The Paradox of the Ethical Carnivore

By Dean McCleland in Current Affairs, Health 0 Comment

In all likelihood I will be vilified by the Vegetarian fraternity for even posing the question of ethnics and meat eating. To them it is an oxymoron, a casus belli using their favourite weapon, the politics of rage by casting their views in melodramatic terms. Call me old-fashioned, even heartless, but I have no intention of banishing meat from my menu. This is not to say that I nonetheless face a moral dilemma. I have always concurred with the widely held view that it in spite of being bred for the pot, these animals must be treated humanely whilst being mindful of the ecological consequences of the methods in which they are farmed.  

 Herein lies the paradox as alluded to in the title of the blog and not the fact of eating meat.

Main picture:  Caring owl feeding an injured owl with 2 broken legs and a damaged wing estimated to be 1 year old. To find out more about this incredible bird go to its very own website at http://www.thecaringowl.co.za/

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Superb Quotes on Marriage

By Dean McCleland in Other Miscellaneous Topics 0 Comment

 

David Bissonette: 

When a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep her.

 

Sacha Guitry 

After marriage, husband and wife become two sides of a coin; they just can’t face each other, but still they stay together.

 

Socrates

By all means marry. If you get a good wife, you’ll be happy. If you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.

Woman inspires us to great things, and prevents us from achieving them.

Sigmund Freud 

I had some words with my wife, and she had some paragraphs with me.

 

Anonymous 

“Some people ask the secret of our long marriage. We take time to go to a restaurant two times a week. A little candlelight, dinner, soft music and dancing. She goes Tuesdays, I go Fridays.”

 

Sam Kinison 

“There’s a way of transferring funds that is even faster than electronic banking. It’s called marriage.”

 

James Holt McGavran 

“I’ve had bad luck with both my wives. The first one left me, and the second one didn’t.”

 

Patrick Murray 

Two secrets to keep your marriage brimming
1. Whenever you’re wrong, admit it,
2. Whenever you’re right, shut up.

 

Nash 

The most effective way to remember your wife’s birthday is to forget it once…

 

Anonymous 

You know what I did before I married? Anything I wanted to.

 

Henny Youngman 

My wife and I were happy for twenty years. Then we met.

 

 

Rodney Dangerfield 

A good wife always forgives her husband when she’s wrong.

 

Anonymous 

A man inserted an ‘ad’ in the classifieds: “Wife wanted”. Next day he received a hundred letters. They all said the same thing: “You can have mine.”

 

Anonymous

First Guy (proudly): “My wife’s an angel!”
Second Guy: “You’re lucky, mine’s still alive.”

 

What it Means to be African

By Dean McCleland in Current Affairs, Opinion Pieces 0 Comment

The logical culmination of the unmitigated disaster that is South Africa at the moment and the lamentable performance or rather the continued non-performance of Jacob Zuma, has resulting in my casting about for explanations for the inexplicable vacuous behaviour of the ANC and many of Zuma’s appointees. This article by Prince Mashele in the Sowetan on the 9th May 2016 places one explanation on these events. If so, South Africa’s future is rather dire as it too will succumb to the fate that has befallen the rest of Africa. No wonder the world’s smart money is not on South Africa succeeding. 

Pictures:  Walter Sisulu National Botanical Gardens using my Samsung J5 cell phone this morning

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What a Wonderful World

By Dean McCleland in Inspirational 2 Comments

To this day, I can still recall when I first heard this haunting melody by Louis Armstrong. In all likelihood the reason why I can still recollect this moment so vividly is because it evokes memories of incessant pelting rain. The song, the magazine on WW2 that I was reading, and the dark foreboding sky, are all inextricably linked. 

This day was the 1st September 1968, the day of the raging floods in Port Elizabeth. 

These pictures evoke the same memories and evince the same response

 Main picture: Jet wash in the morning mist

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Riots in Tshwane: A Window into the ANC’s Psyche

By Dean McCleland in Current Affairs, Opinion Pieces 0 Comment

With the patina of age, the real ANC has been revealed. Like in a 22 year old marriage, the state of the relationship is not determined by telling one’s spouse how much one loves them but by showing how much one cares. So it is with the riots in Tshwane. The ANC members wanted one candidate yet the party unilaterally foists another candidate on the metro.

That is one dimension of what has occurred. What is more illustrative is how the members actually reacted. No longer was it robust debate but rather an unedifying display of base emotion? What do those reactions reveal of the members’ real psyche and the current state of the ANC?

Main picture: Scenes of violence and wanton destruction in Pretoria which the SABC banned South Africans from viewing

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A Nesting Crested Barbet

By Dean McCleland in Other Personal, Personal 0 Comment

I have only caught sight of the bird fleetingly in the garden but evidence that it has set up home in our yard is obvious. It has been creating a hole in the dead limb of a tree. My best guess at the identity of the freeloader is that it is a Cardinal Woodpecker. By rights, I would have preferred if it had obtained the necessary Planned Permits but the deed has clearly already been perpetrated.

Main picture: The Crested Barbet obtaining free board and lodgings in my tree

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A Sunday Jog through Soweto

By Dean McCleland in Current Affairs 3 Comments

This morning’s race was in Orlando, Soweto. Many whites refuse on principle to run in the townships. The usual reasons advanced are the lack of cleanliness combined with safety concerns.  Whilst accepting the former as generally a given considering that these areas are populated by the lower classes, in the case of the latter it is no more dangerous to run races in rich or poor suburbs. It might be unchartered territory to run through Soweto but many whites will be surprised both confirming their preconceptions whilst dispelling others. 

This is a journey through one suburb of Soweto. Please join me on my jog.

Main picture: The Orlando Community Hall

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Zimbabwe: Lessons in how not to run a Steel Plant

By Dean McCleland in Current Affairs, Rhodesia / Zimbabwe 1 Comment

Zisco Steel located at Redcliff in Zimbabwe highlights the problem when politics, factionalism, cronyism and corruption override economic considerations. The end result was the destruction of the steel industry in Zimbabwe.

At Independence in February 1980, Zisco Steel was the second largest integrated steel plant in Africa. It employed some 6000 workers in a network of companies that produced rolled steel, long products, reinforcing rods and wire. Half its output was exported. More importantly, it supplied Zimbabwe with the majority of its steel requirements.

Main picture: Zisco Steel when still operational 

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I slipped the Sultry Bonds of Earth

By Dean McCleland in Military History 2 Comments

This sonnet by John Magee, written in September 1941, about his experience in flying a Spitfire will forever epitomise for me the elegant and sleek lines of that iconic plane.  At 80 years old on 5th March 2016, it has certainly aged gracefully. Of the 20,351 built only 55 are still flying today. To celebrate its diamond anniversary milestone, aerial photographer John Dibbs and wordsmith Tony Holmes have created an epic & fitting tribute to the Supermarine Spitfire. 

These legends of WW2 and the Battle of Britain in particular are captured by John Didds in pin-sharp pictures using only a hand-held camera. John Dibbs took years of being flown to within 15 feet of these planes to capture the stunning pictures below. 

This is tribute both to the enduring beauty of the plane and to the skill and experience of John Dibbs.

Main picture: AR614 tears through the sky over the white cliffs of Dover

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