Letter: Workaholic hell

Sir: What a lovely, cosy world your correspondent Swenta Hartvog (letter, 8 October) must inhabit. Ordinary mortals and members of the lower orders are safely back home at 5.15pm while the lucky gifted workaholics are slaving away into the small hours. Dr Bones delivers bouncing babies, lances unsightly boils and strips out varicose veins by day, then he is up all night ridding society of the common cold and controlling a new flesh-eating bug.

Mr Chisel, the craftsman, is putting the finishing touches to his lovely new motor launch that will be used for transporting the village children to the school on the other side of the lake, avoiding the narrow winding lanes full of dangerous motor traffic.

Professor Sparks, mean-while, has just completed his design for the new power station, which will run on chicken manure.

What happens when Dr Bones falls asleep from over-work, his killer bug escapes and emasculates half of the adult population of the village; Mr Chisel is too tired to notice that he used gutta-percha instead of epoxy resin and his motor launch sinks, drowning most of the village children; and Professor Sparks is just too stressed out to notice that the plug on his chicken manure reservoir was imperial rather than metric and the contents seep into the village water supply?

It's a good thing they have got Mr Flogger, the insurer, nearby. I hope this member of the lower orders flogged the right policies to all these workaholics.

TONY FLANAGHAN

Salisbury, Wiltshire