The really boring and totally pointless snippets thread IV

[Wodrick]

I am suffering Hippo withdrawal.

[4mastacker]

Here you are Wodrick , your daily dose.

miss dianne.png (218.59 KiB) Viewed 379 times

[Wodrick]

Not really what I referred to

[Boac]

I think I saw ahead like that moving gently back and forth on one of those fairground game stalls.

[1DC]

Yes I too would like to hear from our Botswana correspondent, I hope he comes back soon.

[Rwy in Sight]

Lion was truly the most disgusting beer on God's earth. Castle was, and probably still, is so full of chemicals that just looking at the bottle is liable to give you a hangover.

I believe that I have mentioned on ON before, the one 'beer' that disagreed with me from day one was Keo.
My 1st morning on Cyprus I woke up with a headache, and said it can't have been the beer, I only had 3!

But I was wrong.

I had to pay NAAFI prices for imported UK canned beer for the rest of my tour.

What's wrong with Keo? It tastes better than most cheap dutch beer available in the region!

[ian16th]

What's wrong with Keo? It tastes better than most cheap dutch beer available in the region!

I can only go on my experience. It gave me a headache after drinking very little of it.

This was in 1962, Keo might be making it differently these days.

[TheGreenGoblin]

Ellis Park was a Lion Lager only monopoly.

Then SAB, had a Coca-Cola moment, and in their wisdom, changed the taste of their 2nd biggest selling brand! It eventually went off the market.
They have now re-invented it, dunno how its selling.

The rule of thumb for Englishmen was, in Joburg drink Castle and in Durban drink the Lion.

Their biggest seller is of course Carling Black Label. Almost entirely to the NR market.

Lion was truly the most disgusting beer on God's earth. Castle was, and probably still, is so full of chemicals that just looking at the bottle is liable to give you a hangover.

Used to drink Windhoek when they still had a spring that hadn't dried up. Not quite as good these days.

This short biographical tale by Trevor Romaine sums up Lion Lager for me...

It happened a long time ago. A time when people actually did what they said they were going to do. I was driving along a dirt road in the Drakensberg in South Africa with my girlfriend. In the distance, I noticed a speck on the horizon. A speck that would teach me about something that, until then, I did not know even existed. Integrity. I know it’s a big word and hard to explain, but I will try nonetheless. You see, that speck on the horizon was a very old, toothless, African man with a white beard, riding an old bicycle. I slowed down so that I didn’t spew dust all over the poor old guy. I waved at him and he waved back as we passed. His smile was wonderfully warm and friendly. He looked about eighty and way too old to be riding a bicycle. I watched him in my rear view and then looked up to see a bakkie coming towards me at full speed. It was moving very quickly. There was a dust cloud billowing behind it. As the truck passed me, I saw three young guys in the front seat. One of them had a Lion Lager in his hand. I’m embarrassed to say that I could spot a Lion Lager beer from a mile away. That’s something I learned in the army. I glanced at my rear view and my heart almost stopped. The driver of the bakkie was heading straight for the old man on the bicycle. I saw the old guy look nervously over his shoulder as the vehicle came up from behind. I closed my eyes because I knew that they were going to try to dislodge him from his bicycle. I opened my eyes and saw them swerving towards him and missing him by inches. I could also see them gesticulating and shouting at the man as they drove past. The old man wobbled on that bike and I saw him drive off the road and crash down a little ditch. I slowed down and turned the car around. I got to the old man and he was sitting down in the veld, rubbing his knee. The front wheel of his bike was buckled and bent. The old man looked so sad. ‘Haai eh-eh,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘What is wrong with those kids?’ ‘Are you okay?’ I asked. ‘Ja, basie,’ he replied. ‘It is just my heart that is sore.’ He told us he was a gardener at the Champagne Castle Hotel and was on his way to work.

I put his bicycle in the boot of the car and we took him to the hotel, which was about five or six kilometres away. Apparently he rode his rattletrap bike to work every day, rain or shine. As we were leaving, I gave the man about forty rand in cash from my wallet and a few rands from my girlfriend’s purse. ‘It’s to fix your bike,’ I said. ‘Sorry, my kleinbaas,’ he said, ‘I can’t take your money.’ My girlfriend told him to take the money because I was just going to use it to buy drinks and get drunk anyway. The old man chuckled and told me I had a wise girlfriend. ‘I will pay you back, my basie,’ he said. ‘That’s okay,’ I said. ‘You don’t have to.’ But he insisted that I give him my address and I did so, on a little scrap of paper, thinking that he would lose it in about ten seconds. Needless to say, I had the resources to find more beer money. And my girlfriend and I had a great weekend in the Berg and I forgot about the old man. The scuffed and wrinkled white envelope arrived at my little flat in Sandringham, Johannesburg, one month later. In it was one rand, twenty-five cents! Yes, the old man did what he said he was going to do. I swear, at the end of every month, an envelope arrived with one rand and twenty-five cents in it. No note, no return address – just the money the old man had promised to pay me back. I was in advertising in those days and a little over a year later, I went back to the Drakensberg to shoot a television commercial with Sarel van der Merwe, the rally driver. It was for Jurgens caravans and he was towing the caravan through the Berg, showing how rough and tough those caravans were. The filming took place very close to where that old man had fallen off his bike and I decided to go and find him, to tell him that he didn’t need to send me the money every month because I was doing fine. I found out that he had retired from the hotel. They told me that he lived in the village near where I first saw him and they directed me to his place. My art director and I went to the man’s home. It was exactly what you’d imagine. A thatched mud hut with missing windowpanes covered in Spar plastic bags to keep the wind out. An old African granny with grey hair answered the door. She had a doek on her head that was tied under her chin like people used to do in the olden days when they had toothache. Inside the hut, the hardened mud floor was swept clean. There was a Primus stove, a galvanised tub with a bar of Sunlight soap in it, a rickety old table with a clean cloth on it, a little cupboard and a bed on bricks with white sheets. That’s all. It was spotless. The Sunlight soap was the only colourful thing in the entire place. I have such a clear vision of that bar of soap. I can see it in my mind when I close my eyes. Other than those few items, the place was spare. The woman was the old man’s wife.

I asked whether he was around so I could tell him that he didn’t have to pay the money back to me. What she told me stopped me cold. The old man had died six months before and she had continued paying his debt. I was stunned. She had nothing. Absolutely NOTHING! Yet she was doing what she considered was the right thing. Paying their debt back as promised. She kept his word. She continued sending me money every month, despite the fact that her husband had died and she was poor. I told her I didn’t need the money and gave her a little more from my pocket. She was so grateful and would not stop hugging me.

Experienced exactly he same when hitching up from Cape Town to see my girlfriend (later my wife, now ex) in Kimberley. Black chap further down the road also hitching, just outside Wellington. Deliberately run down by a bunch of white farmers in a bakkie (pickup/ute)...

[larsssnowpharter]

Back from dog following. Can report:

1. Wet.
2. Windy.
3. Woodland fungi abundant.
4. Black both didn't locate any truffles or porcini.
5. Blackberry crop not good.

[G-CPTN]

Landmine detection rat awarded gold medal for ‘lifesaving bravery’.

[TheGreenGoblin]

Landmine detection rat awarded gold medal for ‘lifesaving bravery’.

Must have been a Desert Rat!

[Wodrick]

One is in receipt of communication from *LG* referring to my query about her encounter with hurricane Sally.

They have survived an almost direct hit with no damage or injury apart from a garden that looks like the Somme.

From what she says there is a lot of damage roundabout, downed cranes, broken bridges etc.

[Pontius Navigator]

Here you are Wodrick , your daily dose.


miss dianne.png

Ready, willing and able

[barkingmad]

That award-winning landmine detection rat looks very like Basil, the 'Filigree Siberian Hamster', which starred in the Fawlty Towers episode with the hotel inspector?

It might even be one of the episodes which nanny still permits us to watch?

Edit: Would any of his/her relatives be permitted to operate in a NHS hospital environment, sniffing out the Covid-1984 samples alongside the spaniels? Somehow I think not...

[TheGreenGoblin]

That award-winning landmine detection rat looks very like Basil, the 'Filigree Siberian Hamster', which starred in the Fawlty Towers episode with the hotel inspector?

It might even be one of the episodes which nanny still permits us to watch?

Edit: Would any of his/her relatives be permitted to operate in a NHS hospital environment, sniffing out the Covid-1984 samples alongside the spaniels? Somehow I think not...

Replace the quasi humanoid unter Menschen in government with more like that award winning "Basil" rat say I!

Howling gale here earlier which blew panels and slats off the border fence with our neighbour. My better half and me out in the wind and the rain, shouting at each other, she almost lifting off the ground as errant gusts caught a panel and the rain and hail drove us backwards, as we set about doing a sterling job together to make the damage right and shore up the sagging barrier. Sometimes what we can together amazes me (even if I say that myself)! Fence as good as new now.

Per unitatem fortitudo

[reddo]

Off to work tomorrow. Looks like Russia's on the cards.

[4mastacker]

The wind has also taken its toll of me back garden fence. One of the main posts has come loose in its concrete base and the wind is rocking it back and forth adding to the looseness. Buggah!! Never have a big metal wedge to hand when you need one. Mrs 4ma's solution - "We need a new fence"!!

[OFSO]

Howling gale here also. Just had visit from Covid + lady and her two mad labs (is there any other sort of Labrador). Lady has had several viral infections over past few years. Currently super healthy, but tests.... Kept front gate shut to keep mad labs out. One is 11 years old but I knew it as a puppy and it ain't forgot. Possibly!

[Rwy in Sight]

Waiting for beer buddy and a female friend to arrive.

[G-CPTN]

I knew it as a puppy and it ain't forgot.

Neighbour has one like that - it bolts towards me when it spots me.