10 things we didn't know this time last week

10 THINGS

Ten Jacks - by Jeremy Harrison

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Even the most hardened news junkie can't keep in touch with every story which happens in a week. But here are 10 things which shouldn't go unnoticed.

If you spot something you think should be included next week, send it to us using the form at the bottom of the page.

 

1. When Tommy Cooper once tried on a fez in a Cairo market, the stallholder - who didn't know who Cooper was - turned to him and said: "Jus like that," according to Jerome Flynn who is currently playing Cooper in the West End. Somewhat taken aback, the master magician asked him: "Why did you say that?" He replied: "Because every English person who ever comes here and tries on a fez turns round and says it to their friend. You're the first who hasn't."

2. Even though every billboard in the country seems to be persuading people of the virtues of ringing 118 000, or 118 118, or 118 500 or any other figure beginning 118, it seems the message is not getting through. The numbers belong to the newly deregulated directory inquiries services, putting an end to BT's monopoly grip on 192. (In setting the new rules, Oftel, the telephone watchdog, insisted that no company should be allowed to own the most obvious number - 118 192 - as that would give an unfair advantage.) But Paul Elliott, BT's directory inquiries boss, revealed this week than more than a million calls are made each day to 192 - every one of them in defiance of all the advertising money can buy.

3. Next week sees the 20th anniversary of the release of the first Smiths' single (Hand in Glove) - a landmark which will inevitably make a lot of people feel very old. The affection millions still have for the band (matched by the disaffection millions of others feel) will be on show during an attempt by BBC 6 Music to find the top Smiths fan. Devotees nowadays debate their memories of quiffs and gladioli on a multitude of sites, including the Shoplifters Union, a neat Smiths reference. The site is not, it insists, actually anything to do with shoplifting and helpfully provides a link to a shoplifters anonymous site (which is).

4. Speaking of Tommy Cooper, his untimely demise came just as Les Dennis and his late partner Dustin Gee were due to come on stage. In his stage show this week, Dennis relived the experience, about which he has said: "We were telling jokes while behind us we could hear people saying, 'He's going, he's going'." Talking about the event, and the later death of Gee, makes the tone of his show strange, says the Guardian. The Daily Mirror did not, however, mince words about Dennis's impersonations: "His Cooper sounded like Louis Armstrong."

5. One unsung hero of last week's local government elections was Staffordshire councillor Ramon Mycock, whose name seemed to cause sniggering wherever it was e-mailed. Councillor Mycock, who was re-elected as the representative for Churnet Valley, looks debonair on his council web page thanks in no small measure to his eyepatch. But someone at the council is obviously not amused by the whole thing and has changed Mr Mycock's listing to Barrie.

6. Also next week is Mike the Headless Chicken Day, celebrating the life and prolonged death of a rooster who lost his head in September 1945, but continued running around for 18 months. His owner fed the bird through its neck, using an eyedropper. Scientists worked out that the axe had missed Mike's jugular vein and that a blood clot had prevented it bleeding to death. Most of its brain stem was left on its body, and Mike continued trying to peck and preen as if nothing had happened. The event will be commemorated in his hometown, Fruita, Colorado.

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7. Football is bad for you - or at least losing is. The frequency of heart attacks in four "football-mad areas" - Newcastle, Sunderland, Middlesbrough and Leeds - has been found to go up on the days of home defeats. Anger and stress act as the trigger. Dr Bill Kirkup, the north east director of public health, found that strokes also soared in the hours following a match. Worst affected is Sunderland, where the rise in deaths was 63%.

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8. In the early days of 10 Things We Didn't Know This Time Last Week, we found out about the Spanish town of Zamora which wants to become the world's first "wireless city". In short it would mean anyone anywhere in the town being able to go online without having to plug in to the phone system, a bit like being in a giant Starbucks but without the smell of panini. But now Paris could follow - a dozen antennae have been put up on the route of one particular bus route as a test to see if the whole city should follow. But despite access being free until the end of June, only 604 people had signed up to the scheme in its first month, the IHT reports.

9. Where are British men going? Analysis of census results find that there are 81,300 more women than men among people in their 20s, leading to a shortage of marriageable men. And the reason, the Office for National Statistics says, is that young men are emigrating. The unanswered question is why.

10. An era ends this weekend, with the running of the final mail train - carriages which contain their own sorting offices. The last train will run between Glasgow and Cardiff on Friday night/Saturday morning. One of the nails in the coffin of the service was that more than a quarter of trains were arriving late. The service started in 1838, and at its peak there were 130 mail trains working each night. WH Auden's poem Night Mail ("This is the Night Mail crossing the border, Bringing the cheque and the postal order") lives on.

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Thanks to reader Chris May for the picture of the number 10 front door, spotted in Westminster.

If you see something you think should be included next week, let us know using the form below.