That spring is delayed all over Europe and North America is bad enough (the sun is shining here at latitude 58.7057° N but the temperature is all of – 10 °C).
That people will be “celebrating” Earth hour today is even worse.
But that the annual Pooh Sticks competition (world championship) scheduled for tomorrow has been cancelled in the UK is beyond the pale.
And those to blame are clearly the CRU of the UEA, the IPCC and the WWF.
CANCELLED
We are very sorry to announce that we have to cancel this Sunday’s World Pooh Sticks Championships.
If we had just had a little rain on the day then we would have still played and we would have splashed around in wellington boots and dropped our coloured sticks over the bridges, however we’ve had so much rain over the last few weeks that the river is still too high and fast to have our safety boats on the river and there’s no sign of the rain stopping this weekend.
“I think we all ought to play Poohsticks,” So they did. And Eeyore, who had never played it before, won more times than anybody else; and Roo fell in twice, the first time by accident and the second time on purpose, because he suddenly saw Kanga coming from the Forest, and he knew he’d have to go to bed anyhow. So Rabbit said he’d go with them; and Tigger and Eeyore went off together Because Eeyore wanted to tell Tigger How to Win at Poohsticks. (from “The House at Pooh Corner”)
‘The official Pooh Corner Rules for Playing Poohsticks’ was written in 1996 to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the publication of ‘Winnie-the-Pooh’.
- First, you each select a stick and show it to your fellow competitors. You must agree which stick is which – or whose, as it were.
- Check which way the stream is flowing. Competitors need to face the stream on the side where it runs in, under the bridge (upstream). Note: If the stream runs out, from under the bridge you are standing on the wrong side! (downstream).
- Choose someone to be a Starter. This can be either the oldest or the youngest competitor.
- All the competitors stand side by side facing upstream.
- Each competitor holds their stick at arms length over the stream. The tall competitors should lower their arms to bring all the sticks to the same height over the stream as the shortest competitor’s stick.
- The starter calls, ‘Ready – Steady – Go!” and all the competitors drop their sticks. Note: the stick must not be thrown into the water.
- At this point in the game all the players must cross to the downstream side of the bridge. Please take care – young players like to race across. Remember, other people use bridges and some of them have vehicles or horses.
- Look over the edge of the bridge for the sticks to emerge. The owner of the first Stick to float from under the bridge, is the winner.
Remember: Falling into the water is SAD (Silly And Daft)!
Tags: House at Pooh Corner, Milne, Pooh Stick World Championships, Poohsticks, Tigger, Winnie-the-Pooh
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