Snakes alive!
WHAT'S with these stowaway snakes? Panic broke out on an Aeromexico internal flight when a green snake started crawling out of one of the overhead luggage compartment then, to passengers' horror, plopped down to join them.
They hastily left their seats and made in the opposite direction, as shown in videos posted on the internet.
The plane was given priority landing in Mexico City, where airport staff came on board and caught the snake, according to Associated Press. There's now an investigation into how it got on to the aircraft.
Note: it was a green snake. Next we learn from Huffington Post that a deadly green mamba was found on a freighter docked in Aberdeen, Scotland, which had come from West Africa. The crew managed to get it into a box. (Oh boy, that takes some doing - you don't fool around with green mambas. Deadly poisonous, lightning quick) which they handed to the local SPCA.
The SPCA were unable to find a specialist reptile keeper to look after it, largely because the nearest serum for a mamba was 650 km away in London. So they reluctantly had to kill it.
Questions arise: Was the snake in the Mexican aircraft also a mamba? If so, why are green mambas on the move, stowing away? Are they getting in quick before Brexit and Trump's Mexican wall put an end to migration?
The animal kingdom has insights and instincts we cannot ignore.
Hansard
THE above recalls an exchange from long ago in Parliament. Harry Lawrence, MP for Salt River, had called a Nat member opposite a "snake in the grass." He was ordered to withdraw it.
"I withdraw, and I apologise to the honourable mamba."
It's all there in Hansard. Every few thousand pages or so, you'll find a gem.
Squirrel goes nuts
A SQUIRREL went beserk in a seniors' centre in Florida, in the US, jumping on folk and biting them. It prompted a frantic 911 call for help.
"It's in our activity room," the caller said in audio that was relayed by a local TV channel, according to Huffington Post. "It's jumping on people and biting them and scratching them. We need help."
Then somebody announced that the squirrel had been caught and thrown out.
Yes, America is in a ferment. Was this a Trump squirrel or a Clinton squirrel? Most alarming for the old-timers, especially those who are physiologically vulnerable to nut-crunching squirrels.
Weary, wary
INVESTMENT analyst Dr James Greener reflects, in his latest grumpy newsletter, on the American presidential election and detects voter sentiments similar to those revealed in Britain's Brexit referendum and our own municipal elections.
"Isn't this democracy stuff astonishing? You give people a choice and they choose. Just as amazing has been the over the top panic reactions to the news that a man with no political experience or background will now become president of the USA.
"But that's the point. Trump's victory suggests that the electorate have grown weary and wary of the same old Washington insiders and dynasties wielding the power and milking the systems. Much the same reaction emerged in our own elections in August and the British referendum a couple of months before that. More and more of us want less government in our lives.
"Apparently, the most terrifying thing about the president-elect is that he is aware that debt is the country's big problem and that the best way to solve this is to reduce government spending. And reduce borrowing – which is probably why interest rates are ticking up.
"Many of his ideas about how to achieve these changes threaten the way of life of various communities who have become used to being recipients of state hand-outs. Some Americans have taken to the streets to register their disappointment by burning stuff. A familiar reaction to us down here."
NPA debacle
IAN Gibson, poet laureate of Hillcrest, reflects on the astonishing goings-on in the National Prosecutions Authority.
An inept lawyer called Shaun,
Is said to be a number one pawn;
For his charges against Gordhan,
Had the touch of a moron,
As his case was clearly forlorn.
Tailpiece
HE TAKES her home after a first date.
"Can I come inside?"
"Certainly not! I never invite a man inside on the first date."
"How about on the last date?"
Last word
Tip the world over on its side and everything loose will land in Los Angeles.
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