Commentator confusion
'TWAS a game of two halves, to be sure. It's the first half we'd like to forget. And let's not rest too much on our laurels about the second half either.
It was astute replacements from the bench by coach Allister Coetzee that did it – a batch of Lions players, brought on fresh, from our most successful side in Super rugby (though I hate to say it) and thoroughly acclimatised to the highveld altitude.
Even the commentators became a little confused as the Boks suddenly picked up zip. They were not sure if they were commentating on the Lions or the Springboks.
The Irish were out of puff, dead on their feet in that closing 15 minutes (as so often happens at Ellis Park). But next week we're back at sea level in Port Elizabeth, both sides with everything to play for.
Here comes a humdinger!
Space travel
BRITISH army captain astronaut Tim Peake landed safely in Kazakhstan with an American and a Russian colleague, the Soyuz space shuttle coming down under a huge parachute after hurtling at searing speed through Earth's atmosphere, following their stint in the international space station.
The amiable Peake seemed to bring a new immediacy to space exploration with regular TV interviews from the space station, horsing about in weightlessness with his colleagues and running the equivalent of a marathon on a treadmill.
But as he and his colleagues were carried bodily out of the capsule, sweating profusely and too weak to walk, and one observed the all but incinerated capsule, one could not help but reflect that if the future is regular space travel, it must still be a long way off.
Do we really have the technology? Is there really any way to conquer the immensity of space, the distances involved when measured against a human lifespan? Would it not require a paradigm shift that has so far eluded us?
This is not to dismiss the ingenuity of the space programme scientists and technicians or the courage of those who allow themselves to be blasted into space.
But before we think of colonising distant galaxies, surely we need to address the damage to our own planet – environmental and otherwise – that is being wrought by that aggressively destructive species, homo sapiens.
Church notes
SOME excerpts from church bulletins:
· The Fasting and Prayer Conference includes meals.
· Ladies don't forget the rummage sale. It's a chance to get rid of those things not worth keeping around the house. Bring your husbands.
· Remember in prayer the many who are sick in our community. Smile at someone who is hard to love. Say "Hell" to someone who doesn't care much about you.
· Don't let worry kill you off – let the Church help.
· Miss Carlene Mason sang "I will not pass this way again", giving obvious pleasure to the congregation.
· For those of you who have children and don't know it, we have a nursery downstairs.
· Next Thursday there will be tryout for the choir. They need all the help they can get.
· Irving Benson and Jessie Carter were married on October 24 in the church. So ends a friendship that began in their schooldays.
· This evening at 7pm there will be a hymn singing in the park across from the church. Bring a blanket and come prepared to sin.
· Low Self Esteem Support Group will meet Thursday at 7pm. Please use the back door.
· Weight Watchers will meet at 7pm at the First Presbyterian Church. Please use large double door at the side entrance.
Skinny-dippers
NEWS from Australia. An elderly Queensland farmer had a pond round the back, ideal for swimming. He'd set up picnic tables and a barbecue and planted apple and peach trees. Very nice.
One morning he took a bucket and walked round to the pond to pick some fruit. As he approached he heard splashing, female voices and laughter. A whole lot of girls were skinny-dipping.
They crowded into the deepest part of the pond as he approached.
"Go away, you old pervert!" one shouted.
"I'm no pervert," he said, holding up the bucket. "I'm just here to feed the crocodile."
You've got to get up early to outwit an old Queensland farmer.
Tailpiece
THE contortionist went bankrupt. He couldn't make ends meet.
Last word
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.
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