DID you read our story about Blue, the pony who returned to her stable in Wroughton on her own from a field in Wichelstowe?

Having been sold, she missed her fellow ponies so much that she escaped and braved a bridge over the M4 and a fairly busy country road, passing a supermarket on the way.

The good news, which would bring a tear to the eye of a marble statue, is that Blue has been bought by the stable and will now be with her friends forever.

I admire the yard owner, Debbie Jones, not just for her obvious love of animals but also for her clear belief in telling the unvarnished truth.

She’s a better person than I am. If I were in charge of that place, I don’t know whether I’d be able to resist the temptation to embellish things a bit for personal gain.

“Oh, yes,” I’d tell the assembled press.

“We’re very proud of Blue. She’d only just escaped when she had to leap a raging river in the middle of a thunderstorm.

“Just as she was about to leap the raging river, she noticed a little girl who had fallen in and was about to go under for the third time, so she dragged the little girl out on to the bank, administered the kiss of life, trotted to a nearby telephone box and dialled 999 with her nose.

“Then, once she’d finally leapt the raging river, she was passing the supermarket when she noticed that an armed robbery was in progress. Sneaking inside and creeping up behind the robber, she knocked the weapon out of his hand with a single swipe of a hoof and freed the hostages by nibbling at their bonds.

“Then she realised that the robber wasn’t really an evil person, just a crazy, mixed up kid who’d had a bad start in life, and whose poor old mum would be on her own if he went to prison, so she carried him on her back to the nearest counselling centre.

“And then…hold on a minute, my phone’s going.

“Hello? Who’s that? The Walt Disney Company, you say? Why yes, 20 per cent of the gross sounds very interesting indeed…”

Riding rough-shod over the law

IF you happened to be driving near the top of Victoria Road at about 6pm last Thursday, you may have had a bit of a shock.
That’s because a fully-grown young man decided it would be a great laugh to ride an infants’ tricycle slowly up and down the road in front of rush-hour traffic.
He and his friends gibbered and hooted with glee like a troop of drug-addled monkeys every time a car, lorry or bus was forced to slap on the anchors.
Thanks to this cheery joker, countless drivers, passengers and pedestrians were at risk of injury or worse – as was the happy halfwit himself.
Any driver who struck him would have suffered terrible psychological harm, even though it would not have been their fault and they would arguably have been an agent of Darwinism.
Anyway, if you were one of the drivers affected, you’ll be pleased to know that at least one horrified witness called the police.
I’m reliably informed that an officer of the law came along shortly afterwards. Although the idiot tricyclist had endangered not just himself but many others, he was not arrested. He and his friends were, however, spoken to and then dispersed.
Or rather, they dispersed about 45 minutes later. As soon as the officer was out of sight, they gathered at the corner of Victoria Road and Prospect Place to hassle and intimidate passers-by. 
They also used the callbox there. Some time after the call, a car appeared and they gathered around it as whoever was inside handed out mysterious items. I don’t know what the items were.
Lollipops, perhaps. Yes, that’ll be it. Lollipops. Nothing sinister.
I hope this narrative reassures anybody who was distressed by the events – and anybody else reading this whose neighbourhood is blighted by anti-social behaviour, day after rotten day and night after rotten night.
Remember, folks – anybody who dares to suggest that criminals are gaining the upper hand is probably some nasty media type spreading fake news.

Forget rules

A 15-YEAR-OLD called Leah Young was repeatedly placed in isolation at Nova Hreod Academy for not wearing a blazer.
Her failure to comply with uniform rules stemmed not from defiance but because her family was unable to raise sufficient funds.
All spare cash is being spent on travel to Oxford, where Leah’s mother must go for cancer treatment.
Whatever one thinks of the ins and outs of this case, can anybody at the school justify punishing a child for circumstances entirely outside her control?
If the answer to that question is in the negative, can they make provision to ensure that such a nasty thing never happens again?
Rules are necessary in most walks of life, but remorseless imposition of rules, to the extent of flying in the face of common human decency, is often a sign of moral cowardice.