by 
A notice claiming to be polite has been slammed today for being really quite abrupt and short.
‘Polite Notice – dogs will not be tolerated’ – reads a sign by the duck pond in the pretty village of Bumbleton in Sussex.
“There’s no please, no thank you. I don’t see how by anyone’s measure this could be considered polite,” said Simon Williams, a local money launderer.
“If anything, the thinly veiled threat makes it really quite rude.”
Mr Williams had several suggestions on how to make the ‘polite’ notice genuinely polite.
“Well, some sort of greeting for a start. ‘Good day’, maybe ask after my well-being – it’s just common sense really.”
But Eleanor Gay, a village councillor responsible for signage and prostitute rehabilitation has hit back.
“Clearly that’s just nonsense. By virtue of stating that the notice is polite makes the notice polite. If we hadn’t stated that it was a polite notice then I can see there could be a problem, but we have and it is that fact that makes it a polite notice.”
But, if anything, Ms Gay’s words have only exacerbated the problem.
“Well, that’s just complete nonsense. If the notice was genuinely polite then you wouldn’t need to state on the notice that it was a polite notice. Its politeness would be self-evident.”
The war of words escalated quickly.
“F**k off,” said Ms Gay.
Mr Williams responded robustly by calling Ms Gay a ‘massive shitter’.
At this point the pair were asked to leave the village post office as their behaviour was upsetting the other customers, but the argument looks set to continue.
