Be like a
cockatoo –
go man go!
SCIENTISTS in America are astonished at the way a white, sulphur-crested cockatoo named Snowball dances like crazy to 1980s music.
Snowball, who has never had a dance lesson in his life, lunges on his perch, lifts his feet and swings from side-to-side in 14 different dance routines when they put on songs like Another One Bites The Dust and Girls Just Want To Have Fun.
According to Sky News, after an initial study by his owner, Irena Schulz, he displayed a greater range of movements than at first thought. The scientists studied further and conclude that Snowball seems to dance as a response to music.
As they put it in the magazine Current Biology, "This would be remarkable, as creativity in non-human animals has typically been documented in behaviours aimed at obtaining an immediate physical benefit, such as access to food or mating opportunities.
"Snowball does not dance for food or in order to mate; instead, his dancing appears to be a social behaviour used to interact with human caregivers (his surrogate flock)."
Astonishing stuff. And we have a parallel example right here in Durban. A habitue of the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties shares his flat on the Berea with an ensemble of singing/dancing hadedahs. They do everything from Gilbert and Sullivan to Rhythm and Blues. It's pretty raucous.
Those Current Biology folk should come out and take a look.
Row simmers
THE transatlantic row continues to simmer over the unflattering analysis by British ambassador Sir Kim Darroch of the capabilities of President Donald Trump and his White House.
Memos to his government from Sir Kim contained words like "inept", "chaotic", "incoherent" and "dysfunctional." Mysteriously, they have been leaked.
Prime Minister Theresa May (yes, she's still in place for now) has said she stands by Sir Kim, though she disagrees with his analysis.
President Trump says he'll have nothing to do with Sir Kim and as for Theresa May, she "made a mess of Brexit" in spite of all the good advice he gave her.
Now a new angle. The New Yorker quotes Sir Kim saying he tried to conceal his insulting remarks from Donald Trump by writing them in English.
"I believed that, by writing these messages in English, it would serve the same purpose as encryption," Darroch said. "The fact that Trump was somehow able to decode them remains deeply mysterious to me."
Darroch said that "out of an abundance of caution," he took further steps to make the cables indecipherable to Trump, deploying multisyllabic words such as "dysfunctional."
"Clearly, I did not take into account the possibility that one of his aides might read these cables aloud to him and explain what all of the long words meant. I was not aware that there was anyone at the White House capable of performing such duties."
But, according to the New Yorker, Trump appears not to be taking the insulting cables personally.
"The British are just mad at us for taking over their airports in the eighteenth century," he said.
Yes, this is satirist Andy Borowitz again.
Tailpiece
TWO goats are scavenging on some rough ground behind a Hollywood film lot when they find an old roll of celluloid film. They're munching away at the film when one says to the other: "Not bad, is it?"
"Mmmm, it's okay. But I think the book was better."
Last word
The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well. - Joe Ancis
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