Rome Letter:It is time for a shameful confession. As regular readers of this letter will know, the Irish Times' Rome correspondent would not dream of putting finger to keyboard without first putting on his Lord Reith-style dinner jacket. Decorum, after all, is decorum, writes Paddy Agnew.
There have, however, been very hot times recently. (I realise that the mere mention of such climatic conditions is likely to prompt an unpleasant reaction among some of you. Even now I can hear the sound of Curragh season tickets being torn up as well as that of galoshes being dusted down.)
The point, however, is this. Such is the heat here that even your Rome correspondent has been forced to suspend the dinner jacket in favour of more modest shorts and T-shirt. (Let us hope the editor is not reading this or I will be out the door, found guilty of failing to maintain traditional high Irish Times standards.)
There was a time when I used to measure the summer heat by its effect on the biro. In my first summer in Italy, many years ago, I left a biro on the dashboard of our little beat-up Fiat 127 when going off for a swim in the Gulf of Trieste. When I came back, the biro had melted into a splendid "S" shape.
This startling discovery prompted weather analysts and forecasters worldwide to opt for the "Agnew Biro Test" when assessing the impact of heat. Unfortunately, the net result for many forecasters in northern Europe was that they found themselves with perfectly straight, totally soggy and unusable biros. Stationary expenses spiralled horrendously.
However, your fearless correspondent has just developed a new and perhaps more effective heat test, again one developed thanks to years of original research.
It all came about when a chap was lazy about dumping the rubbish. Rather he took it out of the kitchen bin and then left it on the kitchen floor for dumping next morning.
It just so happened that one of the rubbish bags contained a half-consumed, half-chilled watermelon. Next morning, the kitchen floor was awash. Such was the heat of the night that the damned watermelon had melted into a huge and very sticky puddle. (Sorry, in these parts we have the heat at night too.)
Obviously, the watermelon lake in the kitchen prompted some harsh reprimands from the Baroness - indeed we experienced a rather "mauvais quart d'heure". (The Baroness, of course, is not always attuned with the niceties of scientific investigation, such as how chaps can discover all sorts of important things by merely getting into their baths.)
So, there you have it. Next time you are complaining about the Irish summer, or lack of, spare a thought for those of us who must manfully take up arms against a sea of melting watermelons and S-shaped biros.
For those of you back in the auld sod, however, the Rome correspondent does have some very good news. Your correspondent recently met Irish Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern in Rome.
When he and his delegation finally sat up to the table (at first they were all bent over, wringing out their damp socks given that they had just arrived from Dublin), they gave me the good news.
Ireland is soon to have its long-desired roof. This will be called "Bertie's Souwester" and will be a cross-Border, joint initiative that should cover most if not all of the 32 counties. Heat lamps and palm trees as well as comely maidens will be placed at all crossroads, dust will be imported from north Africa and town councils will be asked to lay in a supply of sombreros for heat-crazed council workers.
A word of advice, though, with regard to this forthcoming, technological miracle. In the new, "covered" Ireland, be careful where you leave your watermelons and biros.
PS: The dinner jacket has just come back from the dry cleaner (note to the Editor - I promise I will be wearing it next week).
Yours in the Heat, Rome Correspondent.