“The suspect has only one hand“.

This was tagged on at the end of a standard description (medium height, short brown hair etc etc) of a con-artist the police are looking for, as read out on the radio while I was driving the kids to school. I couldn’t help it, I snorted and giggled. It sounded somehow Pythonesque.

“I want to confess! I done it!”
“Now, now, sir. Sir knows very well that we’re looking for a one-handed man.”
“I got better!”

Wouldn’t saying “we’re looking for a one-handed man” be better to put at the front of the description?

Categories: media

Tags: pedantry, peeves