secretary admitted that the streets of Britain are no longer safe to
walk. The solution is obvious: send our well-trained muggers to sort out
the Taliban, and keep our impoverished, under-resourced young soldiers
at home, where they belong. As the British Army has also agreed that its
single soldiers can now bring their girlfriends back to the barracks for
an officially approved night of bliss, I doubt if they'll have enough
energy to get on the plane to Kabul, never mind spend the next few
months looking for Kamikaze terrorists in the back of beyond.
All this may explain the rumours that post-coital smoking has
increased, at least in every British army barracks. Before the official
easing of our military's sexual tension, most British soldiers
probably went straight to the cigarette.
As for not walking the streets of London, some of us have now taken
to clambering over the roofs. It takes a little longer to get to the
shops, but at least you don't get mugged on the way. Also, the roofs,
for the time being anyway, are still smoker-friendly. Indeed, I have now
started puffing my Havanas down chimneys, to liven up the
smoker-unfriendly inhabitants of the each building I find myself perched
on.
While I was up on the roof the other day, I noted that Portugal's
navy was ordered back to port last month after the country's Defense
Ministry admitted it had run out of money. The 16-vessel fleet, now
lying at anchor, must be getting through a lot of cigarettes - what
else can they do?
Back home, two of Britain's biggest supermarket chains have started
giving away the 'morning-after' contraceptive pill to teenage girls.
Shortly after, they also announced that sales of pipe tobacco have
decreased, dramatically, in recent years. Is there a connection between
the two, I wonder? Maybe some of our young girls should try smoking a
pipe, instead of doing other things with it.
Not that I care. I'm happy up on the roof, next to the pigeons. I
plan to stay here just as long as I have the strength to pour another
large slug of single Malt whisky and ignite my last, for now, double
corona. And the good news is that my matches won't get wet when that
tidal wave hits the streets and washes the muggers and non-smokers away.
