Andy McNab's Estonian plumber

Finally for today, I've been carrying around a page torn out of the London Evening Standard magazine a couple of weeks ago (the ES, perhaps because it's a monopoly, seemingly doesn't see the need to bother trying to win new customers with an online edition). Andy McNab writes:

"I don't have any problem with Eastern Europeans coming over to London to work, and I am sick of hearing people complain they are taking our jobs. If the work wasn't available for them, they simply wouldn't be here, they would be working somewhere else in Europe instead. Besides, the local Russian pharmacy opens a lot longer hours than most, and my Estonian plumber not only turns up for work on time, his quote for the job doesn't suddenly increase because of 'a problem with the piping'."

Bravo! (Sorry, pun is explained below...)

Of course, Andy McNab isn't someone to mess around: he's ex-SAS and first came to fame with his book Bravo Two Zero, the account of an ill-fated behind-the-lines operation in the first Gulf war. Curiously his is one of at least 3 books about the operation (by Andy McNab, Chris Ryan, another member of the patrol and, not so easy to find, Michael Asher, ex-SAS, but not on the patrol). Each of them is a jolly good yarn, and reading all 3 gives different perspectives, like one of those movies with different constructions of the same events ("The Usual Suspects" and the recently previewed "Where the Truth Lies" come to mind).