True story. This past Sunday morning I was waiting near the main gate of Christ's College in Cambridge, waiting for my sister to pick me up. There was a lot going on. Graduates I had enjoyed a reunion bash with the previous evening were dropping off their keys at the Porters' Lodge and taking their leave. People who had been attending an engineering conference in college were also bringing their bags for storage and preparing to leave town. And there was a charity walk under way, with hundreds of people parading in an almost unbroken stream through the college for local good causes. There were army cadets waving big, green styrofoam fingers to show them the way.
Two Polish ladies who had been at the engineering conference came to the Porters' Lodge, paid their bills, handed in their keys and asked for their luggage to be stored. Then they came out to the courtyard (which dates back almost half a millennium) for a last look round. There's quite a small sign asking visitors not to walk on the exquisitely manicured lawn; only Fellows of the college are permitted to set foot on the hallowed turf. Maybe they didn't see the sign because of the stream of charity walkers, or maybe they didn't care, but one of them walked a few paces onto the grass to get a better angle for a selfie.
She was immediately spotted by the porter who was returning from putting her bags in storage. He called out in a loud voice, "Off the grass, please". She obeyed at once, but not before the charity marchers had taken notice. As they passed me, one middle-aged female walker said quite loudly to her companion. "There's always one, isn't there?"
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