Tuesday, 21 July 2026

It's The Silly Season!

This phrase was first coined in the UK in 1861, describing late July. August and September. It is a period during the summer months when the papers publish trivial news stories to fill space, primarily because major institutions are in recess. During this time, stories about massive vegetables, strange animal behaviour, or Loch Ness Monster sightings often take centre stage in the news.
Here in East Anglia, we have had some rather ambiguous headlines, alongside bizarre photographs in the last couple of weeks. Julian and I were reading the Eastern Daily Press online over the weekend. We honestly couldn't decide of some of these captions with the accompanying pictures were deliberately chosen, or whether the head had gone to their heads.
For instance 

Sandringham Estate in Norfolk
hit by "Vermin Infestation"

The report does explain...A tenant, who did not wish to be named, told a national newspaper: "There are always rodents in an agricultural area like this, but most people can keep the numbers under control by having a cat."…However, tenants on the estate are banned from keeping cats under a rule introduced by the late Queen Elizabeth II to protect wildlife in the area. Despite the complaints raised at the council meeting, it is understood that the estate has not received any direct reports of vermin from tenants, . …It comes after Andrew Mountbatten Windsor's new home on the estate, Marsh Farm in Wolferton, was invaded by moles earlier this year.

Next My Grandsons are particularly keen on this local theme park. But this picture certainly made Julian and me laugh
Dinosaur Park gets green light for new look
We presume the exclamation mark is to be illuminated in future !!
Thirdly
Owners of "hidden" sauna, built without planning permission, fight to save it.
The bizarre thing about this story is that the sauna never was 'hidden' - the EDP had a big feature on it back in April when it opened.
The establishment is called The Hidden Sauna Club because it is off the beaten track, looking out over the countryside. It has proved incredibly popular. Quite why the owner thought she could build this without first seeking planning permission is unclear. But she is now applying retrospectively, claiming "the sauna is small in both scale and impact"
It is proving very popular, operating seven days a week, daytime and evenings, with sessions for up to 8 people at a time.[£20 an hour, if you're interested] So it's clearly a nice little earner. But the first sentence really tickled me
"The owners... hope the council planners WILL NOT POUR COLD WATER on its bid to stay in business" 
I don't know about the silly season, but as they say round here, it is

One final thing,
picked up, bizarrely, by the Manchester Evening News before the EDP or the BBC reported it - the World Snail Racing Championship at Grimston in West NorfolK, was won this year by Snailor Swift!! [here]



22 comments:

  1. Absolutely the silly season!

    I love Snailor Swift, though. That's worth reading about.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Haha ... well done Snailer Swift.

    ReplyDelete
  3. We have had an ongoing silly season for some time now in North America and it is not funny. So it is good to hear about Snailer Swift, and I love the Roarr! sign, but why couldn't Queen Elizabeth II allow indoor cats?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don't know why "no cats" - but the late Queen was very much a dog person. Maybe she felt cats were more likely to damage the antique furniture

      Delete
  4. All so entertaining and thank you for sharing. Late today as I was helping at a charity event which meat my daughter and I left home at 8 30 am and arrived home about 3 30pm. We are both exhausted partly due to the heat and standing for most of the time. Catriona

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well done, I hope your charity benefitted from your efforts

      Delete
  5. Snailer Swift! Brilliant!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Personally I couldn’t live somewhere if I couldn’t have my cat with me. Did the newspapers think the ‘silly season’ up! Xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They've been doing it for 165 years...

      Delete
  7. Love the humor in those headlines! Ours, these days, aren't quite as humorous.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I am so sorry. Life in the USA must be really hard for so many folk right now.

      Delete
  8. Certainly is Silly Season when a certain Scottish Labour leader jumps ship straight into the House of Lords! Now You could NOT make that up!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Ha, the snail story is funny!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I love the silly season. A welcome relief from all the grim daily news but have to say.....Andrew, vermin.....oh dear !!

    ReplyDelete
  11. An unfortunate juxtaposition of headline and headshot, methinks

    ReplyDelete

Always glad to hear from you - thanks for stopping by!
I am blocking anonymous comments now, due to excessive spam!