Beer, beer, glorious beer
THE streets of the Belgian town of Bruges run with beer. But it's an underground
flow. Pipes under the cobbled streets take the beer from the De Halve Maan brewery –
which has been going for 500 years – to a new bottling facility outside town.
This eliminates traffic congestion caused by brewery trucks and the exhaust fumes
that go with it.
What an excellent idea. Why doesn't Durban do the same – put in underground beer
pipelines from the breweries at Prospecton to major consumption points such as
King's Park, Kingsmead and Moses Mabhida?
And if there should be the equivalent of the oil spill at Hillcrest recently – well, that's
the jackpot!
It's surely feasible. My industrial contacts tell me the pharmaceutical manufacturers
are about to put in an underground pipeline of liquidised bluestone to Mpenjati nudist
beach. If they can do it, why not the breweries?
Target missed
SARAH Palin, America's dishiest rightwinger, has been in another spat with
animal rights group Peta (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals).
Previously the former governor of Alaska scrapped with Peta over things like their
opposition to commercial fishing rights and to the annual Iditarod dog sled race.
But now Peta has objected to her posting pictures on Facebook of her son, Trig,
"standing on their dog", a black labrador named Jill Hadassah.
Peta's position: "Peta simply believes that people shouldn't step on dogs, and
judging by the reaction that we've seen to Sarah Palin's Instagram photo, we're
far from alone in that belief."
Palin's response: "Dear Peta – Chill! At least Trig didn't eat the dog."
Then it got hectic as she accused Peta of pontificating from their leather
armchairs – to which Peta responded that, as vegans, they don't sit on leather,
they sit on non-animal upholstery.
To get things into perspective, Trig is all of six years old. In the photo, he has one
foot on the ground, the other on the labrador, who is looking up at him in tongue-
lolling adoration.
One feels Peta missed the target completely here. Who could be so vile and
cruel as to name a labrador Jill Hadassah? Dogs also have their sensitivities and
feelings, you know.
Political link
SARACENS rugby club, in England, have started attaching strange
patches to their players, taped behind the ear. They are to monitor
impacts to the head sustained by professional players over an
extended period.
Saracens say they are concerned about the possible effects of
concussion, medium-term and long-term. It's the question nobody
has dared ask until now.
It takes us back to politics in the US, way back in the seventies when
Gerald Ford was president.
His critics said he'd played too much gridiron football without a
helmet.
Eye of newt ...
VETERINARY news – a London vet has successfully operated to
relieve a constipated goldfish. Faye Bethell performed the hour-long
op - which involved tiny amounts of anaesthic and a miniature heart
monitor - for £ 300 (R5 400).
Dr Bethell seems to specialise. She has also, in the past year:
castrated a skunk; dealt with a newt's eye; removed a snake's skin
tumour and extracted a corn on the cob from a dog's intestines.
Is she involved in amateur theatricals? She'd be a shoo-in for a role in
the opening scene of Macbeth.
Double, double toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble ...
Hemmed in
PEOPLE power ... a would-be robber took a sledgehammer to the glass of a
teller's cubicle in a bank in Langfang City, northern China.
He climbed through the jagged hole and wandered about looking for cash. But
the tellers had locked it away and sprinted for the ladies' loo.
Discouraged, he climbed back through the hole he had smashed, only to find the
bank floor jammed with customers and curious passers-by who had come in to
see what was going on.
He was hemmed in completely and easily nabbed by the cops, who had been
called.
Inscrutable, these Chinese bank robberies.
Tailpiece
Secretary: "I've got some bad news for you."
Boss: "Now, my dear, don't be negative. Surely there's some good
news."
Secretary: " Okay. The good news is you're not sterile."
Last word
The Romans would never have found time to conquer the world if they had
been obliged first to learn Latin.
Heinrich Heine
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