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Topic starter
14/08/2026 4:05 pm
Turned on my phone a few minutes ago just to check for messages (being Scottish to the core I switch it off to save power when I don't think I really need it). I was greeted by a flashing red "Danger" symbol on-screen and a truly deafening alarm (louder than my phone's normal max volume). Then a lady - equally deafening- read out a message "issued by His Majesty's Government" which was also visible on screen, telling me that global warming had created such a country-wide fire hazard that we should on no account use a naked flame, however small, for fear of starting an uncontrollable wildfire. In the middle of London. Fifty square miles of concrete, brick and glass. OK, so there are parks, and we do have trees in the streets, but even so. . .
Of course, if a local conflagration were to break out, we do have a hosepipe - but then there is currently a ban on using it, on pain of death.
- "Ah, good evening, officer, can I help . . . oh, the hosepipe? Just trying to protect our 100 year old apple tree from that approaching wall of flame . . ."
- " No excuse sir. On the ground, now. Hands behind your back. Do NOT resist. TASER!! TASER!!
A stray spark from his poorly-insulated 20 year old taser ignited the tinder-dry leaves of the old apple tree, and by the time the officer ran out to his Morris Minor patrol car and came back with a small and quite inadequate fire extinguisher, the tree was reduced to ash. We are now deprived of shade from the sun when sitting outdoors, and our pet three-toed sloths are reduced to hanging from an old rotary clothes drier pathetically adorned with artificial plastic leaves (fire resistant, one fervently hopes).
p.s. No, I'm not kidding. This message was presumably sent to every mobile phone in the country. It has come through twice more while I have been typing this, but fortunately I realised that clicking "OK" would make it shut up.
No doubt our hard-pressed National Health Service will now be dealing with hundreds of heart attacks amongst the alarm-traumatised elderly. Hospital phone lines will be red-hot. Which could obviously be dangerous in present circumstances.
Graeme.M. Ogg
London U.K.
14/08/2026 4:39 pm
Dang, you’ve a bigger issue than my sister in Castle Rock Colorado has… a huge bear has been spotted roaming her neighbourhood this week !
14/08/2026 6:10 pm
My condolences to you, the tree and the sloths. I suppose all things have a bright spot and that is you can no longer be accused of using unauthorized water.
14/08/2026 6:29 pm
We have our own well from which we draw water for our trees and plant-life, fortunately. Still, the weather has been so hot, for so many weeks, I didn't do my annual flower replanting, this spring.
Tony Perrone and David Green reacted
14/08/2026 9:13 pm
Just added four inches of water to my pool. Too much heat evaporation. No water shortage here and I am doing my part to cool off everything. Our forest fires are all north of the Great Lakes.
Tony Perrone reacted