IT'S not often you can correct a police officer in public, but one Hunter woman had a rare chance and took it.
It seems Newcastle City police were trying to find the local this week, after she failed to show up for court over a traffic charge.
She was known to spend some time around Jesmond, Lambton, Birmingham Gardens and Wallsend, officers said when - as is common in these very online modern times - they posted her mugshot on their Facebook page and asked if anyone had seen the 37-year-old.
Whether it was a clever bit of policing or an honest mistake in the constabulary's notes, the even more honest court-dodger (who incidentally follows the local Police Facebook page) was one of the first to comment on the post, quickly correcting her reported age - "I'm actually 34" - before suggesting what we were all thinking: "don't miss court guys".
As the adage goes: age (much like the time and date you're meant to go before the beak) is but a very important number.
The case of the missing crab
It was an odyssey by any account.
The pet hermit crab, Bluey (sometimes known as Hermy) with his distinctive bright blue shell, had been missing for a almost a month Melissa Hinchey and her family from Redhead were getting worried. Somehow Bluey had escaped his habitat and now anything could have happened.
Hope was waning. And then, almost four weeks later, the post appeared in the local community page.
It turns out the most adventurous crab had marched a full two blocks from his home only to be rescued by a well-meaning neighbour and returned to his family.
"We were shell-shocked," Ms Hinchey told Topics, with a laugh. "To think, he was able to survive!"
In a string of posts on on the locals' Facebook page, celebrating the happy ending, the Robinson Crusoe of crabs was safely returned to his habitat and his loving owners. All's well that ends well.
The fighter, the fix, and the giant fish
John Ure takes issue with his old man being slung into the same crowd as the old "burglars out of work" who lingered around Jimmy Sharman's boxing tent at the Newcastle Show, but he does admit that a good few of his dad's bouts in that ring were fixed.
"He was one of the mugs in the crowd in front of the tent who accepted the challenge," Ure said of his father, Clarence Roy (better known as Jack) Ure whose story appeared in Topics back in January. "He had a few fights against Jimmy's boys ... He was, of course, on Jimmy Sharman's payroll and the bouts were carefully orchestrated, with the rare win and usual loss."
Jimmy Sharman Jr was a veteran show spruiker and his characterisation of his fighters in 1988 as out-of-work wise guys was because of two things - one: locals always liked to blame anything that went wrong on the show people. And two: some of them were probably crooks (well, "itinerant" as Sharman described them).
"We had the stigma, but not anymore," Sharman said, "I've had women smash umbrellas over my head, break my glasses and throw shoes at me when they reckoned (as a referee) I didn't give the local lad a fair go against my boxer."
Sharman's tale appeared in the pages of the Newcastle Herald's Weekender magazine on March 22, as the topic of local history scribe Mike Scanlon's latest column.
"Sharman's career spanned truly another era, when tent boxing was a popular showground attraction in sideshow alleys everywhere," Scanlon wrote of the attraction that pitted the local bloke off the street against a reasonably seasoned fighter in a spectacle for the times.
The elder Ure, John recalls, was at that time supporting his wife and young son and had roped in his wife's brother, Les, as his manager and second.
"He didn't have many wins, but he earned a few bob - in those days money was welcome no matter what its source," John said, "He told me at one time that he was copping a bit of a hiding in a match where he was obviously outclassed and, during the break between rounds, he said to Les through bloodied teeth:
"'Do you reckon I can still win from here?' - 'No trouble at all' said Les, 'All you have to do is knock him out'.
"He didn't."
"Incidentally," John went on, "Dad told me once that he and Les were fishing with hand lines in Newcastle Harbour one evening (probably somewhere around Lee Wharf) and one of them hooked a huge jewfish - about 30 or 40 pounds weight from memory.
"They took it to the Bellevue Hotel (on Hunter Street at the Bank Corner) and sold it for one and ninepence."
