The star of
Rabbie
Burns
Though he was but a ploughman lad
And wore the hodden grey,
Auld Scotland's sweetest bard was bred
Aneath a roof o' strae.
To sweep the strings o' Scotia's lyre,
It needs nae classic lore;
It's mither wit an' native fire
That warms the bosom's core.
HEY, it's Burns Nicht – haggis, neeps an' tatties, bagpipes, loads of whusky and many a snatch of poetry and song.
Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o the puddin'-race!
That's how it kicks off. Royal Natal Yacht Club will be no place for Sassenachs tonight.
It's remarkable how Burns and his earthy, evocative poetic work will be celebrated in so many parts of the world tonight. He's been an inspiration in the Scottish diaspora and way beyond.
He's also reputed to have contributed to the bawdy ballad, The Ball of Kirriemuir, that is sung with gusto in every rugby club in the world (but has no place in a respectable newspaper).
Aye, the star of Rabbie Burns.
A RHEA is on the run in Oxfordshire … emus escape in Texas. What is it with these large, flightless birds, distant relatives of the ostrich?
Thames Valley Police in Oxfordshire, England, spotted the rhea – which originates in South America - legging it across Sonning Common, according to Sky News. They gave chase but it outran them and has not been seen since.
It is believed to have escaped from a farm.
Then at Galveston, an island off the coast of Texas, police spent a whole day chasing a pair of emus – originating from Australia – that had mysteriously put in an appearance.
These birds also know how to leg it, but the cops eventually caught them near a school. It turns out they escaped from the backyard of a fellow who did not know emus are not allowed on Galveston, according to Huffington Post.
The world waits anxiously for an ostrich break-out. Zoos everywhere are on high alert and Oudtshoorn is poised for declaration of a state of emergency.
A STATE legislator in Arizona wants to help fund President Donald Trump's Great Wall of Mexico by squeezing money out of every Arizonan who patronises pornographic websites.
Representative Gail Griffin (Republican) has introduced a bill to the state legislature that would have this effect, according to Huffington Post.
Hmmm. Does this somehow connect with Stormy Daniels?
THE cold snap in the northern hemisphere has brought out the skiers in their droves. But it appears to have irritated the moose population of Colorado, in the US.
Social media has a video of a large bull moose charging at skiers and snowboarders at a ski resort at Breckenridge, Colorado, according to Associated Press. Nobody was injured.
The resort management warn that mooses (meese?) are highly territorial and should be avoided.
Yes, but skiers and snowboarders can also be highly erratic in the territory they cover. I was once ski-ing in Austria where a fellow in our party managed, on one run, to knock a bloke off the ski-lift then land on the roof of a house, still standing on his skis. I reckon he'd have seen off any moose.
Just what is the plural of moose?
Tailpiece
A KENTUCKY cop flags down a trucker.
"You got any ID?"
"Got any idee 'bout whut?"
Last word
Howard Hughes was able to afford the luxury of madness, like a man who not only thinks he is Napoleon but hires an army to prove it. - Ted Morgan
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