ON THE LINE

It used to be a time-honoured quiz question in some areas, and one that often baffled quizzers. What links Ghana, Algeria, Spain and Mali? Or even Ware, East Grinstead and Lewes? The answer is the same. It is the Greenwich zero Meridian Line, of course.
I first came across the zero Meridian when I was a junior reporter on a weekly newspaper in Lincolnshire desperately searching for column inches, and actually became fascinated with the thought that this invisible and yet so important line, the basis of global navigation and a link with some very obscure places, managed to clip a corner of our circulation area. Not every newspaper can claim that, of course, so I wrote a little story about it.
In due course it was picked up by someone in Holbeach (Lincolnshire), who evidently also thought the passage of the line ought to be marked in some way. Which is how (the last time I was there, anyway) a certain spot on a certain grass verge at Wignall's Gate, Holbeach, beside the A151, came to have a commemorative stone. Which also puts Holbeach in a very exclusive club.
Me too, I think, because when I was in London several decades ago I stood astride the Greenwich Line with a foot in both camps, as many tourists in London have also done. But I've also stood with a foot on either side of the line in Wignall's Gate. And not many people have done that.

MORE SNOW, PLEASE

Last winter - in terms of where we live, anyway - was a wimpish thing of no snow to speak of, an occasional frost, dull skies, and bitingly cold winds. A very different story elsewhere, of course, and different again in other countries. In Canada, where heavy snow comes each winter as regular as clockwork, most things still manage to work. Drivers simply switch their summer wheels and tyres for the winter variety, and ploughs and blowers keep the main roads open.
It is much the same in Norway, where motorists have a set of winter wheels hanging in their garages, ready for use. But here? Well, if we get a powdering and a little ice, our roads come to a standstill and the gritters get the blame.
But no, it isn't the fault of the gritters. It's the fault of the motorists, hardly any of whom (myself included) have winter tyres or wheels, or snow chains. And why not? Because we don't usually get enough snow nowadays to make it economically worthwhile buying any, and perhaps because no-one has come up with any reliable sort of emergency winter wheel kit.
And there's the rub. Not enough snow, and not regularly enough. Therefore, and because of our modest half-and-half winters, the gritters will have to continue to shoulder the blame. For the foreseeable future, anyway.