Category: this is south africa

Musical Marie

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It’s all going off on the Isle of Man. Or at least it was just 70 years ago, back in 1953:

For the record, MM started her attempt on the same day that the Korean War ended. But that’s nowhere near as impressive as playing the piano for 158 hours.

The amazing thing is – supported by spiritualists, brandy, seven hundred cigarettes, sixteen thousand visitors (at a shilling a head, nogal!) and seven gallons of tea – she succeeded!

Musical Marie continued to play marathon piano recitals in England, the Isle of Man, Wales and Ireland until 1960.

The ‘trainer’ seems there only to rub her wrists, slap her face and collect the cold, hard cash that just keeps rolling in. Tough job.

As for the ubiquitous mentions of her weight in every article, well, clearly 17 stone – it’s just under 108kg – was a thing back then. Sadly, these days I don’t think 108kg is that unusual for a Manchester housewife. Nor the 100 fags a day.

Snek

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A long, hot day starting with gym and ending in the drive back to Cape Town.

Somewhere in between those things, this:

A mole snake (Pseudaspis cana) chilling with its head deep in a mole hole in the dunes at Suiderstrand.

It was very accommodating for close up photos, perhaps mainly because its head was deep in a mole hole in the dunes at Suiderstrand.

Super chilled.

But it was also rather warm to the touch, perhaps because it was lying (mostly) in the midday sun.

Anyway, a lovely sighting on our beach wander.

Hell(o) on Earth

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It appears that ever-expanding and actually fairly decent local budget airline FlySafair have recently rebranded, with a pink heart in a pink circle.

Their website favicon has the new logo on it:

…even if you have to look very carefully to see it on the actual pages:

But ok, what do I know about branding and advertising and marketing and so on. I’m just the customer.

But even now knowing about the rebrand, I still don’t think this ad works:

OK, OK. I can see it as “HELLO” now, but the thinner line on (and the heart within) the “O” made my brain think that it wasn’t actually part of the word “HELLO” at all. I simply read “HELL”, which I’m pretty sure wasn’t what they were going for, and which I have heard on very good authority that Victoria Falls isn’t.

HELL ZIM & ZAMBIA!

Note also the price difference between Livingstone Airport (actually called the Harry Mwanga Nkumbula International Airport) in Zambia and the Victoria Falls Airport in Zimbabwe. They’re only 35km apart, but Zim is clearly missing out on some handy extra tax revenue there: although there’s likely to be some sort of R600 passenger processing fee payable in dollars – cash only, thank you – when you get there).

But I digress – often. Branding and Marketing Wizards: please use fonts and logos more carefully in future. Or simply ask me if everything looks ok before you flight it (no pun intended) and I’ll give you a quick yes or no for a very reasonable fee (payable in dollars: cash only, thank you).

Doomed

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Following on from this post (which was copied by the Daily Maverick here – thanks TA), I have further bad news regarding the intelligence of the local social media populace.

Quite why user @loyalty_0111 chose to share this image, I don’t know. People like to share things,and that’s fine. But then to caption it “Gauteng oil field”?!?

wut?

Anyway, that’s not the real problem here. The real problem becomes evident when looking at the replies to the tweet.

Because half of them think that this is an image of a genuine Gauteng oil field.
This despite the fact that Gauteng is very, very landlocked.

This is not a new thing: it’s fairly well accepted that Gauteng has always been landlocked. .

The image is actually one of the Draugen Oil Field in the North Sea, just off Norway. By all accounts, this is an engineering marvel. And while I’m not saying that SA engineers are not also incredible, they have yet to bring the sea to Gauteng.

But – again – this is social media “informing” the younger (voting) population. And them lapping it up, despite the clear and obvious red flags.

We are doomed.

Lion around

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Absolutely no need for that pun. Gym and singing exam both went well, thanks for asking.
I’m watching a bit of Liverpool and Manchester City before we head out for a braai at a friends’ place.

So here’s a quota lion from last year on the Garden Route.

This one was so close to the safari vehicle that she didn’t even fit on the frame of the not ever so powerful lens that I was using. She could have just leapt in and eaten any one of us.

I – very sensibly – positioned myself just behind my daughter at this point. Just so I could get a better angle on the passing animals. No other reason.