The Idler, Monday, October 25, 2010

England expects … regulations

YESTERDAY was the Trafalgar Day lunch, at Point Yacht Club, where the Royal Naval Association and guests toasted Nelson's victory of 205 years ago. It happens every year, all over the Commonwealth.

But how would Nelson the naval genius have fared in today's age of Wikileaks, the Health and Safety regime in Britain and general political correctness? A Durban-based master mariner sends this account.

"Order the signal, Hardy."

"Aye, aye sir."

"Hold on, that's not what I dictated to the signal officer. What's the meaning of this?"

"Sorry sir?"

"England expects every person to do his duty, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religious persuasion or disability. What gobbledegook is this?"

"Admiralty policy, I'm afraid, sir. We're an equal opportunities employer now. We had the devil's own job getting 'England' past the censors, lest it be considered racist."

"Gadzooks, Hardy! Hand me my pipe and tobacco!"

"Sorry sir. All naval vessels have been designated smoke-free working environments."

"In that case, break open the rum ration. Let us splice the mainbrace to steel the men before battle."

"The rum ration has been abolished, Admiral. It's part of the Government's policy on binge drinking."

"Good heavens, Hardy. I suppose we'd better get on with it. Full speed ahead!

"I think you'll find that there's a four knot speed limit in this stretch of water, sir."

"Damn it man! We're on the eve of the greatest sea battle in history. We must advance with all dispatch. Report from the crow's nest, please."

"That won't be possible, sir."

"What?"

"Health and Safety have closed the crow's nest, sir. No harness. And they said that rope ladder doesn't meet regulations. They won't let anyone up there until a proper scaffolding can be erected."

"Then get me the ship's carpenter without delay, Hardy!"

"He's busy knocking up a wheelchair access to the fo'c'sle Admiral."

"Wheelchair access? I've never heard anything so absurd."

"Health and Safety again, sir. We have to provide a barrier-free environment for the differently abled."

"Differently abled? I've only one arm and one eye and I refuse even to hear mention of the word. I didn't rise to the rank of admiral by playing the disability card."

"Actually, sir, you did. The Royal Navy is under-represented in the areas of visual impairment and limb deficiency."

"Whatever next? Give me full sail! The salt spray beckons."

"A couple of problems there too, sir. Health and Safety won't let the crew up the rigging without crash helmets. And they don't want anyone breathing in too much salt - haven't you seen the adverts?"

"I've never heard such infamy. Break out the cannon and tell the men to stand by to engage the enemy!"

"The men are a bit worried about shooting at anyone, Admiral."

"What? This is mutiny."

"It's not that, sir. It's just that they're afraid of being charged with murder if they actually kill anyone. There's a couple of legal aid lawyers on board, watching everyone like hawks."

"Then how are we to sink the Frenchies and the Spanish?"

"Actually, sir, we're not."

"We're not?"

"No, sir. The Frenchies and the Spanish are our European partners now. According to the Common Fisheries Policy, we shouldn't even be in this stretch of water. We could get hit with a claim for compensation."

"But you must hate a Frenchman as you hate the devil!"

"I wouldn't let the ship's diversity co-ordinator hear you saying that sir. You'll be up on disciplinary."

"You must consider every man an enemy who speaks ill of your King."

"Not any more, sir. We must be inclusive in this multicultural age. Now put on your Kevlar vest, sir; it's the rules."

"Don't tell me - Health and Safety. Whatever happened to rum, sodomy and the lash?"

"As I explained, sir, rum is off the menu. And there's a ban on corporal punishment."

"What about sodomy?"

"I believe it's to be encouraged, sir."

"In that case - kiss me Hardy!"

Tailpiece

THE NAPOLEONIC wars were a long time ago but they at least produced one bit of cross-Channel acculturation.

The French crews, before they put to sea, heeded the call: "A l'eau, c'est l'hoeure" (To the water, it is the hour). This anglicises to: "Hello sailor!" which is a term today heard on every English wharfside.

Last word

 

"Sailors have the cleanest bodies and the filthiest minds"

Eleanor Roosevelt

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

The Idler, Friday, October 22, 2010

Eeriness on the N3

 

THERE was something eerie about it like suddenly coming upon the mythical Elephants' Graveyard – pantechnichons, container carriers, all kinds of weird and wonderful giant rigs standing there motionless on the N3.

 

Had they assembled to die, as in the myth? No, it turns out there had been some kind of accident on the down carriageway just outside Maritzburg yesterday and now these behemoths of the road were pushed back almost to Howick – a distance of some 20 km – their engines switched off, some of their crews braai-ing at the roadside. I happened to spot this phenomenon from the up carriageway, on my way to the Karkloof.

 

The traffic police seemed to have somehow filtered the cars and other light vehicles out of the logjam and sent them on the old route through Hilton – which the giants would not be able to negotiate. It only added to the surreal atmosphere of kilometre after kilometre of stranded hugeness.

 

In such a situation questions arise. What was this massive bottleneck costing the economy? For how much longer can the N3 serve as the only link between the Gauteng megalopolis and Durban, Africa's greatest port? And what the heck has happened to our rail system that should be carrying most of this load?

 

Elephants' Graveyard – maybe that's it.

 

Tricky case

I'M TOLD there's a little confusion between the police and the prosecuting authorities.

The cops breathalysed a motorist in Florida Road the other night and found him to be over the limit. They took him to the police station, where charges were laid.

Name of the accused, as recorded: Charles Glass.

Distant galaxy

A TINY, faint dot in a picture taken by the Hubble space telescope has been confirmed as the most distant galaxy ever detected in the Universe.

This collection of stars -classified as UDFy-38135539 - is so far away its light has taken more than 13 billion years to arrive at Earth.

Tiny and faint it might be – but be sure, if there's intelligent life out there it will sooner or later make contact with the folk on the Bluff.

Lanky cat

YESTERDAY we had a picture of an American cat named Stewie being held out at full stretch by his adoring owner, Robin Hendrickson. Stewie, of Reno, Nevada, had just been recognised as the world's longest cat at 123.2cm, from the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail bone.

I'm not sure who goes around measuring cats in this way, let alone who records the measurements and adjudicates. But it does illustrate the metaphor of a place being too small to swing a cat in.

 

The worm turns

A FLUTTER in Russia. A regional governor, Sergei Zelenin, posted a message on Twitter claiming he found a worm in a salad he was served at the Kremlin. He illustrated it with a photograph of a live worm on a plate of salad.

"That's an original way to show that the lettuce leaf is fresh," he said.

But the Kremlin is not amused, and top foreign policy adviser Sergei Prikhodko accuses Mr Zelenin of "irresponsibility, stupidity and imbecility".

"I would advise anyone who wants to invite Mr Zelenin as a guest to think hard before doing so," he says.

There are other ways to handle such matters. I once knew an army officer who, when on duty in the mess hall, went about with the traditional "Any complaints?"

Suddenly a private said: "Yes Sir!" and produced a lettuce leaf with a caterpillar on it.

As my officer friend boggled, wondering what to do, the sergeant-major intervened: "Well, don't wave it around, son! Everyone will want one!"

 

Tailpiece

 

DAVID Cameron is visiting a hospital ward in Edinburgh. He greets a patient who replies: "Fair fa your honest sonsie face, great chieftain o' the puddin' race, aboon them a' you take your place, painch, tripe or thairm, as langs my arm."

 

Retreating in confusion, Cameron tries the next patient, who replies: "Some hae meat and cannae eat, and some wad eat but want it, but we hae meat and can eat, so let the Lord be thankit."

 

In desperation he tries the next patient. " Wee sleekit,  cowrin' timrous beastie …" the man begins.

 

Cameron asks the ward sister: "What kind of facility is this? A mental ward?"

 

"No, it's the Serious Burns Unit."

 

Last word

 

There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full.

Henry Kissinger

 

Captain Cook Friday, ctober 21, 2010

This was rugby at its best. An utterly transfixed crowd being lashed by freezing rain as our fellows kept them out so doggedly; the crowd there 'til the bitter end. Total identification with the team, a hoarse roar at every yard gained, every tackle put in, every line-out forced. This was Horatio on the Bridge, to the laws of rugby union, an epic.

And haunting the mind of all of us old enough to remember it, the spectre of that Currie Cup final of 1956 – our first ever – when, in very similar weather conditions, Northerns (the very same old enemy) were throwing at Peter Taylor's Natal side everything including the kitchen sink in the dying minutes of the game, seeking to rub out our 8-6 lead.

It's history that they managed it – a very dodgy try as injury time ticked away its last few seconds and they took it 9-8 (tries were worth three points in those days). Was it going to happen again?

This was truly desperate stuff. Our defence was absolutely heroic. This was hard, hard rugby, throughout the game. No quarter asked or given. Both sides attacking the gain line; both putting in the most crunching tackles.

Our pack were magnificent. It's difficult to find the right superlative. So starved of possession were the Bulls in the first half that when Morne Steyn did receive, he seemed somewhat surprised and puzzled by this oval object that had landed in his hands.

Our backs were also magnificent, especially under the high ball. The Bulls tried the hoist and chase time after time – the up-and-under, the Garryowen, the skop en donder, as it's variously known – and only once did it half-work. Our fellows were cool as cucumbers, steady as rock, even in that driving rain.

Magnifico! The game proved yet again that strength on paper means nothing. The match is not played on paper but out on the turf, on the day. Eighty minutes decide matters. The side that really wants it generally gets it. I wonder what the bookies are saying about tomorrow week?

Our win last Saturday was celebrated with customary decorum in the Duikers' Club – a bit of high-spirited bok-bok, some Cossack dancing on the bar counter and, er, exotic dancing by the Tattooed Lady. I understand things got a little out of hand in Florida Road.

In fact I understand the ladies of the Pub With No Name are planning a streak down Florida Road next Saturday if we should clinch it against Western Province. It sounds a little alarming but, on the other hand, why not? The fellows will be using their knicker elastic anyway to shoot out the street lights in celebration. Yes, the Florida Road feu de joe. What a way to end a rousing season!

But first the lads have to deliver. There's no reason why they shouldn't. They've got a week now to recover from that cruncher. To get their kop right again, as it was last week. Plummers and the boys have had a fantastic season. Let's keep the focus, end on the highest of high notes. Let's give Florida Road a fright!

'Erewego, 'erewego, 'erewego!

The Idler, Thursday, October 21

Two old gents with a tale to tell

IT WAS A pleasure this week to meet two absolutely game old gents, each with a vivid story to tell. Peter Johnson, aged 89, lives in Westville and came along with his daughters. Cyril Crompton, 94, drove down alone from Johannesburg and was staying in a backpackers' lodge.

They were at Adams bookstore in Durban for the launch of their book, Luck's Favours (Echoing Green Press), which recounts their separate experiences in World War II.

To start with the elder, Cyril was stationed at the Bluff gun battery but found it a bit dull. He hankered for action and heard that the Royal Durban Light Infantry were about to be posted Up North. So he and a fellow-gunner swam the harbour mouth and re-enlisted with the RDLI.

So far, so good – except the army doesn't work that way. You don't pick and choose. Ten days later they were arrested by the military police and charged with desertion and banged up in jail.

But the army lawyers scratched their heads. How do you charge a man with desertion when he's signed up for another regiment? They realised the whole thing was bloody silly, dropped the charges and had them sent back to the Bluff.

From there, Cyril transferred to the Anti-Aircraft Regiment then found himself at Sidi Rezegh, site of an awful battle in the Western Desert that accounted for 10 percent of South African casualties in the entire war. Smuts described Sidi Rezegh as the Delville Wood of World War II.

The South Africans fought Rommel's troops until the last round of ammunition, then had to surrender. They went into the bag and much of Cyril's part of the book – titled For the Adventure of it – describes being sent as POWs to work the coalfields in Poland, then the incredible hardship of a forced retreat in mid-winter as the Russians advanced on the Germans.

Peter was a signaller who was taken POW at Tobruk. His account – titled On the Run in Wartime Italy – describes escapes from Italian and German POW camps and a phase when he joined Yugoslavian partisans who were harassing Axis supply lines.

He also describes the role of the ordinary Italian people – women especially – in assisting escaped POWs. He told the launch of his chance encounter with an Italian contessa who assisted him. Questioned by the audience, he insisted he had only this very brief association with the contessa. Did I catch a gleam in his eye?

These are two very game old birds indeed,.

 

Living links

PUBLISHER Jim Phelps described Cyril Crompton and Peter Johnson as living links with a time when South Africa was the darling of the world. A wholly volunteer army had successfully fought Nazism and Fascism. The prime minister, General Smuts, had been a driving force in founding the United Nations.

The Nats had seized South Africa by the throat in 1948 and ruined all that. We have still not quite recovered, he said.

It's a good point.

Round the bend

RESCUE workers in Jiangsu province, China, had to break apart a toilet bowl to free a man who had his arm jammed down it, trying to retrieve his cellphone which he had dropped. He was immersed up to his shoulder in the U-bend.

It rather reminds me of the story of the fellow who went to great lengths to fish his haversack from one of the ponds at the sewage treatment works.

It had his lunch in it.

UK defence cuts

WHAT'S the difference between Hitler and David Cameron?

Hitler didn't sink the Ark Royal.

Halloween

WINE makers in California have taken to growing giant pumpkins, according to this news snippet. In a recent pumpkin competition the winner weighed 1 500lb

That's some punkin. I suppose they rate it as a jeroboam. Does this mean a new idiom for the wine writers?

"This chardonnay has the nose of a hubbard squash, taking us swiftly into a delightful medley of butternut, gemsquash and pumpkin fronds ..."

Great for Halloween parties.

Tailpiece

"DOCTOR, I'm worried about my husband. He thinks he's a lorry."

"You'd better send him to me."

"Not today. He's gone to Newcastle to deliver some 10-ton steel girders."

Last word

 

There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action.

Bertrand Russell

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

The Idler, Wednesday, October 20, 2010

But where are the Nats now?

 

WE OF THE SCRIBBLING craft have been marking the 33^rd anniversary of the Nat government's closure of the World newspaper and some other publications. The anxiety is that our present rulers intend bestowing on themselves powers to muzzle information that even the Nats did not have.

 

The concern is in order. But we need also reflect that the newspapers are still with us. Where are the Nats?

 

Also, in today's digital age of e-mail, cell-phones and all the gadgetry  of the internet, information control is simply impossible.

 

Press control belonged with the mindset and technology of the Cold War. It's astonishing that so many of our politicos don't realise that.

 

 

Wizardry

 

WE LIVE in an age of electronic wizardry. You need money to pay the parking garage? You go to the ATM. You want to pay the parking garage? You slip your ticket into the slot. A message comes up telling you what you owe. You slip a banknote into the machine.

 

It spits it back. It doesn't accept anything higher than a R20 note. But the ATM doesn't give you anything smaller than a R50 note. The ATM is round the corner from the parking garage.

 

So you go to the shop and buy a stick of peppermints, the way you did in grandma's day, just to get some change.

 

Plummers blossoms

 

READER Valerie Johnson and her husband Ron have discovered why the bees swarmed last Saturday, delaying the start of the Currie Cup semi-final.

 

"It's springtime and they knew Plumtree was about to blossom."

 

 

State of suspense

 

ANYONE feeling noivous? Several mass killers are apparently on a list of prisoners being considered for presidential pardon. Meanwhile, enough weapons have been stolen from police stations in recent years to arm the defence forces of a couple of our neighbouring states.

 

A former naval armourer tells me there's no excuse for the theft of weapons. Rifles should be stored with a chain through the trigger guards and with the bolts removed and stored in a safe in a different locality, he says. A rifle without its bolt is no use to anyone.

 

"This is sheer negligence on the part of the police. In the army, navy or air force they would be court martialled."

 

Yet the thefts continue. Just the other day a police station near Pretoria got hit. Where else do you find such contempt for the police?

 

 

 

Grand Candy

IT'S THE SWEET life in Armenia. The central Caucasus country has just produced the world's largest ever chocolate bar.

Called the Grand Candy, it measured more than 5 m in length and took three days to make. It weighed more than four tons.

The bar gave Armenia its first Guinness world record and led to a huge celebration. It was cut up and distributed .

Statisticians say the average Armenian eats 40kg of chocolate a year and it would take therefore take him 107 years for him to get through eating the giant bar.

Will this be another attempt at a Guinness record?

Useless invention

 

NEWS from Texas. Dr Calvin Rickson, a scientist from Texas A&M University has invented a bra that keeps women's breasts from jiggling and bouncing up and down. It also prevents the nipples pushing through the fabric when cold weather sets in. At a news conference, after announcing the invention, a large group of men took Dr Rickson outside and beat the daylights out of him.

 

Lotto stunner

SHAKE the bag! Israeli lotto punters were stunned when six numbers - 36, 33, 32, 26, 14, 13 - were rolled out live on television, in the exact reverse order of less than a month earlier. The odds against that happening are something like four trillion to one.

As the odds against winning any sort of lotto are rather longer than your being struck by lightning, these must be long indeed.

But the Israeli lotteries number cruncher, Dr Chaim Melamed, insists there is nothing untoward.

"We are in the business of luck, and when it comes to chances and probabilities anything is possible, even the rare and infrequent."

 

 

Tailpiece

WHAT'S white and runs through the desert with a bedpan?

Florence of Arabia.

Last word

I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.

H L Mencken

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

 

The Idler, Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Another Ulster atrocity

HERE'S another atrocity in the saga of sickening violence that is Northern Ireland. Jim Rodgers, mayor of Belfast, agreed to leapfrog a council female employee, who was in fancy dress as a tomato. It was to promote a gourmet food fair.

But Mr Rodgers slipped on the wet grass and knocked Lorraine Mallon flying. She ended up with a slipped disc and brought a negligence case against the council.

Now she has been awarded 64 000 pounds in damages.

Mr Rodgers says he would have made the jump if he hadn't slipped. "It was just one of those unfortunate things. I'm very fit and take care of myself."

I fear we will never understand Northern Ireland with its weird sectarian practices..

 

Blunt pencil

 

A MARKET analyst named James Greener puts out a regular and somewhat testy newsletter on world and local affairs. In his latest he calls for some austerity measures in South Africa to match those elsewhere.

"One of the austerity measures being taken by the UK government has been to shut down dozens of tax-eating organisations that provide little value. This is a great idea. Sadly the same cuts are not yet evident here despite being woefully overdue.

"The National Youth Development Agency has an annual budget of R370 million. It pays R11m a year in salaries to a 12-member Operating Executive Committee who rely on input from a 63-member Advisory Board. Just the tea and biscuit bill for a meeting this large will leave precious little money out of the budget for any other youth development – whatever that is.

"Over at the misnamed Road Accident Fund which is actually a R43 billion deficit, not a fund, the CEO was awarded a bonus amounting to almost half his already outrageous salary of R4.3m. Reports failed to indicate the reason for the award but clearly it can't have been performance.

"The Competition Commission has delivered an opinion on the staffing complement for the proposed forthcoming merger of two life assurance companies. This change of focus from consumer protection to employment policies is alarming and typical of unchecked bureaucracies.

"And Stats SA sent a charming young lady armed with a blunt pencil and well-used eraser to my house to ask questions and complete a huge census form. She treated my refusal to identify my race group, on the grounds that we had stopped all that nonsense 16 years ago, with polite amusement and then went on to record that I wear glasses and own a variety of consumer durable items that will undoubtedly catch the attention of any potential burglar who sees the document as it travels through the system. She forgot to ask about the Rottweiler though."

Grrrr! Woof!

Dummy text

FOLLOWERS of Jonathan Cainer, who writes the astrology column in the London Daily Mail, suffered disappointment last week. His horoscope was not quite up to his usual standard.

"Aries: This is a swathe of dummy text that can be used to indicate how many words fit a particular space.

"Cancer: The paragraphs have been made deliberately different lengths in order to avoid repetition.

"Libra: There is no pretend Latin because, annoyingly, it wreaks havoc with spell check.

"Pisces: It's extremely boring if you should actually bother to read it."

It seems Cainer didn't see it coming. But proofreading would help.

Fairy tale

ONCE upon a time, a prince asked a beautiful princess: "Will you marry me?"

The princess said:"No!"

And the prince lived happily ever after and rode motorcycles and went fishing and hunting and played golf and dated women half his age and drank beer and scotch
and had tons of money in the bank and left the toilet seat up.

 

 

Sound grasp

THE PEOPLE who read the weather forecast on TV generally manage to avoid controversy and acrimony. But not Polish-born Tomasz Schafernaker who was caught "giving the finger" to his BBC colleagues, live on air, and who referred to the Outer Hebrides and the Western Isles, off Scotland, as "Nowheresville".

He has now been discreetly removed from the screen by the BBC, who have given him an off-camera job behind the scenes.

It seems a pity. Schafernaker displays a sound grasp of idiom and geography.

Tailpiece

WHAT do you call a woman who sells herself for lasagne?

A pastatute.

Last word

Either this man is dead or my watch has stopped.

Groucho Marx

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

The Idler, Monday, October 18

Float like a butterfly

Half a bee,

Philosophically,

Must ipso facto half not be.

But can a bee be said to be,

Vis-a-vis its entity,

When half that bee is not a bee,

Due to an ancient injury?

D'you see?

FLOAT like a butterfly ... the lines from Monty Python's Flying Circus came to mind as bees intervened on Saturday to delay the start of the Currie Cup semi-final by 40 minutes. Nobody could quite believe it. Bees? Crocodiles from the Umgeni maybe – but bees! Apparently they had swarmed under the eaves of the main grandstand and objected to the presence of Blue Bulls supporters.

There was also a theory that the fellows out there on the field with a blower, fire extinguishers and a red smoke flare – occasionally jumping and slapping as they got stung – were part of the NRU's prematch entertainment. Lively stuff!

How do you persuade bees to leave? You recite Monty Python to them, that's how, but the NRU did it the hard way.

But it was worth the wait. What an epic match! Oof! This was samp and beans rugby, no candyfloss. It was like the Battle of the Somme – only a lot more serious. This one belongs in the annals.

And it was almost as if the thing was scripted. The bees held matters up for 40 minutes. That meant much of the second half was played in a deluge of rain, which only added to the starkness and the drama.

Chills the body but not the soul!

 

Desert isle tale A story comes this way of a fellow who was shipwrecked on a desert island.  He had no supplies and survived on only bananas and coconuts. He is lying on the beach one day when the most gorgeous woman he has ever seen rows up to the shore. In disbelief, he asks: "Where did you come from? How did you get here? She replies: "I rowed from the other side of the island. I landed there when my cruise ship sank." "You're lucky you had a boat washed up with you." "Oh, this thing? I made it out of raw material I found on the island. The oars were whittled from gum tree branches, I wove the bottom from palm branches and the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus tree." "But, where did you get the tools?" "Oh, that was no problem. "On the south side of the island, a very unusual stratum of alluvial rock is exposed. I found if I fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into ductile iron. I used that for tools and used the tools to make the hardware." The guy is stunned. "Let's row over to my place," she says. She docks the boat at a small wharf. A stone walk leads to an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white. As they go inside, she says casually: "It's not much but I call it home. Would you like a drink?" "I can't take another drop of coconut milk." "It's not coconut milk," she winks. "I have a still. How would you like a Pina Colada?" He accepts and they sit down on her couch to talk. Then she says: "I'm going to slip into something more comfortable. Would you like to take a shower and shave? There's a razor in the bathroom cabinet." Sure enough, there's a razor made from a piece of tortoise bone. This woman is amazing. When he comes back she's wearing nothing but strategically positioned vines and smells faintly of gardenias. She beckons him closer. "Tell me," says, slithering up to him . "We've been out here for many months ... You've been lonely. There's something I'm sure you really feel like doing right now, something you've been longing for?" She looks into his eyes. He can't believe what he's hearing. "You mean ..."He swallows in excitement. "Don't tell me you've got Supersport?"

 

Tailpiece

ARCHAEOLOGISTS in the Negev desert have discovered a 3 000-year-old mummy who died of a heart attack.

Reason for the diagnosis? He had a betting slip in his hand that read: "Ten thousand shekels on Goliath."

Last word

Those whom the Gods would destroy, they first call promising.

Cyril Connolly

GRAHAM LINSCOTT