tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-238084856370735932.post3016276069234569886..comments2018-07-04T02:06:55.622+01:00Comments on Barking Mad in Amble by the Sea: Blame it on the BoogieRoss Eldridgehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09250071187770548501noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-238084856370735932.post-42271668973325821022008-09-26T11:01:00.000+01:002008-09-26T11:01:00.000+01:00Hi Elmer:There's a sub-text. The bored teenage...Hi Elmer:<BR/><BR/>There's a sub-text. The bored teenager in the Newcastle United Football Club shirt is a NUFC fan ... therefore he MUST be a "wanker". (The book is on the way ...)<BR/><BR/>Hi Sarah:<BR/><BR/>You are absolutely right about history being far more interesting if presented in a more readable and amusing format. Last night I reached the last of the Stuart monarchs, Queen Anne. The heading is "Queen Anne gives her name to a chair ... Then breaks it!" Turns out Queen Anne was so enormously fat, not helped by at least 18 pregnancies (she outlived all her children for all that), that artists dreaded being asked to paint her portrait, and she was eventually buried in a square coffin as her corpse just wouldn't fit in anything else. She was the lesbian lover of her chum, Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough. I'm not exactly sure that "it's good to be Queen". <BR/><BR/>Anyhoo ... When someone mentions a Queen Anne chair, I'll now recall clearly that Anne would NEVER have sat on one without reducing it to kindling. <BR/><BR/>Our BORING history master at grammar school told us the Churchills got the Dukedom and quite a gift in the funds to build the vast Blenheim Palace (where Winston Churchill was eventually born) because John Churchill won the battle of Blenheim against the French in 1704. You know, it might be that Sarah had more than a little influence!<BR/><BR/>Hi Suz:<BR/><BR/>I gather different villages had different Morris Dancers, and they did local dances. The ones that visited us did sing a strange song that they told us nobody would understand (and we didn't). I had no idea they sang. I've not seen live Maypole Dancing (or any pole dancing) either. But I remember a friend of my grandparents (who would be 100 by now had she not popped her clogs) did a routine where she pretended to be a very camp gay boy outing himself to his horrified parents. The routine ends with the boy singing: "Oh, don't cry, Mother, for I'm to be Queen of the May!" <BR/><BR/>Sweeties chucked by the Greek Goddess to the kids ... "Have a hemlock humbug, little darlings ..."<BR/><BR/>Did you see the news story ... Some bright sparks have decided that Stonehenge was actually a sort of Accident & Emergency Hospital. How did they figure that out? Long lines of skeletons, people clearly died waiting to see a doctor, much like the present National Health Service! <BR/><BR/>"I'm sorry, Mr Beltaine, you WILL have to see a physician from beyond the edge of the world. Dr Parampreet Singh's office is over by the Blue Stones. Please stop belly-aching!" <BR/>"But, my belly is aching, dammit!"<BR/>"Check the Pagan ... he's in pain, he says, and still he jokes."<BR/><BR/>Pun on Check, of course!<BR/><BR/>That's the update ...<BR/><BR/>R.Ross Eldridgehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09250071187770548501noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-238084856370735932.post-58972249547821901672008-09-26T02:17:00.000+01:002008-09-26T02:17:00.000+01:00bolphie! another post of sheer delight! i'm so get...bolphie! another post of sheer delight! i'm so getting that history book, it looks even better than my beloved thomas cahill's stuff.<BR/>we have morris dancers locally. on beltaine they performed on the green at shepherdstown college. i LOVE shepherdstown. it hosted the only (as far as we can tell) may day parade still being held in the US. and they're Xtra cool cuz i got to march in it, done up in greek goddess attire and carefully throwing candy to the tots wherever it wouldn't trip the dancers.<BR/>i lurves morris dancers. and maypoles. and beltaine.<BR/>:) khairete<BR/>suzsuzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04232899709402267181noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-238084856370735932.post-81128248343517947952008-09-25T16:27:00.000+01:002008-09-25T16:27:00.000+01:00So, I'm immediately convinced that G W Bush has a ...So, I'm immediately convinced that G W Bush has a bejeweled crown in his closet he wears only at night. Surely he is too afraid to wear it during the day; Congress (or your average Joe Briefcase) might rip the thing right off his head. It must make love making with Laura a bit (more) tedious, the crown tipping this way and that. Probably has his socks on too. <BR/><BR/><BR/>I'll have to look for the book you are reading, Ross. It sounds like a good laugh. There was a book similar to that I read back in the 80s, I think: An Incomplete Education: 3,684 Things You Should Have Learned but Probably Didn't. It was a rollicking good read. I learned a lot, too. I remember Wagnerian opera being described as great, providing you enjoy sitting in the dark for four hours contemplating death. I probably would have done better in school had the subject matter been delivered in this fashion. <BR/><BR/><BR/>I loved the pictures but really didn't need them as your descriptions were on the mark. What a nice outing and I'll remember that small girl with the gawky expression for some time, as well as your assumption that you looked like that back in the 60s.<BR/><BR/>I love going on these outings of yours. I feel Cailean trotting along beside and almost hear and smell the sights.<BR/><BR/><BR/>Speaking of sights and sounds, I hear the helicopter coming back-- third day in a row-- whoop-whoop-whoop. Someone's sure to die today, mon. It's nine-friggin'-o'clock in the morning!sarah corbett morganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06327514344421041651noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-238084856370735932.post-44460888203421875022008-09-25T10:48:00.000+01:002008-09-25T10:48:00.000+01:00Enjoyed it all, except for the 'wank'.Enjoyed it all, except for the 'wank'.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16547985469776723386noreply@blogger.com