Cat-calling

The practice of cat-calling – allegedly socially acceptable in the 1970s – has rightly come under the spotlight of late. The difficulty, however, in socially outlawing this practice is the challenge of radically changing such a deeply engrained convention with any immediate effect. Despite the (loud) wishes of the feminists, that’s actually not so easy to do and consequently seems likely to fail.

So how about some baby steps towards a mutually acceptable conclusion? Perhaps it should begin this way, but for me the smart progression in cat-calling would be something along these lines:

_catcall2

And if it’s kind of difficult for you to imagine that a hunky, macho builder would call his cat “Fluffy”, then try to imagine one not wolf-whistling at a passing woman.

More dairy issues

After yesterday’s Malan’s Dairy post, here’s another dairy issue.
This time it’s at Woolworths.

DSC_0004(1)

And they’re not even kidd… they’re not even joking.

When it comes to cattle, this isn’t a problem. Consumer comes before calf. It’s the natural order of things. But when it comes to goats’s, it seems that the kids are alright. Their need is greater than yours – and it’s a well known fact that baby goats are fully dependent on a reliable supply of Chevre.

Damn this nanny state.

Fortunately, as the notice suggests, once September comes, the shelves will once again by laden with goats’s’s milk products. Until then, you’re going to have to just go all mainstream and bovine, hipster folk.

Blog Name Change

After carefully considering the media reports of the stowaways on the BA54 flight from Johannesburg to London Heathrow, I have come to the conclusion that I obviously need to rename this blog to more accurately represent just how far I actually am from civilisation:

Sky News:

Stowaway Plunges To Death From BA Plane - Google Chrome 2015-06-19 112725 AM.bmpGuardian:

Stowaway fell to death from plane on to London shop after 8,000-mile flight  UK news  The Guardian - Google Chrome 2015-06-19 114633 AM.bmp

Henceforth, 6000 miles… will be known as Oops, my mistake. Apparently, it’s actually more than 8000 miles from civilisation…

I’ll sort the URL as soon as I get the new domain name registered.

It seems that the plane must have taken a 2500 mile detour. As some wit remarked:

The deceased probably would have survived the standard length journey.

It’s actually 5645 miles from Joburg to London Heathrow (and 6022 miles from Cape Town).
Flightradar24 reports that the flight in question left JNB at 21:17 and landed at LHR at 07:02. That’s 10¾ hours (allowing for the 1 hr time difference), meaning that if the distance was “over 8000 miles”, the plane must have been supersonic for more than 95% of the journey. Pretty impressive for a 747. (Actually, pretty impossible for a 747.)

Please note my neat sidestepping issues of desperate emigration, airport security and any other serious and awkward issues that this story raises.

UPDATE: The Independent as well

Stowaway falls to death from wheel of South Africa flight over London, another is in hospital - Home News - UK - The Independent - Google Chrome 2015-06-19 121637 PM.bmp

And the BBC:

'Plane stowaway' body found on Richmond roof - BBC News - Google Chrome 2015-06-19 041702 PM.bmp

“Churnalism”.

Subdued hound

Not 24 hours after this now infamous video was shot, the beagle was at the vet. Which wasn’t good news for anyone concerned – save for the vet’s bank manager, I suppose.

rsz_dsc_0003The diagnosis? A poor diet over the weekend. We’re guessing sand, fish, bones, seaweed and some more sand. That sort of thing is going to irritate your colon and it seems that the colon of the beagle is indeed irritated. We do try to watch what the dog eats, but it’s impossible to be there 24/7. We have prevented any previous episodes of this nature, which, given the desire of this breed to eat anything and everything, surely deserves at least some praise.

Despite appropriate medication, Colin remains rather subdued this evening, so we’re left hoping for an overnight turnaround before more serious measures need to be taken tomorrow.

Confluence

“I love it when a plan comes together,” said Hannibal, although for me, something better than a plan coming together is a series of other things which aren’t plans coming together and making a blog post.
Like this sort of confluence, for example:

A visit to Sheffield. (I just did this.)
A shot I took in a pub toilet on Sunday. (Careful now.)
And a pocketed article on the demise of Working Men’s Clubs in Sheffield, featuring this line:

We did have a young band called Drenge who filmed a video here recently, but other than that we don’t have much interest from students and the like.

Two mentions in a week of a (local to) Sheffield band that I didn’t know about?
About time I knew about them, I think. And wikipedia will assist:

Drenge are an English two-piece alternative rock band, from Castleton, Derbyshire, based in Sheffield. The band is made up of Eoin Loveless, on guitar and vocals, and his younger brother Rory, on drums. They take their name from the Danish word for “boys”, although it is pronounced differently.

And the Drenge video shot in the Sheffield Lane WMC was for We Can Do What We Want – an anarchic, punk-rock effort with rather too much gratuitous Clockwork Orange-style ultraviolence for my liking.

Not that this video is ever so much better, although at least the main victim is a W-reg Citroen Saxo rather than a bingo crowd. Starting with some teens drinking in bus shelter in Bamford (I was there on Tuesday), continuing with some joy-riding in the Hope Valley, and finishing with a jealous girlfriend and her mate beating up a lad and chucking his body onto a moorland fire (actually, it’s not better at all), this is Backwaters:

It’s pretty good music though, with hints of Arctic Monkeys, Joy Division, The Wildhearts and even The Smiths, as well as the more obvious comparisons with that heavy, grungy punk backdrop. Maybe something for walking along the beaches of the Southern Cape in wintertime.

And so I will, as the pub toilet ad suggested, give the album a go and I will report back.