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Salient: Victoria University Students' Paper. Vol. 29, No. 5. 1966.

Thur bage

Thur bage

A Column Of Freelance Comment

In The Face of a monumental outbreak of Parkinson's Law down at NZUSA (slowed somewhat by a recent attack of Parkinson's disease), one tends to forget our own. and very dear bureaucracy. Last afternoon I was settling down for a quiet snooze in the women's common room when a phial of hydrofluoric acid slipped out of my pocket and shattered on the floor. As you know. HF is that vicious stuff that will eat through anything, including last week's haricot chops, and has to be kept in the thumb of a rubber gardening glove. Naturally I wanted to mop it up before it did too much damage, so I rushed out to find a caretaker.

"Look," I said. "I've shattered a phial of HF on the floor. Is there a mop anywhere?"

"There's no need to use that language. I suppose you've got permission to have HF in here? You'd better see Mr. Boyd."

I nipped downstairs and wended my way through the labyrinth behind the office, looking, not for a Minotaur, but for Mr. Boyd, finally located the Room With The Porthole, and burst in. Boyd himself was sitting behind what must be the best collection of paper weights in Kelburn.

"I've had an accident on the floor of the women's common room!"

"What!" said Boyd, "you'll need a booking for that. I can see you tomorrow morning at ten."

"It's extremely urgent."

"Half-past nine in the morning then."

"But it's HF, Boyd!"

"I don't care who it is."

"It's eating a hole in the floor!"

"He can't do that! It's against university regulations!"

We rushed through the caf. and found a mop and bucket in the basement, under the theatre. Then he whipped back upstairs. A crowd had gathered around, what was now. a substantial hole in the floor. The HF was steaming and frothing a bit. as is its wont.

"It's a UFO!" said someone.

"Oh!" I said, and looked around for little green men but saw only Ashenden. who held up a little sign which read, "No Press Allowed."

"Unauthorised Foreign Object," explained Boyd. "This hole certainly hasn't got a booking. What's it for?"

Someone suggested that it was for putting a pole in, so students could slide down to the caf.

"It's for hauling up buckets of earth through, so NZUSA can plant bananas on the roof," added a card player, for even they had halted.

We tried mopping it up but the mop dissolved. Boyd and I rushed up to get Mr. Biggs.

"Charlie." said Boyd, "have you got a gardening glove?"

"You'll need a requisition slip and approval from the treasurer." said Mr. Biggs sagely.

"Thurbage!" said Boyd, "if the hole isn't stopped immediately, you'll be barred from the Student Union for a month!"

"There won't be a Student Union," I mused.

We went back to the women's common room and found that half of it had subsided into the hole. The committee rooms were leaning dangerously and you could roll a golf ball from one end of the common room to the other. If you wanted to, that is.

Boyd and Biggs tried hosing down the acid, but this remedy only served to spread it further. Finally we had to evacuate the building. Even an attempt to throw Weir House porridge down the hole proved futile. We stood disconsolately around as the whole Stud. Ass. collapsed into a hole in the ground, smoking and frothing to the end. Fritz hovered at the edge of the disaster, rushing hither and thither, barking and coughing.

"This is a catastrophe, Boyd," I said, as the corner of the Memorial Theatre lurched out of sight. "What can one say?"

Boyd reflected for a second, and nodded his head sadly. "Management Committee isn't going to like this one little bit."