A snifter or two?

Had a quick one up at the Surfeit of Lamprey with an old school chum, Jeremy Enjoyse-Silk. He is resting, at the moment. You may recall him as the lead in that dashed thing a few years back where he played the head of a rich family and had affairs with various women characters while making and losing millions when the Southsea bubble burst. Must have been five or six years ago, now.

Anyway, we had a bit of a discussion about this matter of lowering the drink drive limit. Dashed if I care, really as I don't drive myself and I never permit my chauffeurs to drink alchohol on duty, don't you know. Seems to me, though, that it isn't the limit that is at issue.

It's this culture we have. I remember back at college how it was considered somehow heroic to get smashed every night. Trouble is, people don't grow up and keep doing it long after its sensible, if it ever was. Now I'm alright with the chaps going out after a big sporting event or whatever and having a few provided they take the train afterwards. But I must say, the village suffers its few disturbances every summer from groups arriving, drinking too much and then making a lot of noise and harassing folk.

Last summer, a group of rowdy young men and women decided they would remove the statuary along the top of the manor's west wall. I mean, dash it all, those were put up there in the 18th century. Some of those pieces were irreplacable. Fortunately, they only got two down before they were chased off by the staff. The local constabulary seemed to think it was a bit of a joke, which upset me more than the damage, at the time and I told them so. If the police don't react more seriously to vandalism, well, what chance do we have? You'd think, living in a police state, that property owners and upstanding members of the community would get more respect and help than they do. They seemed more interested in questioning my staff and I on how the chasing off had been conducted than catching the miscreants.

£6k it cost to replace those two pieces. Do you think six thousand pounds of damage is acceptable? I don't.

No, you won't change anything by altering the limits although make it one pint and I'd still be happy. It's the drink culture you have to change and it starts with making arrests as people get into cars at the pub and with a serious response to this unacceptable yob behaviour that bullies, worries and upsets ordinary folk.