As You Should Surely Know By Now
Conrad loathes the works of the Barf Of Avon with the fiery intensity of a large thermonuclear detonation, one of about ten megatons. This is partly due to the horrid infliction of him upon hapless students at school and college; we really cannot get away from the incomprehensible bafune. If researchers ever dig up his laundry list then the English pseuds will coo and fawn over it's 'wonderful imagery' and 'spectacular conceits'. Bah! Art!
Ash as Lego
(What, you thought I was going to feature SHAKESPEARE?!)
ANYWAY here we come to the paradox of another random phase popping up in my mind of a morning: "Saint Columb's Inch". I even used it when posting on Facebook, before checking to see if it wasn't terribly seedy or sordid or sleazy. Well, it certainly isn't DON'T LOOK SO DISAPPOINTED! and is an actual location in the Firth of Forth. Art!
Behold, Inchcolm. The name comes from the Gaelic "Innis Choluim", which means "Island of Saint Columb", after the saint and not a random passer-by.
Now for the embarrassed confession. I did Google for the name, and found that a reference exists to it in a text, which I shall append here:
Ol' Bill never did have a sound grasp of spelling, did he? because this snippet comes from "Macbeth" <hack spit>, which was foisted upon Your Humble Scribe as an 'O' Level a very long time ago. So now we all know where the phrase originates, only leaving the mystery of WHY it cropped up at all. Answers on either a postcard delivered to The Mansion or in the Comments.
If you can live with gulls and puffins and seals, and a distance of one quarter-mile from your fellow Hom. Sap., then there are two positions available on the island to manage tourists. Apply safe in the knowledge that when the Zombie Apocalypse occurs, you can point and laugh*.
Read It In Books?
This will be the immediate response from some readers as to why the above cropped up, and apart from nodding in agreement that Echo And The Bunnymen are indeed a cool band - Art!
- HOW LIKELY IS IT THAT I WOULD BE READING SHAKESPEARE?
In fact my current book of choice is "The Hood Battalion", concerning a formation of Perfidious Albion's army during the First Unpleasantness. It was part of the Royal Naval Division, a unique division composed of a couple of battalions of Royal Marine Light Infantry and then ten other battalions raised (or transferred) from the Royal Fleet Reserve, the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve and the Royal Navy Reserve and no, I've no idea what the distinction was. Art!
They had Sub-Lieutenants and Commanders and Chief Petty Officers rather than the Army ranks, and they got paid more, too, thanks to the Admiralty. One of their Colonels was the son of Prime Minister Asquith, Andrew Asquith, who not only had 1) No sense of fear, 2) The need to look up "cowardice" in a dictionary but 3) Tactical genius on the battlefield. Then there was Colonel Freyberg ...
A story for another day, methings**.
Further To The Maverick's Gig
Egad! What are these choking clouds of fug that inhibit the view and stifle the lungs? O I see, a dry ice machine. Okay, the Mavs eventually take the stage, running late <Mister Hand redacts yet another impatient screed about schedules because it's about as un-rock-and-roll as can be>, so - Art!
There you have Matt, Matt and Shelli, with drummer Jess just barely visible in the background on that last picture, and lovely colour artefacts courtesy my phone's camera. Sadly Matt (no, not that Matt, this Matt) did not get to play any cowbell as credited on their CD, because everything sounds better with a cowbell. Art?
"I gotta fever - and the only thing that'll cure it is MORE COWBELL!"
Not sure how we ended up with Blue Oyster Cult after starting with Matt Hartless And The Maverick Seven, but that's how we roll here.
"Tormentor" Time Has Rolled Around Again
I know what you're thinking: now that Luma's attendant spirit has vanished, gone to a better place, what else can there be? O I thought you'd never ask!
‘Unlike
the masses, you can destroy a spirit quickly and simply. While that isn’t a problem for me and those
like me, spirit denizens like Morgan see you as a threat because you can
destroy them on the spot, instantly, without all the endless process the
clerics need.’
Louis looked around the cemetery:
pine trees, loose leaves, cold hard unattended tombstones.
‘I’ve been around for over thirty
years. You, Jen, that horrid writhing
thing on the gravestones over yonder and Marjory are the only spirits I’ve ever
encounterred. Having met the spirits
that I have already I don’t want to meet any more.’
Risking a look at the spirit next
to him, Louis witnessed what must be the textbook definition of “disdainful”.
‘Really, Mister McMahon. Why have you never encountered spirits on a
regular basis before?’
Before Louis could reply, the
spirit vanished. That meant he wondered
about the answer all the way back home, not coming up with any serious
resolution.
Once indoors he felt the absence
of Jennifer. No supernatural entity to
make his meals or cups of tea, booh-hooh.
Back to a bachelor diet of yoghurt and breadsticks, with a gherkin and
pickled pepper garnish. Nor could his
favourite spirit companion hang around to answer questions about the spirit
world or the supernatural.
How about narrow horizons? he suddenly realised. Since he came out of hospital his world consisted of three environments: college, home and supermarket. He taught at college, came home from the college to his house, went shopping at the weekend. No friends, no outside interests, no occupations outside the home.
A routine like that meant he’d
never meet anyone new, never cross borders or boundaries, never – never
encounter a spirit unless it turned up in his bedroom.
WASH YOUR SEWER-LIKE MINDS OUT! I keep telling you this may be dark, yet it's not salacious. BOOJUM! remains SFW, if not SFS***.
The Moon's A Bafune
If it only had a halfway decent agent it could have been raking in the dollars, raking them in. Providing that conspiracy theory about it really being a giant hologram after NASA blew the real thing up in 1976 with Apollo 21 is nonsense.
What do I mean? Carry right on for enlightenment.
MOON ZERO TWO: Dubbed a 'space western' at the time. Art!
Featuring a very cast-against-type Warren Oates and Bernard Bresslaw as the bad guys, who are out to steal an asteroid made out of <thinks hard> sapphire? only to be thwarted by James Olsen and a very delicious Katherine Schell.
MOON: A bravura performance by Sam Rockwell, almost the only person in this film (we shall skip lightly o'er the person behind Gerty), and there's a fantastic shot of the Moon's surface showing how the Helium 3 harvesters have dug their way across it, except I cannot find it on the DVD and suspect it may have been edited out. Art!
Sam, meet - Sam.
MOONTRAP: A film about a trap on - you may be ahead of me here - the Moon. I think the tagline approximated to "For seven thousand years, it waited". And the 'It' in question is not remotely friendly or cuddly. Art!
Apparently somebody needs a hug
Starring Walter Koenig, after he got his big break in "Babylon Five"
OKAY! I now have to go sort out laundry, my rock-and-roll lifestyle never ceases to thrill. Tally ho!
* If you're a terrible person. Which I am.
** Kind of like 'methinks' except vaguer.
*** "Safe For Sanity"
No comments:
Post a Comment