Peter Rhodes: Over to you, Sherlock

PERFECT Med-blue skies from dawn to dusk down here on what the marketing people insist on calling the Jurassic Coast. The idyll is spoiled only by the constant whining of what sounds like a particularly annoying lawnmower suspended in the heavens. Turns out to be a microlight. One man’s amusement is a thousand families’ irritation.

GREAT excitement at our holiday cottage, for we have become a crime scene. Just before we arrived at the cottage someone used a crowbar to break into the utility shed in the back yard. The security bloke from the rental company gave it a thorough going-over. He pointed out, detective-like, that the door lock was full of cobwebs, so obviously no key had been used, and the bolt was in the unlocked position. So we have a would-be burglar using a crowbar to force open a door which was already unlocked. Puzzling, eh?

IN truth, this crime is a mystery only because generations of cop dramas have led us to believe that criminals are brilliant strategists and crimes are complex and meticulously planned. What fiendish conspiracy is afoot here, Watson? The reality? It is that most burglars are not bright. They tend to be village idiots with a headful of dope and a bellyful of booze, too dim even to try the door before using the crowbar. Over to you, Sherlock.

WHEREVER you go in this varied and tribal United Kingdom of ours, some things remain constant. Like the eagerness of the authorities to develop their own variations on the English language. Take this officialdom-cobblers from Cornwall Fire and Rescue Service describing a recent blaze: “"Firefighters from Helston, Tolvaddon and Mullion have been dealing with a fully-involved property fire. At the height of the incident it was sectorised into two sectors.”

MIND you, the private sector plays fast and loose with our language, too. In these days of computer-generated text and spell-checkers, a reader asks how can it be that a van dealer in Wolverhampton has paid for the following to be professionally painted on the rear of its vehicles: “Take advantage of our price guranratee.”

JEREMY Corbyn insists he’s ready to fight another election. He must be the only person in the UK who is.

AND before we start sharpening the pencils for the polling stations yet again, are we even convinced that Corbyn genuinely wants to be prime minister? He has been the eternal urban revolutionary with a 40-year career of carping and criticising other people’s policies from the safety of the the backbenches. If he became PM, approaching his 70th year, he’d suddenly be responsible for all sorts of things. I bet he’d run a mile from a career change like that.

LABOUR’S best hope of taking power will come if the Tories are daft enough to elect Boris Johnson as their leader. Corbyn may have a few skeletons in his cupboard but Johnson’s is one massive, heaving, bone-packed ossuary.

MEANWHILE, as Downing Street insists the DUP will not demand any special favours for supporting Theresa May’s government with a wafer-thin majority, the Department of Transport unveils plans for B2BB, the £48 billion Belfast to Blackpool Bridge.