Author: Kim du Toit

No More Bill

Bad News, Travels, Writing

I see with great regret that the peerless travel writer Bill Bryson is closing up his inkwell for good.

In an age when cheap airfares and package tours — not to mention online “visits” through media such as Gurgle maps and InstaGram — could have made travel writing about as relevant as toenail clippings, Bryson’s refreshing, no-nonsense style has defied the trend.

I first encountered the man through his Lost Continent: Travels In Small-Town America.   I found in Bryson a kindred soul because at the time, Longtime Buddy Trevor Romain and I were doing very much the same thing, albeit on a smaller scale:  once a year we would take a long weekend off work, pick a part of the U.S. that we’d never visited before, and fly in (he from Austin and I, at that time, from Chicago).  Then we’d rent a car and set off, destination unknown and only the return flight’s departure time as a deadline.  The Golden Rule:  No Interstate Highways.  Even major U.S. roads with only two digits (e.g. U.S. 30 or Route 66) were treated with suspicion, and we’d get off into the back country roads with alacrity.

We were often asked why we did this — and we did it for nearly a decade — and our reply was simple.  We did it to remind ourselves why we had both left our country of birth and settled in this new, this wonderful and this dauntingly-large and diverse land.

To say that we met interesting people would rank among the great understatements of the century:  in New Orleans, Queer Tom and Opera Kate (an out-of-work opera singer working as a barmaid);  the lady in a little town outside Portland who collected frogs of all descriptions (stuffed, porcelain, wooden, whatever) and displayed them all in her restaurant;  the huge guy in New Hampshire who, when we asked him if he’d ever played football lisped:  “Nope.  I got weak kneeth”;  and the slightly-batty breakfast diner owner in Rhode Island who wore the most eccentric earrings we’d ever seen, a different pair every single day;  these, and many, many others were encountered in our travels, and gave us both dinner-party conversation topics and “Remember when?” reminiscences that survive to this day.

And during every single trip, Trevor and I fell in love with America all over again.

So when reading Bill Bryson’s books, it was like reading about one of our own “Blue Highways” trips (the name taken from the title of William Least Heat Moon’s book of the same ilk).  And when Bryson settled in Britishland, it gave rise to works like the astonishing The Road To Little Dribbling  and Notes From A Small Island  — books which, because I’d been to the U.K. often myself, made me nod my head because I too had been to Little Dribbling, only it was called Upton-Under-Wold, Thirsk or Lesser Foldem.

I cannot recommend his work highly enough, because he is an extraordinary writer who sees everything through a pair of clear-sighted lenses and not rose-tinted ones.  Never one to suffer fools or stupid things, he still talks about them with affection covered by incredulity.  If you’re looking for a reading project for the winter, you could do a lot worse than read everything Bill Bryson has ever written.

And Bill:  good for you.  While I am distraught at your retirement, I am forever grateful to you and your wonderful works.

As to why he’s getting out:

“I would quite like to spend the part that is left to me doing all the things I’ve not been able to do. Like enjoying my family, I have masses of grandchildren and I would love to spend more time with them just down on the floor.”

I can think of no better reason.  Give them each a hug from me.

A Triumph For Feminism

Crime, Feminazis, Law and Order, Men & Women

Let’s see:  because #feminismrules, you assign a female guard to an all-men’s prison.  What could possibly go wrong?

Quite a lot, apparently.

Lauren McIntyre, 32, is accused of having a sexual relationship with convicted double murderer Andrew Roberts over a four-month period at HMP Isle of Wight, Metro reported.
Prison guard McIntyre — believed to be a mother-of-two— is accused of willfully and without reasonable excuse or justification misconducting herself in a way which amounted to an abuse of the public’s trust in the office holder because she had secret sex with murderer Roberts.

And the choirboy?

Roberts was convicted of strangling girlfriend Louise L’Homme, 23, and their eight-month-old daughter at the home they shared in 2003. He is serving a life term in prison.

This is what happens when you mix men and women together in a closed environment.  (And for the benefit of the dense:  whether it’s in a prison, a co-ed campus dormitory or on board a Navy ship, they’re gonna have sex.)  ‘Twas ever thus, and no amount of Feministical Theory or Woeful Handwringing will prevent it.

In the old days, prison guards were called “screws”.  Nowadays, that nickname seems to have a whole different meaning, dunnit?

Scale

Drive Time

Yesterday, I posted a pic which made a tongue-in-cheek reference to a car’s size relative to the human who might drive it:

…and while this Alfa Berlina is not a small car, others of the era certainly are, even though if viewed without some perspective they might seem quite large.

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about.

I have always loved the concept of Bizzarrini cars:  their breathtaking design, their powerful (American) engines and of course, the astounding automotive engineering skill of Giotto Bizzarrini himself.

Here’s the 1967 Bizzarrini 5300 Strada model:

Now I think we can all agree that this is a gorgeous car, and the 400bhp Corvette engine under the hood doesn’t hurt its appeal, either.  The problem is that the long hood makes the car look quite big — “Corvette big”, even — but when put into perspective, the Strada is anything but:

Now that we’ve established the actual size of the thing, here’s a trio of different Bizzarini Strada models and colors:

…and its interior isn’t at all displeasing:

Finally, allow me to show you the Strada’s racing stablemate, the P538 (which won its class at Le Mans in 1965 and placed ninth overall):

It is not good for this old man’s heart to look upon such things.  I think the word is “palpitations”, and I got ’em.

Sleeping Dragon

Elections, Politics

I’ve heard the conservative-leaning electorate described as the “slumbering giant” or similar, and this article gives several good reasons why we are quietly waiting our turn to vote rather than burning down Harvard or the New York Times  building.  (Okay, also because that would be illegal, and we have jobs and such.)

More to the point is why we are quiet at the moment.  Just out of curiosity, can anyone give me a single instance where a conservative voter has gone around yanking “Biden” or “Clinton” yard signs out of people’s gardens?  Not one?  I can’t think of any either.  Nor, by the way, have I read any reports of cars being keyed or otherwise damaged simply because they sported a “Howard Dean For President”, “Clinton/Gore” or “Biden/Harris” bumper sticker — and in both the above, had there been any such incidents, you can be damn sure that it would have got full coverage on the nightly news or in the Washington Post.

No:  all such hostility has come from the Left, pretty much as it always has.

That said, just because we aren’t crucifying the board of the Soros Foundation en masse  or hanging random Pantifa rioters from lamp posts does not mean that we aren’t seething with rage — and believe me, we have every good reason to be enraged, not just at the above but also at the way that Big Government has become the equivalent of a giant weight pressing down on all of us.  (Here’s a little boo-hoo article from City Journal which talks about the topic in detail.)

In three weeks’ time we’ll see of all the above is true enough to bring out the conservative vote in droves, and keep the Left away from the levers of power.

Just don’t believe the polls.  As the first linked article suggests, they’re asking questions in a frame which no longer exists, and in any event, the Left has a real interest in making us think that we don’t stand a chance — just as they did when that Trotskyist bitch Hillary Clinton ran for office in 2016 — so the polls are not to be believed.

Here’s what I think:  the sleeping conservative dragon is going to wake up, and I don’t think the Left are going to like the results.  If it were me, I’d be warming up the helicopters’ engines and handing out pre-noosed ropes — we already have sufficient guns and ammo — in preparation for the Glorious Day (as Mr. Free Market puts it).

But like all conservatives, I’d be satisfied with a massive Trump / Republican electoral victory next month.  And for that, the Left should be grateful.

Dept. Of Righteous Shootings – International Division

Righteous Shootings

So over in Brazil, these three mopes decide on doing a little undocumented clothes shopping, and call on a local emporium, waving a gun in the owner’s face etc. etc.

Whereupon Our Hero pulls out his own gun and shoots all three dead.  [pause to let the massive applause and cheers die down]

Now there are a couple of noteworthy aspects to this happy little episode.

 1) El Grandes Huevos had the gun pointed at him when he pulled his own gun
2) from his waistband, and
3) kept shooting until it was all over.

To recap:  no sexy quick-draw holster, no quick reloads.  Just eight(?) bullets and two brass balls.

We should all be so manly.

Good Guy 3, Choirboys 0.

The 1750

Drive Time

Most men like powerful cars (e.g. Jeremy Clarkson:  “POWWWWERRRRRR!”), and among the power-hungry there is a common thought nowadays that a 3-liter six-cylinder engine is the basic starting-point for any performance car, and four-cylinder engines are inferior (hence nicknames like “four-banger” and the like).

Not so.

Back in the late 1960s, Alfa Romeo came up with a four-cylinder engine of only 1,779 cubic centimeters (actually rounded down to the 1750 nomenclature, unlike the standard Italian exaggeration) which was an absolute screamer.  So efficient and racy was it that they used the same engine across all their “105” chassis models;  the GT Veloce:

…the Spyder:

…and even the Berlina sedan model (with a human figure, for scale):

Ahem.

I’ve driven all three, and not once did I ever say to myself, “Oh, if only this were a 3-liter six!”

The point was that all three models were lightweights, and the four-cylinder engine was perfectly adequate for the task — which in each model was to go fast, and they did.  And in normal Alfa Romeo fashion, they went through corners as though on rails, and the peppy little four-banger engine and five-speed short-throw gearbox made every trip an adventure.

Provided that they started, or didn’t lose non-essential parts like rearview mirrors, door handles and what-have-you along the way.  (I once had the experience of the interior mirror coming off in my hand as I was adjusting it.)

I also once drove a Marauder (Lotus 7 knock-off) equipped with the 1750 engine.  Now the Alfa GTV was no heavyweight, coming in at just around a ton, but the fiberglass-bodied Marauder could be lifted with ease by only two men, and carrying no weight at all, so to speak, the 1750 engine was a monster.  I actually lifted off the throttle at the end of the Kyalami racetrack straight, whereas with the GTV I’d always been able to keep the pedal to the floor to make the first right-hand corner.

Four-banger?  Sheesh.  (Of course, the main reason for a four-cylinder-engined car’s poor performance nowadays has nothing to do with the lack of powerpower, but with the extra weight that has to be added to all cars because of all the safety regulations that have been mandated by Nanny Gummint since the 1970s.  But I won’t discuss that topic further as I’ve just finished clearing up the wreckage from my last RCOB episode.)

I love the 105 Alfa Romeos and their 1800cc engines, all of them.  I would drive one today quite happily.