A Sign of the Times

Apropos of nothing in particular a pair of stories that I found when I was sorting through some papers that belonged to my father. I found a postcard that I had written to my parents around 1970. I wrote, “Oslo is very impressive but very expensive. My hotel costs £4 a night and evening meals cost £2.” More than probably a good reason to make sure your tourist guide is up to date when you do your budget planning.
My father had kept a clipping from the “Bolton Evening News” about my travels in the USA in 1963.On the reverse was a court report. A driver drank six and a half pints of beer and drove his car. He collided with a wall, demolished it, was picked up by the police and ended up in court. He admitted to drinking six and a half pints, but was not fined. The court accepted his reasoning that six and a half pints were much less than his usual evening ration of fourteen pints, so he wasn’t drunk. This was in pre-breathalyzer times.