Thank You Steve And Oscar!
(BOOJUM!'s memory and subconscious respectively), whom can always be counted on to come up with strange words or phrases that we can adapt into fodder for the blog. In this case it's the word 'CHARIVARI', which I had a faint inkling of being to do with the circus? Art!
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| One suspects it's not child-friendly. |
Possibly, if in a rather tangential manner. Now, allow me to elucidate and paraphrase from my "Brewer's Dictionary Of Phrase And Fable". It originates, of course - obviously! - in Greek, from 'Karē', which means 'Head' and 'Barus', meaning 'Heavy', which sounds more like hangover symptoms to me.
ANYWAY it was picked up and Latinised into 'Caribaria', meaning 'Headache', until the French got their hot sweaty mitts on it, and it mutated into 'Charivari'.
So much for the etymology - not a word you expected to see today, nicht wahr? Art!
Charivariying
The reason for the headache is that a crowd would get together to create an unholy row by banging pots, pans, drums and quite possibly some of the emptier heads amongst them, whilst hissing and booing - the target of a charivari had no doubt that they were off the Christmas card list. In more modern times Conrad supposes the equivalent would be forcing the object of your approbation to attend a Motorhead concert. Art!
<short pause as I attend to the food cooking in the kitchen>
The blog is notably quiet (and sinister with it), so where does my claim to be a Charivari Champ come from?
O I thought you'd never ask! Art?
It must have been doing something right, it ran for over a hundred and sixty years. BOOJUM!'s only just coming up on ten. Our overheads are a lot lower, mind, because we've only got me, Art, Steve and Oscar. Neither the Motley nor the Hard Hog have any creative input, don't believe anything they tell you.
Motley! Put this handy suit of armour on, we'll make our own charivari. No, they're only cricket balls, they won't hurt at all.
This One's A Tad Bloody
Okay, let's get the background established. Art!
These are industrial table saws, where the cutting blade is fixed in place and the operator manipulates whatever is to be cut into the blade.
Original Poster Nathan on Quora explained that he was a manager for a very large building supplies company. One day he was fired, because senior management: didn't like the colour of his socks/were jealous of his golf handicap/thought he cost too much <delete where applicable>. His last words to his manager were that the giant table saw used to cut huge wooden panels NEEDED a cover over the blade and a locked box over the power button. Senior management shrugged, ignored him and went for 18 holes to try and get under par. Art!
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| He never saw it coming |
You can guess where this is going.
Three months after being fired - none of this 'let go' nonsense - OP was contacted by a lawyer, who wanted to know if he'd be willing to testify in court as to what he'd told senior management. Possibly with a sense of schadenfreude, OP gleefully complied, as it turned out the safety measures hadn't been put in place and a worker had lost a hand.
OP's testimony really sank the corporate ship. especially since he'd been pestering for those safety measures the entire time he'd been working there. Hmmm I wonder if senior management decided to end his pestering as a reason for firing him? Art!
The injured worker's settlement was so large - no total quoted - that it bankrupted the company and they were gone in less than eight weeks. Ouch. In fact, double ouch.
There's no clue to the name of the business in question, and a quick Google search reveals a horrifying multitude of table saw accidents, so we may never know.
"City In The Sky"
Our pair of apparent entrepreneurs have successfully wangled a meeting with Sir Richard Branson and things are going well.
‘I must say, your call intrigued me.
You put all your cards on the table, and no mistake. “We would like you to invest in a project that
will cost billions, that you won’t live to see completed, that will take
decades to complete and which nobody else will help you with. It will, however, help to offset the
consequences foreseen by the Bonetti Report.”
I think that’s how it went.’
Martin grinned bleakly.
‘We’ve spent so long talking to so many people that we cut the waffle.’
Sir Richard looked keenly at each man in turn.
‘I don’t think what you have to say would be “waffle”, Mr McCarthy. Astrobiology research at
Mark
relaxed slightly, daintily and appreciatively sipping his fruit juice. If the entrepreneur was familiar with the
Bonetti Report then things would run much faster. The Report had been a seven-day wonder
earlier that year, before people got apocalypse-fatigue and it receded into the
background, chased there by the perpetual bickering between
‘The
Report has been dismissed by some as scaremongering of the highest order, Sir
Richard,’ began Martin. ‘How much have
you read?’
I didn't want to info-dump on you so the Bonetti Report is being introduced gradually. You're welcome.
BOOJUM! Reviews Shizzle
We can't afford to beat about the bush here, there's a backlog to get rid of. Quick, nurse, the screams!
"CITADEL": Hmmmmm judging by the dark colour palette, and the fact that one of those featured is pointing a gun, doubtless a spy flick, where they either have to infiltrate or storm the citadel in question, which is difficult as the only way in is via cable-car or helicopter, and then of course they have to escape, which they did with pre-placed ex -
No, hang on, that's "Where Eagles Dare", isn't it? O never mind, let's move on. Art!
Not a citadel in sight
"SUPER MARIO BROS": Much to my startled amazement, The Critical Drinker really liked this film, which is odd as he hates nearly everything. Despite this there is absolutely no danger of Your Humble Scribe's eyeballs ever intercepting it on the big screen, or on the small one, or even on a mobile. Just not going to happen. Art!
Far too bright and cheerful
"DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS": Haven't they done this already? Or am I confusing it with an endless parade of generic fantasy films? Whichever, Conrad hopes it is HUGELY successful, because a certain tranche of South Canadians (who are permanently on the lookout for things to be offended by) consider it to be pagan ideology and subverting the minds of their precious darlings, and their children, too. Go go D&D! Art?
One day, a film will NOT feature Chris Pine
"German Strategy In The Great War" By Lt. Col. Philip Neame
My current bus book at the moment, I've been able to read loads of it thanks to the traffic clot at Hollinwood. Art!
Oddly enough, Naval & Military didn't bother to put the original date of publication anywhere in this reprinted work. It actually came out in 1923, so it's a century old, and Ol' Phil makes the point at several stages that readers might be better informed if or when the official Teuton history of the war emerges. I've got a work entitled "The Splintered Empires" which is a very recent work on the Eastern Front in the First Unpleasantness, must read it after Ol' Phil's work. GSITGW does have some very nice colour maps within.
One might counterpoint the title with the Ruffian performance on the Eastern Front - "Ruffian Lack Of Strategy In The Great War". Not all the Ruffian commanders were bad, their staff officers were verily a curate's egg.
Finally -
There is such a thing as slitting your throat to spite your neck.
Doubtless you have heard how the Ruffians blew up the Nova Kakhovka Dam by now. Conrad is unsure what their excuse will be ("It was the SBS riding killer kamikaze dynamite dolphins!") but nobody in Crimea is going to be anything but glum. Art!
Now the reservoir level has dropped, the North Crimean Canal, in red above, will no longer be supplying Crimea with 95% of it's water. No water for drinking, agriculture or industry. When Ukraine promptly cut it off and then dammed it in 2014, things in Crimea got successively worse, so bad in fact that various pundits stated that Ruffia would go to war to restore it. Well, they've gone to war and just destroyed that very same water supply.
That's all, folks!
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