Oregone

Conrad Narrowed His Lips, Menacingly -
Once again, Your Humble Scribe is entirely unsure why a person rendering their lips narrow is taken to mean that they are in a seriously unamused mood.  Perhaps because it makes them O so much less kissable?  Or, does it make it harder to speak, that they don't blurt out anything daft or mendacious, merely maintaining a sinisterly silent status?

Someone labouring under the influence of strong emotions.
(Or a violent attack of wind)

     Might it yet be another cliche generated by the Hollywood film industry from it's heyday of thrillers and noir dramas?  You know, where you knew Sam Spode meant business because he'd just come out with a wisecrack, then narrowed his lips, which was shorthand for "One of you lousy bums is gonna die cheap and nasty, like yer apartment and live-in hostess girlfriend."

Never did a man called Sam wear a cooler fedora.

     Heaven only knows what the Hays Code would have done were Sam to have narrowed both his lips and his eyes.*
     I beg your pardon, we appear to have gone wildly off-track.  I was narrowing my lips prefatory to a loud and aggressive rant about NO!  THAT IS NOT A SPELLING MISTAKE!  IT IS A FUNNY PUN!  IT IS SO!
     Allow me to explicate.  This will require BOOJUM! touching on matters Political, which is a sordid topic we avoid like a bath in ass's milk.** Normally!  Venal as we are here, if we think it will entrap a few more visitors, then Politics it is.
     Okay, let us view the South Canadian state of Oregon.  Art?
                    
                          Oregon                                                                           Portland
     I have been to Portland and thoroughly enjoyed it as a city.  Very interesting with lots to see and do.
     The Democratic Party control the State Senate in Oregon, as they have a majority.  This means the Republican Party do not have their hands on the levers of power, since they cannot make and enforce policy.  Got that?  The Democrats, dizzy with power, were going to bring in legislation that would ensure the state is carbon-neutral by 2050. 
     Here an aside.  If I had control like that, I wouldn't fiff-faff around with dull and boring carbon reduction policy:  No, it would be "Invade Canada!  Marine Task force to sink North Korea!  Colonise the Moon and put big-ass missiles on it!"

Military Moon-missile-mobile

     Back to dull old reality.  So, the Republicans do not want to allow this carbon dullness to get imposed, and in order to prevent same from happening, have run away.  They are thought to be over the border in Idaho, meaning that the Oregone State Senate cannot reach a quorum and cannot thus pass the carbon boring legislation.  The Democrats are, perhaps understandably. not amused with this and have authorised their state police to hunt the missing senators down.
     This might be dismissed as the Reps having what our South Canadian cousins call "a hissy fit" (or what we in the Pond Of Eden term "Throwing one's toys out of the pram"), were it not for the bampot militia fringe, who see an opportunity to wander around with guns and look big and hard.  They are making noises about "protecting" the absent Reps, which by implication seems to mean reciprocally "threatening" the present Dems.  The Senate itself - Art?

Don't touch that dial!

     - had to be closed down due to the promises of militia 'protection'.
     Fascinating stuff, eh?  Expensive, too, since those missing senators are being fined £300 per day of absenteeism.
     Now, motley, time for you to sit on this tea-tray as we take the blind-fold off and reveal your position at the top of the ski-jump - hold on tight to that tray, now!

Island, Varast!
Which is "Iceland, Beware!" in Icelandic.  The BBC has a timely and embarrassing article on all the Dog Buns! "Influencers" who are being paid by hideous capitalist consumerist conglomerates to go get selfies in Iceland.
     Here an aside.  Conrad, Your Usually Angry Scribe, is even more annoyed than usual with these "Influencers", a title he would substitute for "Grasping Mercenary Product Pimps".  The only amusing thing about that debacle, the Fyre Festival, is that a lot of those who were horribly inconvenienced were Grasping Mercenary Product Pimps.

Tee hee!

     bBck to Iceland.  These Ugly Intruders are literally trampling over Icelandic terrain that can take months to recover, if ever. They drive off-road and destroy the landscape, they laughingly urinate upon said landscape, they are in fact a collection of mobile blots on the landscape.

IS THAT LEGAL, MADAM?

     The Icelanders, whose supply of patience is not infinite, are now utterly fed-up with these globe-trotting chimps, and hopefully will start throwing a few in prison.***
     This from Conrad, who has a proprietal regard for the land of Sigur Ros, Bjork and the Apparat Organ Quartet.  It's a beautiful country; respect it.^




The Hobby Gets Expensive
I am now reading Peter Simkin's "From The Somme To Victory", which I have a feeling I started a good while ago, then put down idly in a moment of absent-mindedness.  This is a big mistake to make in my Sekrit Layr, as another book or three are then laid down upon the original one, then a notepad, an old newspaper, a comic book or two, there was no bookmark and, when it is finaly unearthed again - begin from page 1 again, Conrad.

The book

     Peter, bless his polyester-and-cotton-rich-blend socks, goes into the most relevant literature on this subject, in a whole chapter devoted to looking back at his fellow scribes.  One of the more notable works is by one Charles Bean, an Australian war correspondent who assembled the official Australian war histories; these, as with the British Official Histories, are a worthy starting point. 
     So!  Conrad sought them out on Abebooks, to see how -
     HOW MUCH?!  £1,117?!
     Birdsweat!  Not only that, to rub a combination of salt and lemon juice in the paper cut, they expect you to pay £14 for postage.  And it's only 7 of the 12 volumes in total.  And one's not an original. 

Also -

      - they're only available in the Antipodes. 
     Given that the relatively slim Appendices and Map Sets for the Official History of Gallipoli come in at £275 (only 11 maps total!), my hobby does seem to be taking a turn for the more costly.

"The colour of dried blood ..."

     And now, since I am typing this at work during my lunch-hour and am HUNGRY, I shall log off and eat.  Nor do I care that the Font has gone to Times instead of Trebuchet; that's how much of a rebel I am.


*  Closed it's eyes, wet it's pants and hidden in the corner.  The Hays Code was a wimp.

**  Ten days old ass's milk at the height of summer.
***  An Icelandic prison cell = equivalent of a two-star hotel room.  The proof -

^  There is no "Or else".  You will just - disappear.