The Idler, Thursday, February 3, 2011

Alien spacecraft? Competition commissioners?

TWO MORE people report seeing red lights in the sky. Bridget Lee, of Durban North, saw them last Saturday night about 8.30. Llewellyn van Wyk reports seeing a very bright red light in the sky near his home at Waterfall a few weeks ago. It disappeared into cloud as he called his neighbour to look.

Bridget says the lights came from the direction of Umhlanga.

"It's difficult to tell at night but they appeared to be about the height of a microlight and were travelling at about the speed of a microlight but they were silent.

"They travelled from a north-easterly direction and disappeared from our view going toward Moses Mabhida Stadium.

"We must have seen about 15 of them in the time that we were watching. Looking through binoculars they were the shape of a teardrop, with a flame inside. We wondered whether they were balloons but no balloon we know of would be able to accommodate a flame."

This gets more and more mysterious. Moses Mabhida? Could these be alien spacecraft that mistook the stadium for the mother ship? Was it the Competition Commission on a secret recce to investigate bid-rigging and collusion in the building of Moses Mabhida?

So far we've heard nothing from the Bluff. I suppose it's reassuring that the Groot Padda is not involved.

New capability

DEMONSTRATORS continue to surge about the streets of Cairo. A problem arises. What now? Twitter, Facebook and e-mail in general have whistled up the decent folk of Egypt. Where do they go from here?

It's remarkable. Cyber technology has provided humanity with something akin to whatever it is that makes large flocks of birds wheel in unison without any apparent command; that gets vast herds of wildebeest to gather instinctively then gallop together across the plains.

Or – worryingly – that induces vast numbers of lemmings to gather and fling themselves off cliffs en masse, into the sea.

Strange and disturbing times.

 

Doctors speak out

THE BRITISH Medical Association has expressed itself on changes to the national health service proposed by Prime Minister David Cameron.

The allergists voted to scratch it; the dermatologists advised no rash moves.

The gastro-enterologists had a gut feel, but the neurologists thought the government had a nerve.
 
The obstetricians felt the government was labouring under a misconception. Ophthalmologists considered the idea short-sighted.

Pathologists yelled: "Over my dead body!" Paediatricians said it was time to grow up.

Psychiatrists thought the idea was madness; radiologists could see through it.

The surgeons said: "No cuts!" Ear, nose and throat specialists wouldn't swallow it, nor would they hear of it.

Pharmacologists thought it a bitter pill. Plastic surgeons said: "This puts a whole new face on things."

Podiatrists thought it a step forward; anaesthetists thought the whole idea a gas; cardiologists didn't have the heart to say no.

In the end the advice of the proctologists was followed: Leave it to the bums in Whitehall.

Bargains galore

HERE are some classified advertisements that appeared in a British newspaper:

·         Free Yorkshire terrier - Eight years old; hateful little bastard. Bites!

·         Free puppies – Half cocker spaniel, half sneaky neighbour's dog.

·         Free puppies - Mother is a Kennel Club registered German Shepherd. Father is a superdog, able to leap tall fences in a single bound.

·         Cows, calves: never bred - Also one gay bull for sale.

·         Joining nudist colony - Must sell washer and dryer, £100.

·         Wedding dress for sale - Worn once by mistake. Call Stephanie.

·         For sale by owner - Complete set of Encyclopaedia Britannica, 45 volumes. Excellent condition, £200 or best offer. No longer needed, got married, wife knows everything.

 

Think it through

A PENGUIN found washed up on a beach in Peru, has been named Tomas by his rescuers, who now plan to reunite him with his colony on an offshore island.

It's admirable. But have Tomas's rescuers thought this through?

He might well be a hippy, a penguin who deliberately left the colony because he was sick and tired of wearing a dinner jacket. Maybe what Tomas needs is a set of denims.

Tailpiece

"Oi! You're wearing an earring."

"It's no big deal."

"'Ow long 'ave you been wearing it?"

"Since me wife found it in the cab of me van."

Last word

A signature always reveals a man's character - and sometimes even his name.

Evan Esar

 

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

The Idler, Wednesday, February 2, 2011

It's the Age of the Geek

 

WE'VE entered the Age of the Geek. A while ago, Twitter, Facebook and other e-mail enthusiasts in the West were doing things like organise simultaneous pillowfights in city centres all over the world, to the bewilderment of onlookers and police.

 

Now they're getting serious. They've brought down a regime in Tunisia. Another is tottering in Egypt. E-mail is able to focus discontent, harness and organise it into irresistible street protest. The tweeters are not ideologues or fanatics. They appear to have no coherent political programme.

 

They're just middle class, educated, privileged kids who've got tired of being pushed around by dim, authoritarian clowns. They are the Geeks.

 

It's a new and strange force, before which authoritarians everywhere rightly tremble.

 

Virgil's version

 

TIMEO Danaos et dona ferentes – I fear the Geeks even when bearing gifts. No, sorry – that should be Greeks.

 

Mystery red lights

 

INQUIRIES have come in about a dozen or so red lights spotted in the sky over Virginia/Umhlanga last Saturday night about 9 o'clock. Looked at through binoculars, according to our informant, they looked like "mini transparent hot air balloons, with fire under but no baskets".

 

They sound like distress flares, possibly out of date ones fired off at a party just to get rid of them. Had the sighting been at the Bluff, the explanation could be more complicated – a return of the giant frog figure.

 

Does anyone out there have any idea?

 

 

Transition

 

ANDY Murray - from British to Scottish in three sets.

 

It's funny how whenever a Scot, a Welshman or an Ulsterman gets to the top in sport, the English newspapers always describe him as "British".

 

But if he doesn't quite make it, he goes back where he came from. So, after losing the Australian Open, tennis professional Andy Murray is once again a Scot.

 

But dinna fash!

Bunnyhops

YOU AND I might have missed it but for 89 years they've been holding a huge annual jamboree in England of rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, mice and rats. This weekend the Small Animals Show at Harrogate, Yorkshire, will have more than 3 000 entries.

But this time there will be a difference. The show will feature a Rabbits Grand National, a steeplechase event in which the bunnies race over a course with hurdles. Rabbits entered from Sweden apparently offer stiff competition.

It sounds a lot of fun. Combine it with a few entries from the Terrier Fanciers Association and it could be spectacular.

Keeping busy

 

WHAT it's like in retirement:

 

·         How many days in a week? - Six Saturdays, one Sunday.

·         When is bedtime? - Three hours after you fall asleep on the couch.

·         How many retirees to change a light bulb? - Only one, but it might take all day.

·         What's the biggest gripe? - Not enough time to get everything done.

·         Why don't retirees mind being called Seniors? - The term comes with a 10 percent discount.

·         What is formal attire? - Tied shoes.

·         What's the common term for someone who enjoys work and refuses to retire? – A nut.

·         What's the best way to describe retirement? - The never-ending coffee break.

Water music

FORESHORE apartment dwellers at Biscayne Bay, Florida, woke the other morning to see a baby grand piano on a sandbank out on the water. One puzzled woman rowed out and took photographs.

Handel's Water Music? No, it seems two teenagers had placed it there, planning to make a music video epic to support the effort of one of them to get into art school in New York.

But the piano has now been removed. Florida wildlife officials warned that the teenager and his parents could otherwise face charges.

I suppose a piano on a sandbank makes a change from the piano falling on somebody's head out of a multi-storey building, which is a stock item of the cartoon industry.

 

Tailpiece

Grandpa: "Go hide, your teacher is here because you bunked school today!"

 

Grandchild: "You go hide ... I told her you'd died!"

 

Last word

There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.

Douglas Adams

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

The Idler, Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Year of the Rabbit

AS CHINA gears up for the Year of the Rabbit – which starts tomorrow – a bunny cartoon has been censored.

A three-minute video on a popular website begins with rabbit babies being poisoned – apparently a reference to a recent toxic milk scandal.

The rabbits are then forced to attend a political meeting with a group of fierce tigers who promise a "harmonious forest" – a jibe at the communists' "harmonious society".

The tigers then set the bunnies on fire and bulldoze their homes, all the while instructing them to remain obedient and "not speak out of turn".

This is not what most of us would call side-splittingly funny; hardly the sort of thing for New Year jollifications. But the satire is so direct and biting that the censors have removed the video from the website.

I guess the Year of the Rabbit is going to be much like the other years.

 

Heartwarming story

 

THE FILM, The King's Speech, has been much in the news lately as a contender for Oscar and other awards. The account of the terrible struggle George VI had to overcome his stutter has touched many.

 

Private Eye, the British satirical magazine, takes up the theme in a review titled: "The Future King's Speech":

 

"The heartwarming royal story of the shy, diffident old man who suddenly has to take on the burden of the throne of England, when he has only been waiting for it for over 60 years.

 

"Poor Charles has an appalling problem with his speech. Every time he opens his mouth, all that comes out is an embarrassing stream of nonsense.

 

"We see him desperately struggling to say something interesting and important that will unite the nation in 'the great war to preserve, you know, this global harmony thingie, that we all, in a very real sense, hope to, you know, ... polar bears ... Indian version of Poundbury ... Chelsea Barracks ... defender of the interfaith ... it really is, what's the word, appalling.'

 

"If only he could manage to say the words that would make him truly popular – 'I am handing over the throne to William'. But would it ever happen?"

 

Cruel – but that's satire

 

 

Art of letters

 

THE ART OF letter-writing has all but disappeared in this digital age. It's pleasing to see it making a small come-back in "Dear John" letters that are doing the rounds. Examples:

 

·         Dear Noah,
We could have sworn you said the ark wasn't leaving 'til 5pm.

Sincerely,

Unicorns.

·         Dear Icebergs,
Sorry to hear about the global warming. Karma's a bitch!
Sincerely,

The Titanic.

·         Dear America,
You produced Miley Cyrus. Bieber is your punishment.
Sincerely,

Canada.

·         Dear Boyfriend,
I can make your girlfriend scream louder than you can.
Sincerely,

Spiders.

·         Dear Yahoo,
I've never heard anyone say: "I don't know, let's Yahoo it ..."
Sincerely,

Google.
>

·         Dear Justin Bieber,
Ariel would really love her voice back.
Sincerely,

King Triton.

·         Dear Soccer Fans,

B–z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z-z!
Sincerely,

Vuvuzelas.

 

 

·         Dear Prince Charming,
You've got some explaining to do!
Sincerely,

Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty.
>
>

Tailpiece

THREE friends marry women from different parts of the world. The first marries a Filipino. He tells her to do the dishes and house cleaning. It takes a couple of days, but the third day he comes home to a clean house, the dishes washed and put away. The second man marries a Thai. He orders her to do all the cleaning, the dishes and the cooking. The first day sees no results, the second it's better. The third day his house is clean, the dishes are washed and put away and there's a huge dinner on the table. The third man marries a girl from Glasgow .He orders her to keep the house cleaned, dishes washed, lawn mowed, laundry washed, and to have hot food on the table for every meal. The first day he sees no results, nor the second; the third day some of the swelling has gone down, he can see a little out of his left eye and his arm is healed enough so he can fix himself a sandwich and load the dishwasher.

 

 

Last word

I can win an argument on any topic, against any opponent. People know this, and steer clear of me at parties. Often, as a sign of their great respect, they don't even invite me.

Dave Barry

GRAHAM LINSCOTT

The Idler, Monday, January 31, 2011

Drama in the Maghreb

 

EVENTS in Egypt recall one of those classically terse cables between head office and the man on the spot, that have become part of the lore of newspapers.

 

It was the early 1950s and things seemed quiet in Cairo. Two foreign correspondents took girlfriends for a weekend on the Great Bitter Lakes.

 

They returned to find that a group of army officers, led by Colonel Gamal Nasser, had forced King Farouk to abdicate. They had missed the whole story.

 

A cable from the newsdesk read: "Farouk resigned. What your plans?"

 

Gingindlovu

 

HISTORIAN Peter Quantrill supplies the origin of the name Gingindlovu, raised in this column last week.

 

"You are quite right in that the British troops, during the second invasion of Zululand, having camped in the Gingindlovu area, failed miserably in their attempt to pronounce the word; hence they referred to it as 'Gin, gin I love you.' Typical Tommy humour.

 

"You are also correct in saying that the real derivation is: 'He, who swallows the elephant.' This came about when in 1856 civil war broke out in Zululand. King Mapande's two sons, Cetshwayo and Mbuyazi, fought for the succession to the Zulu throne. A bloody battle was fought at Ndondakusuka , in which no quarter was asked. The result was the death of Mbuyazi and his 7 000 followers who included women and children.

 

"Now it so happened that Mbuyazi had a tuft of hair growing out just under his neck, that caused him to be known by the Zulus as the 'Elephant.' On Cetshwayo's triumph, he built a homestead on a hill north-east and not far from the present town that was subsequently burnt by the British.

 

"He triumphantly named it 'Gingindlovu', or 'He who swallowed the Elephant'."

 

 

Row your boat

 

THREE and a half-year-old Simone Blitenthall, of Kloof, listened to her mum and dad talking about canoeists being bothered by crocodiles in the Umgeni River. Then she adapted a nursery ditty:

 

Row, row, row your boat,

Gently down the stream.

When you see a crocodile,

Don't forget to scream!

 

That's very good.

 

 

 

 

 

Financial currents

A FAST food company attributes improved business to the heavy rains that chased people indoors to the malls and shops. It sort of makes sense, says financial analyst Dr James Greener in his latest grumpy newsletter.

"I spent a few days near the mouth of the flooding Umfolozi River. The muddy torrent flowing into the sea was so strong that the waves were completely brown and choked with vegetation washed down from the countryside.

"Fishing was out of the question but the fridge in the bar to which I retreated was in perfect working order."

Eyebrows

I told this girl she drew her eyebrows on too high. She looked pretty surprised.

 

Questions, questions

SOME legitimate questions:

·        Why do supermarkets make the sick walk all the way to the back of the store to get their prescriptions while healthy people can buy cigarettes at the front? * Why do people order double cheeseburgers, large fries, and a diet Coke? * Why do banks leave vault doors open and then chain the pens to the counters? * Why is it that doctors call what they do "practice"? * Why is lemon juice made with artificial flavouring, and dishwashing liquid with real lemons? * Why is the man who invests all your money called a broker? * Why didn't Noah swat those two mosquitoes?

Tailpiece

A WEALTHY playboy offers the beautiful girl a glass of wine. "Port or sherry?"

"Oh sherry by all means. To me it's the nectar of the gods. Just looking at it in a crystal-clear decanter fills me with a glorious sense of anticipation. When the stopper is removed and the gorgeous liquid is poured into my glass, I inhale the enchanting aroma and I'm lifted on the wings of ecstasy. It seems as though I'm about to drink a magic potion and my whole being begins to glow. The sound of a thousand violins being softly played fills my ears and I am transported into another world.

"Port, on the other hand, gives me wind."

Last word

 

Violence can only be concealed by a lie, and the lie can only be maintained by violence. Any man who has once proclaimed violence as his method is inevitably forced to take the lie as his principle. - Alexander Solzhenitsyn

GRAHAM LINSCOTT