[the prunic wars] between a dick and a dale

If you find the humble prune a little hard to stomach, why not compose your compote of apple and rhubarb?

As Mrs. Albert Forrester said, in Maugham's Creative Impulse:

Since it's occurred to me lately that perhaps I've exhausted the possibilities of the semi-colon, I'm going to take up the colon.

The colon, so beloved of those who would hang, draw and quarter - is indeed not to be poked at and as Medicine-dot-net rightly observes:

Prunes and prune juice have been used for many years to treat mild constipation. There is no evidence that the mild stimulant effects of prunes or prune juice damage the colon.

There you have the origins of the conflict - prune juice and the decision whether to utilize the health-giving properties of either the French, Imperial, Italian, or Greengage variety in the cleansing of the colonic tract.

Indeed, so controversial is the issue that in the United States, an effort to rebrand "prunes" as "dried plums" began in 2000, to appeal to a younger market who associated prunes with elderly people.

This is, quite frankly, cruel. Prunes appeal to people of all walks of life and states of constipation - just look at their properties to start with:

The beginnings of the Greengage prune

Calories in Prunes:

1 prune = 20 calories

1 cup prune juice = 180 calories

Closet prune eaters have existed for years - witness this poor girl:

It was just a bag of prunes, but I behaved as though it was crack. Knowing how closed-minded people can be about certain foods -- I still bear the scars of a childhood of raw green peppers in my lunch -- I thought it best to eat them on the sly.

On the sly? The mighty prune! Dick Madeley sets us straight:

Some prune facts which everyone should know before they start spreading the juice around. Did you know that in some parts of South America the stones from prunes are placed in the ears to enhance the effects of cannabis?

Prunes are also high in vitamin D and can help you tan more easily. The downside of this is you’ll spend more time on the toilet and, all things being equal, the prune / sunbathing ratio cancels each other out. You might even look paler, though not down the backs of your legs.

Big Chip Dale, sadly, is not a prune man. With his exposure it's probably as well but I can't help feeling Chip went a little OTT when he not only accused Dick Madeley of something I can't quite fathom but accused me, in virtually the same breath, of Prunica Fides - breaking the faith.

I might have gladly confessed to breaking wind, as the Carthaginians were wont to do to power their galleys away from the pursuing Romans but the faith? Never! I am a staunch prunist, I tell you.

So there it is.

The First Prunic War may have ended a dull time of flagging stats and flaccid colons but let the final word be Sir Winston's, at a moment when the very future of the prune eating world looked its darkest:

Now this is not your end. It is not even the beginning of your end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning when colonic irrigation is seen as some sort of substitute for the imbibing of the humble prune.

Next week - baked beans and their effect on Australian leg-spin bowling.

Here it is - the offending item that the hot air is all about