The Idler: Who will Harry marry?

REUTERS

Charlotte Riordan of Lyon and Turnbull auctioneers stands next to a section of Girl in a Yellow Bikini by artist David Mach, which is made entirely from postcards of Britains Queen Elizabeth, before its sale in Edinburgh, Scotland. Picture: reuters

Who will Prince Harry marry? It is a question that has the entire Commonwealth on tenterhooks. British satirical magazine Private Eye manages to combine it with a spoof on the Daily Telegraph, a sober broadsheet that has lately taken to carrying photographs of attractive girls.

“After the Prince confesses that he finds it very difficult to find a woman with whom to share his life, we invite Daily Telegraph readers to choose his future wife:

l Fruity carnival beauty, Zumba Bumba, 23, Miss Tabasco as seen on the front page of the Telegraph.

l Fruity A-level student, 18, getting her results on front page of this paper.

l Fruity cyclist, Victoria Pendleton, 32, lycra-clad Olympic hopeful, as seen on sports pages of this newspaper.

l Latest fruity actress in Downton Abbey, possibly the one playing Lady Cynthia (22) or Lady Amelia (25) but definitely not Dame Maggie Smith (94) – see TV pages.

l Fruity Mrs Assad, 36, soon-to-be-available widow of dictator and internet shopper – see all pages.

l Fruit and nut Allison Pearson (52), Welsh Telegraph columnist who has brilliant ideas about whom Prince Harry should marry… (cont. P94).”

Great stuff! I’m sure Mercury readers might have a few ideas as to who Prince Harry should marry.

Maybe he could even get into competition with JZ in the polygamy stakes. Imagine if Harry were to choose a bride from every country in the Commonwealth? What a wonderfully unifying thing. The princesses could have their own grandstand at Royal Ascot.

This would put Harry right up there with August II of Poland, “The Strong One”, the king who sired 355 children around the turn of the 17th century (though they don’t tell us from how many wives).

The thing is to always aim high.

All that sand

EARLIER this week investment analyst Dr James Greener wondered what they would do with all the sand when Transnet created the new Durban dig-out port.

eThekwini councillor Geoff Pullan says we can relax. All the sand from the dig-out can be used instead of what is taken from the sand-winning operations in the rivers around Durban.

“The Department of Mineral and Energy Affairs seems to dish out sand-winning licences quite easily. Unfortunately these operations mess up the river courses and even redirect the water flow. There have been occasions when the large holes scooped out of the river bed have caused harm to children swimming there.

“It will be brilliant to get our river sand washing down to the beaches again… just in time to re-apply for Blue Flag beaches.”

Blue Flag beaches? Hey, happy days are here again!

Dull and Boring

THE SCOTTISH village of Dull is to forge links with an American town called Boring. Dull is in Perthshire, Boring in the state of Oregon. Arrangements are being made for a twinning of the two, but it’s not certain yet where the ceremony will be held – the Dull public library (quiet please!) or the Boring deeds registry.

Maybe they need strippers and a jazz band.

Strange likeness

CHARLES Moore, a columnist in Britain’s Spectator magazine, detects a strange likeness between Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks man, and Anders Breivik, who admits to the atrocities which shook Norway and the world.

“I keep getting confused between Julian Assange and Anders Behring Breivik,” he writes. “One, I recall, was briefly the hero of the Guardian, and the other, so far as I know, never was.

“One is accused of murdering scores of Norwegians, the other of sexually assaulting a couple of Swedes.

“One believes in destroying multiculturalism, the other in destroying privacy. They seem to have little in common, yet something about these two Nordic-looking men born in the 1970s, with their vaguely left-wing, dysfunctional family backgrounds and their absolute narcissism, makes them quite hard to distinguish.”

You know what? Moore is right.

The skirl

MACTAGGART is indignant. His neighbour knocked on his door at 2.30am.

“Two-thirty AM, can ye believe it? What a nerve! Luckily I was still up playin’ ma bagpipes.”

Tailpiece

TOURIST in the Swartland of the Western Cape to waitress with a pronounced Malmesbury brei.

“I love the way you roll your ‘r’s.”

“Ag thanks, it’s these high heels.”

Last word

The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him. – Robert Benchley