How Finland Invented Jon Snow

Very Presciently, At Least 100 Years Ahead Of Time
Here we tackle the didactic part of BOOJUM!'s remit, where we seek to educate you, the masses (if five readers can be called a mass), in an entertaining and amusing style.*
     But first, the traditional aside!  I can call it a tradition if I want, it's my blog.  I would like you to salute Gareth Jones, holder of a rather macabre record, as he was the first actor to die on live television.  Literally die, not merely being subject to the (metaphorical) slings and arrows of the studio audience as they hurl both brickbats and unkind epithets.  Art?

Er - not many photos of Ol' Gaz - apart from this rather funereal one

     Gareth was only 33, and his collapse on set was a horrid and unexpected surprise.  His fellow cast members had to backfill and improvise in his absence after a commercial break, though the director took care not to inform them that Ol' Gaz was actually dead, since Donald Houston, also in the cast, was a good friend and might not have wished to carry on.  Art?

Don, in "Where Eagles Dare"

     This is where things get a bit strange.  The broadcast was a live one, as they tended to be in 1958, about survivors of a nuclear war eking out an existence in the London Tube railway system, and had thus been dubbed "Underground".  Ol' Gaz's character was due to die on-set - through a heart attack.  It appears the Coincidence Hydra has a broader purview than I realised.  Once he was off-stage, both cast and director had to variously fudge and improvise to cover his absence from then until the end of the play.

Fudger Verity Lambert - later to be associated with a blue police box and a Thyme Laud or something ...

Yes, Very Interesting And All That - But "Finland" And "Jon Snow"?
Let us travel both in time and space for a moment or two, waaaaay back to 1919, when Kaarlo Juho Stahlberg was being made first ever President of Finland (a photo in my volume of "Kuvia Suomesta") and "Juho" is the Finnish equivalent of "John".  See how everything is linked to everything else?

Ol' Jon

     Juho did not enjoy being President, as he was an immensely shy and private person who did not like being present at official functions, especially showy events, and especially showy events to do with Sweden.  One gets the feeling that he did the job out of a sense of service, the dirty cur!
     Oh - no, wait, that's an honourable attitude - ignore that last.
     Okay, at the end of 1925 Kaarlo decides that he doesn't want to be El Presidente any longer, since it is a pretty tough gig and he, as incumbent, would enjoy significant advantages o'er any opponent seeking the title.

"I won't be a member of any club that would have me as a member."

     Finns then and ever after have proudly pointed to Ol' Kaz as the archetypal Good Politician: someone who would make an awesome ruler because they don't want to be one.       I now refer you to the ruminations of Lord Varys in GoT.  Art?

A man greatly resembling a poached egg.  And that's before he gets - well - you know

     Ol' Vaz really has the hots for Jon Snow as Lord High Muckamuck And Grand Poobah, because of our bluff Northern hero's penchant for not wanting to be king.  You wait and see, Jon is going to end up sitting his ridiculously handsome bottom on the Iron Throne, absent the Burny Bad Bitch.

     Whoops, another Intro that makes up most of the post!  Quick, let us change the subject to LITHIUM WAFER BA - O let's not.  Instead -

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi
I worked this out to be Latin for "Thus passes the splendour of the world", which is close enough, and it means that all things must pass, and Lo! all Earthly magnificence will one day fade and be removed from the great scheme of things.
     Which is, again, rather prescient.  Art?

     My aged and infirm laptop.  I leave out the corner that I broke by treading on, but here you can witness the general air of lassitude.  The "L" and "O" keys no longer work (hence the "Lo!" above), nor does the "Delete" key, and the space bar can also be sticky.  The DVD drive has recently given up the ghost.     So my humble Toshiba is not long for this world (get your obituaries prepped) but I can still play torrents on it, so the tip does not beckon just this minute

     Blimey, today's Cryptic in The Metro is rather tricky - I've still got 11 clues to get, when I've usually completed it by the time my bus gets to Gomorrah-on-the-Irwell.  I suspect they've brought in a new compiler.  And it's not just me - colleague Ciara is also finding her Quick version (which isn't challenging enough for Your Humble Scribe) a tad difficult.                 
                                                   One is cross, the other is wordy


"Enfant Terrible"
I apologise for , once again, having something inexplicable pop up in my mind.  Conrad's brain: the living example of non-sequiteur.**
     You may have heard this phrase being used already, as in "Harlen Ellison, the enfant terrible of science-fiction's brave new wave -" and guff along those lines.  It's French, so you have to pronounce it with the correct accent.

Harlan.  Being sort of <thinks> Harlanguid

     My copy of "Brewers -" defines it as a person given to saying things that are exceedingly shocking, in the manner of a child (or infant) who simply blurts stuff out with no thought of the consequences.  You know, things along the lines of "What were you doing with the plumber in the bathroom, mummy?"**

Come on, you KNEW this would happen ...

Finally -
Good Lord aloft, did they really make a television series called "The Flying Nun" that ran for 82 episodes?
     Yes.  Yes, they did, and one of the script contributors was none other than our very own Harlan Ellison.
     Life can occasionally be stranger than fiction.  Art?

Hmmm.  Conrad not impressed.

*  Okay, okay, four readers.  There.  Happy now?

**  Meaning a thing without logical connection to any preceding event or statement.  Pretty much the whole of BOOJUM! then.
***  Although, since the child in question is 23 years old, there may be a bit of an agenda here.