Cry God for Harry, England and St George! Or maybe not. As St George's Day approaches, Shoptalk looks at our poor attempts to celebrate our patron saint's day.

IT'S St George's Day on Sunday. Do you feel a wave of patriotic fervour overtaking you, an urge to fly the flag and celebrate? The Irish look on St Patrick's Day as a great excuse for a party - with all welcome, the more the merrier. The Welsh wear daffodils and used to have eisteddfodau - but in the pubs and clubs of Cardiff these days that also means party time.

The English meanwhile. . .

The trouble is that St George has got too caught up with Eng-er-land rather than England. And also with the worst sort of nationalism. The Celtic fringe might want to make everyone welcome at their patriotic parties. The English seemed more inclined to boot them out or beat them up.

No coincidence that a sudden resurgence in Englishness blossoms just before the World Cup.

But St George could be reclaimed. The unlikely partners in the re-branding of St George are card companies and brewers. The brewers, of course, would love to see the English celebrate their national day with all the drink, fervour - and profit - of the Irish.

The card companies, delighted after turning Easter into a major card sending occasion, and after inventing other excuses for card sending: Father's Day, Grandparent's Day, Secretary's Day, Next Door's Dog's Birthday Day, have suddenly realised that St George's Day is just sitting there waiting to be beefed up a bit.

And, as we should all be keen to see St George treasured as a national saint to be proud of, rather than as an excuse for bashing Johnny Foreigner, the new PC attitude has surely got to be encouraged.

Of course, the best card to send on St George's Day would be one that showed the beauties of England - such as the brilliant Joe Cornish photographs. Instead - and how symbolic is this - the cards nearly all hark back to the past.

There are some grand St Georges, some very jolly St Georges. Less jolly is the fact that Churchill seems to figure in quite a lot of the cards. Undoubtedly a great man, great leader, but please, the war has been over for more than 60 years. Can't we get over it too?

And as for the card featuring the England football shirt and "66". Well, that's just plain pathetic.

But we liked the one with a sandcastle. Much more like it.

So if you're English and proud of it, then celebrate it - but, please, in the nicest possible way.

St George's cross is also pouring into the shops, covering everything from hair slides to giant flags in the build up to the World Cup. Sports shops have full kits for decorating your house; Mothercare has towels for toddlers - you can even push your baby in an England buggy, under an England blanket with an England parasol.

Elsewhere, supermarkets too are going all out to catch them young and to get children, girls too, sporting the St George's cross. From bootbags to badges, sweaters to slides, rattles, ribbons and lots and lots of teddy bears.

Now that should take some of the aggression out of it all.

St George, the Saracen knight and the green dragon, plus medieval townsfolk demonstrating archery, games and mummers' plays, will be at Scarborough Castle tomorrow and Sunday, 11am-4pm.

The cloggies come out. . .

MORRIS and other traditional dancers of all ages from Tyneside and Northumberland will be holding a St George's Day Dance Out on Sunday between noon and 3pm at the Baltic Square, Gateshead.

Hexham Morris men, Hexhamshire Lasses, Tyne Bridge Women's Morris, Short Circuit Rapper and Addison Rapper and Clog will be performing dances from a number of different English traditions. And to prove that not all the dancers are "fat old men with beer bellies" Addison clog's children's group will also be taking part.

Jean Smith, of the Morris Federation, who is organising the Dance Out, says "We are using St George's Day to remind people of their traditional English roots and to celebrate them - particularly the wide variety of traditional dance."

BOUQUETS OF THE WEEK DDear Sharon I COMMEND to you Nicky Dunn who works for GNER at Bank Top Station, Darlington, as a candidate for Bouquet of the Week.

I regularly collect my daughter (a grown up lady but still my child! ) on Friday evenings and I knew she was on the Edinburgh train arriving at 19.02. When she had not appeared by 19.25 I rang her mobile repeatedly but only got her voicemail.

The train had already departed for York. I went to inquiries where Nicky was on duty. She was so kind, so efficient and so willing to help me. She rang ahead to York station, contacted the train and had them search for my "missing person". She saw my panic and remained calm and supportive throughout and arranged coffee for me while she continued to inquire.

Eventually my daughter contacted me - she had had many work calls on her mobile and was dealing with them in order. We had missed each other at the station and she had taken a cab into Darlington.

When I told Nicky the good news, she and her colleagues were almost as pleased as I was.

GNER are most fortunate to have staff of Nicky's calibre. She is a real star.

Elizabeth McAllister, Darlington.

Nothing quite so panic inducing as planning to meet someone who seems to have vanished into thin air.

We're glad Elizabeth and her daughter were reunited happily and well done to Nicky for (a) being calm and helpful and (b) being equally calm and kind when it all proved to be a false alarm. This is the latest in a long line of compliments we've received over the years for Darlington station staff and we're sending Nicky this week's bouquet.

Duncan Gale, of Neasham Road, Darlington, is a star among painters and decorators - not just for his workmanship but also for his kindness and consideration. Two pensioners in sheltered accommodation wrote to say: "You know the problems you can have in getting work done. Well, nothing was too much trouble for him. He took the blinds and curtains down and put them back up. He also vacuumed and left everything nice and tidy. He was a pleasure to have in our home."

HAVE you saved a life today? If you're a blood donor, you might have. You might even have saved the life of Joyce Metcalfe's granddaughter. "My granddaughter Ellen was in a car crash on the M6.

She is 23 and pregnant. Because of her injuries, sadly, she lost the baby.

She lost a great deal of blood and was given a number of transfusions.

We do not know who the people were who gave their blood, but we do know that they saved her life. We cannot thank them enough and would urge anyone who ever thought of becoming a blood donor to please make that effort. And we would just like to say to all blood donors, you do a marvellous thing."

If you want to say a public thank you for good service or to a helpful neighbour, kind stranger or efficient business, then just write with all the details to Sharon Griffiths, Bouquet of the Week, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington, DL1 1NF. Or e-mail sjgriff111@aol. com. Each week the person nominated in our main letter gets a real bouquet of flowers or a box of handmade chocolates from The Little Chocolate Shop in Leyburn.