Take a running jump

EDDIE the Eagle flapped into York this week as guest speaker at a sportsman's dinner at the Viking Moat House Hotel where he revealed he wants to compete in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, USA.

In ski-jumping! When I heard this I nearly fell off Black Bess who is strongly tipped for this year's Tote Ebor Handicap at Knavesmire.

Unsteady Eddie who ignominiously flopped to fame ski-jumping in the Calgary Olympics of 1988 said all he needed would be £50,000 a year in sponsorship to have him up and plummeting in 2002.

The myopic 35-year-old birdman of Cheltenham has as much chance making the next Olympics as I have becoming a circuit judge.

Back in 1988 when he arrived at Calgary airport his battered holdall burst open on the luggage carousel disgorging his thermal long-johns and a tantalising tangle of colourful satin underpants.

As he bent to retrieve his scattered scanties his glasses fell off and smashed.

While trying to pick up his specs his trousers split.

"I spotted a banner saying 'Welcome to Calgary, Eddie the Eagle.' I was looking at it as I walked to the exit. For some reason the automatic doors had been switched off and I walked into six inches of solid plate glass," says Eddie.

Then the wheels fell off his baggage trolley. His skis flew across the floor and his case sprang open again.

"Canadian TV showed my eventful arrival on every news bulletin for a week," recalls the lovable lemon.

After his successful flop in the Olympics he returned home to an invite from a famous Finnish songwriter asking him to recordhis number, Eddie the Eagle.

The afternoon Eddie landed in Helsinki the songwriter died of a heart attack.

Would you sponsor a man who hasn't got the skill to take a running jump? Offski, Eddie!

AMID all the hullabaloo about the long-awaited opening of the World of James Herriot in Thirsk, it was good to see some local people had retained a sense of proportion about the £1.4 million addition to their town's delights.

As two women picked their way past visitors and local radio reporters clogging up Kirkgate on the centre's first day, one said to the other: "Oh. I thought that was opening next week."

"Nah," said her friend without a backward glance, before heading towards the market.

Managers of the "world" had been so worried about curious masses descending on it they told locals not to try to get an early glimpse of their latest attraction. Nah!

One month after the great floods of Malton and Stamford Bridge a TV news crew returned this week for an update.

Trying to replicate the same shots they filmed from a floating police dinghy they decided to drive slowly past the same water-logged homes they filmed earlier. The cameraman leaned out of the car window to give that wobbly, watery impression. Two minutes into filming a police car screeched to a halt and the newshounds were ordered out of the car, bemused.

They were told the police had had phone calls about people acting suspiciously and fearful of burglars trying to clean up, so to speak, what was left from stricken homes they had pounced.

The reporter was amazed, but amused. "Here we were with equipment worth more than £35,000 and they thought we were casing the joints for water-damaged loot," he said.

Got to hand it to the cops, they don't hang about. Ouch! Just got this searing pain in my neck and dejavu... again.

Maverick Kelly wrote to the Evening Press on Wednesday appealing for readers' input into her proposed documentary on private and public toilets in the region.

With a name like Maverick (remember TV's gambling gunslinger who was never short of a royal flush?) I thought she might be pulling my chain. Not so, along with other students at Sheffield's Northern Media School they are putting together a 30-minute film lifting the lid on lavatories.

One of their number even uses flushing sounds to make music. Elsa McLaren said: "It sounds strange, I know, but we are serious. We want to hear about all sorts of loos - posh and rough. We may just enter the finished version in film festivals or, if we're loo-ky, get it accepted by TV for network screening." Here's loo-king at you, kid.

IN response to the Evening Press's April Fool spoof about building a Millenium dome over the city centre one reader rang in saying: "Why on earth don't they think these things through.

"I mean, they want to build this great big tent over the city but have they actually thought about it?

" If one part of it caught fire, the whole thing could go up and the fire would spread across the city."

Another reader calling herself Toya Gobuck left a message on the our answer machine saying: "I'm absolutely thrilled to read about it.

"I actually won the lottery a few months ago, and was wondering how I was going to spend the money.

"I would love to contribute some of it to the dome, perhaps about 'two and a half'? I don't want to use any more.

" I've got to think about my future." She said to let her know if we wanted her money but forgot to leave her phone number.

Teacher (to five-year-old girl from York's Park Grove School):

What size are your shoes? Girl: Same size as my feet.

I was bored...

I had time on my hands, so I went to the jewellers' in Walmgate (no, not to rob it) just to...

Then everything seemed tickety-boo.

DEFINING MOMENT

Criminal: A person with predatory instincts who has not sufficient capital to form a corporation - Howard Scott.

3/4/99

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.