Thing To Be Today: slightly safe

It's Guy Fawkes Night here in England, the night of our main firework celebrations.

I have to report, with some sadness, that Guy Fawkes Night has gone a bit out of fashion recently. This is partly down to some obscure feeling that the celebration is anti-Catholic (which it isn't); partly down to Health and Safety fears; and partly down to a less obscure feeling that perhaps there might have been something to be said for blowing the whole Houses of Parliament sky high after all. (I suppose I have to admit, here, rather wistfully, that this also is not the case.)

Still, there are some determined revellers who still let off fireworks on November 5th, and I've been reading the instructions-for-use on some rockets we plan to let off tomorrow.

angle slightly away from spectators, it says.

Slightly...

I suppose part of the fun of fireworks is that they make you jump.



Though to be honest I wasn't reckoning on the jump being sideways into the nearest bush.

Thing To Be Today: slightly safe. The word safe comes from the Old French salf, from the Latin salus, safety.