Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Fading away? Let’s hear it for the whistlers

Mike is worried about the decline of whistling.
Mike is worried about the decline of whistling.

Appropriately, I was eating a Happy Meal when I heard the whistling.

Defying all modern trends, a man of some vintage was whistling a song.

It was the Stevie Wonder hit I Just Called To Say I Love You and he whistled the entire thing, beginning to end, including the little dum-dum-dum bit at the end that’s usually handled by a cheap keyboard in a backstreet bar.

I thought it was glorious and I enjoyed every perfectly-toned note but the distinguished fast-food employee had but a single fan. His young colleagues hated him with the fire of a million suns, judging by the looks they were giving him as he pointlessly wiped surfaces with a worrying cloth and expressed the joy of his work in a traditional way.

Whistling is dying out. A 2015 survey by YouGov – also pointless, although interesting – found 70% of people believed whistling had declined over the previous 20 years. I read about it in a London-based newspaper that was taking a rare break from attacking refugees, so it must be true.

The same report mainly attributed the loss of whistling to the disappearance of jobs like errand boys, although I’m more inclined to believe its secondary reason is the popularity of iPods. Who needs to whistle when they have bangin’ tunes in their earbuds?

The newsroom that produces this newspaper once had and possibly still has, a phantom whistler.

Somewhere in the crowd of people producing The Courier, Tele and Sunday Post, someone would provide anonymous music to accompany the journalism. Many of us hated it but we could never track the perpetrator.

Now, weirdly, I miss it. As a person guilty of excessive nostalgia, I find it upsetting that new generations may never hear such personalised, laid-back creativity, or even learn the skill themselves.

As the traffic builds around us and the pace of life increases, simple pleasures are drowned out. They can only be saved if we choose to save them. So I have resolved to teach my children to whistle and to do it more.

And if the Phantom Whistler of the Newsroom is reading this, I call upon them to strike again.