The great
spaghetti
court drama
MY OLD colleague George Muller tells me the former Judge President of Natal, John Broome, has died at his home aged 91.
Judge Broome, who went to Hilton College, qualified in law at the English Bar and converted to the South African Bar in 1956. He took silk in 1971 and was appointed to the Natal Bench in 1976.
George – who for years drew the daily "By George" cartoon for the Daily News, besides his other editorial duties, has good reason to remember John Broome. As an advocate he defended him in the 1960s in the hilarious "Spaghetti Libel" case.
George needed a picture to illustrate a piece he was placing in the paper about stomach complaints. He got from the library a file photograph of a man demonstrating the wrong way to eat spaghetti. The fellow had the stuff hanging from his mouth and plastered all over his face.
George wrote an amusing caption along the lines of "Da stomachi gonna getta da achi …"
Unfortunately the man in the picture was local - a classy Italian tailor who took great umbrage and sued, saying he'd been ridiculed and defamed.
The Daily News eventually paid damages of R1 000 – a tidy sum in those days – and George's colleagues never let him forget about Signor Stomachi. But he did have a great dinner table story.
Daily signal
A SNIPPET of news from a reader who calls himself Hughbythesea.
Every Monday morning for years, at about 11:30 am, the telephone operator in a small Sierra-Nevada town in America received a call from a man asking the exact time.
One day the operator asked why the regularity.
"I'm foreman of the local sawmill," the caller explained. "Every day, I have to blow the whistle at noon, so I call you to get the exact time."
The operator giggled, "That's funny," she said. "All this time, we've been setting our clock by your whistle."
"Could this be happening in Nkandla too," asks Hughbythesea.
Very likely. The daily signal for firepool drill.
Decision
OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties: "I used to think drinking was bad for you … so I gave up thinking."
Overspend
ON AVERAGE, the government now each month spends 30% more that it collects, says investment analyst Dr James Greener in his latest grumpy newsletter.
"This is the sort of number that ought to keep finance ministers awake at nights. As the saying goes: those who understand compound interest, earn it. Those who don't, pay it.
"The amount that the nation has to borrow grows every month and so too does the interest on that loan. And yet like foreign policy, the national debt raised barely a mention in the manifestos of the parties in the election.
"One fellow in red overalls and beret even promised to double one of the single biggest items in the Budget (the monthly social grant hand-out) and this naturally was warmly cheered.
"Whatever the rhetoric and grandstanding that we have been subjected to, the reality of that debt is slowly grinding away and will swamp everything. Government and indeed most official spending is in desperate need of pruning."
Oh boy! Will Cyril one day regret winning that election?
Tailpiece
He: "I love you."
She: "Is that the beer talking?"
He: "It's me, talking to the beer."
Last word
I am opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer me the position.
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