The Idler, Friday, April 26, 2019

Date with

destiny in Van

Diemensland

THE Sharks being who and what they are, they will probably chow the New South Wales Waratahs in Sydney tomorrow. They do perform well Down Under and this season have shown a penchant for stirring performances away and silly buggers at home. You couldn't be further away than Sydney. Unless you're in Auckland or Christchurch or somewhere.

Also, they have some significant reinforcements in the Bewiskered Warthog Akker van der Merwe, returned from a brief excursion into pugilism; Tyler Paul, Ruan Botha and Jean-Luc du Preez. As we all know, the team have got what it takes anyway. When they turn it on, they're world class. It's all in the kop. Forget Durban. This is Sydney.

But we need that win. The damsels of the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties are optimistic, shifting already in their undergarments in anticipation of the traditional celebratory feu de joie when catapults are fashioned from their knicker elastic to shoot out the streetlights.

'Erewego, 'erewego, 'erewego!

Dialogue

A STRANGE bit of dialogue comes this way.

"The Sharks need a coach."

"But they've got a coach."

"No, they've got a dad just helping out."

I don't subscribe in any way to this. I believe the season will yet prove Robert du Preez' qualities. And the boys? C'mon, any Super 12 side would snap them up.

But you've got to admit it's kinda funny.

Cowbells

YOU retire to the countryside for a quiet life … and then you can't sleep at night for the pesky cowbells clanging in the meadow.

Or so argue a German couple who have unsuccessfully tried for the second time to get a Bavarian court to silence the cowbells, according to the BBC.

The unnamed couple, who live in the market town of Holzkirchen, also complain of the smell of manure and the insects that are attracted.

One does wonder what they are doing in the countryside. As local politician Ilse Aigner says: "The cow – with its bell – is part of our rural way of life."

But the townie couple insist the fight is not over. They're going to appeal. Ding, ding! Case dismissed! Again!

Dog overboard!

OIL rig workers found a dog swimming round a drilling platform – 220km off the coast of Thailand. The brown aspin – a local breed – was exhausted but swam to them when they called him.

The puzzle is how he got there. Speculation is that he must have fallen overboard from a vessel, possibly a fishing trawler, according to Sky News.

After a couple of days Boonrod – the Thai word for "survivor" – was sent to shore with a fuel tanker, and a vet pronounced him to be in good shape.

Boonrod has so far not signed on with another trawler.

 

Tailpiece

SNOW White is returning from town to the cottage in the forest where she lives with the Seven Dwarves. In the distance she sees smoke, then as she gets nearer she realises her cottage has burnt down.

Frantically she searches the forest for any sign of the dwarves, then she hears a lone voice chanting: "Scotland for the World Cup! Scotland for the World Cup!"

Snow White gives a gasp of relief. At least Dopey's safe.

 

Last word

It is a good morning exercise for a research scientist to discard a pet hypothesis every day before breakfast. It keeps him young.

Konrad Lorenz

The Idler, Thursday, April 24, 2019

Home sweet

seastead

home

THERE seem to be various layers of unreality in this "seasteading" story of the couple who set up home in a tiny floating cabin on top of a spar, 14 nautical miles off the Thai island of Phuket.

Thailand has taken umbrage at this violation of its territorial sovereignty and sent in the navy to tow the cabin ashore. The couple – American Chad Elwartowski and his unnamed Thai girlfriend – were not home at the time, which is just as well because the Thai authorities are threatening the death penalty, or life imprisonment, for this heinous offence.

It seems there's an embryonic seasteading movement, which wants to create floating cities worldwide as a response to global warming and rising sea levels. There's even a Seasteading Institute that's apparently having discussions with the UN, according to Reuters.

Is any of this real?

And now it turns out that Chad Elwartowski is a Bitcoin dealer. Bitcoin is the crypto-currency that exists in people's computers and is an Eldorado/a mirage, depending on your point of view.

As I say, layer upon layer of unreality. Perhaps a seastead cabin off Thailand is the appropriate HQ for a Bitcoin dealer. Seastead mortgages available in Bitcoin.

It's a strange, strange world that's getting stranger.

 

Mystery

DISASTER in the Free State? A message comes this way from one Sonette Diedericks to Parys Nuus & Inligting (Parys News & Information).

"Weet iemand iets van die kerk wat afgebrand het?" (Does anyone know anything about the church that burned down?)

Ah yes, Parys, the Paris of the Free State.

Hunch

ROB Nicolai, Howick's resident theoretical physicist, says the authorities in Paris have questioned all personnel on site at Notre Dame Cathedral to try to discover what caused the fire.

Quasimodo said: "I never saw anything suspicious but I have a hunch."

 

Lunch

 

WHICH recalls the riddle: What's greasy and flaps about church steeples?

The lunchpack of Notre Dame.

 

Happy hippo

 

AN IMAGE comes this way of this week's floods in Durban. It shows vehicles making their way down a flooded road, headlights on, the water very high.

Ahead of them in the water is a hippo.

Fact or photoshop? Probably the latter but fiction so easily becomes fact these days.

 

Bee patient

A YOUNG woman went to Fooyin University Hospital in Taiwan, complaining of severe pain in one eye. Doctors examined her and removed – live – four tiny bees that were feeding off the moisture in her tear ducts.

The young lady was discharged, clear-sighted. The bees were sent to a research institute for further study, according to Huffington Post.

It seems the sweat bees of Taiwan live off the moisture in the eyes of humans and animals. They very seldom sting. We're not told about the Taiwanese wasps and hornets.

 

 

Tailpiece

A STREAKER runs through a golf club, a towel over his face. He runs past three women.

"At least that's not my husband," says one.

"No, it's not," says the second woman.

"He's not even a member," says the third.

 

Last word

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author. - GK Chesterton

The Idler5, Tuesday, April 23, 2019

That hellish

Kremlin

all-nighter

AMERICA seems to be in a strange state of suspense. While Donald Trump is jubilant that the 22-month Mueller investigation has cleared his 2016 election campaign of collusion with Russia – though not necessarily him of obstruction of justice – very few know what the 485-page report actually says.

Attorney-General William Barr first summed it up in four pages, then last week released the full report but so heavily redacted (material edited out for various legal and security reasons) that nobody is much the wiser.

Now the New Yorker brings us an angle on the redaction process. It says Russian President Vladimir Putin and his team spent a "hellish all-nighter" redacting the report on behalf of Barr.

"The Russian president was reportedly 'in a state of disbelief' over how much Barr had failed to redact. Quickly assembling a crisis team at the Kremlin to implement further redactions, Putin told his associates: 'Put some coffee on, boys - it's going to be a long night.'"

This is satirist Andy Borowitz again, over the top, getting a bit of a laugh. Now the Democrats in the House of Representatives have subpoenaed to be shown an unredacted version.

Yet the redacted version speaks unambiguously anyway of Russia's Internet Research Agency running pro-Trump trolls and automated bots on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms, with social media accounts that "reached tens of millions of US persons".

Posts from some of these Russian accounts were retweeted unwittingly by high-profile supporters of then candidate Trump, including his sons, Donald J Trump jr and Eric Trump.

These fake accounts even set up rallies using unwitting supporters in the US.

Nobody can say quite what effect all this had on the outcome. But given that Trump actually had an overall minority vote – it's surely a concern.

Then consider well-founded suspicions that Russia did the same with the Brexit referendum in Britain – again a narrow result.

What are Vladimir Putin's interests in all this? Discord in Nato – which has already happened to an extent. A weakening of the EU and Britain.

Maybe Borowitz is closer to the mark than we think.

 

Rugby stats

A DRY statistic. The weekend before Easter, Maritzburg College sent 25 rugby teams to Pretoria Boys' High. All 25 won their matches.

Playful emails between Maritzburg and Pretoria have ensued. One Pretoria father declared: "I enjoyed the day's rugby like I enjoy a day at the dentist."

There's a song about it: Marching To Pretoria.

Free State

DISASTER in the Free State? A message comes this way from one Sonette Diedericks to Parys Nuus & Inligting (Parys News & Information).

"Weet iemand iets van die kerk wat afgebrand het?" (Does anyone know anything about the church that burned down?)

Ah, Parys, the Paris of the Free State.

Hunch

ROB Nicolai, Howick's resident theoretical physicist, says the authorities in Paris have questioned all personnel on site at Notre Dame Cathedral to try to discover what caused the fire.

Quasimodo said: "I never saw anything suspicious but I have a hunch."

 

Lunch

WHICH recalls the riddle: What's greasy and flaps about church steeples?

The lunchpack of Notre Dame.

 

No surprises?

INVESTMENT analyst Dr James Greener takes issue with Pakamani Hadebe, the new CEO at Eskom, for saying: "Surprises at Eskom are over".

"One would think that the message to keep one's head down and mouth shut would by now be carved into the large mahogany desk in the corner office at Megawatt Park. Or just scrawled in lipstick on the mirror in the en-suite bathroom.

"There are just so many skeletons in so many cupboards in that business that surprises are never over.

"What about the company's debt book? A huge concern both for Eskom and the whole nation's credit rating."

 

 

Tailpiece

THIS fellow is in a bookshop. He approaches a woman behind the counter.

"I say, do you keep stationery?"

"No, usually I wriggle a bit."

Last word

Events in the past may be roughly divided into those which probably never happened and those which do not matter.

William Ralph Inge

The Idler, Thursday, April 18, 2019

Refugees

from the

razor

IS POGONOPHOBIA about to become a source of social discord? The word means fear or dislike of beards and bearded men, derived from the Greek pogon for beard.

For a long time, maiden aunts and others have harboured suspicions as to the motivation of those who sport facial hair. Now researchers at the Hirslanden Clinic near Zurich, in Switzerland, have come out with it emphatically – bearded men carry more germs than dogs.

They compared the bacterial load of human-pathogenic micro-organisms in specimens taken from 18 bearded men and 30 dogs, according to Huffington Post.

All the bearded bros showed high microbial counts, compared with only 23 out of 30 dogs. In fact, seven of the men had so much beard bacteria they were at risk of falling ill, says the BBC.

"On the basis of these findings, dogs can be considered as clean, compared with bearded men," study author Andreas Gutzeit said.

It's caused quite a hoo-ha. Keith Flett, founder of the Beard Liberation Front in Britain, cast doubt on the report.

"I think it's possible to find all sorts of unpleasant things if you took swabs from people's hair and hands and then tested them. I don't believe that beards in themselves are unhygienic.

"There seems to be a constant stream of negative stories about beards that suggest it's more about pogonophobia than anything else."

Flett perhaps has a point. What breeds of dog were tested? A short-haired fox terrier would be virtually microbe-free. After burrowing for rats or moles, within 20 minutes or so his coat looks like an advert for Omo, having rubbed off all the dirt on the furniture. An Airedale terrier by comparison carries around in his thick coat all kinds of often unidentifiable matter that could well provide a breeding ground for microbes. I know, I've owned both.

Accepting that bearded men are themselves pretty constant in terms of any microbe count – they seldom go burrowing after rats or moles – it makes all the difference in the world whether they are being compared with fox terriers or Airedale terriers.

That said, it seems there has for a long time been a prejudice against beards. In August 2013, Christopher Oldstone-Moore, history lecturer at Wright State University in Ohio and author of The Beard Movement in Victorian Britain, commented: "Facial hair for the past century has been thought to reflect a suspicious streak of individuality and defiance ... Politicians, public servants and businessmen – and apparently journalists – risk their reputations if they abandon the razor."

This is shocking prejudice. There was a time at Oxford University when students would shout: "Beaver!" at any bearded geezer they encountered. Will the Hirslanden Clinic research see a resurgence of such rudeness.

I think we have to go out of our way to show kindness to our bearded fellow-citizens. Pogonophobia has no place. Let's have Pogonophilia instead. The fairer sex have to take a lead in this – plant kisses on the bearded ones at every opportunity.

Of course, I have no personal interest in this. But if the bearded ones want to buy me beer, who am I to decline?

Tailpiece

TWO retired army officers are sitting in their club.

Says one: "When did you last make love to a woman?"

"Oh, 1947."

"Good heavens, that's a long time ago."

"Not really. It's only ten past eight now."

 

Last word

Until you walk a mile in another man's moccasins you can't imagine the smell.

Robert Byrne

The Idler, Wednesday, April 17, 2019

Florida is

where it's

happening

IT'S all happening in Florida, in the US. Three women were found lounging about stark naked at a highway rest stop near Tampa Bay. Questioned by police, they said they were "air drying" after taking a shower.

They then cut short the police interview, jumping into their car and speeding off, pursued by the cops, according to Huffington Post.

When the cops followed them to a shop's parking lot, one of the gals got out and attacked them with a pink baseball bat. All three had to be tasered before being taken to the lock-up to be charged with fleeing to elude police, resisting arrest, aggravated assault and lewd behaviour.

These Florida gals are high-spirited but clearly a handful.

Meanwhile, at Fort Myers the place is being invaded by horny and hungry alligators. Two factors coincide. It's the mating season. Also, high temperatures have wrought a metabolic change, making the alligators hungry as well. So instead of honeymooning in the swamps, as usual, they've made for the suburbs where there's a bit of grub to be found as well.

It's all rather chaotic. Yes, Florida is where it's happening.

Cathedral city

SALISBURY, the Wiltshire cathedral city, has been named the best place in Britain to live. This is according to a poll by the British Sunday Times.

Home editor Helen Davies says: "Salisbury remains a divinely attractive and welcoming place. It's handy for coast, countryside and London, has some of the best schools in the south-west, a great market and it's very strong culturally too."

That's fine – just as long as you can avoid the Russian secret service spooks with their novichok poison.

British wit

MORE from Rosemarie Jarski's Great British Wit. Topic: Success.

·         Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm. - Winston Churchill.

·         All the rudiments for success in life are to be found ironing trousers. – Chris Eubank.

·         Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess.

·         Winning is everything. The only ones who remember when you come second are your wife and dog. – Damon Hill.

·         If you can keep your head when all about are losing theirs, you'll be taller than anybody else. – Tim Brooke-Taylor.

·         The penalty for success is to be bored by the people who used to snub you. – Nancy Astor.

·         I attribute my whole success in  life to a rigid observance of the fundamental rule – never have yourself tattooed with any woman's name, not even her initials. – PG Wodehouse.

Change

DURBAN poet Sarita Mathur pens some lines on change.

We all seek change,
From the inside out,
Abundance within our world🌎
Within our heart and mind.
Contentment of another kind
Away from all the noise and din.
In restfulness and peace.
Our outer world will also change,
Bringing in joy and happiness
Contentment too.
Change within ourselves.
Creates the change we seek.
Our physical world gets transformed too,
We have to Be The Change
We want to see.
A happy and dynamic future.
Awaits you
As it awaits me.

 

Tailpiece

DADDY takes little Johnny to the zoo for a treat. When they get back, Mummy asks: "Did you have a nice time?"

Little Johnny says: "It was great. For Daddy too. He was so happy when one of the animals came in at 30 to 1."

Last word

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. - F Scott Fitzgerald

The Idler, Tuesday, April 16, 2019

Please no

spikka da

Engleesh

DEBORAH Haynes, foreign affairs editor on Sky News, has appealed to foreigners not to reply in English when Brits approach them using their own language, however imperfectly.

"It's demoralising and actually - unless we're floundering and need help - rather rude.

"I've lost count of the number of times I've bucked up the courage to attempt a bit of French in a French-speaking nation only to have the person I'm addressing shoot back in English. (She's in Brussels for the Brexit drama).

"I imagine most times the other person is simply trying to be polite, rather than get in a bit of English-language practice at my expense, but at least give me a chance.

"I found myself feeling pathetically grateful - after largely receiving English responses to my French questions - when in a cafe in Brussels I ordered a pain au chocolat and a cup of tea in French (not hard) to be met with a response… also in French!

"The waiter asked if I wanted milk with my tea, to which I responded: '"Yes please" (Oui, s'il vous plait - see, it's really not hard)'."

How does this square with my own experience once in Brussels. The signage everywhere is bilingual – French/Flemish. You can buy on the streets a Flemish newspaper. Flemish is very close to Afrikaans – more so than Dutch. But, I was to discover, Brussels is actually a French-speaking city.

 

I needed a toothbrush. The shop sign said "Apotek". Ha, Apteek. I marched in and asked for a "tandeborsel."

"M'sieur?" The girl behind the counter was flummoxed. She called a colleague.

The colleague spoke slowly and deliberately" "Do you speak may-be a leetle bit Engleesh?"

"Ag ja, I speak a leetle, leetle bit Engleesh. A teethbrush asseblief."

As I walked out with my toothbrush, I heard one of the girls say: "C'est un Allemagne." (He's a Gerrman).

Election sediment

THE election looms ever closer. Investment analyst Dr James Greener notes in his latest grumpy newsletter a connected geological process.

"Sedimentologists are flocking to a traffic island on the M4 in Durban North to view the wonderful example of bedding taking place on a row of flagpoles.

"As each new posse of party workers adds their own flimsy cardboard-mounted poster to the top of the pole it soon slides down compressing those beneath it and after some rain there is a perfect layering of portraits and promises at the base of each pole.

"Wind weathering is adding to the geological processes. The lower levels could be nearly fossilised by now."

 

 

Fascist dogs

OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties:

"Dogs are fascists. I like cats."

"That's ridiculous."

"Absolutely absurd."

"Dogs don't have political ideas."

"Did you ever see a police cat?"

Implants

TECHNOLOGY news. Apple has announced that it has developed a breast implant that can store and play music.

The device will cost from $499 (R6 956) to $699, depending on cup and speaker size.

This is considered a breakthrough because women are always complaining about men staring at their breasts and not listening to them.

 

Tailpiece

THIS fellow goes into his local and is astonished to see a cow serving behind the bar

"What are you staring at?" says the cow. "Never seen a cow serving drinks before?"

"It's not that. It's just I never thought the moose would sell this place."

 

 

Last word

Good taste is the enemy of comedy.

Mel Brooks

The Idler, Monday, April 15

A debacle

to be

missed

ALAS and alack – what happened in the Jaguares debacle? I'm afraid I can offer no explanation, no analysis, because I was not there (I count myself fortunate), I was at Old Halliwell, up in the Midlands, making merry with my Big Cousin Jennifer, who used to swing me around by my arms when I was a kid, on our granny's front lawn.

Twenty-odd of us were there celebrating Big Cousin Jennifer's 180^th birthday, seated on a vine-shaded verandah of the stone-walled structure dating back to the transport rider days of the 1830s, partaking of a fantastic, lingering lunch and looking down on the lovely Karkloof valley.

Yes, the Midlands are a tonic to the soul. They remind me very much of the Scottish border country. Old Halliwell lies between Howick and Currie's Post and for many years I believed Howick was a misspelling of Hawick, Queen of a' the Borders, back in Bonny Scotland. But actually it was named after Lord Howick, Secretary of State for the Colonies back in those days.

What do we do about Sharks rugby? This seesaw stuff is just too much. I could volunteer the services of my Big Cousin Jennifer against the Queensland Reds– even at age 180 she can still swing 'em around and she's a ferocious forager. You should have just seen her at the lunch.

On the other hand, itchy-powder in the jockstraps could be just the thing. It concentrates the mind.

America

NEWS from America. An off-duty firefighter walked starkers into a Rhode Island convenience store, smiling broadly, bought a soda and left without causing any kind of fuss.

He got into his car, put on his gear drove off and next thing was flagged down by the fuzz.  Seems the convenience store had phoned in about a dangerous nutter.

According to Huffington Post it had been a bet with his girlfriend, who'd been sitting in the car fully clothed all the time.

Now he's been charged with disorderly conduct and the fire department – where he has 40 years' service – has put him on administrative leave.

Is there not a bit of overkill here? What if there's a fire on Rhode Island? He'd wear at least his fireman's helmet.

Meanwhile, in Portland, Oregon, police entered a bathroom with guns drawn. They'd been alerted by a house-sitter that somebody was moving round in there.

It turned out to be a robotic vacuum cleaner that had switched itself on.

At least it wasn't an off-duty fireman, stark naked. The cops had a good laugh.

 

 

Scotland

NEWS from Scotland. A Staffordshire bull terrier needed an emergency op at a Glasgow veterinary clinic after swallowing a Nintendo video game.

The dog, named Rocco, began vomiting and could not eat. An X-ray showed he had a rectangular-shaped object in his small intestine that turned out to be a Nintendo DS cartridge, according to Sky News.

It's not surprising Rocco was ill. Many of us can't stomach video games and Nintendo is, I understand, full of violence and altogether over the top.

 

Tailpiece

HOW do you know an Irishman is at the cockfight?

He enters a duck.

How do you know a Pole is there?

He puts money on the duck,

How do you know an Italian is there?

The duck wins.

Last word

Idleness is not doing nothing. Idleness is being free to do anything.

Floyd Dell