Lost in translation

IT can’t be denied that the German people have many talents.

They’re highly skilled at manufacturing motor cars, brewing beer and prancing around in tight lederhosen.

However, there is one fatal flaw in the Teutonic DNA.

Germans can’t pronounce the letter "w".

This is not entirely their fault, for the letter doesn’t appear in the German alphabet, which can lead to a certain amount of confusion.

When Diary reader Moira Campbell was working as an English assistant in Germany, her class were reading a passage about Snowdonia, and a pupil said that he would enjoy clambering up the mountain, then looking down at the wallies below.

Moira couldn’t stop herself giggling.

“All I could picture was a beautiful set of expensive false teeth,” she says.

 

Cruddy crustaceans

THE fossil of an ancient type of shrimp was discovered in the leafy suburbs of Glasgow, and declared a previously unknown species.

Because it’s a Glaswegian crustacean, it has been given the splendiferous name Tealliocaris weegie.

All of the above is undoubtedly fascinating, unless you happen to be Diary correspondent Robert Menzies, who merely shrugs, then says: “Not sure why so much fuss is being made about a 333 million-year-old shrimp being found in Bearsden. You can find even older ones in the Merchant City. They're usually in the starter course.”

 

Revolting youth

VISITING her local Sainsbury’s, reader Dorothy Calderwood overheard a boy of about 10 say to his equally young pal: “I hate kids. They’re annoying.”

His friend, nodding along with disgust, replied: “Yup. Sure are.”

 

Tweeting the problem

THE other day reader Iain McDermid visited his daughter, who informed him that she was unable to use her cooker as birds were nesting in the cooker hood.

Determined to find a solution, Iain reassured his daughter: “I’ll help you hatch a plan…”

 

Nailed it

DEPRESSED reader Kate Grant was telling a work colleague about peeping into her young son’s rabbit hutch and discovering that the unfortunate animal had died during the night.

Kate’s colleague shook his head in a less than sympathetic manner, then said: “Dead as a doornail, eh?”

After a beat, he added: “I’ve always wondered about that phrase. Why is a doornail more dead than any other sort of nail?”

Kate tells us: “I politely reminded my colleague that we were discussing late lamented pets, not deceased hardware.”

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Double trouble

OUTRAGED Alan Scott reveals: “I got ripped off by a carpenter. Paid him in advance for a double bed. He did a bunk.”