Morning Mirror Edition 124 - 7/2/2005


ROY BENNET IS STILL IN JAIL !!

Online Petition: www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/498614221
Visit: www.freeroybennett.com
Email: info@freeroybennett.com


In this edition

Smalls



Addicted to Email.


I love email in fact I am addicted to e mail.

Yes I realise it has eliminated the need for exercise (How many times have I sent Heehoo an email when he is sitting in the study right next door instead of walking over and chatting ?) But it makes communication simpler and more fun. I just love decoding messages like "do u hve time 4 mtg 2morrow@3 ?"

However, I love my own e mail but hate Heehoo' s e mail addiction. As much as I love receiving banal and ridiculous jokes, sermons, pictorial weepers and garbage from my friends , I hate the never ending flow of information that keeps Heehoo glued to his computer till all hours of the night....even when we are supposedly on holiday !!

But the thought of being able to communicate anywhere anytime, regardless of the time zones, is happiness personified.

Now in days gone by, letter writing was a punishment to me. I would collect beautiful pads of paper with an ENORMOUS picture that was deliberately spread all over the page, which would necessitate only the smallest obligatory wordage possible !!

"Dear Aunty Poppy, (written in my best, most ostentatious, boldest calligraphy style with the biggest possible nib) Thank you for the beautiful purple art deco vase. I just love it, Your loving niece Maggie" was all that was necessary because the picture took up the rest of the page !!

But now, I cannot stop writing to people, in fact, some folk despair when they receive an e mail from me because they feel obliged to write back. Some folk I suspect even pretend that my e mail never arrived to alleviate the necessity of a return reply !!

But hey, who cares, even if I don't get a reply, I just write another letter to which I do not expect (nay deserve) a reply !!

It is just so darned easy, one letter to twenty relatives !! Just change the top and the bottom bits and pieces, add a few personalised inanities, and hey presto, you have contacted the whole family without a problem. SOOO EASY !!!

I just love it !!



Alaska's lone elephant to stay put.

22-year-old Maggie to get her own treadmill !!

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Animal handlers agonised over the issue for more than a year: the wisdom of moving Alaska's only elephant away from the only home she has ever known. Nine elephant experts were consulted from zoos and animal parks in the United States and Canada, and a decision was made: Maggie stays.

The 22-year-old African elephant will continue to reside at the Alaska Zoo -- instead of going to a warmer climate -- with the understanding that her accommodations will be improved and she'll have to maintain a busy schedule, including aerobic workouts on an elephant treadmill. In other words, keepers say, Maggie's life will be all the richer for it. "We felt we owed Alaska the right to continue to make Alaska the home for Maggie. She has an adoring crowd. The whole community is her herd," said Anita Pritchard, a member of the zoo board that voted overwhelmingly in favour of keeping Maggie. Maggie arrived at the zoo in 1983 as an infant when her herd in Kruger National Park in South Africa was culled. She joined Annabelle, a more easygoing Asian elephant born in India in 1964.

The Alaska Zoo's relationship with elephants precedes its opening in 1968. Annabelle was the reason the zoo was built, said director Tex Edwards. A wholesaler won her for selling the most toilet paper. The prize was either $3,000 or a baby elephant. The baby elephant was kept in a heated horse stall until the zoo was ready for her.

When Annabelle died of a chronic foot infection on Dec. 14, 1997, the question of Maggie's loneliness had to be addressed. Zoo staff wondered whether she should be moved to another zoo with more elephants. The American Zoological Association recommends that female elephants be kept in groups of three or more.

A zoo committee mulled the issue and consulted the experts, Edwards said. The committee even considered moving Maggie to the 550-acre North Carolina Zoo in Asheboro, N.C. But one expert felt that Maggie was healthy and content just where she was. Most of the others felt her situation wasn't ideal but neither was moving her, particularly when factoring in the risk of sending her on a long trip and whether she would fit in at her new home.

The experts weren't concerned about the weather in Anchorage, where temperatures can dip to 20 below zero in winter.

At a hefty 9,120 pounds, Maggie could stand to lose a little weight. Zoo officials are talking with engineers and manufacturers about building Maggie her very own exercise equipment.

The improvements, to be completed in two to three years, will cost an estimated $500,000 and are part of a $4 million campaign to improve the zoo. Designing and building the first elephant treadmill could cost between $150,000 and $250,000, Edwards said. The zoo has talked with mining experts because they know about heavy loads, conveyers and belts. "We hope to be the first zoo in the world with an elephant treadmill," Edwards said. But whether Maggie, who once resided in Zimbabwe, is depressed because she spends dark and freezing winters in Alaska has been the subject of a long and charged debate in the state and across the country.

Facing demands that she be moved to a warmer climate, Alaska Zoo officials decided to keep her in Anchorage for now but came up with an unusual proposal: They plan to build this 9,120-pound elephant a treadmill. The zoo has been under fire from animal rights groups and some Alaska residents, who have called for a boycott until Maggie is moved south. Across the country, similar criticism and internal debates about the treatment of elephants in captivity have closed exhibits in recent months, relocating the animals to warmer climates and to sanctuaries where they could roam for miles like in the wild.

The plan in Anchorage is to complete the treadmill, a first-of-its kind $100,000 elephant exercise machine, by the summer. It would be 20 feet long and 5 feet wide, featuring a conveyer belt strong enough to allow Maggie to get her blood flowing and move her creaky joints, zoo officials say. A donor has put up the money for the treadmill, officials say, part of a roughly $500,000 "elephant house" improvement plan that would double the space in Maggie's 1,600-square-foot barn and add other amenities.

If it keeps Maggie in shape, preventing the arthritis and foot infections that have plagued other elephants in the nation's zoos, then remaining in Anchorage is best for her, zoo officials said. Maggie has a history of not getting along with other elephants and Smith contended, as did other zoo officials, that when the Alaska Zoo had two elephants--Annabelle, an Asian elephant, died of a foot infection in 1997--Maggie was miserable and unusually aggressive.

But animal rights groups and outside elephant experts say it is cruel to keep an elephant alone, particularly a female who is meant to socialise with other elephants. Worse than Anchorage temperatures, which can dip to 20 degrees below zero, they say, is her lack of elephant companionship.
A ZIMBABWEAN ELEPHANT IN ALASKA ON A TREADMILL !! SHAME ON YOU.


CONDOLENCES

With Deepest Sympathy to the families of the following:-




SYMPATHY MESSAGES


CONDOLENCES

Mrs Mary Banfield, widow of George Banfield - both prominent former members of the Black Eagle Society and late of Suburbs - died on 26th January at the Village of Happiness, Ramsgate, Natal. Loving condolences to Alistair and Tess and families. MHDSRIP


TIDBITS


TIDBITS

"Take sides.
Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim.

Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."

Elie Wiesel


We could learn a lot from crayons.
Some are sharp, some are pretty,
some are dull, some have weird names
and all are different colours....... but
they exist very nicely in the same box.'




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