CIRCUITOUS is another resonant word, though not in the big league, like serendipity. It means going round by the houses, like - say - one or two of these columns or the 213 bus from Darlington to Sunderland.

We have remarked before on the unlucky for some 213, a grey knuckle ride that consumes one and a half hours and several laps of Wheatley Hill before staggering, knackered, into Peterlee.

The consolation is that there's plenty of time to read the papers, possibly even to write, sub-edit and print one or two. Saturday's Telegraph, for example, not only had a serendipitous column about Britain's favourite word but a winner at last in their competition to find someone who'd actually seen non-scoring Newcastle United centre forward Alan Shearer eating in a McDonald's.

It was back in his Blackburn Rovers days. Several Tyneside sightings, in which Uncle Al was said to have forced his way to the front of the queue and then dived to the ground in order to gain the assistant's attention, were for some reason held to be hoaxes.

The Guardian, meanwhile, carried an eight column headline "Poll defeat leaves Trimdon in crisis".

It was several seconds before we realised that this actually referred to more problems for Northern Ireland politician David Trimble. Such is the numbing effect of another 90 minutes on the circuitous 213.

THE return journey only so far as Sedgefield, and a cup of tea with skiffle king Lonnie Donegan before his appearance that night at Trimble Labour Club.

Much more of that in tomorrow's John North, though this column's personalised number plate department was interested to spot 662 LON on an elderly estate car outside.

It was too late to ask him: Lonnie lovers may wish to suggest the significance of 662.

The night was magical, not least the performance of the rather less well known Eddie Walker, a sort of sky blues singer who could make a guitar walk on water.

Eddie even cracked a joke, just one, which (serendipity or what?) concerned the service 213.

Bloke gets on a bus. "Peterlee, single," he tells the driver.

"Seamus O'Flaherty, married with four children," says the driver.

The previous week he'd told it in Croydon. For some reason, said Eddie, they didn't laugh at all.

FROM Malcolm Clarke in Sedgefield, the following day's Sunday Times carried a letter about Tony Blair so primitive in its crudity it's amazing it ever saw daylight.

On the same page, more happily, was a letter about cycling on the pavement - a growing problem mentioned here last week. "Will the fixed penalty notices for drunken louts be imposed with the same rigour as the fixed penalty that was going to clear cyclists from pavements?", asked John Cole, tongue in cheek.

We'd not heard of it. Cycling on the footpath is illegal under section 72 of the 1835 Highways Act - by which time, presumably, the velocipede must have made its first uncertain appearance - but the £20 fixed penalty was introduced only in August last year.

Durham police have been commendably candid. In the first year, they say, just 16 tickets were issued.

The force spokesman acknowledges the problem, especially for the elderly, but insists they issue fines only in "serious" cases - and not against juveniles. The rest of us must continue to watch our backs.

BACK on the road again, last week's column also posed the question of whether flashing car headlights at traffic lights will make them change colour.

Our elder son, advised in infancy to blow at them, insisted it was so: just so much hot air, says Roger Elphick from Durham County Council's highways department.

The lights, says Roger, are usually coupled to a sensor device (not a camera) which detects the approach of an oncoming vehicle and where possible - "if nothing is coming from a conflicting direction" - changes the lights in its favour.

"These sensors detect and react to the movement and/or proximity of vehicles, not changes in light.

"As your son is approaching the traffic lights, the presence of his vehicle will, given the right circumstances, clearly trigger a change in their colour.

"That he flashes his lights at the same time is merely a coincidence which may have convinced him that he has made a remarkable discovery.

"If that happened you'd end up with a strobe effect disco at every light controlled junction."

THE dog rang on Sunday evening, the same flashing blade at the distant end.

He was watching Who Wants to be a Millionaire, had noticed a question about Cockney rhyming slang - you know, "dog" equals "dog and bone" equals phone.

But why, everyone wondered, should "rabbit" be rhyming slang for talk? John Briggs, our voice on the Internet, has searched successfully - "rabbit and pork", he concludes.

By the same metre, we can reveal that "plonk" equals "plink and plonk" equals vin blanc and even that blowing a raspberry has something to do with raspberry tarts.

Why some people have come to be known as "berks", however, is a less printable matter altogether.

WHATEVER you might want to call the passenger in question, a Darlington air hostess of our acquaintance reports that a gentleman insisted upon diet water - and got quite high when she tried to explain.

....so finally, the reason for that picture of Mr Eugene Fox in his garden at Tame Bridge, Stokesley - a story of rather a lot of lost sheep and a nomination for the inaugural chief constable's commendation for wit.

Mr Fox, known thereabouts as Hughie, was anticipating lunch one day last week when he became aware of what at first appeared to be a "mass of white" coming down the path.

It was 70-odd sheep which had got out of a nearby field, turned right for the town and then took a fancy to Hughie's horticulture.

"I was just dumbstruck," he reports. "I at least expected a shepherd to be following them but then I had to close the gate to stop them causing an accident on the road.

"Finally I ended up talking to them, asking them what on earth they thought they were doing and if they hadn't homes to go to, that's the state I was in.

"They were into everything, in one end and out the other. There was a terrible mess everywhere."

Eventually he rang the polliss. An hour after that a lone constable arrived, essayed the closest thing he could to a straight face and delivered his immortal line:

"I understand we've a case of sheep worrying a Fox...."

More from the same circles next Wednesday.