The Idler, Tuesday, December 31, 2019

We continue the Babylonian tradition   NEW Year's Eve. It's resolution time. All the bad habits, the naughty indulgences of 2019 go into the trash can. The year 2020 will bring self-discipline, exercise, healthy living and avoidance of chocolate and booze. We are at one with the ancient Babylonians. Do I have New Year resolutions? That's top secret, I'm afraid. You don't want to forewarn the damsels, heh, heh! Yes, the Babylonians of about 4 000 years ago were the first to make New Year resolutions and to celebrate the New Year. During a 12-day religious festival known as Akitu, they crowned a new king or reaffirmed their loyalty to the reigning one. They also made promises to the gods to pay their debts and return any objects they had borrowed. These promises are considered to be the forerunners of our New Year resolutions. That was the ancient Babylonians. It's the Scots who have given New Year celebrations an extra zing. Hogmanay – as it's known in Bonny Scotland – begins with first footing, visiting friends and neighbours as the strokes of midnight still reverberate, carrying gifts of shortbread and black bun, which are exchanged for a wee dram of whisky. All very jolly. And there's high symbolism too. It's considered most auspicious – good luck for the year ahead - if the first visitor across the doorstep is a tall, dark man. It's bad luck if he has red hair. And the worst luck of all is if it's a red-haired woman. Why the Scots should have a prejudice against red-haired women is not clear. Apparently it's got something to do with the Vikings who overran the place all those centuries ago and introduced the genes for red hair. But I personally have nothing against red-haired women, in fact I have known some corkers. They are welcome across the threshhold any time. But this is to digress. Hogmanay is celebrated in Scotland over several days and nights with weird and wild ancient traditions, many involving a whirling of fireballs – a practice said to be of Viking origin, to drive away evil spirits. Also fireworks, it goes on and on. And many a wee dram. But It's been a tough and often an ugly year worldwide. Impeachment in America; Brexit in Old Blighty and possible dismemberment of the UK; atrocities all over the Middle East – and in America as well. Ugly sentiments break surface. Not pretty. And wildfires in Australia that must surely persuade even the dimmest climate change denialist that the scientists have been right all along. But hey! The Boks won the Rugby World Cup in Japan. We beat the Poms at cricket in the First Test. We're on the up and up. There are some bright spots in spite of Eskom. The mystics and the astrologers says 2020 will be a lot better. Something to do with alignment of the planets. To return to the Hogmany idiom, let us consider the lines of the immortal Robbie Burns:   And there's a hand, my trusty fiere! and gie's a hand o' thine! And we'll tak a right gude-willy waught, for auld lang syne …   . Tailpiece   IT'S New Year's Eve, you've got only a few hours to do all the things you will resolve not to do in the new year.     Last word   DEER readers, my gnu year's resolution is to tell you a gazelleon times how much I caribou you! Sorry. Bad puns. Alpaca bag and leave. – Greg Tamblyn

 

Idller Monday

Prince Harry

gets bitten on

the backside

BACK in harness after the Christmas break, a pleasant interlude up in Maritzburg with younger relatives who continue to distress me with the way they mistreat their beautiful little French bulldog named Harry, after the prince.

Readers might recall my previous misgivings as to the way they treat this poor little blighter by pointing a red laser beam onto the floor. Harry goes almost crazy chasing the red dot about the place, screaming hysterically as they switch it about.

A French bulldog is more like a terrier than his clumsy, slobbering English bulldog cousin and this Harry is an absolute livewire. He does not deserve to be laughed at the way they do and I fear that he could develop a neurosis.

Also, a miniature black panther named George has been added to the younger relatives' menage. They say he's a cat, but I say a small panther (and a panther is a cat anyway).

A panther because this George is in constant hunting mode, crouched low, tail swishing furiously. His favourite trick is to hide in the shrubbery then pounce on Prince Harry, biting him on the backside.

Then the game is on. French bull terrier versus miniature black panther. Gales of laughter from the onlookers. This is most demeaning of our furry friends and is most definitely a case for the SPCA.

 

 

Cricket seesaw

WHAT an absorbing few days of Test cricket. And phew! No need after all to yank Jacques Kallis, Graeme Smith and Mark Boucher out of backroom coaching and into the starting line-up. No need to second Siya and Faf from the Bok squad. The lads are handling it. But given the CSA high-jinks – the threat even of a players' strike – anything could have happened.

This First Test against the Poms has been a seesaw, a study in skills and strategy, proving yet again this this is the purest form of cricket. Put another way, Test cricket is chess, limited overs draughts and T-20 pocket billiards.

One hears commentators and others talking these days about players needing a bit more "red ball cricket" to get in the right mode for Test cricket.

One shudders. But it's true. So much cricket is played these days with a white ball (which behaves differently from the red) on plumb wickets, and wearing pyjamas instead of whites, that getting back to the real game is an adjustment.

Yes, I'm a traditionalist. Harrumph!

 

 

Cold-nosed dog

MORE from Rosemarie Jarski's Great British wit. Topic: Pop Music.

·       All rock 'n roll singers sound like a nudist backing into a cold-nosed dog – set to music. – Robert Orben.

·       Most people get into bands for three simple reasons: to get laid, to get fame and to get rich. – Bob Geldof.

·       The greatest achievement of Punk rock was the way it made flared trousers unfashionable. - Tony Parsons.

·       I think Mick Jagger would be astounded and amazed if he realised to how many people he is not a sex symbol. – Angie Bowie.

·       I'm the only man who can says he's been in Take That and at least two members of the Spice Girls. – Robert Williams.

·       Does Paul McCartney make records just to annoy me personally? – Alex Harvey.

 

Tailpiece

THIS fellow goes to the doctor's.

"I've got a cricket ball lodged in my rectum."

"How's that?"

"Now don't you start."

 

Last word

 

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. – 

Carl Jung

Idler Monday

Two foolish

children

in a flat

AT THIS time of year we look to our short story writers for something that truly captures the spirit of Christmas. This year it's the turn of O Henry and his The Gift of the Magi.

James and Della Dillingham Young are living in a flat in New York, around the turn of the 19^th century.

"The 'Dillingham' had been flung to the breeze during a former period of prosperity when its possessor was being paid $30 per week. Now, when the income was shrunk to $20, the letters of 'Dillingham' looked blurred, as though they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D. But whenever Mr James Dillingham Young came home and reached his flat above he was called 'Jim' and greatly hugged by Mrs James Dillingham Young, already introduced to you as Della."

Some more about this loving couple.

"Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim's gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other was Della's hair. Had the Queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the airshaft, Della would have let her hair hang out of the window some day to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty's jewels and gifts. Had King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he passed, just to see him pluck at his beard from envy."

But it's Christmas Eve and all Della has to buy Jim a present is $1.87.

She dashes into town and sells her glorious locks to a wigmaker for $20. Then she goes hunting for a present for Jim, a platinum fob chain for his watch.

"She found it at last … As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim's. Twenty-one dollars they took from her for it …"

Then Jim arrives home

Jim, darling," she cried, "don't look at me that way. I had my hair cut off and sold it because I couldn't have lived through Christmas without giving you a present."

Jim produces what he's bought for her – beautiful tortoiseshell combs with jewelled edges, to hold up her lovely hair. He's sold his watch to pay for them.

"The magi, as you know, were wise men - wonderfully wise men - who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi."

Powerful stuff.

Seasonal greetings to one and all.

Tailpiece

GOOD King Wenceslas phones the pizza parlour: "The usual please … deep and crisp and even."

 

Last word

Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fireside and his quiet home! – Charles Dickens

Idler Friday

(Subs: If you want the pic of Robert D'Avice under the waterfall, that's available)

 

 

The great

Mbotyi

bonfire

 

IAN Gibson, poet laureate of Hillcrest, responds to this week's piece on Pondoland and the Wild Coast, saying it brought back "so many wonderful memories of that gem of a coastline."

Robert D'Avice, retired ace photographer with this newspaper group, sends in a photograph of himself standing under the cascade at Waterfall Bluff, taken by Phillip Duff.

Ian says those who loved that part of Pondoland will join in preserving it.

"As a youngster I played cricket for Flagstaff against Bryan Goss's team". (Which would presumably have been Lusikisiki – the Goss family had a store there). "Visitors had to relinquish car keys which would be returned only after the beer was finished."

Yes, that's the Pondoland we knew.

Ian and I go back a long way with cricket. At Maritzburg College many years ago he coached me and can therefore share in my subsequent achievement of 4 for 32 with my unplayable legbreaks against the RAF Red Arrows for the Durban Press XI (which I think I might have mentioned before).

We (that's the Pondoland mob, not the Durban Press XI) sometimes played cricket at low tide on the large sandbank in the Mbotyi lagoon. It switched to rugby as the tide came in.

I first met Andrew Zaloumis – later to become head honcho at isiMangaliso Wetland Park, in Zululand – on the beach at Mbotyi.

It was New Year's Eve and they'd built a huge bonfire on the beach. Andrew – who I think was still at school at Michaelhouse at the time and had colours in gymnastics – was doing beautiful somersaults over the fire and landing on his feet.

It was too much for a fellow in our camping/fishing party, a desperado named Ginger Dick (a Hilton boy) who had been partaking of beer as a medication against sunburn.

"That's bugger-all!" Ginger cried and rushed at the fire for his own somersault.

His head connected with one of the topmost blazing logs. He went right through the fire in a shower of sparks and burning kindling, then sprinted on down the beach with various items ablaze, to dive into the surf with a sizzle.

Ginger was somehow not badly harmed. He stole the show from Zaloumis.

Yep, Pondoland. Them wuz the days!

 

 

Load shedding

 

ESKOM notice: "There has been no load shedding for the past week. Eskom is aware of the problem and working on it."

 

 

"Weird, zany

 

THE Christmas shopping mode is in deadly earnest. Where does one find that something special, something unique? Huffington Post provides its annual Weird and Zany Christmas Gift Guide:

 

·         Sunglasses for cats. This stylish non-prescription animal eyewear is easy to put on your cat's face.

·         The Daddy Claus Christmas robe (for Daddy).

·         Dinosaur-shaped pot plant holders.

·         Laptop Scratch Pad for your cat – mouse shaped like a real mouse.

·         Nutcracker Undies – his and hers – matching.  

(That's enough weird, zany and unique Christmas gifts – Ed)

-Portrait of randma'sarrot. Broccoli Clock – analogue – showing The Office TV character Kevin Malone eating broccoli throuhout the da.aptop Scratch Pad for your cat, mouse shaed like a real mouse.Nutcracker Undies – his and hers - matchin.(That's enough Christmas gifts that are special, unique, weird and zany - Ed)

Tailpiece

 

Knock knock!.
Who's there?
Hannah.
Hannah who?
Hannah partridge in a pear tree …

 

 

Last word

 

That's what college is for - getting as many bad decisions as possible out of the way before you're forced into the real world. I keep a checklist of 'em on the wall in my room. - Jeph Jacques

 

Idler, Thursday, December 19, 2019

The ladies

rule in the

frozen north

BROUHAHA in the Baltic. Estonia's foreign minister Mart Helme, a man, describe's Finland's new prime minister, 34-year-old Sanna Masrin as a "sales girl".

There's an uproar. Estonian President Kersti Kaljulaid (a woman) apologises. Helme says he was "misunderstood".

Sanna Masrin leads a coalition of Finnish parties, each one led by a woman.

And just you watch 15-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg – she'll be the next secretary-general of the UN.

Former US president Barack Obama is on to it. He says the world would be far better run by women.

Don't the gals get it? The fellows are making way, leaving the heavy work to them. The guys want to just play golf and drink beer together.

 

 

 

Batman and Boris

 

READER Richard Isemonger, of Hillcrest, says Donald Trump in that long black coat reminds him of Batman or of the spaghetti westerns. It prompts him into a bit of scriptwriting involving Donald and Boris:

Batman to Boris: "Congratulations on your presidency. Now set aside that long road that leads to the big place where your queen lives. Buy a long black coat and practice walking towards the press. Have a running helicopter nearby so you can shout at them."

Boris to Batman: "I am not a president and that road is longer than yours. I would rather use my bike. My voice is not strong and a long coat is no good when I have to tuck my shirt tail in."

Batman to Boris: "OK, but get a better hairstyle, like me. No-one will see your shirt tail."

Boris to Batman: "I don't like orange hair."

Batman to Boris: "Blue will be OK. Get a long red tie. Remember to shout. They will write fake news if they don't hear you."

Boris: "Roger."

Batman: "Get a First Lady."

Boris: "Roger."

Batman: "Who is this Roger? I have not met her."

Boris: "My dog."

Batman: "Is she good looking?"

Boris: "I think he is good looking."

Batman: "Clap you hands, use thumbs-up, and point to people when you address crowds. They like it."

Boris: "In this country they'll think I'm unhinged."

Batman: "Don't worry what people think. By the way, I have a favour to ask ..."

 

Boris: "Hello? Hello?…" (Line cuts off).

Ha, ha! Er, what's Richard getting at?

 

 

Electronic age

HEY, a new poet on thre block. Joan Truscott pens some lines on the electronic age.

Cellphones, tablets and computers
It's an electronic age.
Being connected is all the rage.
Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.
People use devices wherever you look.
Googling for info
Will tell you what you want to know.
Gone are the days of letter writing
Sending emails is more exciting.
We used to communicate face to face
Now using whatsapp is more commonplace.
Children no longer know how to spell,
Their grammar is faulty as well.
Abbreviations in messages are fine
Even a funny face or sign.
Social media is the buzzword
Wherever you go, it is heard.
Sometimes we need to put our gadgets away
Find out what living without technology
is about.

 

Tailpiece

 

A SCOTSMAN takes a huge jar of urine to the climic to have it tested. The results come back. There is no sign of any illness.

He takes out his mobile phone. "It's me, Wullie. Tell yer Aunty Mary there's nothing wrong with you, her, me, Grandpa or the dog."

 

 

Last word

 

The intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, the sensible man hardly anything. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 

The Idler, , Tuesday, December 17, 2019

Drake's drum

back in

service?

I have singed the beard of the King of Spain,

And carried away the Dean of Jaen,

And sold him in Algiers …

 

OKAY, that was Sir Francis Drake back in the 16^th century – an earlier Elizabethan age – but this kind of forcefulness in foreign affairs is frowned on today. Will Boris Johnson's election victory nevertheless bring a new assertiveness to the Brexit soapie?

Are the Brits about to sail the seas, as of old, to build up a trading empire, independent of the foreign rotters across the Channel?

Er, perhaps we need to amend British to "English". The Scottish Nationalists all but wiped out the Tories and others in the same election, making it difficult to argue with the Scots' demand for their own independence, which would be a withdrawal in miniature of Britain's withdrawal from Europe (and, some would say, equally pointless and damaging).

Also, it seems Northern Ireland could depart from the United Kingdom. Bojo's withdrawal "deal" with the EU already leaves them half-in, half-out of the EU, with a customs border down the Irish Sea (which he'd promised would not happen).

And in the same election, for the first time ever the Irish nationalists (most of whom do not take up their seats at Westminster) polled more votes than the Unionists.

Also, the Good Friday Agreement provides for a referendum in Northern Ireland on unification with the Republic in the south (a member of the EU) should sentiment on such matters change.

So the issue could become not so much EU regulations on the curvature of bananas (one of Bojo's favourite themes) but a redesigning of the Union Jack.

Headwinds could lie ahead for Bojo. He has to negotiate a trade deal with the EU to compensate for relinquishing leading membership of the world's largest, wealthiest and most sophisticated trading bloc. Otherwise the Brits are left paddling a barbed-wire canoe up a sewer.

But Donald Trump is standing by with a super-duper trade deal to compensate. Er, no. It's not in his gift. Such a deal has to go through Congress – it can take years – and the House of Representatives has already said it will pass no deal that threatens the Good Friday Agreement. (There's a strong Irish lobby in the US).

Oh dear. So do the Brits then sail the seas to find new trading partners? The Solomon Islands? Lesotho? Isipingo?

Will this Brexit soapie turn out a Brexit weepie?

 

 

Runaways

OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties: "What do you do if your best friend runs away with your husband? You miss her terribly."

 

Borrowed time

DURBAN poet Sarita Mathur gives us some lines on borrowed time.

Borrowed time
That's all of us
Living in the present.
That's why it's called , 'The Present',
It's a gift.
Let's love and laugh
Gratitude is the key
It all becomes very simple
When we realise
From sunset to sunrise
That we're living on 'Borrowed Time'
In health
And that is wealth
Let's in gratitude be,
Let not misfortune fall on us
For us to see
That we're living on 'Borrowed Time '

 

Tailpiece

HOW many Brexiteers does it take to change a lightbulb>

None. They call a Polish electrician.

 

Last word

The only thing that scares me more than space aliens is the idea that there aren't any space aliens. We can't be the best that creation has to offer. I pray we're not all there is. If so, we're in big trouble. - Ellen DeGeneres

The Idler, Friday, December 13, 2019

An answer

to the energy

question?

 

THE Christmas tree in a Chattanooga aquarium, in Tennessee, is being lit up by … an electric eel.

The electric eel in question is known as Miguel Wattson (Geddit? – watts), according to Huffington Post

A special system connected to Miguel's tank carries his electric shocks to power strands of lights on a nearby tree.

Miguel releases low-voltage blips of electricity when he's trying to find food. That translates to a rapid, dim blinking of the Christmas lights. When he's eating or excited he emits higher voltage shocks which cause bigger flashes.

Wattson has his ownTwitter account where he shares tweets generated by his sparky self, courtesy of coding by Tennessee Tech University's iCube centre.

"They combine electrical engineering and emerging business communication to give the eel a voice," centre director Kevin Liska says.

Between Miguel's tweets come statements like "SHAZAM!!!!" and "ka-BLAMEROO!!!!!,". A video posted to the account shows Miguel shaking in his tank as lights on the nearby tree sputter on and off.

Hey, what a Christmas in Chattanooga!

 

 

Unexpected energy

 

ELECTRIC eels are pretty rare on our coast. However, I knew a fellow who encountered one on the sandbank in the Mbotyi lagoon, down the Wild Coast.

He was wading across the sandbank when he stood on it. We've most of us had the somewhat unnerving experience of treading on a small skate in the sea or in a lagoon, and having the thing wriggle momentarily under the foot.

For this fellow it was exactly the same, except it also delivered a jolt of electricity. He leaped high in the air, splashing down backside first, where he landed on it again, getting another jolt of electricity in his nether regions.

A shocking experience, to be sure. But imagine how terrifying it must have been for the poor electric eel.

 

 

Stage 7

LOAD shedding continues. A video comes this way showing a fellow sitting in his digs, which are lit up only by a candle.

There's a knock at the door. "Eskom!"

He gets up and answers the door holding his candle. An Eskom official is standing there.

"Yes, how can I help you?"

"I'm here to implement Stage 7."

"What's Stage 7?"

Foof! The Eskom fellow leans forward and blows out the candle.

 

 

Insults with class

 

MORE from Rosemarie Jarski's Great British Wit. Topic: Insults, put-downs and comebacks.

 

·       If there's a worse insult I don't know it. I have just been told by my friend Gladys that she'd trust her husband to spend an evening alone with me. – Marjorie Proops.

·       I expect to pass through this world but once and therefore if there is anybody I want to kick in the crotch I had better kick them in the crotch now for I do not expect to pass this way again. – Maurice Bowra.

·       It seldom pays to be rude, It never pays to be half-rude. – Norman Douglas.

·       If I had to choose between him and a cockroach as a companion for a walking tour, the cockroach would have had it by a short head. – PG Wodehouse.

 

 

 

Tailpiece

 

PADDY is on a quiz show.

"What's the capital of Ireland?

"Pass!"

"Kissing which famous stone gives you the gift of the gab?"

"Pass!"

"What are the colours of the Irish flag?"

"Pass!"

Voice from the back of the studio: "Good man, Paddy! Tell dem nuttin!"

 

Last word

One should always play fairly when one has the winning cards. - Oscar Wilde

 

 

The Idler, Thursday, December 12, 2019

An inside

track on

Brit election?

DOES Sky News have an inside track on today's election in Blighty? A headline on their website declares: "Meet the woman about to become the world's youngest prime minister." A picture of Jo Swinson (aged 39), leader of the Liberal Democrats, accompanies it.

But how can they be so confident Jo will make it, presumably heading a coalition in a hung parliament?

 

Oh, silly me! It's not Jo at all. It's Sanna Martin (aged 34) who will be sworn in as prime minister of Finland on Tuesday. But the likeness is striking.

Maybe Sky are just spooking Boris Johnson, whose lead seemed to be shrinking in the polls over recent days. In a contest with so many imponderables it's just too close to call and a hung parliament seems still very much a possibility.

What an unconscious double for Sky News if Jo the Libdem should in fact end up replacing Bojo the Brexiteer as PM. I would not put money on it – in fact the odds are decidedly against – but then nor would I put money on Bojo getting a working majority, nor achieving Brexit by January as he says he will.

One senses that this Brexit soapie could have a way to run.

 

Zambia angle

FRONT page headline in the Times of Zambia: "Power cuts to ease".

Front page report: "Load-shedding hours are likely to reduce this week when Government starts importing electricity from South African power company, Eskom."

You don't know whether to laugh or cry – or maybe go out and get drunk.

Yes, Zambia and Zimbabwe have severe electricity supply problems because drought has limited hydro-electric capacity at Kariba.

Those are not quite the same problems as have beset Eskom.

Maybe getting drunk is the only option.

 

 

 

Tugela Basin?

ESKOM'S forerunner, the Electricity Supply Commission, formed in 1923. We got through World War II without load-shedding. (The blackouts along the coast were deliberate, to frustrate enemy submarines and possible attacks from Japanese aircraft carriers). We got through a lot more since, without load-shedding.

Whatever happened to those detailed plans to exploit the hydro-electric potential of the Tugela Basin, which it was calculated could generate power to serve several mega-cities, plus agriculture, and leave enough water flowing into the sea to serve a city the size of Greater London? People spent entire careers working on it, at both provincial and national level.

Are those plans mouldering somewhere in Pretoria? They certainly did exist, including a catchment transfer scheme from the rivers of the Eastern Cape to the Tugela Basin. Imagine the mass employment that would have provided, quite apart from the energy generated.

The model was Roosevelt's Tennessee Valley Authority in the US (which is still going strong).

Do today's energy planners know anything about these plans?

And what's happened about those solar power generating projects in the Northern Cape? Will Cape Town be allowed to make use of them?

So many questions, so few real answers. When will this country get smart? Escape the coal-fired thinking of the Victorian era?

Eskom call

MEANWHILE, a punter reports on interaction with Eskom.

"I phoned Eskom today and asked to speak to Jenna Reiters.

"They said: 'Sorry, no Jenna Reiters here.'

"I said: 'Don't you think it's time you got some?'

"They put the phone down."

Tailpiece

HE LOST the election to a pair of socks. He could taste defeat.

 

Last word

Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness. - Bertrand Russell