Posted inLifestyle

Flies just want to have fun

One of the worst things about summer is the endless supply of flies and mosquitoes eager to become part of your day, to add you as a friend on Facebook. The intensity of these insects, however, pale in comparison to what summertime Scotland has to offer. First up, they have something called clegs. These things […]

Posted inLifestyle

With (or without) the Bee Gees

It started as a normal British chat show. It was 1997 and host Clive Anderson was fielding a few questions to the Bee Gees live on prime-time television. The band of brothers had walked in to generous applause from the studio audience, smiles aplenty as Anderson said “Good to see you” and ushered them to […]

Posted inLifestyle

Tiresome time in Bob Dylan’s mind

There’s a movie out soon modelled on the artistic persona of Bob Dylan. One of the four “Dylans” is played by Cate Blanchette, in an Oscar-tipped performance. Unfortunately this is reawakening Bob’s-a-genius nonsense. The revival of the singer’s fortunes can be traced back to 1997, when he emerged with an album called Time Out of […]

Posted inLifestyleMedia

A very blind date

No, luckily not something involving me, but rather a horrible live-on-air incident that happened on a show called Blind Date in the UK in 1997. We all know the format: a guy or girl chooses a partner for a blind date by listening to the responses of three “invisible” hopefuls. In Blind Date, the losers, […]

Posted inMedia

The emergency anchor man

This tragic incident occurred in the Eighties live on the SABC’s TV1. It was the 8pm news and the newsreader, either Michael de Morgan or John Bishop, had called in sick. In a mad scramble to find someone to read the news with less than an hour to spare, the producers settled on an unassuming […]

Posted inLifestyle

Doing them for a fiver

Walking around Brixton in the United Kingdom trying to sell overweight filofaxes to old ladies doesn’t exactly give you that “holiday” feeling. But sooner or later, if you’re a young South African on a working holiday (as I once was), you have to start working — preferably while you can still afford a travel card. […]