How Very Fortunate

Yes, That Is Ambiguous
No, it does not refer to you, gentle reader, and how lucky you are to be reading "These noble lines that greet your sight", to steal a phrase from Hillaire Belloc.
     No, what I mean is - what's that?  Who is this Hillary Ball?  <sigh> an author and poet of long yesteryear, is who.  Would an example help?  <further sigh> go on then.

"I shoot the hippopotamus

With bullets made of platinum,

Because if I use leaden ones

His hide is sure to flatten 'em"

     I know, I know, you could better use hollow-point soft-core than - Oops!  No, what I meant to type is that comes from a hundred years ago when you could get away with that sort of thing.  Not today, for do we not love the hippopotamus?

Maybe not all of us ...

     Here an aside.  Yes, already.  The hippo, for all it's buffoonish appearance, is a very dangerous animal indeed and is responsible for a great many deaths every year in Africa.  Further, one must wonder at the eyesight of the Greeks who gave it the name, which means "water horse", because it bears vanishingly small resemblance to a horse.  "Water weasel" or "Water wallaby" would be closer*.

Yeah, look smug at your name's origins

     Where was I?
     Oh, yes, I meant Maurice Chevalier and how fortunate he was.  
     "I'm sorry, Conrad, I don't follow you at all," I hear you complain.  "Although this is not unusual."
     That song of his!  

"Every little breeze seems to whisper Louise

Birds in the trees twitter Louise"

     How VERY fortunate that his lady love is called "Louise", no?  Imagine what trouble Mo would have if he'd fallen for a lady dubbed "Ludmilla" or "Eustacia".

"Every killer seems to hum Ludmilla"

     Doesn't quite have the same romantic ring, does it?
     As I said, fortunate.

Can't really see them twittering anything romantic

     Righto, that's the Intro out of the way, let the motley begin!

I Don't Quite Know How To Put This
As you know, whilst we occasionally break the house rules about Politics, Religion and Current Affairs, we do strive to remain Safe For Work, because there may be children out there reading BOOJUM!  The probability is slight, I admit, and one has to wonder what they would make of such immaculately-crafted sheer nonsense, but the possibility is there.
     Hence I am unsure how to proceed with a recent discovery.  This goes back to The Flop House and their skewering a film called "Guardian of the Highlands".  

I really ought to get a commission from these guys

Could I find any illustrative pictures of this wretched film?  Why yes I could.  Not only that, a brand of novel appeared in the Images search that I could only dub <ahem> "Horny Highlandry". 

An example with added bad pun

 I apologise if this violates your sense of moral propriety, I just felt like sharing.  They seem to be directed at a female audience who want something a little racier than Mills & Boon, with titles like "The Highland Henchman" and "Highland Fire" and feature topless males with the physiques of Greek gods, and an occasional huge sword.  

Unrealistic!  For one thing, it's very cold in the Highlands.  Yon chap would get hypothermia

I'm sure the sexual symbolism of an enormous weapon is not lost on you, gentle reader.
     Conrad is glad he never Googled this at work!

Being British
Today your humble hack is dubbing the UK "The Allotment of Eden" as our weather has been less vile of late.  That being so, let us proceed.
     The Allotment!  Source of all that is good in the world, like tea, curry and Marmite**.  The English language, which has given the world such classics as "The Sands of Valour", "Five on Kirrin Island" and "The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club"***.  Parliamentary democracy, although you may wish to argue about that, and - queuing!

Exactly so!

     Yes, nobody else on the planet has the same unflappable ability to queue like we British.  Take Dunkirk, for example - only an innate ability to queue allowed all those soldiers to be evacuated in an orderly fashion.  How did we take to rationing in the Second Unpleasantness?  By queuing!
     There is an amusing contrast in the article with the French - must get around to an amusing nickname for them - who argue that, if humans were meant to queue, why were they given elbows?

Guy Garvey unavailable for comment

*  Although I don't think the Greeks would have known about wallabies, as they originate from the Antipodes.
**  Okay, the first two come from India and a "Marmite" is a French pot.  Sue me.
***  No Shakespeare, can't stand the fellah.