This World

My youngest son will be 18 in a few weeks. Seventeen has been quite trying for him.
He could have joined the army if he so wished yet is not allowed to buy Call of Duty in the shops. He can fire a live gun but not a simulated computer one.

He can’t vote, which if he did enlist seems unfair. The elected government of his elders could send him off to war. That government might not have got in had his generation had a vote. Continue reading “This World”

Results of the Revolting Rhymes competition

A good, but short selection of ‘Revolting Rhymes’ for this revival of the poetry competition. Very hard to judge….

Bearsy’s poem (here) was a well told tale of the ‘King’s New Clothes’ with an excellent delayed rhyme scheme and with overtones, to my mind of AA Milne as well and Dahl!

Low Wattage gave us a new version of ‘The Owl and the Pussy Cat’ (here) capturing their grief after the wedding excellently, with a couple of ‘in-house’ references, cleverly placed!

Janus made an excellent go of ‘The Tin Soldier’ (here) – though from the comments I read afterwards he had to sort out formatting and do a little post-post- editing, helped in the end by Bearsy! I hate that stanza thing disappearing when pasting in from word! What’s the answer, Old Bear?

John Mackie’s contribution tells the tale of ‘Hansel and Gretel’ (here) with a lovely twist – the addition of Stockholm Syndrome!!! Hilarious.

After thought and consideration I hereby nominate Low Wattage as the winner this time and hand the honour of setting the next competition to him.

Sevens rugby, 2011 – P.E.

My programme

Never in my wildest dreams did I envisage watching international rugby right here in the Eastern Cape in the middle of December.

This week was historically reserved for the first of our summer holiday cricket tests, always played at St. George’s Park and always well attended. That was until the thieving, fraudsters who now run S.A. cricket sold out to bigger unions. ‘Our’ test is now going to be played up in Pretoria, most Pretoria residents are now on holiday and probably at the coast enjoying the sunshine and beaches or off at a game park, there will be nobody at Centurion but when has common sense ever prevailed over administrators lining their pockets?

Back to the rugby.

The 2 day event is billed as ‘Rugby’s biggest party’ take my word for it, it is!

What a day, what an event, rugby like you’ve never seen, non stop action, 21 games yesterday, starting at 11:15am finishing with the final just after 8pm.

Party, party, party, music, music, music, dancing girls, the most amazing camaraderie that I’ve witnessed both in the stands and on the field, ever.

It all took place at our brand new (okay, it’s 18 months old now) stadium built for the FIFA 2010 world cup, The Nelson Mandela Bay stadium.

Below is a pictorial of my day (yes ladies, it’s not all about rugby but the day, feel free to have a look :))

Continue reading “Sevens rugby, 2011 – P.E.”

Just to be clear on the pesky Euro…….

“The eurozone faces an imminent, acute funding problem. Member states need to  repay over $1,100bn of debt in 2012, the bulk of it due in the first six   months. On top of that, European banks, heavily dependent on state largesse, have around $665 billion of debt coming due by June next year.” DT today.

And Matt says:

“Does Father Xmas visit countries in the Eurozone that are naughty?”

And all the Europrats have talked about is budgets and fines for malefactors! Good luck if you think the UK should be in there too. In my book it’s better to disembark before the ship sinks – probably next summer.