Woolamaloo Two: November 2004

Tuesday, November 30, 2004

H A P P Y S A I N T A N D R E W 'S D A Y !

The national saint of Scotland. I will desist from boring you all with details of how the Saltire came to be our national flag as I'm sure I've mentioned it before.

The tartan of my own Clan, the Gordons. One of the most powerful dynasties in Scottish history (oh there must be a mansion or castle somewhere I have a claim to surely?!?!?!) precise origins of our house are unclear with various versions told, but it is too far back in the misty history of a misty land to ever really know. However, what is known is that the Clan's rise to eminence came when Sir Adam de Gordoun picked up his sword in the service of the greatest of all Kings of Scots, Robert the Bruce in the cause of Scottish freedom. They fought at Bannockburn and Sir Adam was one of those entrusted with the great honour of carrying to the pope the Declaration of Arbroath, a remarkable document calling for liberty and freedom and arguing the case of Scottish freedom. Today you may find Gordons on most continents and their descendants are legion (it's the kilt you see - very handy for a quick shag, so that's why we're everywhere! And before you ask, no, I do not wear anything under my kilt, I am a proper Scotsman!). Not for nothing was the Chief of Gordon called the Cock o' the North (stop giggling, Lili, you dirty girl).

Other fascinating facts: you can fit a CD and a silver hip flask of whisky into you sporran; most people can wear a tartan if they choose, except of course English folks (sorry, it's not me being anti-English, it's just the law); Christopher Cockrel, inventor of the hovercraft, was inspired to his remarkable invention after witnessing a kilt-clad Scotsman suffering an attack of acute flatulence; the enormous length of the Scottish sword, the Claymore is not a penis substitute - it's advertising - hello girls! ;-).

Now feel free to join me in a warming dram of single malt. If you are drinking a blend you are a person of inexcusably poor palette. If you even think about adding ice you will be gutted with a claymore up the backside, sideways (it would be a mercy killing). Pour yourself a generous dram, preferably into a glass with a rounded bottom, like a small wineglass or small congac glass. This is so that you may then grasp the curved bottom (steady again, Lili). Gently swirl the whisky around the rounded glass. Do not drink right away - swirl a little more and allow the heat from your hand to impart a little warmth to the malt. Raise the glass to your nose and take a breath, allowing the various aromas - quite different in characteristics from malt to malt and batch to batch. Hold the glass to the light (candles are best) and admire the colouring. Now, and only now, are you ready to take a drink. Allow the whisky to wash over your tongue and let it lie a few seconds to let it tantalise your tastebuds before swallowing (BTW - if you are ever at a whisky tasting you still swallow (Lili, I'm not going to tell you again, or was that Maeve giggling this time?), unlike the wimps at a wine tasting). Does this seem elabroate?

Perhaps, but it is the correct way to enjoy single malt and you don't want your friends and associates thinking you are an uncouth peasant, do you (yes, thinking on Alex and his freebie from his publisher's jolly trip to the fine distilleries of Islay here)? And remember please that craftsmen have put tears into the creation of the drink in your hand - ten, fifteen, twenty or more - so you must treat it with respect (besides, like most sensual pleasure it is at it's finest when savoured slowly) and not just throw ice in it and down it like some East Coast preppy. Now I hear a rather fine seventeen year-old Ardbeg calling to me to toast the Saint and Caledonia (nothing like getting into a nice seventeen year-old - steady!). Slainge!

Flag gif courtesey of Flags of the World Collection (thanks)

Saturday, November 27, 2004

Opening the books

Interesting note in the Bookseller this week to the effect that MI5 are allowing a historian access to write about an organisation so secretive it makes the Masons looks affably extrovert.

"The Security Service (MI5), the agency that deals with national security, is to open its books to historian Christopher Andrew for an official history to be published by Allen Lane in 2009.

Andrew "will be at liberty to present his judgements" about what he finds in the MI5 files. Stuart Proffitt, publishing director at Penguin Press (of which Allen Lane is the hardcover imprint), says: "No security or intelligence service has ever opened its archives to a historian as the Security Service is doing now." The book will be "the most important and influential book about British history in the 20th century for many years".

Andrew is professor of modern and contemporary history at Cambridge University. He is the author of several books on intelligence matters, and broadcasts frequently. His agent is Bill Hamilton at A M Heath."

Source: the Bookseller

Dare I suggest that they invert Donna Tartt's global best-seller title and call it 'History Secret'?? You'll note that the proposed publication date means it is likely certain Prime Ministers will have left office by then, just in case there are any more damaging stories about the misleading of Parliament and the British people on the road to war (alas, not the Road Less Travelled I am ashamed to say). Just coincidence of course. On a related topic one of hte internet job seraches I have going sent me details of MI5 recruiting recently. How times have changed - once upon a time our intelligence services were officially non-existent, although everyone knew about them of course. Then they placed bizarre ads in the pesonal columns of the likes of the Times and you had to solve it to track them down and apply. Or else you were recruited directly from Oxford or Cambridge because obviously that's where good spies come form, like Burgess or MacLean... Makes you wonder why they never thought about that, doesn't it? If the Old School network of Oxbridge graduates often turned out to be homosexual communist traitors why didn't Mi5 and MI6 think to recruit from perhaps Glasgow University instead?

Not as vital to national security perhaps, but last week's Bookseller also featured our own Alex, being given a jolly from publishers in his new role at Head Office. Nice picture of my former colleague Bob McDevitt of Headline who drove them all around Islay, home of the finest single malts in the known universe and various distilleries. And people whigne about the amount of free books I blag...

Neurosex

Aimless, nocturnal browsing (full moon keeping me awake once more, must have a good howl) brings me to this very interesting and artistic (as well as sometimes naughty) site, Neurosex. No, it's not a porno site, although it does have some erotic imagery - just have a look, it's pretty groovy.

Freakazoid

Go to the Dollhaus then check out the archives. I don't know much about art, but I know what I like and I love it freaky. Actually the first part of that is rubbish as I do know a bit about art, but then it wouldn't have sounded so good...

Wednesday, November 24, 2004

Naughty books

That got your attention, didn't it? Dirty minded lot! But I love you anyway. Came (so to speak) across an interesting book today called O: the Intimate History of the Orgasm by Jonathan Margolis. I would have jolly well thought it was an intimate history - most things conerncing this matter usually are. Quickly scanning the book I find my Fascinating Fact for Today, which is that right here in prim and proper 18th century Edinburgh there was, among the number of gentlemen's Clubbes one specifically for masturbation. Really, I'd have thought a proper gentlemen would have had a servant to do that for him. Well, I always knew there were a lot of wankers here, but I didn't know they took it so seriously. Lili apparently has a chapter all to herself, although I suspect it will have to be updated now that she has Mr C and all five speeds of her 'friend' working. On other naughty book news I realised that even an experience bookseller like myself can no longer tell the difference between teenage girls books and adult 'chick-lit' titles without checking the computer. Although on closer inspection the teenage versions are a little more grown-up and mature although littered with drug, profanity and outrageous sexual license references. This may save a generation of girls form growing into limpid Bridget Jones-type readers preferring something meatier, but it may also make them all drug-addled sluts. So, it's a win-win situation for us single booksellers, really. And I'm thinking Lili and Alexa have all the ingredients between their blogs to make a best-selling teen girls novel.

STATE OPENING OF PARLIAMENT - MUCH FUN HAD BY ALL

Today the ancient ritual of the state opening of parliament was performed as it has been in this kingdom for so many years. As with many of the ceremonies we hold in the UK this often perplexes our overseas readers, so we at the Gazette thought we should perhaps explain this venerable British ceremony to you.

After having a jolly nice breakfast and a read of the morning papers the reigning monarch – in this case her Britannic Majesty Queen Elizabeth II by the Grace of God, may God Bless Her and All Who Sail in Her – makes their way to the Houses of Parliament. After a robbing ceremony in the Lords section of the House, where she is surrounded by enormous artworks depicting our Glorious British History (such as Arthur, Merlin and other important aspects of our national history) the monarch proceeds towards the House of Commons.

The Commons is, of course, the chamber where the elected representatives of the People (those folk Prince Charles likes to keep in their place apparently) meet to hurl obscenities at one another. Some cynics say that it is just a chamber where Fat Cats fill in endless slips demanding money from the Gravy Train of Public Funds, but this is simply not the case – they have their offices for that. Since the 1600s, although the Sovereign is still the Head of State, the supremacy of the Parliament has been paramount (indeed this was made explicit by a rather vulgar man called Mr Cromwell who had a disagreement with Charles I about the exact role of the Head of State, which lead to the aforementioned Head departing from the Shoulders of State. He was a vulgar man, and if alive today would almost certainly be subject to penalty under the anti-yob legislation). As such, although Queen, she must ask permission to enter the chamber.

This has been done for centuries in the same, simple but dignified manner: her Majesty has her servant Black Rod knock on the Chamber door three times. For those unfamiliar with the archaic terms used in the British Parliament, the Black Rod is a public office from the Tudor period. Its exact origin is unclear but it is thought to come down to us from the time of the famous Queen Elizabeth and involves a large, strapping, black manservant and a very large Unicorn horn. Even Virgin Queens need some fun, you know. Why do you think the Unicorn is on our coat of arms? After Black Rod has knocked three times the Speaker of the House will open a slot on the door and whisper: “who’s there?” To which the Queen will reply with a most carefully crafted Knock Knock joke. Each new Opening requires a fresh new Knock Knock joke and the Queen’s Jesters in Extraordinary labour for many months to ensure a new punchline for each occasion.

This is followed by the Sovereign raising their voice and calling, “little politicians, let me in or I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your House of Commons down.” It is worth noting that in the long centuries of parliamentary history here this threat has never, ever been carried out – even Henry VIII balked at it; it is more in the form of a ritualistic rather than actual threat. The Speaker of the House will now defend the rights of the House over the Monarch by answering, “Not by the hairs of your inbred chinless chinny chin chin.” (This part of the dialogue is most unfortunate given the age of the present Queen since it is well known many elderly women suffer form unsightly facial hair problems and are sensitive to the problem, although not, it should be noted, sensitive enough to shave). Having thus established that Parliament is therefore supreme over even the Monarch the ritual is concluded, except for several hours of procession in glittering costumes (well, Dimbleby has to have something to witter on about on the BBC coverage), a light lunch at which the Monarch shows there are no hard feelings over the old Civil War and Charles I head thing by supplying all the Members of Parliament with a Steak and Kidney Pie (or two for John Prescott) and a pint of Newton and Riddley’s finest (or four for John Prescott). There then follows the Queen’s Speech, which is not actually written by the Queen or anything she actually has any say in whatsoever as it is written by the government and details what they are going to do in the next session of parliament (well, maybe, if they get round to it – it’s kind of like electoral promises you see, some of it may be quietly dropped if found to be inconvenient or if Tony doesn’t like it).

THAT QUEEN’S SPEECH

As the full Queen’s Speech takes seventeen hours to conclude in full (including encores) and is as dull as a religious broadcast on Radio Belgium we thought we’d bring you the highlights. Her Majesty’s Government (by which we mean Tony and his select few unelected mates, we wouldn’t let those buggers in the Cabinet have a say, scruffy lot) shall introduce new Terror Legislation. This is designed, as the name implies, to Terrify the People in order that they will happily sign away more civil liberties, erode human rights legislation and deflect attention away from the quagmire of Iraq by Scaring the People Shitless so they’ll vote for anything if they think the government will protect them. And any security leaks in the meantime can be blamed on illegal refugees and asylum seekers. Why not? It worked very well for Cousin George over in the former colonies recently, you know. And he and Tony are such good chums. There were also vague promises to overturn the decay in our beloved National Health Service and education caused by the previous administrations, although we suspect that here they spin doctors, who do have a short attention span after all, forgot that they were the previous administration. There was also the correct quota of Humbug, a number of Blah, Blah, Blahs and the required number of Harrumphs as dictated by ancient protocol. This, dear overseas readers is why Britain is the Mother of Parliaments and is therefore better than everyone else, including her own citizens it appears and so anything Tony does in the world is okay. Really.

Tuesday, November 23, 2004

Why Walmart?

An interesting article via the Environmental News Network which makes points about Walmart, America's biggest employer, and is somewhat similar to many of the points raised in books like Fast Food Nation and Nickeled and Dimed. If you are a Right Wing person who found this site by mistake don't worrry, it's all just part of the Liberal Media Conspiracy. Still, interesting reading - think about where you'll buy your holiday items after reading this.

What did the Unuit say to the Robin?

Well, nothing apparently. Another from ENN which explains that another problem with Global Warming (which is of course another invention of the Liberal Media) is that species unknown to natives such as Inuit are expanding northwards and they have no words for these - to them bizarre - creatures. It sounds almost like a bad joke until you think about it (or if you are a Right Wing nutter here by mistake again then you can wait until Rush Limbaugh tells you what to think - don't want you to strain your little brains, do we?).

Sunday, November 21, 2004

misty night in Edinburgh - not unusual at this time of year of course, but the way the floodlights on the Castle illuminated it and made the mist glow was fantastic. It looked like a magical, Faerie version of the Castle, draped in luminescent fog, the ancient stones picked out in eerie patches of lights and dark shadows. The picture, alas, does not convey a tenth of what it really looks like.

Tuesday, November 16, 2004

Dude, where's my towel?

Bad things recently

Having to pay Edinburgh bastard moneygrubbing council's tax, may they choke on every penny

Return to shift working as Evil Boss decrees even those now in stockroom must do late and early shifts, which is a waste of time for that post.

Xmas working hours brought in early - first shift now starts at 7.30 bloody am which is fucking ridiculous.

Evil Boss fucking me off by refusing my requests for a day's holiday on the 31st of December for my birthday and the first week of January off as I have taken for hte last few years. Nope, it's still to close to 'peak trading period'. As both are after Xmas and the 31st is a crap day for business as the whole of Princes Street is closed to traffic that day in preparation for the world's biggest Hogmanay party it makes no sense.

Evil Boss then has cheek to ask me to work one of the bloody bank holidays in the week he refused me off. Cheeky smegger. Said no.

Noticing he has put me down for one of those days anyway, the sandal-wearing bastard. Words will be exhanged - if he gives me my birthday off I will do his bank holiday day. If not he can kiss my magnificent Celtic ass, since it is voluntary.

Good Things

Entertaining ourselves in the stockroom by listening to the shiny new BBC CD audio books of the latest Hitchhiker's Guide radio series, which just finished on Radio 4 and was hugely enjoyable (not to mention somewhat nostalgiac for someone like me who is old enough to recall the original series coming out and still has the vinyl versions made by the original cast). Only problem is the Krickit Robots on the cover look at first glance like Clone Troopers from the new (and utterly awful) Star Wars films

Playing Star Wars Battlefront (see how seamlessly this all links? Just like the Frankenstein monster's stitches...). Amazing graphics - it is like being in the movie and is terrific fun.

Realising I can stomp those infuriating Ewoks under the legs of my Imperial Walker in the Battlefront and can shoot Jar-Jar in the back of the head. Very therapeutic.

Watching bizarre movie called Versus loaned to me by my drouthy cronie Tom. Samurai, sorcerors, Yakuza and zombies - bloody brilliant if incomprehensible. Finding the English language subtitle option didn't actually help as it was translated by someone who doesn't speak very good English, but you get the gist...

Books 3 and 4 in Tanya Huff's Blood series - old new to the US and Canadian markets but new to the UK. Small by my normal book scales and perfect little 'snack' books for reading on the bus. Enjoying them very much and the Toronto setting reminds me of Forever Knight, while having the bastard son of Henry VIII as the vampire chum of our plucky PI is brilliant!

More vampire fun in Sunshine. Wait ages for some neck-biting fun and several books turn up at the same time.

Lots of new Simpsons on cable.

Vampire names

Found a site which can generate your vampire name (and also your fairy name if you so want). For me the results were:

the Great Archives determine you to have gone by the identity:

Emperor of The Underworld

Known in some parts of the world as:

Samurai of The Steely Moon

The Great Archives Record:

A child of the Moon Goddess - Cold, determined, but of the light in the night.

Not bothered so much about being Emperor of the Underworld, but you have to admit Samurai of the Steely Moon is a pretty goddam cool monniker, especially for someone who used to fence a lot. I like it!

Sunday, November 14, 2004

Radio

Electric 6 - the people who brought you the delights of Abraham Lincoln singing 'I'm gonna take you to a gay bar' and 'High Voltage' have done it again with a lusciously cheeky cover of Queen's Radio Ga Ga, which starts with a spectral Freddie impression in a graveyard... Class...

...And on the subject of radio, gaga or otherwise, how wonderful was it to hear the Hitchhiker's Guide back on Radio 4 over the last few weeks? Especially great for those of us who recall the original series from the first time around and great to hear most of the (surviving) original radio cast once more.

Searching in the sand

Searching for Sandman and Death images from Neil Gaiman's excellent series I wandered all over the web looking for some decent scans from one of my favourite chapters, the standalone episode Ramadan. For those unfamiliar with the Sandman - shame on you, go out and start reading it right now, it is astonishing - the Ramadan issue was an incredibly magical Arabian Nights tale with a lovely little twist at the end which was both satisfying on a narrative level and on a contemporary world events level. The glorious artwork was by the great P Craig Russell and I was searching for some artwork to use as wallpaper. Alas I found no decent ones from this issue and ended up chasing a lot of dead links. If anyone does know where I can download some then please do let me know. However, as I searched away I chanced across links which mentioned P Craig Russell and Ramadan from a multiple-reviewer panel discussion Ariel, James Lovegrove and I had done for the Alien and a very old review of Hy Bender's Sandman Compaion I wrote on my old Library of Dreams site which is still there although I can no longer touch it. Funny how these things crop up. In Gladiator Maximus tells his men 'what we do echoes in eternity'. Today (or several years ago) the things you put up on the web echoe in virtuality...

Simps

After a brace of new episodes on cable here I thought the producers of the Simpsons would be hard pushed to top the episode where Homer becomes a superhero vigilante, the Pieman (cue much riffing on the Spider-Man movies among many others). But tonight's episode involving Bart accidentally mooning the Stars and Stripes at a donkey basketball game was sheer genius. It satirised the media hysteria in the US, the right-wing shock-jocks, the villification of anyone who doesn't unquestioningly go along with the status quo, the annihalation of civil liberties to 'defend freedom' , detention without charge and US foreign policy (or lack thereof). In short it was full-on, twelve-bore satire with both barrels aimed right at the head and guarenteed to utterly hack off exactly the sort of people who were satirised...

OBITUARY

Yassur Arafat was born quite a long time ago in a country far away. His even more famous Arab headscarf was born four years later and it and the young Arafat would become inseparable, except for a short period during his stay in Lebanon when he and his headscarf, Bul (short for Abdullah) fell out. During this period Arafat was often seen wearing a green combat hat of the sort often favoured by Fidel Castro. Many thought this was a statement of brotherhood to all international revolutionaries but the truth was that he wore the hat because he was a huge fan of Woody Allen – ironically given the New York funnyman’s Jewish blood – and had been obsessively re-watching Allen’s film Bananas on an early Betamax VCR.

Arafat spent much of his younger years moving from group to group in his quest for a direction for his struggle for a free Palestine. He joined the People’s Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (Official) but later left in favour of the Popular People’s Front for the Palestine Liberation (Official), then the Popular Palestine Liberation Front, the Front for the Popular Liberation of Palestine and then a brief stint in the Beirut Girl Scouts before forming the Popular Palestine Liberation Organisation. A few years later the ‘popular’ term was dropped since it was obviously more of an acquired taste to many people and thus Arafat found himself leading the modern PLO. Bul, his headscarf returned to him and eventually they would become the head of state – and the headscarf of state – of the piece of scrubland and refugee camps that Israel grudgingly gave to them.

His final two years were spent cooped up in his compound, basically a prisoner of the Israelis in his own headquarters. Arafat (the Yassur name came from his father who was a huge fan of Slim Pickens and this was how Pickens’ southern accent enunciated the phrase ‘yes, sir’, hence ‘Yassur’) refused to be downtrodden by this increasingly harsh treatment by the Israelis who continued to point out he was doing nothing to stop terrorist outrages while bombing refugee camps to stop ‘aggression’. Using his enforced interment for good Arafat turned his hand to interior design and was constantly remodelling and re-decorating the PLO government buildings, enthused by viewing Changing Rooms on the BBC World Service. He leaves a power vacuum in the PLO, a large collection of Changing Rooms and Woody Allen DVDs and a signed photograph of Lawrence Llewellyn Bowen.

That bulb joke

It has come to my attention that perhaps the recent ‘how many Republicans does it take to change a light bulb’ joke may be construed as a biased article. We at the Gazette deny the charge of being lackeys of the Liberal Media Establishment (we hate Bruce bloody Springsteen) and tell you that we are as Fair and Balanced as such fine and impartial broadcasters as Fox news. To ensure unbiased satire we therefore present you with the Democratic version:

How many Democrats does it take to change a light bulb?

Answer – none. What makes you think that useless shower of twats can change anything?

Oh yes, we like our biting political satire here.

Thursday, November 11, 2004

Dulce et Decorum Est

This year marks the 80^th anniversary of the Great War, the War to End All Wars; a slaughter on a global scale such as had never been experienced before and one which has left such an indelible impression that all these long decades later the 11^th hour of the 11^th day of the 11^th month is seared into the minds of people of many ages across nations, across continents. As the people who passed through this dreadful time and too many others since the War to End All Wars age and, as Old Soldiers do, fade away, it becomes increasingly important to stop on this day on the eleventh hour and Remember. A two minute silence once a year – not too much to ask, is it?

It’s not about glorifying warfare or jingoistic heroism, it’s about marking the sacrifices made by so many. It’s about remembering the awful things that supposedly civilized human beings can do to one another for ‘a good cause’. It is ever more important that today we all remember. As today’s scenes showed all too clearly our species still seems unable to move beyond warfare as a method of attempting to solve problems – you’d have to be a stone not to feel a lump as old veterans laid poppy wreaths this morning in the weak winter sunlight. Amid the rows of blood-red poppies and the small, simple, elegant, wooden crosses was one to honour and remember the men of the Black Watch killed only days ago in Iraq, being laid by old veterans of this venerable Scottish regiment. Horrifically it is more than likely that a lot more mothers, fathers, wives and husbands will be receiving similarly dreadful notices sent to them in the near future.

It’s so very important we remember because as current events keep showing we seem to be stuck in a pattern which repeats over and over and over. The mechanised, industrial-scale slaughter of the Flanders trenches did not come from nowhere. To those of us who actually read history the tragedy of the American Civil War 40 years before can too easily look like a warning, which was ignored and instead blossomed awfully into a dreadful promise, right down to the enormous scale of the battles, casualties, devastation of mass-produced, modern weapons, sepia photographs and poignant memoirs and poetry. It makes me so furious I want to take the volumes of Shelby Foote’s histories and hit our so-called leaders around the head with it until they learn.

History is not dry facts (although admittedly poor teachers may put some off for life by making it thus); history is a tapestry, a fabric, in which we are all woven together. Both the glories and horror of the past impinge on us all, every day, even although we often don’t notice. The events of the past not only shaped the world in which we live, they influence it still, just as the actions we take today will ripple through times and places we may never know. And yet still we act so irresponsibly, our leaders shun history in favour of quick fixes, brief feelings of power over thoughtfulness. They go through a charade of remembering for the cameras in front of the cenotaphs and tombs of Unknown Soldiers, but it is a selective form of remembering. One year only since the end of the Second World War have we marked and Armistice Day in these islands where we did not also have to remember a British soldier who had died that very year in service. One year. We need to remember and we need to teach each successive generation to remember so that one day people will simply not allow warfare anymore. They will ask how we can dishonour the sacrifices made for us by previous generations by sending more young people out to die. They will feel it their patriotic duty not to take up arms against their fellows but to value understanding and friendship. They will remember forever by striving for peace and in so doing they will finally build the monument that all those lives were given for. “Dulce est Decorum Est” – it is sweet to die (for one’s nation). Even when written it was bittersweet, recalling both the suffering and the earlier blind patriotism that lead to it; innocence and the Fall combined in a single line.

“This book is not about heroes.  English Poetry is not yet fit to speak

  of them.  Nor is it about deeds or lands, nor anything about glory, honour,

  dominion or power,

                              except War.

Above all, this book is not concerned with Poetry.

The subject of it is War, and the pity of War.

The Poetry is in the pity.

Yet these elegies are not to this generation,

        This is in no sense consolatory.

They may be to the next.

All the poet can do to-day is to warn.

That is why the true Poets must be truthful.

If I thought the letter of this book would last,

I might have used proper names; but if the spirit of it survives Prussia, --

  my ambition and those names will be content; for they will have

  achieved themselves fresher fields than Flanders.”

This fragmentary preface was found among the papers of Wilfred Owen (who I found out only recently taught at the school literally around the corner from my home while on medical leave for Shell Shock, where he met Siegfried Sassoon). After his treatment Owen returned to the trenches – not by then from any deep-rooted patriotism or dreams of glory I suspect but because like so many others he felt obligated to be with his men, his brothers in arms and share their fate. He was gunned down by German machine-gun fire on the 4^th of November 1918, mere days before the guns fell silent on the very first Armistice Day.

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,

Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,

And towards our distant rest began to trudge.

Men marched asleep.  Many had lost their boots,

But limped on, blood-shod.  All went lame, all blind;

Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots

Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas!  GAS!  Quick, boys! --  An ecstasy of fumbling

Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime. --

Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,

As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,

And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,

His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin,

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs

Bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, --

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory,

The old Lie:  Dulce et decorum est

Pro patria mori.

Dulce et Decorum est, Wilfred Owen.

With thanks to the excellent people at Project Gutenberg, who do remember and try to share it with the world.

As long as we continue to fight among ourselves the silent, accusing eyes of the fallen dead will haunt us.

Monday, November 8, 2004

Carnival of Sins

My NYC chum (no, it does not stand for Naughty Young Chick, although you never know...) Alexa has just psoted the results of her eagerly awaited Carnival of Sins blog. Lili, I'm looking in your direction here for some odd (five speed) reason...

Dull

As in the place – a wee dwelling in Perthshire with the fetching and enchanting town name of Dull. I’m sure it draws in the tourists. Yes, my day slaving for Bastardstone’s was lightened (never an easy task on a Monday) by one of the avalanche of humour books that appear before Xmas, Far From and Other Places by Dominic Greyer (Sort of Books, £8.99, ISBN: 095422177X). This one stood out from the other so-called humorous titles which vie for their chance to end up in some (very disappointed) person’s Xmas stocking in that it was genuinely funny (quite remarkable for one of these seasonal releases, believe me). Basically the author has had great fun in chasing down some of the great many villages and towns in our kingdom which have damned silly names and adding in photographs of the road signs. Cuckoo’s Knob was one of my favourites (if you don't belive me then check out this search for local eateries!)and I was delighted to see that there was actually a place called Land of Nod in Britain. In a world which takes itself to seriously – which leads to all sorts of tragedies – it is comforting to know that our British eccentricities extend also to the very geography of our land. Perhaps it’s something in the water? Actually, it must be in other waters too, as this discussion on Next Exit illustrates. And i-r-genius has a handy compilation of worldwide silly or rude placenames, including Dildo in Newfoundland and the lovely Twatt in the Orkney Isles.

I also spotted in amongst the (too) many small gimmick titles a tiny hardback from the folk behind the Onion (complete with miniature onion bookmark). I was left wondering if this meant this edition was properly a Shallot?

That's Rich

Amusing myself this week with Rich Hall's excellent biography of his redneck 'uncle' Otis Lee Crenshaw: I Blame Society (and probably pissing everyone in our staffroom out by laughing my arse off (well it's one way to a smaller butt - comedy aerobics). His previous collection, Things Snowball helped me deal with the Xmas stress and was passed around several colleagues. The Otis book is also a great de-stressing tool (and I believe Mr. Hall is working on a suppositry version for those with chronic stress). Descriptions of everyday redneck life in Tennessee are delightful - if you like wife-beating to Country music - and his forlorn description of broken love where he confesses he was so lonely he would lick an ashtray because it reminded him of kissing a smoker and so horny he would dry hump a cactus will no doubt ring a bell of sympathy with many lost souls.

Thursday, November 4, 2004

Lies, damned lies

British troops requested by the Pentagon moved from their own area to backup US forces. The timing of the request, so close to a US election, caused much controversy here, even amongst the more hawkish elements who supported the deployment, being viewed by most here as a blatantly political move. In order to placate the House Blair told Parliament and the British people that this would be a limited deployment, restricted to a certain, smallish area in a support role and promised after days of protest that they would be home in time for Christmas. This was a most unfortunate choice of phrasing, being rather too close to the empty promises of the politicians at the start of the Great War that it would all be over by Christmas. Many people thought it ominous.

Now they have expanded the role of the crack Scottish regiment, the famous Black Watch after telling us they would not. And now some of those illustrious regiment are dead, just a few days into their deployment. Blair has mislead Parliament once more and people are dead as a result. No-one can accuse the people of this country of shirking from a hard task or backing down from danger when we know we are right; our history in this respect speaks here far more eleoquently than I could. But what the hell are these Scottish soldiers - and Welsh, English - suffering for? They are not protecting our ancient kingdom. They are not making the world safer. This is not the fault of our soldiers - I hold our armed forces to be the most professional in the world and they do every job we ask of them and they do it bloody well. I also have no problems with them being deployed overseas even in conflicts we are not directly involved in if it is for a just cause - their actions in the former Yugoslavia and the recent intervention in Sierra Leone speak volumes for their ability (indeed in the African case a few hundred Royal Marines and Royal Navy Sea Harriers frightened the hell out of the rebel army about to encircle the capital and made them run like buggery - I don't blame them, theRoyal Marines are not a group you want to face off with).

But the hard truth is there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and there were none when we were lied to to cajole us into war. Iraq had nothing to do with the terrible events of 9-11 whatsoever. The total lack of foresight and planning for what to do after the battle has left our soliders in an dreadfully exposed position. I know they are professionals and being in harm's way is their role. But you never, never put them in harm's way any more than you can help and you certainly don't do it for a damned good reason. To add insult to injury the post-war mess has left the ordinary people of Iraq in a terrible state - living in terror of violence, coping without water and power and hospitals over-stretched, causing much suffering to the people we were supposedly helping. And we've created the perfect war zone for fundamentalists and every nutter with a grudge and an AK-47 to enter into through porous borders to kill and maim. This is security? This is helping the Iraqi people? This is stabilising an unbalanced region? This makes Britain and America and Australia safer?

This is the new shape of the post- Cold War world. This is the world George W Bush is shaping. His cronies in Halliburton and other big business operations are making millions while British and American soldiers are dying and being maimed. What the hell is patriotic about that? This is the world a disturbing amount of people just voted to continue in the US.

Some Scottish soldiers will be coming home in time for Christmas now, but they will be doing it in a flag-draped box. What the hell do you say to the families of these brave soldiers, Mister Blair? What simplistic platitude will come from you mouth for the cameras? Or will you avoid talking to the families directly as you have so often for the dozens of other UK troops killed already in this pointless, meat-grinder of a war? Would you send your son to fight? What are you going to tell these families, Mister Blair? As the 11th of November looms close and we remember the guns falling silent on the War to End All Wars, what are you going to tell those families who are going to watch their loved ones being buried in the cold, winter soil of Scotland after falling in a burning desert so far from home?

No more, I'm too bloody angry right now.

Monday, November 1, 2004

Boldy going where no spacebabe has gone before...

Also on my random virtual ramblings I came across a site with the wonderful moniker of Texas best Grok! It's a site which promotes something without which no geek's life is complete, the SF Babe - weekly polls for the wonderful women of SF. Well, we don't call it the Fantasy genre for nothing you know :-)

Who down under

Just found this article from September while stumbling randomly around the web: one of Doctor Who's all-time sexiest assistants, Katy Manning (she of the wonderful naked pictures posed with a Dalek fame, bless her) has taken Australian citizenship.

YOUR ELECTION CHOICES EXPLAINED

We at the Gazette have been rather worried at the dearth of true debate on the issues facing the actual citizens of the United States in their election. Mired in sleaze and confused by contradictory adverts and nonsensical rhetoric it is all too easy to understand how many are unsure as to how to vote. Therefore we have compiled this simple, plain-English summary of the positions and agendas of the main protagonists in the presidential race.

George W. Bush, part-time president and cowboy, Republican Party and personal friend of Jesus Christ (although he does think Jesus to be a little ‘liberal’ on social issues).

Stands for: more God in government (and the hell with what the constitution says about church and state because obviously he knows better than Jefferson, Franklin and the other Founding Fathers who were all obviously liberal wimps). Helping the crippled American economy to recover by increasing the national debt to proud new levels in order to stimulate growth by paying out huge amounts of taxpayer’s cash to large corporations. Ensuring the security of American freedoms by restricting civil liberties, arranging dawn raids on citizens who may be subversive and thinking for themselves and making the US safer internationally by alienating all of our (damned liberal) allies and attacking everyone else (or getting the Brits to do it for us right before an election). Tax cuts all round (for those earning more than $100, 000 per annum)

Campaign in a nutshell: “I’m a firm, safe pair of hands to protect America (just look at my impressive record).”

Senator John Kerry, Democratic Party, firm believer in the power of flip-flops. Stands for: speaking out for the ordinary American citizen (or at least the immensely rich and privileged ones he actually knows), happily prepared to alter his views and speeches to whatever state he is in (now that’s really listening to your electorate, folks!), the giving of a free copy of Oliver Stone’s Platoon to all families, sorting out the mess of Iraq by er… Well, sorting it out. Tax cuts for people with very long faces.

Campaign in a nutshell: “I’m not George Bush.”

Ralph Nader, independent, professional whinger, part-time green. Stands for: well, we don’t know actually. Getting his name in the news as far as we can tell.

Campaign in a nutshell: “Please, someone, vote for me!”

Still confused, citizens? Well worry ye not, America – for that minority that is actually registered to vote, technical problems with electronic ballots, faulty chads, biased party officials in charge of your election and the ever reliable Electoral College will all conspire to ensure your votes are all but worthless. The wonderful system of checks and balances in action – checks (sic) written out by big business donors and interested parties’ bank balances that is. Now here are some more reality shows from Fox – go back to your TV sets, America and don’t worry yourselves none, y’hear?

Actually folks, this new model of American democracy is actually the closest to the much glorified version practised in the birthplace of Democracy, Athens (ancient Greece, not Georgia y’all): only a small section of society have any real input and the ordinary masses have bugger all say. It’s not called the Greatest Democracy on Earth ™ for nothing you know. God bless America coz no other bugger will bother as you ‘select’ your 44^th President (the 50^th wins a special prize and a money off coupon for Disney World).

Got this timely email from my mate, the Reverend Sandy:

How many members of the Bush Administration are needed to replace a lightbulb?

The Answer is TEN:

1. One to deny that a light bulb needs to be changed

2. One to attack the patriotism of anyone who says the light bulb needs to be changed

3. One to blame Clinton for burning out the light bulb

4. One to tell the nations of the world that they are either: "For changing the light bulb or for darkness"

5. One to give a billion dollar no-bid contract to Haliburton for the new light bulb

6. One to arrange a photograph of Bush, dressed as a janitor, standing on a stepladder under the banner "Light! Bulb Change Accomplished"

7. One administration insider to resign and write a book documenting in detail how Bush was literally "in the dark"

8. One to viciously smear #7

9. One surrogate to campaign on TV and at rallies on how George Bush has had a strong light bulb-changing policy all along

10. And finally one to confuse Americans about the difference between screwing a light bulb and screwing the country.