Done

I’m finished. Someone call a doctor. My sides have split.

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This then, is the response of the official ANC twitter account to their defeat in Port Elizabeth and their utterly dismal showings in Johannesburg and Tshwane.

If you don’t laugh, you have to cry. It’s either hilarious or it’s tragic. It’s both.

For the other parties, this seeing the ruling party adopting this stance must be like manna from heaven. If this seemingly blind obliviousness continues towards and into the next (general) election in 2019, the ANC is not just going to be beaten, it’s going to be obliterated.

However, for the people, with another 3 years to go before the start of any possible change in government and/or attitude, it’s pretty galling. I don’t think (and the election results do kinda support my view) that things are going well here at the moment. There is a massive amount of dissatisfaction, irritation, anger. I’m not saying that the ANC is solely responsible for this, but nor do I see their current, rather apathetic approach doing enough (read “anything”) to combat it.

Incidentally, I’ve left JZ in the background there on the screenshot because his imperious, somewhat sour, face seems to me to be the perfect analogy (and possibly the biggest reason) for the ANC’s – and therefore South Africa’s – current woes.

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It’s stuff like this that makes me wonder if they’ve actually seen the results…

1811 – Extraordinary

The Manx Nostalgia group I’m a member of on Facebook is generally a succession of comments about “it’s a shame that [place] has been redeveloped now” or that “it’s a shame that [place] has fallen into such disrepair”.
The positive nostalgia is sadly lacking.

Still, it does, on occasion, come up with some interesting moments.
Here’s one now:

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First off, Pooilvaaish (to give it the correct spelling) is still a place: a small collection of dwellings on the eastern side of Bay Ny Carrickey, with beautiful views across towards Port St Mary, and the mouth of the harbour where John Comish perished. Interestingly, its name translates from Manx Gaelic as “Pool of Death”. Nice. 

And secondly, yes, there are newspapers from back then, although there’s no mention of what happened to John Comish. There is a lot about a tremendous and devastating storm which occurred “Tuesday last”, and which mentions PSM harbour, but that was the 24th September – the 22nd was a Sunday. So, (not having done a lot of further digging) I can’t see anything specific about his death.

However, that newspaper report is still worth a nice long read, as it does include some other really interesting stuff:

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Let’s get them documented:

  • Naval Longevity: It is a singular fact, that the united ages of the ten first admirals on the list of our naval heroes, amount to 814 years. This circumstance shows that fighting is not a very unhealthy employment.

Either that or pickling with rum is a very effective preservative.

  • Extraordinary Shot: Friday, Mr Levi Larkham, who holds the deputation of Radipole Farm, under I.H. Browne, Esq. killed a hare running and a brace of partridges, at one shot.

Eenhaasentweepatrysemeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein? That’s almost as good as Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein.

But then there was this:

  • Extraordinary growth of a Potatoe: There was last week taken up in a field near Ely, Cambridgeshire, a potatoe, which was of such extraordinary size, the when whole, it would not go into a bushel measure, and when cut in pieces, of the bigness of middling-sized potatoes, it nearly filled the bushel measure.

It could be straight out of Blackadder. It could have been the inspiration for Baldrick and his turnips. It probably was the inspiration for Baldrick and his turnips. I’m just sad that it happened 80 years too early for photos to be taken.

The fact that these 3 pieces of “light-hearted”, trivial news made it into the one page of the newspaper suggests to me that either the editorial staff weren’t really that concerned about other, more serious news, or more likely, that there actually was very little going on in the Isle of Man. That latter fact hasn’t really changed much in the intervening 200 or so years, as this other post, including connections to both the Isle of Man and potatoes, demonstrated.

1 hit wonders?

Here’s a Facebook ad for an upcoming show at the musical theatre beyond the Boerewors Gordyn.

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Let me help you out with the (not so) small print:

Get ready to party to the ultimate 1 Hit Wonders!

Sounds good.

Enjoy songs like Do You Love Me, Play That Funky Music, Kung Fu Fighting, You Spin Me Round, Take On Me, 99 Red Balloons & more

u wot m8?

Remember those songs? Of course you do. The Contours, Wild Cherry, Carl Douglas, Dead or Alive. They gave us such memories, and then they disappeared without trace. Likewise Nena and her red balloons (if you ignore her MASSIVE success in Germany) (which they clearly have).

Hast du etwas Zeit für mich?
Dann singe ich ein Lied für dich
Von neunundneunzig Luftballons
Auf ihrem Weg zum Horizont.

Indeed.

But “Take On Me”? No. Just no. That wasn’t a “1 Hit Wonder’.

And I’m not even annoyed because I’m an a-ha fan. I’m annoyed because it’s plainly incorrect. How can a song which wasn’t even their biggest hit be a “1 Hit Wonder”?

Let’s compare: Carl Douglas hit the top of the charts with Kung Fu Fighting back in 1974. He was NEVER heard of EVER. AGAIN. He disappeared as fast as lightning. In fact, the way he vanished was actually a little bit frightening.

But I digress. Often.

Now, I’ve nothing against Carl. His name will live on in the Hall of Fame through cheesy discos and pub quizzes forever more. And fair play to him. But…

Let’s have a look at a-ha: Take On Me was a number 2 hit for them in October 1985.
Just two months later, they released The Sun Always Shines On TV.
It went to number 1, clearly making it a bigger hit than Take On Me.
But whether it was bigger or not is actually beside the point. It was also a hit. A second hit.
This ridiculous success immediately ruined a-ha’s “1 Hit Wonder” status, a status which had only lasted for about 60 days. The further 7 Top 10 hits which they then went on to have over the next 30-odd years also kind of cemented their reputation as clearly not being 1 Hit Wonders. For me, at least. And everyone else with any sort of rudimentary intelligence.

And yet they’ve been dumped in with Wild Cherry and The Contours.

Incorrectly.

Look, I’ve been to a show there before and it was slick, professional and fun. I’m sure that this one will be as well. But underlying the whole production is the sickening inaccuracy I have described above. If you’re going along, I suggest that you try to overlook the invalid and plainly false information on which the entire show is based.

Because any other approach would surely ruin your experience.

Swoop

Not sure how I hadn’t seen this before, but it’s certainly something worth preserving on here for posterity and revisitation.

This, according to the Youtube authorship anyway, is Jean-Jacques Wallis, and he’s jumping off the Lions Head (remember when my wife did that?) and paragliding down to Clifton beach.
Fast and hard and low.

Ever so low.

Blimey. Bit toight approaching the beach there. Squeaky bum time.

Colour me impressed by his bravery and skill. And yes, at some point, this sort of thing usually all ends in tears, but for the moment, let’s come along and enjoy the good times while we can.

P.S. There’s another one here.

Snoopy songs

Warning: This post contains some naughty words.

With a Snoopy birthday party happening in our household Real Soon Now™, all things Peanuts® are en vogue. Thus, it was no surprise when, in addition to a plethora of other Snoopy-related requests, I was asked by my 7 8-year-old daughter if I could please find some Snoopy music on my phone.

I had a look on simfy.

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Everything seemed to be going just fine for the first six songs.

But then if this meme was ever needed, it’s right here:

that-escalated-quickly-will-ferrell

We listened to the first song, but then we stopped listening to any further songs in order to leave a suitable buffer zone between us and anything after song six.

Safety first.