The Idler, Tuesday, April 10, 2012

The piano player

AN ITEM comes this way from the US. Does it strike any chords locally? Humility? Frugality? Modesty? Perhaps only by way of contrast.

Harry Truman was a different kind of president. He probably made as many - or more important - decisions regarding the history of the USA as any of the other 42 Presidents preceding him. However, a measure of his greatness may rest on what he did after he left the White House.

The only asset he had when he died was the house he lived in, which was in Independence, Missouri. His wife had inherited the house from her mother and father and other than their years in the White House they lived their entire lives there.

When he retired from office in 1952 his income was a US army pension reported to have been $13 507.72 a year. Congress, noting that he was paying for his stamps and personally licking them, granted him an "allowance" and, later, a retroactive pension of $25,000 a year.

After President Eisenhower was inaugurated, Harry and Bess drove home to Missouri by themselves. There was no Secret Service following them.

When offered corporate positions at large salaries, Truman declined, saying: "You don't want me. You want the office of the President, and that doesn't belong to me. It belongs to the American people and it's not for sale."

Even later, on May 6, 1971, when Congress was preparing to award him the Medal of Honor on his 87th birthday, he refused to accept it, writing:"I don't consider that I have done anything which should be the reason for any award, Congressional or otherwise."

As president he paid for all of his own travel expenses and food.

Modern politicians have found a new level of success in cashing in on the presidency, resulting in untold wealth. Today, many in Congress also have found a way to become quite wealthy while enjoying the fruits of their office.

Good old Harry Truman was correct when he observed: "My choices in life were either to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference!"

Too true. They can't stop the music.

 

Most hated man

 

AN INTERNET video posted by an American children's rights group has refocused attention on the Lord's Resistance Army, a Ugandan guerrilla group led by one Joseph Kony, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court at The Hague for a murderous terror campaign which has involved the forced recruitment of children.

 

Kony operates also in the Southern Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic. He claims to be the spokesman of God.

 

British satirical magazine Private Eye takes up the story.

 

"A video featuring the world's most hated man, the war criminal Blair Tony, has become an internet sensation with over 79 million hits and even more 'dislikes'.

 

"The video argues that Tony, the leader of the notorious Frauds Resistance Army in the troubled third world country of Britain should not be allowed to remain at liberty.

 

"The International Court told documentary makers that they wanted Tony to speak to them, but they couldn't afford his fees (£100 000 per minute. Handshake extra).

 

"Young campaigners who have been politicised by the video are now demanding that the United States should intervene to arrest Tony even if it means 'invading Britain and waterboarding Cherie Blair to discover his whereabouts'.

 

"Tony's notorious crimes include enlisting young Britons and sending them to war motivated only by extreme religious views and a Messianic belief in his invulnerability …"

 

Lovely stuff, especially for those of us who always found Blair very creepy.

 

 

Tailpiece

A WOMAN pregnant with her first child pays a visit to her obstetrician.

After the examination she shyly says: "My husband wants me to ask you..."

The doctor replies, "I know, I know …" He places a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "I get asked that all the time. Sex is fine until late in the pregnancy."

"No, that's not it. He wants to know if I can still mow the lawn."

 

 

Last word

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.

Mark Twain

 

The Idler, Monday, April 9, 2012

Things that go 'bouf'

 

A FEW WEEKS ago Spyker Koekemoer (aka Pat Smythe) entertained us at St Clements with the story, The Airline That Never Flew – an account of one of the bantustan follies.

 

A state of the art international airport was built outside Bisho, in the Ciskei (10 minutes' flying time from East London airport), and an ancient airliner bought in the US landed, never to take off again. Eventually it was towed to the coast where it is now a very unusual beach cottage.

 

Now it turns out that one of the airliner's engines is in a museum at Richmond. Malcolm Anderson tells me it's in the Atom museum (Anderson & Tilbury On Mountain), looking down on the exquisitely beautiful Byrne valley, outside Richmond. The museum is attached to the Minerva private nature reserve.

 

Malcolm and Chris Tilbury specialise in repairing old machinery and getting it into running order again. Both are members of the Natal Vintage Tractors and Machinery Club at nearby Baynesfield and are fascinated by "things that go bouf".

 

They have several thousand pieces on display, including a stationary engine that is in working order after having been buried in river mud for 40 years.

 

The Atom museum sounds a most interesting place. I'm sure Spyker would love to drop in. The only problem is, they'd probably take him for an early 19^th century steam-driven thresher or something, and put him on permanent display- or they might grab the vintage Merc that he's just restored.

 

 

Byrne Settlers

 

THE BYRNE valley is, of course, where British settlers in Natal put down roots in the 1850s. One of the ships they arrived in was the Minerva.

 

The Byrne Settlers added a new strand to life in the colony. Unlike the ivory traders, gun-runners and general scallywags who had gathered in Durban, they were serious farmers and they got down to it with real application.

 

For anyone who grew up in Maritzburg or the surrounding Midlands, to read the names on the gravestones in the Byrne churchyard is like hearing a familiar rollcall – names you've known all your life.

 

On the brink

 

LAST week we recalled the occasion Jack Shepherd-Smith, my distant predecessor as Idler, almost caused a civil war when he wrote about a beauty competition in Ladysmith which nobody won.

 

Now a reader recalls the occasion the province was on the brink of wide-scale street rioting when Jack's immediate predecessor, Dennis Henshaw, wrote - and continued to write – that budgies can't talk.

 

Budgie-fanciers were incensed. They threatened to march on the Mercury building en masse, with their budgies. Can you imagine anything more terrifying? A sea of blue, green and yellow. Thousands of simultaneous chirrupings of "Pretty Boy!"

 

I do not possess the combative spirit of my Idler forebears. I concede that budgies do talk – though not as well as chameleons (which are better pets and companions anyway). As for Ladysmith, it's not true that the Miss Lucky Legs competition was won by the billiard table in the Royal Hotel. It was the grand piano in the town hall.

 

Anything for a quiet life.

 

Send 'em up!

THE FOLLOWING conversation was overheard on the VHF Guard (emergency) frequency by aircraft flying from Europe to Dubai.

Iranian air defence site: "Unknown aircraft you are in Iranian airspace. Identify yourself."

Aircraft: "This is a British aircraft. I am in Iraqi airspace."

Air defence site: "You are in Iranian airspace. If you do not depart our airspace we will launch interceptor aircraft!"

Aircraft: "This is a Royal Air Force GR4 Tornado fighter. Send 'em up, I'll wait!"

Air defence site: ... total silence.

 

 

Tailpiece

AN OLD GUY and his son have a one-mule farm in the Deep South of the United States. One day the son hits the lottery and wins $50 000. He rushes to tell his father the good news and hands him a $50 bill.
The father looks at the money for a moment then says: "Son, you know I've always been careful with what little money we had. I didn't spend it on whiskey or women. In fact, I couldn't even afford a licence to legally marry your Ma."
"Pa!" the son exclaims. "Do you know what that makes me?"
"Sure do," says the old guy fingering the $50 bill. "And a damn cheap one too."

 

Last word

If not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled.

P G Wodehouse

 

The Idler, Friday, April 6, 2012

AT LAST the boys are in the Land of the Long White Underpants. This is where we really turn it on. The stalwarts of the Florida Road rugby colloquium will have spent last night in the Thunder Bar improving our Ukrainian and discussing rugby tactics; today we will be at the Shelter for the Over-40s in full force for breakfast and battle royal with Wellington Hurricanes.

This will be a humdinger. Last week against the Brumbies we were in almost total control. It was amusing to listen to the Aussie commentators, it was as if they couldn't quite believe what was happening. That scorcher of a try by Mvovo! What a break-out by Sykes to set it up! This was simply sublime.

It's something that's been building game by game. But of course we still need to tighten up here and there. We really need to get away from pointless kicking downfield that just gives away possession. We need to get some crispness into our passing. Those long, looping passes that leave the receiver standing flat-footed – they're just too awful.

But mostly we need to learn to close down a game when we've all but won it. We blew it against the Stormers. We blew it against New South Wales. And we damn near blew it against the Brumbies. Ten points ahead and just minutes to go and we let in a try and conversion, then let them run at us again in the dying seconds. Mama mia! The gals in the Thunder Bar were so distraught they were clutching at the clientele … er, OK, let's not pursue that line. What I mean is, the guys need to maul the ball, put in the telling linekick, break their hearts in the dying minutes, not let them run at us. That's what the gals were saying in the Thunder Bar.

It was odd to watch high drama in Canberra then later be able to relax and watch the Stormers and the Pienk Bulle with not a care. The pink jersies – or "strip" as people seem to call it these days – did nothing to repeat the drilling the Bulls had dished out to Queensland. Of course, rugby doesn't work that way.

And, speaking of colours, the Lions played Canterbury Crusaders in virtually identical jersies. It possibly cost the Lions a try when skipper Josh Strauss passed the ball to a Crusader who said: "Thanks mate!" and ran in the opposite direction. (Though he didn't add insult to injury by tugging his beard as he went).

I understand these weird and wonderful colour schemes are something to do with marketing, making the game telegenic. Somebody needs to point out to the Ponytails that there's a bit of rugger involved as well.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends … The moment of truth is here. The ladies are advised, as ever, to wear strong knicker elastic. If we shoot out the streetlights in celebration today, we want to do it with meaning.

 

The Idler, Friday, April 6, 2012

An Easter story

O HENRY, American short story writer of the late 19th century, seemingly has a yarn for every occasion. Consider the drama of Miss Tonia Weaver, whose new Easter hat is sitting on a freight train that has been delayed 48 hours.

"Now, if one supposes that Easter, the Goddess of Spring, cares any more for the after-church parade on Fifth Avenue than she does for her loyal outfit of subjects that assemble at the meeting-house at Cactus, Tex., a mistake has been made. The wives and daughters of the ranchmen of the Frio country put forth Easter blossoms of new hats and gowns as faithfully as is done anywhere, and the Southwest is, for one day, a mingling of prickly pear, Paris, and paradise. And now it was Good Friday, and Tonia Weaver's Easter hat blushed unseen in the desert air of an impotent express car, beyond the burned trestle. On Saturday noon the Rogers girls, from the Shoestring Ranch, and Ella Reeves, from the Anchor-O, and Mrs Bennet and Ida, from Green Valley, would convene at the Espinosa and pick up Tonia. With their Easter hats and frocks carefully wrapped and bundled against the dust, the fair aggregation would then merrily jog the ten miles to Cactus, where on the morrow they would array themselves, subjugate man, do homage to Easter, and cause jealous agitation among the lilies of the field."

Tonia is distraught. But she drops a hint to her two suitors, cowman Wells Pearson and sheepman Thompson Burrows, that hats are probably in stock at the store at Lone Elm crossing, 28 miles away.

At which each sets out on horseback. At the store they buy the last two hats – identical red straw cartwheels trimmed with white roses (Miss Weaver likes red), three years out of fashion. Then they race back.

As they reach the approach to Espinosa ranch, Burrows's horse is badly blown. Pearson laughs and sets off on the final gallop. In desperation, Burrows fires a shot which hits Pearson in the shoulder and stuns his horse.

Pearson eventually stumbles to Espinosa on his groggy horse, where he finds Miss Weaver furious about the flat cartwheel hat with white roses that Burrows has given her. The hat he has is all out of shape and the roses are soaked in blood. She snatches it from him in delight and invites him to come to church with her next day.

"What have you been doing, Pearson?" asked Daddy Weaver. "You ain't looking so well as common."

"Me?" said Pearson. "I've been painting flowers. Them roses was white when I left Lone Elm. Help me down, Daddy Weaver, for I haven't got any more paint to spare."

Roddy Ward

IT'S PLEASING that botanist Roddy Ward has been honoured for his contribution to science in KwaZulu-Natal. I don't think there's anyone who can tell you more about the Zululand dune forests, the shifting shoreline, the grasslands – in fact any part of the province – than Roddy. He reads what is about him as if it were a familiar book.

I first met him many years ago when there was a kerfuffle over planned mining of the coastal dunes at Mapelane, south of St Lucia. Seldom have I encountered anyone with such an easy way of imparting knowledge based on the most complex research. His students at Salisbury Island University College were indeed fortunate.

Roddy is one of the pioneers who, through organisations such as the old Natal Parks Board (for which he also worked for a time), the Oceanographic Research Institute and the Wildlife Society, have placed today's KwaZulu-Natal so advantageously in an age where conservation is valued probably as never before.

Phantom switcher

MORE on the phantom electricity switcher-off and switcher-on, as detailed in yesterday's column.

A disconnection notice has now surfaced in my postbox. It is addressed to a close corporation which apparently operates six properties away from mine, in the same street.

Yes, the council people had disconnected the wrong property (mine). My street number was in characters almost a foot high on the wall immediately above the fusebox where the disconnection was made.

Mama mia! Would spectacles help? Unfortunately, I think not.

Happy Easter

A HAPPY and blessed Easter to one and all.

Tailpiece

What's invisible and smells like carrots?
The Ether Bunny

 

Last word

Things are more like they are now than they ever were before.

Dwight D Eisenhower

 

The Idler, Thursday, April 5, 2012

Tale from the bushveld

 

A YARN comes this way concerning my old colleague, Jack Shepherd-Smith, who wrote this column yonks ago then went on to launch and edit the very successful Scope magazine.

 

To celebrate Jack's 75^th birthday (I won't say how long ago this was) his family bought a handsome bench and donated it to Letaba camp in the Kruger National Park, which was their favourite spot. Mounted on the bench was a bronze plaque inscribed with a quotation from Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country.

 

Then the bench suddenly was no longer there. Jack had no luck trying to trace it. He and his wife Margaret told the story to Rose McDonald over dinner one evening up in Pinetown, where they are retired. Rose's heart just about skipped a beat.

 

She knew the bench well. It was her favourite viewing spot. She had even copied the Paton inscription into her diary.

 

Next time she went to Letaba, she got hold of David Motsosi Molobi, the camp manager, and told him the story. He promised to investigate.

 

A few weeks later David phoned to say he had traced the plaque to a storeroom at Skukuza camp where it had been placed after the bench was "retired" due to wood decay. He then mailed it to Rose.

 

"All this had happened without Jack's knowledge, and one day I took the plaque to him. The delighted smile on his face was wonderful to see."

 

Paton's words, as inscribed on the plaque: "Wilderness – keep it, guard it, care for it. Destroy it and man is destroyed."

 

Yes, Alan Paton was one of the early protagonists of conservation as an imperative, a sacred duty, not just a sentimental thing. I'm sure he had in mind the kind of tenacity shown in this instance by Rose McDonald.

 

 

Close to civil war

 

I WAS STILL figuratively in short pants as an apprentice scribbler when Jack Shepherd-Smith was writing the Idler's column. I vividly remember the time he almost caused civil war in this province.

 

Apropos of nothing very much, he wrote a paragraph that went something like this: "Last week they held a beauty competition in Ladysmith. Nobody won."

 

The folk of Ladysmith were furious. The town council called a special meeting and passed a motion of censure on the Mercury. A group of Ladysmith blokes actually tried to kidnap Jack.

 

It rolled on and on, the rest of the province convulsed with mirth, Ladysmith taking it very seriously.

 

I'm not sure if it was Jack or one of his successors who added another chapter: "Last week they held a Miss Lucky Legs competition in Ladysmith. It was won by the billiard table in the Royal Hotel."

 

For a long time, successive Idlers would, whenever they mentioned Ladysmith, add the letters wtmb (wherever that may be).

 

I think I'll give Ladysmith a miss for a while (wtmb).

 

Bright sparks

 

I SPENT some time yesterday persuading the council people to reconnect my electricity which they insisted had not been disconnected

 

The lights went out. I phoned Faults. A team arrived. They said my supply had been disconnected – not at the meter, where it normally happens, but inside that yellow fusebox thing on the pavement (Where I as householder am not allowed to venture). The disconnection notice was inside the fusebox.

 

Weird, especially as I knew my account was up to date. The Faults team agreed it was weird. They had to move on. I phoned Accounts. Yes, my account was up to date. No, a disconnection had not been ordered.

 

"But I'm disconnected."

 

"You'll have to speak to Faults."

 

A four-hour badminton match between Faults and Accounts ensued, myself as shuttlecock. Accounts can't order reconnection of a supply that hasn't been disconnected. Faults can't repair a wrong disconnection.

 

Eventually the lights flicked on. I rushed outside hoping to discover who the phantom disconnector/connector might be. I saw a leg disappear into an already moving car, and the door slammed as he swung round the corner. He looked like The Amazing Spiderman. But this might have been my overheated imagination.

 

Tailpiece

 

THE POLICE have just been to my house to tell me my dogs are chasing people on bicycles. That's nonsense. My dogs don't have bicycles.

 

Last word

 

We do not know what we want and yet we are responsible for what we are - that is the fact.

Jean-Paul Sartre

 

 

Fw: The Idler, Wednesday, April 4, 2012

 

----- Original Message -----

From: linscott

To: registration23.windhoek@blogger.com

Sent: Monday, April 02, 2012 7:10 PM

Subject: The Idler, Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Gilbert & Sullivan spectacular

PEOPLE might be alarmed by allegations in various quarters that senior police officers have been putting members of their own family on the police informer payroll; that police "safe houses" – supposedly for the witness protection programme – have been bought at popular holiday resorts and have been used by top cops and their families; that undercover police vehicles have been used to get these top cops and their families about the place.

But it's not what it seems. There's been a terrible pagination mix-up in the publications concerned. What seem to be the news pages are in fact the showbiz pages. It's all about the comic opera season that's coming up this winter.

Relax and consider these lines from The Pirates of Penzance. They seem to capture the indomitable spirit of the police, in the face of whatever adversity:

When a felon's not engaged in his employment –

His employment,

Or maturing his felonious little plans –

Little plans,

His capacity for innocent enjoyment – 'Cent enjoyment Is just as great as any honest man's – Honest man's. Our feelings we with difficulty smother – 'Culty smother, When constabulary duty's to be done – To be done. Ah, take one consideration with another – With another, A policeman's lot is not a happy one.

 

That pretty well captures it. Relax! The cops are on the case! Roll up, roll up for the great Gilbert & Sullivan show!

Quirky verse

THIS is written in haste, using the laptop batteries, and in semi-darkness. The electricity has been playing games again, coming and going. Yet it seems appropriate. I've just been reading a poem by Geoffrey Haresnape.

Most countries would call it a "power cut,"

others a "power failure,"

some even – shock-horror – a "blackout";

but we have a new terminology

to match our new democracy.

"Outage" –

What a quaint understated sort of word …

 

 

Further on:

 

 

After 4 a.m. I was driving my grown-up son

to run in an All Africa marathon.

From Wynberg Hill

the lights of South Peninsula

were stretched out level beneath us,

a web of silver and golden jewels

comforting to the eye.

Suddenly,

without warning,

they were all extinguished

like a man may put out a candle.

"I'll huff and I'll puff

and I'll blow your World Class City out."

Yep, that's about it. Haresnape is professor emeritus of English at the University of Cape Town and this fifth collection of his verse – Where the Wind Wills, published by Echoing Green Press – is a wonderful combination of satirical humour and the deepest reflections on the mysteries of existence.

Much of it is written through two personae: Eyeball Erasmus, who insists on meticulous rhyming couplets; and Dr Severance Package, who allows free verse.

It's thought-provoking and entertaining stuff and Haresnape will be in Durban one of these days to read it at St Clements. Watch this space!

More blue lights

IN HIS LATEST grumpy newsletter, investment analyst Dr James Greener takes up the case of blue-light activity on the North Coast.

"From this desk I can watch the traffic on the coastal highway out of Durban. There is not a lot up this road that any politicians could vaguely claim required their urgent presence; unless of course they were going to lunch or a round of golf or perhaps to buy a present for someone special.

"Nevertheless, several times a day a wailing cavalcade of fancy cars speeds along this road in a blizzard of flashing blue lights. The only reason for their obvious and objectionably dangerous haste must be that they are late for something. Something which almost certainly involves merely speeches and catering.

"We must therefore conclude that both the panjandrum and his minders are utterly useless at organising a diary and we ought to signify our concern and advice for them at this shortcoming with some suitable hand signals that we can use as they zip past.

"How about a pair of splayed fingers to represent the space that should be left between diary entries? Or a single extended finger to suggest that only one person ought to be in charge of making appointments."

Careful, Doc. You can get arrested for that.

Tailpiece

A STATE trooper stops a pick-up truck down in Alabama.
"Got any ID?"
"Got any ID 'bout what?"

Last word

 

Art is either plagiarism or revolution.

Paul Gauguin