Who Invented The Bookmark?

It's A Question With No Definitive Answer

Before there books, there were manuscripts, hand-written on vellum and parchment, which used various physical tabs so that readers could retain their place.  After all, the giddy social whirl of a monk or cleric didn't allow uninterrupted perusing of tomes, there was a lot of praying involved amongst agriculture and illuminating with gold leaf.  Art!

     The AI Art Generator thinks this is what a bookmark looks like.  Er - I may have added-in a few other terms like 'vampire' and 'atomic', just to be jazzy.

     ANYWAY I have made a list of Bookmarks on Twitter over the past year, thinking that I can come back to them and use them as content in the blog.  

     Such was the plan.  I now have 20 of them, loitering in what Twitter now calls 'History', since Elong Tusk likes to stir the pot rather too much.  I annotated them all last week and Boy! are you going to get the benefit.  No idea how much of BOOJUM! this will take up.  Suck it and see.  Also, a lot of this concerns the Kozaky and the orcs, just so you know.  Art!

NUMBER 20

     He/she/it was commenting on a Tweet put up by 'Vatnik Soup', about the Ruffian summer offensive of 2025 being their last attempt, due to economic woes.  Art!

Pekka, whose English is - waitforitwaitforit - impekkable

     Despite their summer, then spring and yet another summer offensive, the orcs have gotten nowhere, and indeed have lost 745 km² this summer.  Guess who Bookmarked the Bookmarked Tweet?  Yes, Conrad.  Art!

     DA ignored my Tweets, has not been back on the thread and avoids all mention of it on their account.  I'd call that 'Running Away With Fingers In Ears Shrieking LAH LAH LAH' myself.

NUMBER 19

Posted by 'Fred Fella', this is possibly the most macabre use of Lego you will see today.  Art!

      A motorised guillotine, which he suggested might be needed at the ICC if ever the war criminals of Ruffia were brought to account.  Pure satire, of course - obviously! - but I hope his family keep the knife drawer locked.  Art!

     'Znimaniy Ostriv' as the locals call it.  I strongly suspect there will be a film about this in ten years time, and a hex-and-counter wargame five years before that, showing how Kozaky drones, airstrikes and artillery isolated and ground down the garrison.  The orcs don't like it being mentioned, let alone being made famous by the very rude Ukrainian retort at being told to surrender.  Art!

NUMBER 17

Another from Chris, this one proving that life in Mordorvia is worthy of the Ruffian satirists of old.  Art!

     The idea behind this is that all the Ruffian front-line units will surrender their drones, which will then be used to equip a large specialist drone-warrior unit who specialise in only drone-warfare, no meat-wave human-tsunami attacks for them.  The idea was floated in April and has not been executed yet, perhaps since everyone, bar the three drunken idiots at the MoD who dreamed it up after an all-night bender on vodka, coke and rent persons, knew how awful it was.

NUMBER 16

Art!

    Yes, an explosion in a field.  Is that remarkable?  Hmmmm depends.  You're seeing a Ruffian Kindzhal ballistic missile hitting a patch of sod and humus instead of the proper target, as it had been spoofed by what the Tweeter, 'Igor Sushko', called 'Lima' (although the direct translation seems to be 'Limi').  Lima has been in action since the start of this year and up to Igor's Tweet, at the start of May, it had successfully decoyed 26 Kindzhals, 33 cruise missiles and 10,000 drones, totalling $480 million.  KAB glide-bombs can also be spoofed 98% of the time, thought there are no statistics for jam performances.  It's not a panacea; when used it cannot discriminate between targets, so it has to be deactivated if Ukrainian drones and missiles are in the air.  Still, $480 million to plough up farmland makes the eyes water a tad.

Lima being

NUMBER 15

Please note the date on this Tweet.  Art!

     May 28th 2026.  The signs of mobilisation being prepared in Mordorvia are now ever-present, especially the government talking heads loudly stating that there are NO plans for mobilisation, which the orc population naturally takes as absolute confirmation it WILL take place.  Over the past three days 60,000 orcs at risk of mobilisation have fled to Georgia, likely triggering dislike amongst the invaded accommodating Georgians.  Art!

The Georgia that's Not the Peach Capital of South Canada*

NUMBER 14

If you've been following us for long enough, you'll know that the blog has a passing interest in firefighting foams, which are considerably more complex than you might imagine.  Art!

     If Art will follow through and post the illo that Ol' Trolly is talking about -

     As you can see from the foam being sprayed in from starboard, the Ruffian firemen are still working on the middle truck.  Just visible on the one to port is a tanker body on the trailer, making Conrad nervous as to whether there's fuel in there or not.  Even if not, if the vapours mix with air at the correct ratio, some firemen are going to be missing an eyebrow.

NUMBER 13

For the saddoes amongst us who thrive on TOE and OoB information, and 'AfricanStalingrad' as well, whom we'll come to later.  Art!

     My guesstimate is that there are 400 separate units here, and I think I tried to take a photo of a similar display at Bovvie, which may not have turned out correctly.  If you log onto the hell-platform Twitter and follow Jeff, you can get access to the high-definition chart, with details as typical as below.  Art!

From top port

NUMBER 12

A break from coverage of the Special Idiotic Operation, meaning back to our other tentpole subject, the Senile Sepia Saggy Sackbut himself.  Art!

     I would not recommend playing this as a combined Bingo-and-Beer game, as your liver will not thank you afterwards, and I can't manage it myself until next weekend, when the Summer Of Sober is going to be officially over.  Given three months of abstinence, I'd need to pick a very short speech by Don Snoreleone to prevent falling asleep.  Can't have my behaviour being inspired by The Nodfather!

NUMBER 11

For this Bookmark, you need to know your Mordorvian geography.  Art - map!

     That's the Cyrillic for 'Tatarstan', and it is limned in red on the map.  Now for the Bookmark.  Art!

     The picture is a tad ingenuous since it's summer in Tatarstan, so there won't be any snow on the ground.  Come autumn and then winter .....  Shutting down oil wells is a verrrry risky process, as if cold weather arrives, it will cause 'jellification' of the crude, which destroys the well, pumps and pipeline.  This is a case of what you might call - er - Tatarstanding down.


NUMBER 10

One from Beefy.  Art!

     Kudos to Beefy, he puts out a lot of good content.  Plus he is British, which ANNOYS THE LIVING HECK OUT OF THE VATNIKS.

     <ahem>

     ANYWAY here we have a Ruffian talking head whanging on about how the 'useless mouths' can repay their glorious Motherlessland by joining anti-aircraft units.

     

     What he doesn't mean here are MANPADS, which are expensive, nor SAM systems like the S-300, which takes six months to train on, nor yet heavy machine guns, which are complicated to maintain and operate.  No, he means the serfs can lug around AK-47s - nothing as modern as an AK-74 - and try shooting down drones with those.  A fool's game; drones are notoriously difficult to shoot down even by experienced soldiers.

     Conrad is reminded of the Teuton 'Stomach battalions' of the late Second Unpleasantness, when they were desperate for manpower.  They put men who had similar medical conditions in the same unit for more efficient medical treatment, frequently being men with severe digestive system problems.

     No photos that I can find, so your imagination is your friend.

     Right, that's us halfway through the Bookmarks.  More to come.  I bet you can hardly wait.

*  You may not be able to tell but that Caption font is - waitforitwaitforit - Georgia

Three Law

NO!  That Is Not A Typo!

Dog Buns, have you not been reading this scrivel for long enough to comprehend that the English language does exactly what Conrad wants it to do?  

     Okay, for starters, we are getting to the end.  Of 'Legal Eagle's triumvirate of torrid tree tales, in case you were wondering.  I shall leave out Devin Stone's legal analysis of the DeFranco 'Treegate' case, as it does delve deeply into Georgia statutes and the difference 'twixt trespass and conversion.  Art!

     Er - not exactly that Devin had in mind, but we'll let it stand.  

     So!  I have done a bit of digging into the background of the third case that Devin addressed, and discovered that it originates from Fort Collins, Colorado.  A friend of the tree owner affected began posting on Reddit, and things legal snowballed from there.  They posted photographs of what the tree looked like originally, Before Chainsaw - Art!

     A 40-year old Japanese Maple.  The Neighbour, Unjustly Trimmed, hereafter NUT, came home from a week away to find that Neighbour Of Termagantism, hereafter NOT, had hired people to have at the tree, the Disaster After.  Art!

     Ooops.  That's going to smart.  NOT argued that they'd done the trimming as a 'fire mitigation' effort, and that lopping off the other trunk also improved their view of the mountains - Colorado being known for mountains, despite not being called 'Montana' - Art!

     and that these two wafer-thin excuses permitted him, and the company he hired, to trespass on NUT's property.  

     BUT, as Devin pointed out, there were no Fire District orders in issue in that area, meaning that NOT had no reason to carry out any 'fire mitigation' work.  Nor were there any easements in place to allow NOT access to NUT's property.  Ooops.

     

Dev in office

     Here Dev comes out with the explanation of 'Conversion' in South Canadian law.  It is "Conversion in United States law is an intentional civil tort that happens when someone wrongfully takes, uses, or keeps another person's personal property, completely depriving the true owner of its use".  Art!

     Here's the evidence of both trespass and conversion, as all the lumber had vanished by the time NUT got back home.  You're talking about at least $10 per board foot, for those interested in the technical details.

     NUT was - you may be ahead of me here - not happy, and so contacted an arborist in the first instance, whom came out and assessed the tree value as at least $20,000, possibly $25,000 since the tree was both mature and healthy.  NOT had offered $200 'for the inconvenience' which NUT had been careful to not accept (possibly with a few insults thrown in?).  

     Devin then poured a bucket of cold water over those spectators who were chorusing TREE LAW! TREE LAW! because Colorado, unlike other South Canadian states, does not have a x3 multiplier for damages awarded in tree cases <sad face>.  However - ah, that word again! - there is still the issue of trespass.  Once again, NUT is liable to be charged with trespassing, even if they didn't cross their neighbour's boundary, IF they instructed the timber-fellers to move around on NUT's property without permission.  

     Nota Bene: the cutting occurred in February of this year, according to local news media, so don't expect this to go anywhere until next year, even if the courts work at breakneck speed.

     This reminded me of a previous case we've covered on BOOJUM! about horrendous entitled neighbours committing trespass in order to hack about the OP's black walnut trees and honey locust bushes, which had formed a privacy screen - shades of the DeFranco 'Treegate' case on a smaller scale, hmmm?  Art!

      If Blogger is working properly, that ought to be a Honey Locust Tree before your very eyes.  The 'Black Walnut' species also ought to get your TREE LAW adrenaline running, as these trees are incredibly valuable.  Art!

It cost her $15,000 just to touch it

     To act as editor, the previous story from 2024 ended with the awful neighbours being liable for $158,000 in damages and compensation.  Since they were a pair of retired scapegraces, OP believed that they'd have to sell their house to settle the damages - with no final resolution on Youtube nor Updates in the Comments.  Inspired by the Japanese Maple, Conrad did a bit of digging, to no avail; there just wasn't enough information to discover a final judgement in the suit.  More <sad face>.

     There we go, I think that's enough dendrology for a good while.

Tanks For The Memories

Conrad has vague memories of reading about this tank in 'Born In Battle' probably some forty years ago.  I recall that it was mentioned in connection in fighting with Syrian armour during the Six Day War? it being deployed on the Golan Heights.  If gin and old age can be trusted.  Art!

     

     It looks in pretty good nick for an AFV built during the Second Unpleasantness and used in active service for a good twenty years after.  Sadly Your Humble Scribe cannot quite stretch to £1.5 million even on a good day, so I console myself with thoughts of how expensive the insurance would be, and how low the petrol mileage would be.  Still, <sad face>.

More Classical Shizzle

From that website pimping '20 Classical Works Of Literature You Need To Read At Least Once', and we'll see about that.  One classic that I have not yet read but intend to - in the future very vaguely-defined 'at some point' - is 'Don Quixote', by Cervantes.  Prolly in the public domain after being around for 500 years.

     ANYWAY Art!

     Nope.  Conrad doesn't care how uncultured it makes him seem, nope nope nope.  Does reading Niven and Pournelle's 'Inferno' count?  Art!

Mordor Life Is Rubbish

No!  I keep telling you, that's not a typo.  Yes yes yes, you were thinking of that Blur album, weren't you?  The one from 40 years ago.  Art!

     Nope.  We are referring, once again, to life in Ruffia, which seems to get more miserable by the day, as if that were possible.  Fuel shortages are back with a vengeance again, leading to unseemly brawls as Sergei tries to cut in front of Nikolai, who also cuts - tyres with a knife.  

     ANYWAY AGAIN please consider this illo.  Art!

     To starboard is a long queue of cars waiting to get petrol, and to port is another Wild Berries warehouse doing it's best Mount Doom impersonation, a duumvirate that aptly sums up life in Ruffia.

     It will get worse.  Expect a mass mobilisation in September after the Duma 'elections', where already anything that might challenge Bunker Grandad has been banned.  Like democracy.

Spruce With Bruce

No!  Not the tree, the verb meaning 'to smarten things up', which, coming after an item about Mordorvia, sets a pretttty low bar.  Art!

     Once again, note the 'Title Gap' that Ol' Brucie has left in order for the publisher's title to fit in without obscuring his artwork.  Conrad is pretty sure this is for 'The Green Brain' which he read about fifty years ago and cannot remember anything about.  Except for a bit about a person's heart being replaced with insects.  If that's wrong blame old age and rum.  Art!

     Old Dog =  1.  Actually I am now tempted to go read a synopsis of this novel, just to prove that Ol' Frank wasn't merely a one-trick pony as regards 'Dune'.  Art!

     Erk.  I hope he got paid twice.

Finishing With A Little Ungentle Shoeing

O how I will miss the Boorish Orange Oaf Himself when he keels over and faceplants on the tarmac, or slithers bonelessly out of his Oval Office chair whilst the minions think he's only sleeping.  Yeah right.  Art!

 
     If King Piggy gets asked a hard question, or one he doesn't understand, he doesn't ask for clarification or help from an aide, he simply launches into a personal ad hominem attack on the person asking the question; usually a journalist and most often a woman, as he hates hates hates being upstaged by females, which is why Letitia James lives rent-free in his head.  

     He then completely ignores the question, since, as we have observed before, his brain now consists of mashed potato.

And on that terrible insult to mashed potato everywhere, we are done!

It's In The Trees

Indeed It Is

Not the way you were expecting, mind, as that's a quote from the classic horror film 'Night Of The Demon', said during a seance and also sampled for a Kate Bush - how very appropriate! - song if I recall despite old age and gin.  Art!

     Apologies for omitting the exclamation mark but we can't have unseemly levels of emotion here, the blog is British after all.

     ANYWAY I thought I'd begin with a few mythical trees, just to whet your appetite for dendrochronology, which is the study of trees, I think, go look it up if you doubt.  Firstly we introduce the Pink Bunkadoo, and if Art will put down his bowl of anthracite and milk -

     It's distinctive characteristics are that it is 600 PROUD IMPERIAL FEET high, bright pink in colouration and stinks to high heaven.  The latter two facts being why it never caught on with arborists.  Art!

     There's a lot going on here, so let Conrad explicate.  This tree is 'Yggdrasil', from Norse mythology, which forms the foundation for the 'Nine Worlds', clearly long before Pluto was removed from planetary status and moved instead to planetismal, wh

     ANYWAY, Yggdrasil.  Big tree.  Bigger than the Solar System, meaning the Norse might have puzzled where it was in the heavens.   Art!

     In the background here is 'Egig Ero Far', which you will all recognise as Magyar for 'The Tree That Reached The Sky', the Hungarian equivalent of Yggdrasil, except they were a little more elegant and only had three levels: the roots, which were in the underworld; the trunk, which was the mortal world Hom. Sap. gambolled in; the crown, or celestial regions.  

     ANYWAY AGAIN now that we've got the beginning of the Intro out of the way, and determined that it's all about trees, allow me to pick up on the TREE LAW case that we addressed yesteryon, the DeFranco Deforestation Devastation.  Not to prejudice you the audience.  Art!

     What you see is the 'After' shot after the bad doctor neighbour Leo Eliezer had a tree company cut down 178 trees.  Here the plot congeals a tad.  He claims that his engineer gave the DeFrancos plans of the grading and clearing that was to be carried out, which were approved.  'Approved' by whom is not clear; both homes are part of a Home Owners Association, which says the changes were NOT authorised and the tree-felling ought never to have happened as it breached HOA contractual compliance.  Oooops.  I bet you never saw that coming: an HOA acting in a positive manner.  The Bad Doctor - take that, Eliezer, you've been capitalised! - also claims that the DeFrancos signed off on the changes and he has proof of same.  Art!

Devin Stone, the 'Legal Eagle'

     Both Conrad and Devin find this hard to swallow.  Signing away almost 200 trees that formed the privacy barrier you were verrrrry invested in?  It does not seem likely.  Conrad isn't sure if the discovery process has begun yet; when it does, this document needs to make an appearance.  Linz DeFranco mentioned that the Bad Doctor had sent them documents about the upcoming changes; neither of the DeFs had signed them, and informing a party of upcoming plans does not imply consent.

     Devin, technical lawyer head firmly in place, then looks at Georgia's 'Self-Help' rules.  Which need to determine how intrusive the trees were and how much they encroached on Eliezer's property, DESPITE which said rules - usually applied to overhanging branches or intruding roots - do not give carte blanche to trespass and fell trees.  Art!

Do I need to add 'Before'?

     Devin also mentions 'Conversion', a legal term completely different from 'Trespass', where a person gains profit from illegal possession of another's property.  In this case it's all the felled lumber - where did it go, since it certainly wasn't left on site?  The Bad Doctor is going to have to explain this.  Art!

     Devin also uncovered legal details about Georgia's 'Wrongful Cutting Statute' statutes that might prove worrying in a future trial, as they include the x3 multiplier that other states use in Tree law cases.  Then there's the 'Timber Self Help Statute', which is another law including the x3 multiplier, and which might also mulct the Bad Doctor for trespassing charges, too.  Yes, he can be charged with trespass even if he never crossed the neighbour's boundary line IF he authorised the tree-cutting crew to carry out trespass.  Art!

     Another wrinkle - the tree-cutting company might also be held as having behaved 'Wilfully' in legal parlance, especially if they knew the trees were on a neighbour's property, not the contracting party, and any felling needed permission from the DeFrancos.

     Wowsers, a lot of legal detail to contend with, all thanks to the neighbour being an entitled bottomhole, who seemed more inclined to ask for forgiveness than permission.

     I think we can call a halt here, as there is yet ANOTHER Tree Law case to come, this one about a Japanese Maple.  I bet you can hardly wait.

Being All Literary And Shizzle

Conrad cannot possibly lay claim to any intellectual status, thanks to his love of zombie films and superhero comics.  I might be able to fudge it a bit, though, thanks to having read a few works defined as 'classics', as in - Art!

     

     Conrad has read 'The Odyssey', many decades ago.  The thing I took away from it was the last third, which consists of Odysseus' plotting and planning his revenge, then executing it, and I mean 'executing' in the literal sense. Art!

     No, I haven't read it, but I think I have a knock-off version of it in the Book Mountain.  Art!

     Aware of, not read.  

     Proof I am not the closet intellect you might suspect.

More Bad News For BOOH

There's quite a bit, so let me focus.  You may not recall that E Jean Caroll won her case against King Piggy several years ago, as it's several years ago.  He has spent the intervening years in trying to kick the can down the road and avoid paying up, by appealing endlessly - well, 13 times - in the hope that something will stop the payment process.  

     Alas no.  Art!

Original verdict May 2023

     His case was finally referred to the Supreme Court, the final final final court in South Canada, who unanimously rejected it, 9-0.  Done.  Dead.  Kaput.  Nul.

     What will be interesting now is seeing how Fat Caligula will react to this verdict.  He will, of course, rant and tant about it, blathering about how unfair it all is, how much gold there is in the White House, how hot Natalie is - SORRY Melania, I meant Melania.  His brain is likely to implode a little when he realises he LOST.  Conrad suspects there will be a refusal to pay until legally forced to do so, because Don Snoreleone has long had his funds tied up - legally, 'encumbered' - in property, rather than being liquid and available.  

      Yes, Donold, look askance.

     Bring on the buckets of popcorn!

The Beauty Of Bruce

Pennington, that is.  I hope you appreciate all the artwork we're putting up here, and the hours that Brucie put into his creations.  Art!

     Note the 'Title gap' at the top of the picture.  I seem to recall that this is a book cover I've seen on the shelves, probably a 'Dune' variant.  Ol' Brucie likes his flying craft in multiples receding into the distance, doesn't he?   Not sure the FAA would approve of a flight pattern like that.  Art!

     Close if absent cigar.  Deffo looks like a Guild Heighliner to me.

     Images courtesy of the 'Sci-Fi Art' Youtube channel.

     Actually, reading a couple of blurbs about 'Equator', I may have read it fifty or so years ago.  

Finally -

I'm currently annotating a Youtube channel called 'How Not To Die' and their vlog 'Everything Zombie Movies Get Wrong About Survival', because you'd better believe Conrad will have his own input.  For instance:'Norway, the land designed to be zombie-proof' with more to come.  I bet you can hardly wait.