Day: March 14, 2021

Spring Forward

It is that time of the year when we go through that totally worthless exercise of changing to Daylight Savings Time…..

I have been calling for an end to this silliness that does nothing to improve the country or the people…..well finally someone is trying to do something other than bitch about the changes…..

If you hate losing an hour of sleep each spring owing to daylight saving time, we have good and bad news. The bad news is that most Americans will still have to move clocks forward one hour at 2am Sunday. The good news is that “momentum for ending the time change is stronger now than ever before,” one “time activist” tells USA Today. Fifteen states—Arkansas, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Maine, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming—have enacted legislation to make daylight saving time a permanent practice, rather than one observed only from March to November. That would mean no more switching of the clocks twice a year, which messes with our circadian rhythms and reportedly leads to an increase in fatal auto accidents. Yet none of the aforementioned states can have their way without federal intervention.

Under the Uniform Time Act of 1966, states have two options: to switch to DST on a particular day or stick with standard time—usually observed from November to March—throughout the year, as is done in Arizona (with the exception of the Navajo Nation, following a decades-old federal exemption, per KNXV), Hawaii, and Puerto Rico. Georgia could soon join that group as a bill requiring year-round standard time has passed the state Senate in the absence of a federal amendment. But Florida Sen. Marco Rubio hopes that amendment will come soon. He’s reintroduced the Sunshine Protection Act of 2019, which would allow for year-round daylight saving time across the country, per WTSP. However, it and the similar Daylight Act have “stalled in the House Committee on Energy and Commerce,” per USA Today.

This has my support.

About damn time someone address this utter silliness.  A moronic practice that needs to go away.

Any thoughts?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

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ZULU!

Back to some history……

What do you know about the nation of Zulu?

Probably you got your impression from the movie ZULU from 1964 with Michael Caine….or maybe you had a chance to watch the mini-series Shaka Zulu from 1986 starring Edward Fox……

This post is not some review of those two cinematic offerings…..just a few thoughts on the Zulu Nation.

How about a little history of the Anglo-Zulu Warm of 1879?

Few things that most people do not know about the Zulu……

1. In the war of 1879 the Zulus had more guns than the British. Unfortunately for them, most were obsolete muzzle-loaders with limited range and accuracy, and few men had the time or ammunition to practice shooting.

2. The Zulu army’s greatest weakness was its lack of a supply train. Warriors often went hungry unless they could capture food from the enemy. This is one reason why they were generally eager to attack.

3. The Zulus admired skill with words, and made up impromptu verses on the battlefield mocking their opponents and their weapons. This even applied to the British rocket batteries which were supposed to terrify “unsophisticated” enemies.

4. There was no retirement age in the Zulu army, and some of the reserve regiments in 1879 included men in their seventies. 

5. The Nguni cattle whose hides were used for shields came in over a hundred different colours and patterns, each with its own Zulu name. Each regiment was supposed to carry a distinctive colour of shield, but by 1879 shortages of cattle made this impractical.

6. There is often rivalry between different units in the same army, but the Zulus took this to extremes. A clash between two regiments in 1877 left at least seventy men dead. Fighting each other with clubs was acceptable; it was only when spears were used that the officers tried to break it up.

7. Zulus crouching behind their cowhide shields could be mistaken at a distance for grazing cattle – a fact that they took advantage of to trap a Boer commando in 1838.

8. According to the Boers the Zulus had once experimented with a cavalry arm. This was not a success as their horses, stolen from the Boers, stampeded in an attempt to re-join their friends on the other side.

9. Contrary to Victorian myth, the Zulus did not torture prisoners. In fact, they hardly ever took prisoners. The only soldier on the British side captured in 1879 (who was actually French) was interrogated and later released.

10. The Zulus were thought to be such good soldiers that in the 1890s the Germans and Belgians tried to recruit them into their own colonial armies. What they actually got was a collection of men from other ethnic groups who pretended to be Zulus in order to join up.

But this post is not some review of these two cinematic offerings…..nope this is about the real-life Zulu king…..

King Goodwill Zwelithini of the Zulu nation in South Africa has died in hospital where he was being treated for diabetes-related issues.

The king, 72, was the leader of South Africa’s largest ethnic group and an influential traditional ruler.

King Zwelithini was a direct descendent of King Cetshwayo, who led the Zulu nation during the war with the British in 1879.

Throughout his 50 year-reign he was a strong advocate for preserving cultural identity.

As custodian of Zulu traditions and customs, he revived many cultural practices

https://news.yahoo.com/zulu-king-goodwill-zwelithini-dies-072820135.html

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”