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Saturday, 30 November 2024

Down The Rabbit Warren

For When "Down The Rabbit Hole" Just Won't Do

Surprisingly enough there is no entry in my "Brewer's" about this, under either "Down", "Rabbit" or "Hole".  In case you were wondering, and even if you weren't, it comes from "Alice In Wonderland", when she makes the colossal mistake of following the White Rabbit down a hole, because that way lies madness, or at least a touch of mental discombobulation.  Art!

CAUTION!  Microgravity environment

     Should you have been reading BOOJUM! since 2022 then you will be aware that Your Humble Scribe has more than a passing interest in the history, culture and especially the cooking of Korea, because one of my basic philosophical questions about life and everything is "What does it taste like?"  We recently ventured to discuss, illustrate and do a taste-test on "Choco-Pies", the legendary Sork confectionery that is so, so illegal in Norkland.  Art!

The competition for Lotte's CPs

     The Norks have their own, grossly inferior knock-off version which is made by Nazis out of spit and twigs* typical of their envious culture, and here we come to the meat of the matter in this missive.  Art!


     This is "Bulgasari", a Sork film from 1962, when the country was still quite poor and the studio responsible was looking to make book with ₩
₩ (Won - Sork currency), so the grossly inferior knock-off version can be laid at the feet of the Sorks.  One doubts if the Norks had a functional ciné camera in all the land at the time.  Obviously, one of the templates for "Bulgasari" was "Godzilla", even if a Bulgasaurus is a creature from Korean folklore.  Art!


     There are few stills from this film because it seems to have been completely discarded after not being terribly successful, and no print exists of it on celluloid.  For historical reasons the Sorks regard this with a touch of sorrow, as it was their first kaiju ( or 해주)film, and the first to use special effects.  Obviously at the base of a learning-curve there.  All hope is not lost, however (my favourite word on the blog!) because "Doctor Who" episodes kept on turning up decades after they were thought lost for good.  Art!


     Meet "Pulgasari", where the "P" is important, because this film is from 1985.  No, it's not a Sork film; it was made in Norkland, by a Sork film director that Nork dictator Kim Jong Il had kidnapped, along with his wife, in 1978, to make films in Norkland.  No, I'm not making this up and yes, I am completely sober.  Art!

Director Shin Sang-Ok
    
     The reason that poster is in Japanese not Hangul is because they were funding P, along with The Populous Dictatorship.  Art!

Kim Jong looking a bit Ill

     Okay, remember that Shin and his wife had been kidnapped, and they endured imprisonment for eight years, until they managed to escape and request asylum in South Canada in 1986.  This, of course - obviously! - went down like a thallium enema with Jong Il, who promptly banned "Pulgasari" despite having spent the equivalent of $3 million on it, making it the Norks' most expensive film evah.  

     You can't keep a good man down, and even a bad man takes a bit of pressure to keep under, and so it was with big P.  It came out on video in Japan in 1995, later getting an official cinema release, and was a howling success.  Despite Jongy and his Frothing Sulphuric Ire, it has become the most widely-seen Nork film evah, attaining cult status.

     As for why it was 'Pulgasari' and not 'Bulgasari', that may be down to simple differentiation, or then again it may be a translation artefact, as with "G" and "J" in translations from Hangul to English.  Art!

Native Pulgasari in the wild

     We may come back to this creature of folklore, it has an interesting tale behind it**.


South Canadians Love Their Guns

Even unto allowing their children to play with miniature ordnance that would be looked at with extreme suspicion elsewhere.  Art!


     Looking at this, Conrad's first impression is "What could possibly go wrong?" because allowing your children to play with small cannons is - well, pretty bonkers, really.  The proviso here is that  the 'cannonballs' supplied were made of plastic, though our video presenter neglects to state if they were hollow or solid; Conrad suspects solid or they'd not be propelled very far or with much impact when they hit whatever they were aimed at (or which they ricocheted at).  Art!


     The South will not rise again if the OSHA has anything to do with it.  The cannon could fire it's ammunition 35 feet, which implies it could give a smarting injury if the range was but a fraction of that.  There are no horror stories associated with this product, but it's eulogy to the Confederacy might have had something to do with it going out of production in the late Sixties.  For those unaware, "Johnny Reb" was the blanket epithet used by the Union army against their foes.

     I suppose we ought to be grateful that it was only spring-loaded rather than using 'Gen-yoo-ine Black Powder!".  How much do you want to bet that Little Limbs Of Mischief (a.k.a. young boys) went a-searching for steel balls that would fit down the barrel?


Conrad Is ANGRY!

I know, I know, it doesn't take much.  This time you can feel my pain, as I waited in vain, once again.  Yes, we are talking Fir - excuse me, "Bee Network" buses once again.  As in "Wouldn't it bee nice if they turned up on time?"

     After yesteryon's thirty minute wait for a 409 bus due 'every 9 minutes' WHICH IS A BIG FAT LIE Conrad was waiting for another 409 into Ur-On-The-Roche ('Rochdale' if we're being formal).  Art!


     What's missing?  THE DOG BUNS BUS!  It turned up over 10 minutes late, and whilst waiting five 409's went past on their way to Ashton.  I tell you, when I take over there are going to be a lot of Bee Network managers toiling in the uranium mines, before they get rendered down for the organ banks.


"The War Illustrated Edition 198 19th January 1945"

You may have noticed a lack of Ruffian or Sinister photographs or articles in these reports I run about this publication, which is deliberate, because I'm not going to promote the Sinisters or the Sinister Union 1.0 in revenge.  Ha!  Art?



     A reminder that there was another Front in Europe that wasn't the North-West or That Other Front, which always played second fiddle to the Allied forces in NW Europe and had done since D-Day.  In the first picture at top port, you see General McCreery having a natter with some sappers undertaking demolition work, and in the background is a Sherman mounting a dozer blade, hence probably the property of said sappers.  To starboard is a Jeep bogged-down on the road thanks to the truly awful weather in Italy at this time of year; it will have needed either winching or towing out.  A mule would have managed this terrain without problems but there was a shortage of mule trains (which were frequently Italian Co-Belligerent Forces mule trains).

     Below that is a picture of Kiwi infantry entering Faenza, no doubt picking up any rubbish they created and closing any doors used to storm enemy-held buildings.  At bottom are some of the equipments that the Teutons liked least of all: self-propelled 25-pounder artillery pieces, giving the good news to distant recipients.  You can tell they're 25-pounders thanks to the muzzle-brake.


Conrad Being Mischievous

When am I not?  Art!


     Absolutely true, except I clipped out the relevant parts of the sentence, so you may be sucking your teeth and tutting furiously, shaking your head and saying "In my day, you know - "

      Cool your jets.  Unedited Art!


     The lucky minors won a competition to press the Big Red Button that would trigger the explosive charges, felling this block of flats ("apartments" to our South Canadian cousins).  Which is pretty cool.  Dunno if you can include it on your CV, though.  Art!

Miniature mayhem-makers amass!


Finally -

Conrad has broken his Drinking Duck of 60 days, For Your Information, and is now sipping delicately on a can of Old Speckled Hen.  Or as delicately as his giant sausage fingers can manage.



*  Stolen from Eddie Izzard.

**  Credit me with not stooping to low punnery.

Friday, 29 November 2024

Pedantic Hair-Splittery Ahoy!

No, I Don't Think 'Splittery' Is Recognised As A Proper Noun Yet

If it turns up in the next edition of the "Collins Concise Dictionary" then I want royalties.

     This whole Intro, and indeed Saturday's blog, has been delayed thanks to Dr. Peter Caddick-Adams, damn his eyes, because he put up a link to "Thunderbirds Unseen" which went into painstaking detail about Thunderbird 2 and it's launch sequence.  Art!

Film crew to port, Virgil to starboard

     No apologies for destroying your childhood illusions.  And let's have the villain of the piece up here in all his be-helmeted glory.  Art!

The very bad Doctor

     Conrad had NO CHOICE but to watch the whole 17 minutes.  So here we are.

     ANYWAY back on track, and of late I have had 'Gibbet' on my mind, mostly because one of the claimants I deal with in my Deliberately Anonymous Job lived on 'Gibbet Boulevard'.

     Now, this being BOOJUM! and Your Humble Scribe being Your Humble Scribe, we have to firstly define what a 'Gibbet' it, and no, it's not a species of monkey.  Yes, you can do the "Funky Gibbet" if you wish, just don't expect us to cover it*.  Art!


  "A wooden structure resembling a gallows, from which the bodies of executed criminals were hung to public view."  It is derived from the Old French 'Gibe', meaning a staff or club.  You wouldn't want to join this one.

     Typically, a gibbet was used to display the bodies of really hard-core criminals, those guilty of murder, treason, passing port to starboard, piracy, highway robbery, that sort of thing.  Their carcasses were left to decompose as A Dreadful Warning, hopefully to deter others from going wandering off the path of righteousness and light, or at least not to stray too far.  Art!

For when they meant business

     This variation kept the corpse intact, instead of having it decompose and fall apart as the crows got to beaks with it.  Public reaction could be mixed, as a decomposing body does not exactly sweeten the air, besides attracting flies and rats, and being executed for gazing longingly at a loaf of bread when starving also roused tempers amongst onlookers.

     Where do the terminalogical inexactitudes come into play?  Well, about that word 'Gallows', because whilst there is a certain overlap between a gallows and a gibbet, they are different in purpose.  Art!

From the worrying Wikihow on 'Build Your Own Gallows!  Hours Of Fun!'

     From the Old Norse 'Galgi' and not to be confused with the Irish 'Gallowglass', which is from the Gaelic "Galloglach" meaning "Armed foot-soldier".  The definition is of "A wooden structure usually consisting of two upright posts with a crossbeam, used for hanging criminals".  Phew, thanks for not hanging the innocent.  Art?

The madness of 'Suspended Sentence' awaits a different BOOJUM!

     The gallows, you see, was designed to bring about a quick and merciful end, by having the criminal fall from height and have their neck snapped, leading to instant death.  People who took their Christianity seriously were also very disapproving of the gibbet, feeling that death was punishment enough and that haling a body around to rot for months was going a tad too far in terms of legal reproof.  Art!

 


     It has to be said, the gallows has had a far greater impact on culture than the gibbet, as per the track above.  This is a traditional English folk-song, which Led Zep wrassled into a rocked hat, about a man about to be hung from the gallows pole, desperately hoping for a last-second reprieve.  SPOILER ALERT he gets hung.  You don't hear people cackling with 'Gibbet humour', do you?  No.  For the very good reason that it doesn't exist.  'Gallows humour', of a dark and sinister variety, most certainly does exist, as exemplified in Ambrose Bierce's "Devil's Dictionary" where every other entry exhibits same.  Art!

"Airn.  A nutritious substance supplied by a bountiful Providence for the fattening of the poor."

     For those who are still at liberty and full of life with all their limbs attached, very much against the flow of justice and fairness, the description 'Gallows bird' is applied.  One can think of a certain Titanic Terran Toxic Toad whom fits this description to a tomato (because it has 3 't's in it).  Art!

Sometimes the AI hits it dead centre

     Now, there will be a few readers who will take me to task over the image above, claiming that it depicts a frog, not a toad, which we <Cont. page 96>


The Deadly Dalliances Of DEATH!

Back to the free-for-all in the Sixties toy-store, where but lightly-regulated manufacturers sought to soak parents by peddling expensive and dangerous toys for little Timmy and Tammy.  Could you, as a parent, withstand the looks of saddened disappointment on Christmas morning when your children didn't get their 'Kray-Zee Nitro-Glycerine Squirt Gun'?  Art!


     The box cover, with cheerful BOY NO GIRLS ALLOWED demonstrating a plethora of artefacts he's produced.  I don't see any warnings about age limits, hot surfaces or toxic fumes.  Art!

They caved.  I see his sister has joined in the fun.

     I cannot find any details or statistics about burns, scalds, lung damage, impaired vision or hallucinations caused by this kit, so perhaps it wasn't too deadly.  On the other hand, you have an extremely hot plate (150º C) with no guards open to abuse or carelessness or - Conrad shamefacedly hold his hand up - innate clumsiness.

     They were discontinued decades ago yet are still in use by modellers and hobbyists as they were well-made, although wiser adults remove the hand pump used to create the vacuum part of 'Vac' and use a hoover instead.


     Enough text!  Pictires, Art, Pictures!


Our Journey With Bernie

Rather surprisingly, we are now up to Number #39 in this initial sequence of Berni Wrightson FPG trading cards from 1993, which implies we've been putting them up here for at least 39 weeks, or most of 2024.  Art!

"Amphibious Indigents"


     I've read "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" by H. P. Lovecraft and these coves look a lot more sinister and deadly than the feeble frog-folk I remember.  No, I'm not going to relate the whole story to you, go buy it yourself.  Abebooks is your friend.


Ooo-err Matron!

You may remember AND YOU OUGHT TO if you want your descendants to live outside the uranium mines when I take over, that the Ruffian ruble has been having a torrid time of it of late.  When last Conrad checked on Wednesday evening, it was trading at ₽114 to the $.

     Today it seems to have recovered a bit.  Art!

     In reality a moratorium has been announced by the Ruffian Central Bank on foreign currency purchases, from the 28th November to year end.  So the exchange rate will stay at ₽108 for the next 5 weeks.  Quite what will happen after that is anyone's guess, but it allows The Little Tsar to kick the can down the road a bit.  O and I found a cruelly mocking Tweet from five months ago.  Art!


     The RCB is still mulling over increasing their interest rate in December, when it already stands at an eye-watering 21%.  

     Memo to self; lay in extra popcorn for 01/01/2025

Intre Timp In Romania .....

There's been a lot of very odd goings-on in Romania's Presidential election, as a nobody with no party and no history and no political experience suddenly became the front-runner in their elections for Prez.  

     The suspicion that the long, grubby talons of Muscovy have been at play is strong in Bucarest, and so - Art!


     Well well well.  We shall see what we shall see!


Finally -

Prepping for new fridge is well underway.  You will be kept up to date.

     Chin chin!



*  A joke only very old people will understand.

Thursday, 28 November 2024

Oh Oh Oh It's Magic

NO! This Intro Is Nothing To Do With That Song

Whoever sang it.  Conrad can only recall the annoying chorus <sighs heavily> I suppose I shall have to go and dig a little, shan't I? <mutters darkly>.

     Ah.  Apparently by Pilot, who I seem to recall were Canadian.  Or might still be, except their song "Magic" came out in 1975, so they'd be at least in their seventies if they're even still alive.  You know how short the lifespan of Canuckistanians involved in the music business is, all those drugs and drinks and late-night parties.  Art!

Look!  Pilot!

     O actually they were Scottish.  Caledonian, then.  Substitute whisky and porridge for the generic drink and drugs.

     ANYWAY allow me to put up a picture of a product Conrad has heard of yet never encountered before.  Art!


     You may not be familiar with these, either, and Conrad reckons it's a safe bet you don't know where they hail from.  No, they are not Teuton or French in origin, nor Dutch or Norwegian.  If you're thinking European then you are very much in the wrong tent and the wrong desert.  Art!



     A tad fuzzy, I'll admit.  "Seoul, Korea" if you're having trouble resolving it.  Conrad, ever greedy and curious, ventured further.  Art!


     That's my sugar allowance for the next week, one of these has 12 grams of sugar and corn syrup in it.  Should you want to compare it to a Western equivalent, imagine a soft "Wagon Wheel".  Quite moreish but my will of steel allows me to merely gaze longingly at the box and the remaining 5 packets.

     Why are we celebrating this obscure (in This Sceptred Isle, at least) confectionery?  O I thought you'd never ask!  Art?

Art!

     Well, for one thing, the Choco-Pie was an instrument of brotherly harmony between North and South Korea, when they had the Kaesong Joint Industrial Area as a going concern.  This was where Norks slaved away for a potato a day and considered themselves to be luxuriously rewarded for their labours, as their fellow countrymen made do with eating each other*.  Into this working environment came the South Korean Choco-Pie, which the Norks fell upon as if 'twere the food of the gods themselves, and Lo! all was well across the land.
     As in all Greek tragedies, someone had to meddle with happiness, that someone being the Nork government, who withdrew all their slaves serfs labourers from the JIA.  Art!

Kaesong JIA, also known as Shangri-La

     Once you have tasted ambrosia, mind, going back to potato - even if cooked - and human flesh just doesn't have the same cachet.  Thus, there was an underground movement smuggling Choco-Pies into Norkland.  Honest, I'm not making this up.  Kim Jong-Un had them banned in 2014 because he hates them, the greedy biffer, and they'd become a substitute currency.  Art!


     Sorks who want to tweak the tail of the tiger send Choco-Pie shipments by balloon over the De-Militarized Zone into Norkland, which probably melts the pan of The Only Fat Man In North Korea.

     Enter the Nork defector, soldier Chong Song of 2017 vintage, who stole a car, drove it into the DMZ, crashed it and then ran south with his erstwhile mates busy shooting him.  Either they weren't very good shots or Mr. Song's abiding passion drove him on, since he suffered five bullet wounds but still got to the south side of the DMZ demarcator.  Art!

He was in a Lotte trouble

     Our protagonist got treated not only for his bullet wounds, but a severe infestation of parasitic worms, hepatitis and tuberculosis.  Bear in mind he was one of the Nork elite and imagine the masses who can only dream of a potato - cooked or not.

     ANYWAY when he came around from the anaesthetic, Oh - for that is his first name thanks to being Korean - casually requested if he could have a Choco-Pie.

     Why certainly! said the Sork company Orion, claiming that they sent him 100 boxes as a brotherly greeting and welcome to South Korea, also making him a star**.  Not for the publicity.  Despite sending him free Choco-Pies for life.  Art!

The chap himself

     He might have had trouble adapting to life as a Sork, given the land of plenty he'd arrived in, where you need money to survive (instead of your neighbour's gluteus maximus).  Still, you can say he's living the <ahem> Life Of Pi**.
     


As One Statistic Rises, Another Falls

Conrad checked his traffic on Blogger earlier this evening and Dog Buns! what the dickens is going on here?  Art!

     This is patently ridiculous and I'm not sure why the figures have gone potty again.  They seemed to have re-set to Normal after all the Ruffian bots left Twitter at the start of November.  Have they all returned?  Art!


     Egad, that's after a gap of only a few hours.  Art!



About That Fall -

Allow me to present a vlog that "Joe Blogs" put up earlier today, which he'd obviously created many hours earlier, because real life of late has made a habit of discommoding various pundits.  Art!


     Note that timestamp, which makes it's origin before 13:00 in the afternoon of 27th November 202.

     Joe's graphs were valid when he created his vlog, yet but the time I played his vlog back they were out of date.  Art!


     I can say this because I was taking screenshots of the ratio between the dollar and ruble since 08:00 in the ay-emm.  Art!




     This really is bonkers.  As of Monday the ruble was at about 105 to the dollar, and Friday before that, 103.  In the space of a week the ruble has decreased in value by 13%, and shows no signs of either slowing or stopping.  Heavens only knows what tomorrow will bring!

     One possible solution, which smacks of utter desperation, would be for the Central Bank Of Russia to seize all the assets saved by Ruffian citizens in their private bank accounts and keep the ruble afloat that way.  Gullible, credulous and witless sheep the Ruffian population may be, but doing this would test even them.  Conrad can see all the Ruffian banks refusing to allow any savers to withdraw funds, the better to avoid a run on said banks.

     Bring more popcorn!

A Touch More Dignity

Conrad was not impressed with the nomenclature used for our recent extreme weather phenomenon, i.e. Storm "Bert".  Calling a system like this by a diminutive cheapens and lessens the awesome majesty and wetness of a storm.  Thus we are glad to see another storm proudly flying the banner of aptness.  Art!


     A considerable improvement.  Conrad can afford to be magnanimous about Conall, as it missed us up here in the hills-upon-hills.  I'll let you know when Storm Aloysius or Gabblerdictum hits.


O Boy

Elong Tusk is commenting on a Tweet as if he knows what he's talking about, by invoking the name of Judge Dredd.

     How ironic that a South African is referencing a character created by a British writer, drawn by a Spanish artist and used as a vehicle to satirise South Canada and it's institutions.  Art!


     Ol' Stoneyface would not be amused.  Neither am I.  But - it did allow me to legitimately include a photo from the excellent film.


Finally -

I bought alcohol for the first time in 59 days today, and now have to sit and look at it until Saturday, which my iron will can sustain.  


*  Possibly not a joke

**  Ouch.