How stupid do they think we are?

OUR changing language. A reader has received a note from his estate agent explaining that the potential buyer of his house has been unable to sell his own property and he is therefore “not proceedable.” Don't you hate people who drop out of property chains? They are so damn swearaboutable.

SPARE a thought and even shed a tear for that rare newspaper species, the obituary editor. Painstaking and bookish, he has spent the past 20-odd years squirrelling away news items and images in a huge file marked “Duke of Edinburgh – Obituary.” The obituary editor arrives back at the office today after a little break, opens his computer and discovers his Prince Philip file – all 30,000 words of it from childhood to 90-something, plus 50 well-chosen photographs, has been nicked by those bounders on Newsdesk and stuffed in Friday's paper to mark the Duke's retirement from public life. “You can always find some more stuff for HRH's obituary,” says the Editor, breezily. “Quick as you can . . . .”

WITH the Duke of Edinburgh retiring from public life, who will take over the sacred royal duty of saying thoughtless things to innocent citizens? My money's on Prince Andrew.

HOW stupid do they think we are? Unless you have been living on Mars for the past 20 years, you'll know that when a politician promises not to raise your income tax or National Insurance it's because he's figured out some other way of extracting money from you. Your income-tax threshold may be raised, putting more cash in your pocket – but your insurance-premium taxes suddenly double. Your state pension may be triple-locked against inflation but that doesn't stop your local authority whacking up your council tax. Gordon Brown, as Labour's chancellor, was the acknowledged master of stealth taxes but today all the parties are as bad as each other on this score. Every pre-election promise should be taken with a pinch of Saxa but the ones pledging not to take more money off us should be accompanied with a JCB scoop of heavy-duty road salt.

IN the continuing battle against badgers in the garden, an American reader assures me the human-urine method (don't ask) is greatly improved by adding a few drops of red-hot Tabasco pepper sauce. The theory is the badgers, or any other pests, don't want to encounter anything passing pee as pungent as that. The obvious question is, at what stage does one add the Tabasco? That's a mistake you would only make once.

THE joys of globalisation. The instructions for an outboard motor warn: “Falling back the boat, you should drive slowly otherwise the boat will not stable. The outboard motor backet can revolve 360. Only in simple let the engine revolve 180 and the operation handle face back,the boat can fall back to drive.”

PEAK oil and peak coal are terms used to describe the high point, before production of both fuels starts to decline. It has caught on in politics. There is much debate in Scotland, after last week's Conservative surge, that they may have reached peak Tory.

WHICH reminds me. My local music-shop owner reckons we have reached peak ukulele.