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Creative driving Some of the lorries that drive through Limavady these days are bigger than the town and it is to be hoped that it was one of those juggernauts that damaged the pedestrian crossing at the town end of Catherine Street rather than a hapless motorist in a tiny wee car. Habitual pedestrians should pause and reflect when they study the damage to a lamp post that is so recent - it never even saw a lamp to light this badly planned crossing. Could we have some traffic lights, please?

Two down - several thousand more to go! Limavady's urban renewal is progressing at an alarming rate. The two old houses bordering the Christ Church graveyard seem to have disappeared over night. Initial hopes that they were taken out by the old graveyard cannon firing one last shot proved to be overly optimistic. Church authorities - who own the buildings - must have decided that they were a dead asset and they promptly knocked them down. There is talk that the Technical College might be interested in the site.

Flower Thieves give up in Despair The flower displays that are usually such a glorious part of the Limavady street scene are not doing very well this year. The plants look sad and drab and show plenty of leaves but few blooms. One indicator of the immensity of the problem is the fact that nobody has stolen any of them this year. This is not the fault of the green-fingered council boys. Willie Reid, our gardening correspondent commented: "Certain plants do well this year, others just don't". This must certainly be true. The herb garden in the grounds of the News Browser is a pathetic site, whereas the trees in the Country Park are more luscious than ever this year.

Fishing in the Roe The only ones pulling anything out of the Roe these days seem to be the dogs. At this time of the year the banks of our beautiful river are generally quite crowded, with flies and spoons whizzing around the ears of innocent joggers from all directions. But this year all is quiet. All this has a knock-on effect, because without anglers the poachers are far too visible, so they keep away. Without either anglers or poachers there are no onlookers - hence we end up with a very underpopulated Country Park. The cause seems to be the foot and mouth disease outbreak earlier this year, which closed off large sections of the river. Even though the outbreak is officially over, some of the restrictions are still in place - unless people manage to train their dogs to fetch a salmon rather than the more conventional stick.

Suspected Pipe Bomb in William Street In another world exclusive the News Browser can report that today on the 9th July a suspected pipe bomb was found in William Street attached to the window sill of one of the pensioner's cottages. Someone found it, dropped it beside the road where it exploded and then wisely called the police. They instantly asked for help from the army bomb disposal unit which arrived only a few minutes later.

Word of mouth spreads fast in Limavady and by this time half the neighbourhood had assembled to watch the proceedings. The kids hope that the army's bomb disposal robot was to give a star performance was fortunately not realised and after a lot of mysterious goings on, all the excitement subsided. We will keep you informed of any further developments.

A Search for Ancient Students Merle Whyte, who used to be Elder, is organizing a 50th anniversary reunion for the Limavady Grammar School class of '51 (previous century). The festivities will be in the Gorteen House Hotel on the 1st of September, though how they'll recognise gate crashers after all this time is anyone's guess. Would the following missing people please report on the double to Mrs Whyte: Margaret Stevenson, Avril Benner, John White, John Barbour, Brian Hamilton, Joan Dilworth, Billy Benson, Somebody Jackson, Ian Watt, Desmond Scott and Florence Smith.

This Year's Cherry Harvest   The wild cherries in the Country Park are superb this year! Last year's harvest was destroyed by a late frost, but nature has surpassed itself this year. Our reporters have been testing the fruits for the last two weeks and feel that, considering most of the delicious harvest has been picked and eaten, the time has come to reveal to our readers what they have missed.

The Wrens can fly The staff of the News Browser have been busy watching our resident wren hen teaching her young to fly. On the left is Mrs Wren feeding son Christopher a choice morsel - fuel for further aerobatic adventures. Wrens are Britain's smallest birds and we can confirm that what they lack in size is more than made up for by the power of their audio equipment. Now that they have all flown away the place has become very quiet.

When Wedding Flours fall Limavady residents will know immediately what's going on in this little street scene - strangers might need an explanation. The girl sporting the fetching flour arrangement is going to get married. To celebrate this fact her friends tied her to a convenient public utility and then proceeded to cover her with a mixture of flour and water. How this strange ritual came about nobody knows. Have a happy wedding day, young lady!

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