The Idler, Friday, November 19, 2012

Pecadillos then and now

IT'S A CURIOUS business this David Petraeus scandal. The senior American general has resigned from his new post as head of the CIA because FBI agents investigating threatening SMS messages to an attractive female family friend discovered they originated from another woman who had written his biography, become his lover then become insanely jealous, believing the family friend had become his new lover.

This is complicated, even for the FBI. Exit David Petraeus. And now his successor in Afghanistan seems to be getting drawn in as well for sending "inappropriate e-mails" to one of the ladies involved.

Are pecadillos punishable in the American military these days? Or was there a security concern, of which we've not been told?

When General Dwight Eisenhower, commander-in-chief of the Allied forces, had an affair with Kate Summersby, the driver assigned to him by the Brits during World War II, nobody bothered much. They didn't cancel the D-Day landings or anything like that.

Kate went on to become his secretary and Eisenhower went on to become president. It seems he even tried to get a divorce so he could marry her.

Things were different then. They didn't have e-mail. And the job and a general's private life were totally separate.

Scandal widens

MEANWHILE, American satirist Andy Borowitz says the CIA has published a new informational brochure entitled: "How to tell if you're involved in the Petraeus Scandal."

With the scandal seemingly widening every day, "a lot of average folks out there are worried that they might somehow be involved in it without knowing".

"Have you ever met David Petraeus? Have you exchanged e-mails with Jill Kelley (the family friend and object of insane jealousy)? Under 5 000 pages of e-mails and you're probably OK, but anywhere between 10 000 and 15 000 pages of e-mails could potentially mean you're involved in some way."

Yes, a curious business.

Snared

 

MEANWHILE, reader Brian Kennedy notes Wednesday's headline: "Such a smart man snared by his e-mails".

 

"I hope it was not very painful."

 

 

Profumo affair

PETRAEUS recalls the Profumo affair in Britain, one of the few cases where public interest coincided with what would interest the public.

John Profumo, Minister of War, was sleeping with a call-girl named Christine Keeler. His own business surely – even though the details would interest the public.

But Christine was also sleeping with the Soviet naval attaché – most certainly a matter of public interest because of the potential security lapse via unguarded pillow talk and potential blackmail.

As the story burst – in the public interest – the entire world was treated to the most lurid expose of the goings-on in the British ruling establishment. It was astonishing stuff, highly entertaining. Cartoonists struggled to keep up with the unfolding story. It was in the public interest – and boy, were the public interested!

And in those days they didn't even have e-mail.

 

Newspaper order

 

AMONG the colourful stuff to emerge from the Profumo affair was the account of voyeuristic sessions involving two-way mirrors and an appreciative audience. It gave rise to the gag about Christine Keeler's newspaper order – two Mirrors, six Observers, 12 Spectators and as many Times as you like.

 

Lateral thinking

 

ZOLTAN De Rosner, of Pennington, applies what he calls a little lateral thinking to solving the financial challenge posed by Moses Mabhida Stadium.

 

"There is a sure way to prevent this architecturally beautiful white elephant costing local ratepayers a fortune each year. Simply withdraw all the security and, night after night, huge chunks will be removed – absolutely free.

 

"I'd bet that within six months the whole place would have gone. No Moses Mabhida Stadium, no maintenance, no cost … and lots more parking space for the rugby. QED."

 

An elegant solution, to be sure. But I suspect there would be counter-arguments.

 

 

Tailpiece

SCROD is a Massachusetts seafood speciality, usually cod or haddock. A businessman visiting Boston asks a cabbie: "Is there any place round here I can get Scrod?"

Cabbie: "Sure, I know a few places. But it's not often I hear the third person pluperfect indicative any more."

Last word

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.

Bertrand Russell

 

The Idler, Thursday, November 15, 2012

Government needs to act THE NEW WORD "omnishambles" has been named word of the year by the Oxford English Dictionary. It means a situation which is shambolic from every possible angle and was coined in 2009 in the BBC political satire, The Thick Of It. But the OED judges say it has now crossed over into real life. Yes indeed. Refurbishment of the presidential residence at Nkandla to the tune of R200 million … the R70 billion arms deal … the Limpopo school textbooks … non-functioning hospitals … strikes, chaos and mayhem in the mining sector … the collapse of collective bargaining … corruption and nepotism everywhere … service delivery protests … bankrupt municipalities … violent crime … That's real life. Our government need to urgently register copyright on that word "omnishambles". We can't have any old banana republic stealing our thunder.   Mystique of monarchy CHARLES Prince of Wales does not have seven eggs cooked for him for breakfast, every day, from which he chooses one. It's a myth that is debunked in a new website put up by Clarence House, his office. Nor does the heir to the British throne dislike all modern architecture. Nor does his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall smoke heavily. In fact she gave up years ago. But Clarence House are a bit coy as to whether the prince really has a fellow who squeezes the toothpaste onto his toothbrush every morning. They don't give a direct, unequivocal answer. That's as well. You don't want to blab these things all at once. It could damage the mystique of monarchy. Snake haul THAI customs officials have seized 600 deadly cobras after stopping a vehicle at a checkpoint. The snakes were from Malaysia and were being smuggled to Laos for use in traditional medicine. This sounds a bit like the rhino horn business. Except you can't get 600 rhino into the boot of a car.

Mouse squad

TEAMS of mice are being trained to sniff out explosives and drugs at airports. The system is being pioneered by Israeli firm Tamar. It uses specially trained mice equipped with biological sensors.

The mice are trained to react when they smell explosives or drugs, and their reactions are recorded by a computer. Inspectors or security officers are then alerted.

That's all very well, just so long as Tamar don't go on to train up attack rabbits and gerbil perimeter patrols. It could get ugly.

Crown jewels

THEY'VE had to change the locks at the Tower of London – where the British crown jewels are stored - after the Beefeaters spotted a felon stealing a set of keys from a sentry post.

Pssst! You interested in a crown and orb an' sceptre, guvnor? Fell off the back of a lorry, it did …

Movie beckons

A FEW weeks ago we discussed a novel written by my old colleague Pixie Emslie (was Malherbe) set in the platinum mining industry. Although fiction and obviously written before the Marikana massacre, Cry of the Rocks uncannily seems to mirror current events.

Now Pixie tells me director/producer Gray Hofmeyr (whose films include Jock of the Bushveld) has acquired the rights and started on a screenplay which he intends offering to global movie backers next year.

This could bring the story even closer to current events. I wonder if I should audition for the role of Julius Malema.

Tailpiece

A FLORIDA senior citizen drives his convertible out of the dealership. Taking off down the road, he pushes it to 120 km/h; then 140 km/h; then 160 km/h.

Looking in his rear view mirror, he sees the flashing blue lights of a Florida state trooper's vehicle; he hears the siren shrieking. He puts his foot on the loud pedal, taking it to 180 km/h.

Then he thinks: "What the heck! I'm too old for this!" He slows down, stops and waits.

Trooper: "Sir, my shift ends in 30 minutes. Today is Friday. If you can give me a new reason for speeding - a reason I've not heard before - I'll let you go."

Senior citizen: "Three years ago my wife ran off with a Florida state trooper. I thought you were bringing her back."

Trooper: "Have a good day, Sir."

Last word

I was the kid next door's imaginary friend.

Emo Phillips

The Idler, Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Sound democratic principle

LET'S have no quibbling about this council measure to stop the media getting an advance look at agendas dealing with the way ratepayers' money is spent. Why should the hacks be given this unfair advantage? Why should anyone be interested anyway?

Let the ratepaying public learn of the way their money is spent, direct from the lips of the councillors in debate. Let them learn by way of soaring oratory what the real meaning is of what might well look dodgy when set out in black and white in the unimaginative way accountants have. Let us protect innocent ratepayers from misgivings as to the skill and probity of the city's financial management.

The so-called gagging is in fact a sound democratic principle. To behave otherwise would be perverse. Imagine if I were to give advance notice right now of my intention to reveal tomorrow details of the council's plans to slash rates by 50 percent; to reverse the street renaming in Durban; to save Vetch's beach for posterity; and to send a fact-finding mission to the Folies Bergere, in Paris, seeking a possible solution to the financial travails of Moses Mabhida Stadium?

No, the councillors – like anyone else – must wait and read about it in tomorrow's paper.

Shark drops in

GOLFERS at the 12^th hole on a course in California were astonished when a leopard shark two feet long dropped out of the sky onto the green – splat! - and writhed about.

Puncture marks near the dorsal fin suggested it had been caught by a bird of prey then managed to wriggle free.

They took the shark back to the clubhouse where it was put in a bucket of salted water. Then a club employee took it to the ocean, about 8 km away, and released it. It lay in the water a few seconds then recovered and shot away.

Every golfer wants to score an eagle. So what if it's a fish eagle?

Boorishness

A WILD boar caused chaos at a bus station in China when it rampaged through an office, tried to escape through a window then shattered a glass door.

It happened in Shantou, in Guangdong province, and was captured on closed circuit TV.

The incident began when the boar ran into the waiting area, where it jumped on a chair and tried to smash the window. A cook on duty tried to scare it away with a chair but it grabbed the chair in its mouth.

Yes, some commuters are just pigs - too impatient to queue.

 

Croc caught

A HUGE crocodile has been recaptured by police in the Gaza Strip after escaping from a zoo two years ago. The 1.75m fellow had been living in a sewage pit near the town of Umm al-Nasir. Now he's been placed in a pond with four female crocodiles at a place called Beit Lahiya.

You never know your luck. One moment you're in a sewage pit, next you're sharing a pond with four lovelies.

We presume this croc will now be content. But should crocodiles be kept at all in a place beset by such human savagery as in the Gaza Strip? Crocodiles are peaceable and inoffensive creatures by comparison.

 

Idiot driver

A WOMAN in Ohio has been ordered by a court to wear an "idiot" sign after driving on a footpath to avoid a school bus picking up children. Shena Hardin, 32, will have to stand at a junction as a warning to others, after she was repeatedly caught on camera driving dangerously.

A judge at Cleveland Municipal Court told Hardin she would have to wear a sign saying: "Only an idiot drives on the sidewalk to avoid a school bus." She has to comply on two days.

It seems an appropriate punishment. Could it be tried here? We probably don't have enough signwriters.

 

Once upun a time

MORE puns. Hold your nose and swallow the medicine:

 

·        Broken pencils are pointless.

·        What do you call a dinosaur with a extensive vocabulary? A thesaurus.

·         I used to be a banker, but then I lost interest.

·          I dropped out of communism class because of lousy Marx.

Stop pulling faces! It's good for you!

 

 

Tailpiece

WHAT happens when a jazz musician's clothes wear out? It's ragtime, baby!

Last word

To be willing to die for an idea is to set a rather high price on conjecture.

Anatole France

 

The Idler, Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Rugby and the ref factor

 

THE DECISION by the Irish Rugby Union to put its side into black jerseys when they can't wear their traditional green now begins to make sense. It's apparent that IRB referees and assistant referees are intimidated by black jerseys.

 

Watching the All Blacks-Scotland encounter at the Street Centre for the Over-40s, the overwhelming consensus was that if you're wearing an All Blacks jersey – and especially if your name happens to be Richie McCaw – you are allowed to hang about offside and dive over the ruck to poach the ball. Also to run lines that block off potential tacklers.

 

Diving over the rucks actually looks great fun – but surely everyone should be allowed to do it.

 

The match also highlighted an anomaly that is fast becoming a vile hypocrisy. The laws state quite clearly that the scrumhalf should put the ball in straight, the way it has to go in straight to the line-outs.

 

All Blacks scrumhalf Piri Weepu was putting in the ball so unashamedly skew, it was as if he were trying to pass direct to Dan Carter at flyhalf.

 

This is happening all over, not just when the All Blacks are involved. It is a pandering to the heretics who want to call the scrum a "restart" and consider it to be the equivalent of the Rugby League monkey scrum, with a bit of grunt and heave for effect but possession more or less guaranteed the putter-in.

 

Enough of this heresy! The game is in danger of falling into disrepute. The punters are getting restless.

 

Be warned

 

AN ANGUISHED message comes in from Zoltan de Rossner, of Pennington.

 

"Please send this warning to everyone on your e-mail list.

 

"If someone comes to your front door saying they are checking for ticks due to the warm weather, and ask you to take your clothes off and dance around with your arms up, DO NOT DO IT!! THIS IS A SCAM!!

 

"They only want to see you dance naked. I wish I'd got this yesterday … I feel so stupid."

 

Be warned. It's a jungle out there.

 

Omwip?

 

READER Jeremy Whysall reacts to yesterday's piece about Mamwips – Middle-Aged Men with iPads.

 

"I am 74 with an iPad - does that make me an Omwip?"

 

Old Man With iPad? Maybe it does.

 

Jeremy attaches a pun. "There was this lady who had twins. She called them Ureen and Urine - because they were as alike as two peas."

 

These 74-year-olds can sometimes get a bit inconsequential.

 

Sars or Tears

 

ROB NICOLAI, chief astro-physicist and quantum mechanic of Howick, turns his scientific skills to financial/political analysis.

 

Drawing a parallel between Sars, the bird/swine flu pandemic, and Sars, the South African Revenue Service, he says there's a danger of state tender fraud depleting our Sars tax base.

 

"With these scarce resources hitting empty, the symptoms manifest in service delivery protests, military personnel going on strike and investors fleeing with their capital, the definitions of Sars are confusing.

 

"I think the service should be renamed locally as Tears (Tender Enrichment of ANC Representative Structures). There is no known treatment for the inevitable outbreak of nation-wide Tears unless a rude awakening actually does come about in the 2014 national elections."

Bananas

AN INTERNATIONAL trade dispute over bananas has been settled after two decades of wrangling.

The European Union and 10 Latin American countries have signed an agreement to formally end eight separate World Trade Organisation (WTO) cases. The agreement follows the EU agreeing in December 2009 to gradually reduce the tariffs on Latin American bananas.

One reads all this with relief – because South Africa is not even mentioned. With all the talk these days of a banana republic, one suffers an involuntary twitch.

 

 

 

Tailpiece

A MOTORIST in North Carolina has a flat tyre. He pulls off onto the roadside and puts a bouquet of flowers in front of the car and one behind it. Then he gets back in the car to wait for breakdown assistance.
 

A passerby drives by He turns around, goes back and asks what the problem is.
 

"I got a flat tahr."
 

"But what's with the flowers?"
 

"They tell you when you break down to put flares in the front and flares in the back. I never did understand it neither."

 

Last word

I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves.

Ludwig Wittgenstein

 

The Idler, Monday, November 12, 2012

Conditions of eeriness

CONFUSION and panic spread across the land at the weekend as a soft, yellow luminescence eerily showed itself. Was this some impending meteorological disaster? Was the Inkanyamba – the five-headed snake that lives in the Umgeni – about to inflict fire and brimstone?

It took a while for the import to sink in. Old men with grey beards remembered a time when such things heralded growth, times of plenty and test cricket. The weather bureau announced that it was a freak condition known as "sunlight", caused by winds driving away the rain clouds.

Down at Merseyside we celebrated with some great jazz. Barry Varty and his gang were in wonderful form with a swing theme, winding up with When The Saints Go Marching In. It brought the house down.

Later, the Boks somehow pulled it off in Ireland. Patrick Lambie scored 11 of our 16 points.

Happy days are here again!

All Irish?

MEANWHILE, what can have possessed the Irish rugby authorities to put their side into black jerseys to play again the Boks instead of the white they normally wear against us? Black and green are not exactly a sharp contrast, especially for TV viewers.

Or was this the idea of the TV networks, who are said to make all the decisions in rugby these days? (Let's force them to go high definition).

Stand by for Ireland versus the All Blacks.

Soiree switches

THE SEASON of Mondays at Six soirees at the Alliance Francaise ended on a high note last week with Budgie Smith presenting a collage of films on eccentric artist Neil Sack, Neil's eccentric son Steve, artist Andrew Verster (notorious forger of passports to frustrate the apartheid regime) and the highly eccentric artist Walter Batiss.

Batiss's orgiastic sketches were especially intriguing and it was enthralling to watch him so accurately sketching the female form with just a few deft strokes, his pen seemingly propelled by the subject matter. It's heartening to watch a man so deeply engrossed in his work.

Tonight the venue reverts to St Clement's, where Pieter Scholtz's latest book, Tales from the Graveyard (Horus) will be launched. This is set in a cemetery near the small village of Loupiac, in France, where Pieter has a second home.

For those of nervous disposition, absinthe will be served.

Celtic festivals

 

READER Brian Kennedy says the Celtic festival of Samhain does not signify the end of summer (as I wrote in the recent piece on Halloween).

 

"Samhain, November 1, celebrates the end of the harvest and the start of winter. Hence the importance of fruit and nuts on Halloween.

 

"There are three other old Celtic festivals to mark various stages in the year. Imbolc, February 1, the start of spring; Bealtaine, May 1, the start of summer; and Lunasa, August 1, the start of the harvest.

 

"All these feasts have been Christianised over the course of centuries but people in the Celtic countries still celebrate them just as our ancient ancestors did, many today not knowing the ancient symbolism."

 

When it's Imbolc again I'll import again

Tulips from Amsterdam …

 

 

Mamwips

 

STEVE Chatteris, of Durban North, has invented a new acronym: Mamwips. It stands for Middle-Aged Men With iPads.

 

Steve says it's an exasperated response to his middle-aged Yuppie pals showing off their iPads.

 

I couldn't agree more. The Remington typewriter is as far as nature intended us to go.

 

 

Pun-itive stuff

MORE agonising puns:

·         Energiser bunny arrested. Charged with battery.

·         I didn't like my beard at first. Then it grew on me.

·         How do you make holy water? Boil the hell out of it!

·         Did you hear about the cross-eyed teacher who lost her job because she couldn't control her pupils?

·         When you get a bladder infection, urine trouble.

A-a-a-a-argh! Enough! Enough!

Nkandla again

 

IAN GIBSON, poet laureate of Hillcrest, pens a few lines on the burgeoning Zuma residence.

 

The Nation, in inspissated* gloom,

Hears analysts predicting our doom;

But where is the Leader?

Asks a news reader.

Why! At Nkandla, adding another guest-room.

 

*Don't worry, I've checked. Inspissation is the process of thickening by dehydration.

 

Tailpiece

A TENNESSEE state trooper pulls over a pickup: "Got any ID?"

 

Pickup driver:"Any idee 'bout whut?"

 

Last word

You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

Mark Twain

 

 

The Idler Friday, November 9, 2012

Where continents meet

 

DURBAN'S Point precinct is where Europe and Asia met Africa. It has always been a melting pot of cultures and vices – scruffy, dangerous, vibrant and colourful. In days of yore the occasional sortie to places like the Smugglers' Inn, on the dockside, was an absolute must for the social swingers.

 

To quote from a book just published by my old colleague Anthony Morris: "Zulu, English, Afrikaans, Hindi, Tamil – the main Point languages – assailed the ears, loud and exuberant. On the ships one heard the quieter tones of northern Europe, the chatter from the Far East, and the twang from North America. During and after the war troopships and war vessels brought the accents of Britain, Australia and New Zealand. There was more Portuguese and Greek heard in the small cafes and tearooms in Point Road than at the docks."

 

Ant ought to know. He grew up at the Point, where his father worked in the harbour administration. He first surfed and fished at Vetch's Pier. He soaked up the atmosphere and observed the goings-on. And goings-on there were aplenty in a place frequented by sailormen and where Point Road was also known as "Boat Road – whores both sides."

 

From the Point (published as an e-book by Amazon) is a fictionalised collection of short stories and vignettes, much of it told through the barbershop of Karl De Jager, veteran of the wartime Western Desert and subsequent world traveller with the merchant navy. A barbershop is an ideal setting for such yarns. As Ant notes: "Through life one meets several types of prolific talkers. Politicians, salesmen and confidence tricksters seek to influence, sway opinion, sell, steal and seduce. Then there are barmen, barbers and taxi drivers. They talk for pleasure. They neither proselytise nor preach. All they want is attention, and some not even that. They talk regardless. They offer opinions, gossip, hearsay evidence – and sometimes interesting facts."

 

The book is fiction, but based on reality. For instance, I myself remember very well the Point Road lady who could balance two pints of beer on her ample bosom. So will thousands of Durban people. She was an institution.

 

The Point is in a sense Durban's own Cannery Row. Ant does well to capture what was there in those now distant days, before things change for better or worse, as it seems they must. He also gets across the way the Point is a portal to a wider world; its exuberance a spur to people like Karl de Jager (and himself) to get out and explore that world..

 

 

For the record

 

HISTORY turns on such things. Yesterday we discussed the pigeon skeleton found in a chimney in Surrey, bearing a coded World War II message. George Hutchison, of Kwambonambi, solves the riddle.

 

"Just to set the record straight, the pigeon found in the chimney in Surrey was actually dispatched some six weeks ago from Kwambonambi, bearing the message: 'Archduke Ferdinand found alive hiding in the Kwambonambi Country Club. World War I cancelled.'"

 

 

Punography

 

ANOTHER dose of puns:

 

·        I know a guy who's addicted to brake fluid. He says he can stop any time.

·        How does Moses make his tea? Hebrews it.

·        I stayed up all night to see where the sun went. Than it dawned on me.

·        This girl said she recognised me from the vegetarian club, but I'd never met herbivore.

·        I'm reading a book about anti-gravity. I can't put it down.

·        I did a theatrical performance about puns. It was a play on words.

·        They told me I had Type A blood, but it was a Type-O.

·        A dyslexic man walked into a bra.

A-a-a-a-argh again!

 

Tailpiece

She (into her cellphone): "Where are you?"

He: "You remember that jewellery shop we went into five years ago? Where you fell in love with that diamond necklace we couldn't afford, and I said one day I'd get it for you?"

She (with a catch in her voice): "Yes, I remember."

He: "Well, I'm in the bar right next door to it."

 

 

Last word

The folly of mistaking a paradox for a discovery, a metaphor for a proof, a torrent of verbiage for a spring of capital truths, and oneself for an oracle, is inborn in us.

Paul Valery