Now you has jazz
A lot of the Dorsbult regulars lost interest in popular music when Perry Como retired, so when somebody called Mel Botes assured us this week in a television advert that he’d be performing at the 46664 concert in Fancourt, the manne didn’t have a clue who he was. A quick Web search revealed him to be a jazz muso; but not before it demonstrated a funky penchant for literary ad-libbing. ”Welcom to Mel Botes Officail Web Site” read the header. We asked jazz aficionado Paddastoel de Silva how to tell the difference between artistic license and old-fashioned ignorance, and he rolled his eyes and said if we had to ask we’d never know.
F is for fruit salad
Lemmer is the first to admit that the curriculum he studied at the Dorsbult Christelike Sekondêre Skool vir Moedswillige Seuns (DCSSMS) had its problems: his time would have been far better spent watching Tarzan fillems than memorising Afro-Netherlandic heredity (God, Abraham, Isaac, Andries Pretorius, HF Verwoerd), and it took him years to discover that pregnancy is in fact not caused by looking at the ankles of Sotho milkmaids. But this week he and the manne had to wonder whether outcomes-based education is any better, after they saw a post advertised at the Burgher Right School in the Pretoria News that required of the applicant a specialisation in ”Fruit Salad”. Now Vrot Snoek wants to know if he can get a job at DCSSMS teaching higher grade biltong drying.
Keeping abreast of the times
It was 11.02am last Wednesday when the manne in the Dorsbult Bar heard about Patricia Lewis’s debut skin-flick, and that it could be ordered over the internet. At 11.05am the bar was empty, and according to Telkom’s records, at 11.09am Dorsbult’s only Web server exploded. Something about overloading. So whose ample bosom was it in Dark Desires: The Other Side of the Moon? Last week Patricia insisted it was a booby, ag, body-double, but this week local tabloids were adamant the singer had busted her wholesome image and done all her own cunning stunts. Now Lemmer is wondering how long it will be before Amore Vittone accuses her nemesis of using voice-doubles, and Patricia lashes back with a suggestion that Amore get a personality-double.
The opiate of choice
When Okkert Windpomp got back from his honey- moon he asked for a raise down at the silos. They said no, and now Okkert says he’s a communist. His mother told Lemmer she’s sure it’s a phase, like bed-wetting and wearing Liewe Heksie pyjamas, but Okkert — or Comrade Molotov as he now signs his IOUs at the bar — is adamant. So much so that he’s subscribed to African Communist magazine, and Oom Krisjan was fascinated to read its latest online editorial this week. ”Communism has become the vital social and political belief of our times. Already one-third of man-kind has chosen the road to socialism under the leading banners of the Marxist parties.” Chosen? Comrade Molotov Windpomp has chosen Marxism, to be sure, but somehow the referenda and one-man, one-vote elections in China, North Korea and Cuba seem to have escaped Lemmer’s attention.
Better clad than red
Naturally Okkert has been buying all the communist accessories he can, goodies such as the Destroy Monopoly board game (”Go directly to the Gulag. Do not pass Go and do not collect 200 combine harvesters”) and stainless steel hammer-and-sickle toenail clippers. But when he logged on to the South African Communist Party’s website, and clicked on its merchandise page, the T-shirt he wanted was nowhere to found. The garment in question has a picture of Chris Hani on the front, and on the reverse the slogan ”Socialism is the Future”. It seems the shirt is out of stock, which left Lemmer with some tricky questions. For instance, if an advertisement for socialism sells out, with demand outstripping supply, has the proletariat demonstrated the power of capitalism or exposed its shortcomings? And in a socialist future, what else will be out of stock?
Kannie kla nie
Dok Rabie was outraged when he banged down the Sunday Times on the bar top and showed us the piece about the Cape Town taxi driver who’s been driving without a licence for 14 years.
Of course the manne didn’t have heart to tell him that his youngest son, Ebenezer, has been driving his old man’s Valiant on the sly since he was eight, and that when he turns 17 next month, they’re going to chip in to send him for an advanced driving course in Johannesburg.
Still, the manne were tickled by the unapologetic driver’s defence: his passengers have never complained. Lemmer’s guessing they’ve always been too busy praying, or else sitting with their mouths clamped shut so they don’t accidentally bite off their tongues during emergency stops.
I do until I don’t
Oom Krisjan was delighted by Hollywood bald spot Bruce Willis’s take on relation- ships (of which he has had many) in the Sunday Times. ”Your life is a series of relationships. I believe in commitment.”
Commitment to whom, one wonders?