Free Out of the Woods But Not Over the Hill by Gervase Phinn

of the old and inappropriate material for some time. There were books entitled Wireless Studies for Beginners , Life in the Belgian Congo , Harmless Scientific Experiments for Girls and Our King: George VI.
    As a young teacher, I was given charge of the school library. Mr Morgan, the head teacher of the secondary school where I taught, stopped me in the corridor at the conclusion of my probationary year and asked me if I ‘wanted the school library’. There would be an allowance to go with it. Of course, in those bygone days in education, any teacher who was warm and breathing after his or her first year expected to be given a scale salary point. I readily agreed to become ‘teacher in charge of the school library’ and, after a week’s course, and fully equipped with new ideas and lots of enthusiasm, I set about transforming the place. I prevailed upon the head teacher to invest in new tables, easy chairs and attractive wooden shelving. I covered the empty walls with colourful paintings and prints, and arranged pot plants on the windowsills. Not for me the staff room at breaks and lunchtimes; I manned the library, surveying my domain from the small office with great pride and making sure anyone entering this hallowed place did so silently, and that they returned any borrowed books to the prescribed shelves. I chased up overdue books with the zeal of Torquemada and issued directives banning any student who had infringed the rules, which were displayed prominently on the door.
    Then Her Majesty’s Inspector arrived. Mr Dickinson complimented me on the state of the library. Particularly impressive, he said, were the unblemished carpet, pristine polished tables, immaculately tidy shelves and the fact that there were very few books for which I could not account.
    â€˜This is,’ he told me, ‘without doubt the most attractive school library I have visited in a long time – so clean, comfortable and ordered.’
    I swelled with pride.
    â€˜There is just one small thing,’ he continued, ‘which you may feel somewhat trivial but I feel I do need to ask.’
    I looked at him expectantly. ‘Yes, of course.’
    â€˜Where are the students?’ he enquired, smiling.
    Bridge Over Troubled Waters
    I do feel sorry watching the poor contestants facing the sour-faced, sneering Anne Robinson on The Weakest Link . Is it any surprise that they fluff the answers?
    Anne Robinson: ‘In English literary relationships, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, who wrote Frankenstein , married the poet, Percy who?’
    Contestant: ‘Thrower.’
    Anne Robinson: ‘The film starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers was called Flying Down to . . . Where?’
    Contestant: ‘Halifax.’
    Anne Robinson: ‘What “X” is the fear of foreigners?’
    Contestant: ‘The X-Factor.’
    I would hate to be up there in the glare of the lights, facing that virago with thousands watching me.
    I hate quizzes. When the family gather around the table on Christmas Day for the ritual game of Trivial Pursuit, I skulk away to my study. I hear them downstairs, discussing the questions and answers, and I am pleased to be away from it all.
    My aversion to quizzes stems from when I was a teacher and I represented my school house at the annual ‘Inter-House Quiz’. Four housemasters sat on the stage, in front of the entire school, to answer a series of general knowledge questions put to us by the Head of the Lower School. The ‘Inter-House Quiz’ afforded the quizmaster the perfect opportunity to get his revenge for a trick I had played upon him.
    Some weeks earlier, I had amused myself with what I thought was a harmless prank. Each Friday lunchtime, the Head of the Lower School and three male colleagues would ensconce themselves in the corner of the staff room to play bridge. The four teachers took the game extremely seriously and would discuss in detail, at various times