Is Hooting Yard a lopsided version of the world, or is the world a lopsided version of Hooting Yard? Today, news comes in that leads us a little closer to answering that age-old question.
The comments appended here by readers are always worthy of your attention. Occasionally I think it necessary to give a comment a more prominent airing, for even the most assiduous reader might miss a buried gem. Like this one, received today regarding The Heroic Bus Driver Of Pointy Town:
Hi there. With all this discussion of our township I thought it was about time we thanked you for putting Pointy Town on the map. Well, it already is on the map of the Yukon Territory here in Canada, but we don’t get to be in the news much. Pointy Town has just elected a Mayor for the first time, after being recognised as a township, and we have appointed a promotions chief to put us on the Web. The Mayor is Johnny Osikomiwasa (proud of his Inuit roots) and his buzz word this week is ‘promotion’. So that’s what I am doing. So I intend to climb to the top of Pointy Hill (it really is very pointy) and start promoting – well actually I will probably have to do the promoting from my office computer. So keep up the good work and tell the world about our Pointy Town. Hugs, Kelly (very tired, on fire watch)
Now, Kelly Le Cornu, my correspondent, has an email address at pointytown.com.ca, and I have no reason to believe she is a fictional character. Isn’t it marvellous to think that there is a real Pointy Town, with a Pointy Hill? I am looking forward to the promised web presence of this magnificent township, and will certainly link to it. If anyone would like to start planning an outing, let me know. As some wag put it the other day, “it’s like Hooting Yard gone mad!”
This is a job for Tiny Enid.
How often will this have to happen before you get scared? One cannot help but remember the look on the Almighty’s face when one of his friends pointed out that these ‘humans’ he used to write about actually existed. ‘My god,’ said he ‘you mean to say that everything I have written has come to pass?’ ‘Pretty much,’ replied his companion, ‘excepting the twenty foot killer frogs’. Needless to say that God was very, very scared…
I’d be scared of one foot-killer frog, let alone twenty. It’s bad enough when your foot goes to sleep: to have it expire, following a frog attack, but to be lumbered with its corpse thereafter … what an unappetising prospect.
Your riposte reveals the inestimable problem that has long laid like a hibernating toad at the heart of the whole ‘how was the world created’ question. For it now seems more than likely that a great amount of things that were ‘created’ by the Almighty grew entirely out of misreadings such as yours. He wrote one thing; people read another. Thus the world, against everyone’s wishes, ‘turned bad’. The bottom line is this: God may have created the world, but he has never never understood punctuation;
So in effect you’re saying that Satan presented himself in the Garden of Eden disguised as a hyphen, not as a python?
This is likely to have been caused by a mis-hearing, rather than a mis-reading.
On reflection I am inclined to think that a hyphen would be much more dangerous than a python, so we can count that particular mistake as a lucky one. My claim, however, was/is that the world was/is unwittingly created by an overenthusiastic writer; which is to say that all our actions are no more than the result of words written clumsily on a page somewhere in the heavenly hemisphere (possibly by means of a broken typewriter, which would explain all these errors).
Dear Hooting Yard
pointytown.com is still not up and running, so have been forced to use my hotmail address for the time being. On fire watch again,so bored and tired. Mayor Osikomiwasa has moved onto another buzz word for this week – ‘neighborliness’. Could sure do with a bit of that around town! Just so you folks get an idea of our Pointy Town, I could give you a quick tour. Well, we have a main steet, Macdonald Road, that runs in a bit of a curve down the valley and round the base of Pointy Hill. Most of the town’s houses are clustered to the north of the street running up the hill, mostly surrounded by stone pines and a few birch trees. Between Macdonald and the lake is the canning factory, quiet now but smells a bit in summer. At the end of Macdonald to the west there is a football field and the Macdonald Elementary school. At the east end there are the five streets, which were the original houses for the canning factory workers. Now much of the new town has shifted a bit further down the lake near to the holiday lodges and the hotel. We have a newspaper and a local radio station, both run by Mr Osikomiwasa. Population in winter 2,345 or so but in summer, when we get the tourists come up from Vancouver and the States the population rises to more than double that. Pointy Hill is the local landmark as it is bare of trees, apart from a few stunted junipers, but is pointed almost like a pyramid. From the top you can see right down the lakes and the river as far as Scotsdale and Maneteguwa. One of the things that may amuse you, ’cause it certainly amuses the yank tourist that come boating on the lake, it the fact that the bit of land that sticks out into the lake, just below the town is called Pointy Point. You know, there is a limit to the number of times you can smile and grit your teeth when yet another tourist asks us to ‘Point to Pointy Point’
Kelly, what exactly is “Fire Watch”? Are you literally watching out for forest-fires and such things? These do not live in my country for the simple reason that most things that are combustible are mostly sodden by rain for pretty much all of the year.
Hi Sal
Been away from the computer for sometime, so did not see your question. Yes, fire watch is just that, we have a voluntary rota of townsfolk who spend about one night every two weeks on fire watch. The fire cabin is just a little ways up pointy hill and from there you can see the whole town. Problem is that most of the houses are built of wood, mostly pine and spruce, which if it catches fire can really go up a treat. We have volunteer fire fighters and a system of ring rounds if a fire is spotted. I am afraid the we don’t have a Mayor’s word of the week this week as Mr Osikomiwasa has been arrested and charged with fraud – we are all pretty shocked as he just about runs this town. Otherwise things is pretty quiet here – the factory is taking on new staff as there has been an abundance of salmon this year, so much so that we have had to freeze a lot that we could not get canned in time.
That is shocking news, especially as Pointy Town sounded like such a tranquil place. Who has accused Mr. Osikomiwasa of fraud and what about the many business interests he owns? What is in store for Pointy-town?
One the subject of fire-watch, what happens if the fire starts directly behind the watch-cabin while the fire-sentinal is looking townwards?
Dear Sal
The cabin is above all of the houses in the town and there is only scrub further up the hill, but Sal you don’t need to worry as there are windows all round. Well, you can imagine we are really shocked about Johnny’s arrest, but it seems that there has been an investigation going on sometime – even brought in someone from out of town to do the looking. Jessie Rousseau, who manages the factory, told me that it was Toni Macdonald that accused Johnny, but then I don’t trust any of the Macdonalds who used to own most of the town and certainly have a grudge agains the Mayor – must dash more later
This is the stuff of Hollywood films: Imagine – a small secluded fire-prone town, high in the mountains, picturesque but concealing a terrible rivalry:
The Macdonalds, local ne’er-do-wells and former top-dogs of pointy-town. They feel cheated out of their inheritance by local business-man Osikomiwasa who is brilliant but oh so arrogant.
I see this as a multi-million dollar thriller featuring the unique geography, untamed wild-life and colourful local characters.
Of course we might have to embellish the ending a little – I see Mr Osikomiwasa single handedly fighting off the Macdonalds in a solo mission to prove his innocence.
The final action sequence will take place as a blazing inferno spreads inexorably down the mountainside towards the unsuspecting town below.
In the final, pivotal scene Osikomiwasa must decide between his ultimate revenge and saving the town.
Please, somebody write this screenplay
Sal : Please give your suggestions for casting the main characters.
Sal and Frank
Well, latest news is that Johnny has been released on bail to appear in court at Scotsdale next month, so perhaps we will find out more if the newspaper gets printed this week. Everyone was talking about it down at Doctor Brunning’s surgery this morning. Taylor Mahoney said that he had heard that it was something to do with payments for fishing quotas and that the factory accounts had been seized. Well, as half the folks in town rely on the factory for winter income you can bet we are all concerned. A journalist from Vancouver arrived today and is nosing about, so someone must have been leaking news fairly fast – I hope it was not me and these messages. Over coffee at the Depot there was more talk and Toni Macdonald was a bit concerned that she had been taking all the flack whilst her husband had spent the night and half the day up at the fire cabin. She said she was staying at the Depot until Chuck, her husband, plucked up the courage to come down and face up to the criticism. I feel sorry for Toni, she married into a feud that was not of her making and Chuck, despite being a mean and at times violent man, is also a bit of a coward. Johnny never liked him and if anyone has a grudge against Johnny it is Chuck. Will keep you posted
On the radio in the UK we have a radio soap opera set in a fictional British village of “Ambridge” the show is called “The Archers” and it is famous for two things:
a) The show has been running for more than 50 years
b) It’s plot-lines are as tiresome and inconsequential today as they were when the show began.
Whenever I listen to this show I am driven to a form of palpitating rage at how truly awful it is, and yet the BBC’s uber-traditionalist fans would probably start a jihad of much violence and rage if the BBC were to ever even consider ending this series.
I think they should scrap this series and replace it with one set in the non-fictional Pointy Town. Please keep up the pointy-town updates.
🙂
PS. Can you locate Pointy-Town on google maps?
Dear Sal
Google Earth has really bad coverage for the Yukon, but I can tell you that you can see our lake if look just north of Whitehorse, follow the Big Salmon River up until you reach Hootalinqua and our lake is just to the north east. If you reach Big Salmon Lake you have gone too far.
Chuck did not come back from the fire cabin this evening and Toni was still waiting at the Depot with her 28th cup of coffee when I called in after work. Ruthie, who works in the Depot coffee shop, has been calling the fire cabin phone all day, but there has been no reply. Johnny was back this afternoon having arrived on the regular Whitehorse service which calls at the lake twice a week. He seems to have gone straight home as no one has seen him and he is not answering calls. If Chuck is not back by 8 o’clock, then Frank Hertz is going to drive up with Toni to the cabin, as Frank is the next person on duty, and see what has happened to Chuck.
Meanwhile, down at the hotel on the lake shore most of the rest of the town will be at the Spring party – we have this every year on the first day of spring – though none of us are sure if Johnny will put in an appearance. Johnny is usually the life and soul of any of the events in Pointy Town and always dances with all the unattached ladies – he is a real gentleman. Someday I hope he will find a lovely lady he can settle down with, as I am sure he gets pretty lonely up at his house at the far end of the lake.
Just a quick note. Just back from the Spring Party which finished early. Toni and Frank went up to the fire cabin at 8 and found Chuck’s car, but no sign of Chuck. They came back to the hotel in the hope that Chuck had gone straight there, but he had not. Johnny did not put in an appearance at the party either and so several of the folk headed off down to his house at the end of the lake. Toni is frantic about Chuck, as he never leaves his car and it is just about minus 12 here this evening. I am sitting in my office now, looking out on a crystal clear night, I can see the lights of the ice-fishers’ huts on the lake, it is very beautiful but I am feeling pretty low about the whole thing – just hoping that Chuck may have gone up to Johnny’s house to sort out all these rumours flying around. Ruthie from the Depot has just phoned to say that the out-of-town journalist was seen coming down from the fire cabin at around 6 this evening, she says that officer Gerrard is looking round town so as he can ask the journalist a few questions. Ruthie is coming up to my place for a drink as she says she feels uncomfortable staying at the Depot by herself. I must say I will feel better with someone here too – here she is, will catch up later