Aphra Behn
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Posted:Oct 14, 2014 8:48 pm
Last Updated:Nov 19, 2014 7:17 pm
23267 Views
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I'm re-posting this too. I love Aphra, and I want you to love her too.
Note: Say Ay (rhymes with hay) ferah Bean. Her name at christening may have been Eafera Johnson.
Aphra Behn, The Willing Mistress
I think I must have first heard of Aphra Behn while reading one of the books of Christopher Hill, a fine historian of seventeenth century England. I have a habit of crediting the professor when I recall people and events from that time. I reckon it to be a bad habit and it is probably not always accurate, but it's mine and I've grown fond of it. Professor Hill is the one writer who is mainly responsible for my continuing fascination with the time the place and it's denizens.
Aphra Behn was a woman who made her living as a writer in Restoration England. Writing was not an occupation common to or indeed even a skill associated with women of the time. She was a poet playwright and novelist. She lived from 1640 to 1689.
The life of the writer Aphra Behn is a tough nut to crack. Germaine Greer called her a palimpsest. I had to look it up.
"palimpsest |ˈpalimpˌsest|
noun
a manuscript or piece of writing material on which the original writing has been effaced to make room for later writing but of which traces remain.
• figurative something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form"
As to Aphra Behn's palimpsistic character, Ms. Greer ought to know. Aphra Behn has been exhaustively researched by scholars of literature, particularly those of feminist inclination. Both the
beautiful Virginia Woolf and her elegant lover Vita Sackville-West, writers of the Bloomsbury Group, paid their respects to Mrs. Behn. Sackville_West, in her biography "Astrea", called her " the first woman in England to earn her living by her pen."
She also pointed out that Mrs. Behn was not Shakespeare- she is studied and scrutinized because she was the first woman in England to earn her living by her pen. This fact carried little weight with Harold Bloom. In bemoaning the "dumbing down of American readers" he called her a fouth rate playwright, deriding her study in American classrooms in place of the Immortal Bard. Bloom is right. Aphra Behn does not replace Shakespeare. And neither does Harold Bloom.
In spite of the probing into the details of Mrs. Behn's life, not much is known for certain. It has been speculated that her novel "Oroonoko" is autobiography and has been posited with seemingly equal conviction that it can't be. She may have been born to a barber named Johnson, in Canterbury, in 1640. Johnson was named Lieutenant General of Surinam, a British possesion, in 1663. Aphra and her brother traveled there with Johnson and his wife but Johnson died en route. Her experience in Surinam led her to write "Oroonoko". After returning to England from Surinam in 1664, she married a man named Johan, or John, or Hans Behn but the marriage was short- Mr. Behn died in 1665. Aphra may have been a Catholic. She made allusions to a Catholic upbringing in her career, so perhaps it was this which led to her attachment to the court of Charles. She did service as a spy for King Charles the Second during the Second Anglo Dutch War, using the code name Astrea. Three sources in the Wikipedia entry on Aphra claim that our old friend Thomas Killigrew, Nell Gwynn's benefactor, may have orchestrated her spying activities. King Charles was as prompt to pay as any other king or nobleman and she had to pawn her jewelry to survive. In spite of having been stiffed by the king (and I found no reference to suggest that she had been stiffed by Charles in another way) she was a staunch royalist, believing that the nobility and gentry were the natural rulers of men. She was not the first to have risen from the ranks to hold that opinion, and will surely not be the last, but it is not that quality that interested me. I love her poems "The Willing Mistress" and "The Disappointment", and I respect her position as the first female professional writer. A self made man is almost always of interest, and a self made woman, especially in the late seventeenth century, is extraordinary. At any rate her sojourn as a spy upon the Dutch began about 1666 and due to Charles' fiduciary delinquency was ended by December of the same year. By 1668 she was put in debtors prison, as Charles continued to ignore her entreaties for recompense. How she contrived her release is not known. What is known is that in 1670 she produced her first play, "The Forc'd Marriage". In 1671 she wrote "The Amorous Prince", but her third play, "The Dutch Lover" was a failure. Aphra had long been writing poetry and continued doing so through this period. Soon she was hailed as The English Sappho, and the Incomparable Astrea. She kept writing poetry while supporting herself as a playwright. Her plays quite boldy addressed current events cloaked in allegory, but it was not an obscure allegory- her sophisticated audience was in the know, and recognized her subjects and characters.
In trying to learn more about Aphra Behn I discovered a wealth of resources online. I haven't even begun to search libraries. I did read portions of "The Roundheads". Let the reader be forewarned- to understand the lay of the land in "The Roundheads" further research is mandatory. It's a seventeenth century political play- the names and references will be obscure to a modern reader who is not well studied in the Civil War. I'm a student of that Revolution with several books under my belt and I was googling names frequently. Her poems are more accessible. Her poem "The Disappointment" deals with an attempted sexual assault, resignation, and utimately, impotence. Aphra's lover at one time was the openly homosexual John Hoyle and she wrote of homoerotic affairs of her own.
I led my Silvia to a Grove,
Where all the Boughs did shade us,
The Sun it self, though it had strove,
It could not have betray’d us.
The place secur’d from humane eyes,
No other fear allows,
But when the Winds do gently rise,
And kiss the yiedling Boughs.
Down there we sate upon the Moss,
And did begin to play
A Thousand Amorous Tricks, to pass
The heat of all the day.
A many Kisses I did give:
And she return’d the same
Which made her willing to receive
That which I dare not name.
My greedy eyes no ayds requir’d
To tell their amorous Tale;
On her that was already fir’d,
‘Twas easie to prevaile.
I did but kiss and claspe her round,
Whilst they my thoughts exprest,
And laid her gently on the ground;
Oh! who can guess the rest?
Not exclusively lesbian, she really is the English Sappho, and had affairs with women and men and her writing refects that. The first of her poems that I read was "The Willing Mistress".
Amyntas led me to a Grove,
Where all the Trees did shade us ;
The Sun itself, though it had Strove,
It could not have betray'd us:
The place secur'd from humane Eyes,
No other fear allows,
But when the Winds that gently rise,
Doe Kiss the yielding Boughs.
Down there we satt upon the Moss,
And did begin to play
A Thousand Amorous Tricks, to pass
The heat of all the day.
A many Kisses he did give:
And I return'd the same
Which made me willing to receive
That which I dare not name.
His Charming Eyes no Aid requir'd
To tell their softning Tale;
On her that was already fir'd,
'Twas Easy to prevaile.
He did but Kiss and Clasp me round,
Whilst those his thoughts Exprest :
And lay'd me gently on the Ground;
Ah who can guess the rest ?
Aphra Behn died 16 April 1689, three hundred twenty five years ago. Fortunately for us, her writing is much better preserved than her predecessor Sappho, from whom we have only fragments. The epitaph on her tombstone reads:
Here lies a Proof that Wit can never be
Defence enough against Mortality.
I think a better epitaph was that of Virginia Woolf in "A Room of One's Own":
All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn... for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds.
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Nell Gwynn
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Posted:Oct 14, 2014 8:45 pm
Last Updated:Oct 15, 2014 10:28 am
23915 Views
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I'm reposting this. Nell should be remembered in my blog.
Nell Gwynn was said, via a horoscope, to have been born Saturday 2 February 1650, at six AM. Just how this precision was achieved is not known. Few births were accurately recorded in the seventeenth century- why Nell's birth would be accorded such special attention is a mystery known only to the astrologer. Her birthplace is the subject of speculation. The name Gwynn being of the the Welsh persuasion, Hereford, near the Welsh border, claims the honor, and that she was indeed born in Pipewell Lane, renamed Gwynn Street in her honor sometime in the 1800's. She was raised in Covent Garden and adherents of the Covent Garden faction go further in specifying Coal Yard Alley as the scene of her nativity. Nell's life, happily, is less of a mystery. Her mother, Old Madame Gwynn, was born in Covent Garden and ran a bawdy house there. Old Madame Gwynn reportedly struggled with alcoholism. Nell's father, supposedly Captain Thomas Guine, was at any rate absent early in Nell's life, and she apparently passed her childhood in the bawdy house where she later claimed that she served liquor to the patrons, but had not catered to their other requirements.
Nell had hooked up with a man by the time she was twelve or so, depending on which birthdate you accept, and this "Duncan" is said to have gotten her an introduction to the theater being built near their dwelling in Maypole Alley. Nell became an "orange girl", hawking fruit to the theater goers in seductive attire, and also carrying messages back and forth between the actresses and their admirers from the noblity and gentry in the audience. She soon attracted the eye of Thomas Killigrew, who operated the playhouse. Killigrew sent her to his acting school, where she would meet Charles Hart and John Lacey, both rumored to have been Nell's lovers.
Nell began acting by 1664 or 1665, at fourteen or fifteen perhaps. By 1665 she was a smash hit in "The Mad Couple", a comedy, and she had found her metier. As a comic actor she was reportedly unsurpassed, by no less authority than Samuel Pepys. In one scene of "the Mad Couple" Nell rolled across the stage, revealing her petticoats to the theater goers, one of whom, in 1667, was Charles Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, who made her his mistress, left the city with her, and gave her a stipend of a hundred pounds. Later that year Nell was back in London, however, with the Duke of Buckingham concocting a plan to her to the king. By the spring of 1668 the plan had come to fruition and Nell found herself competing with Moll Davis for the attentions of King Charles the Second. Nell and her friend, playwright Aphra Behn are said to have slipped Moll Davis a laxative one evening before Moll's assignation with Charles.
Recalling Nell's career as a comic actor, it is amusing to note that she referred to King Charles the Second as Charles the Third, following her former lovers Charles Hart and Charles Sackville. Nell continued acting, but by 8 May 1670 she had her first , Charles, fathered by King Charles. Later that same year Nell found herself with a new competitor in the person of Louise de Kerouaille, a French Catholic, whom Nell promptly nicknamed Squintabella. Nell continued acting and continued dear to King Charles. About 1681 she was traveling through Oxford in her coach when the crowd, staunchly anti-catholic, became aware of her approach and became unruly. Nell stuck her head out the window of the coach and exclaimed "Good people, be calm. I am the protestant ."
On another occasion she found her footman fighting with a man who had called her a and said "I AM a . Find something else to fight about."
At ten PM on 14 November 1687, Nell died, most likely from the ravages of syphillis. She was thirty seven years old. Not a wealthy woman, she still found money to bequeath to the prisoners at Newgate Prison. Her Charles had been made Earl of Burford by Charles the Second. Nell Gwynn knew where she had been, and what she was, and where she was headed, and never was ashamed of it. Raise a glass to the memory of Nell, a common girl with an uncommon wit and an uncommon character.
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My Dick Pics
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Posted:Oct 13, 2014 2:39 pm
Last Updated:May 1, 2015 9:46 am
24129 Views
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Swampflounder would not allow them. If I were holding public office, I'd be ridiculed for showing, publishing, displaying or otherwise drawing attention to a facsimile of my dick. I might even be prohibited from approaching within a certain distance of playgrounds, and perhaps I might be barred from living in particular neighborhoods. Swampflounder does not see it that way. Here, in my profile, my dick pictures were censored. Disallowed. Prohibited. I reckon I am not the first clown to attempt it- showing pics of my dick- and most likely will not be the last. It doesn't exactly hurt, per se, but it is a bit of a disappointment. Maybe I'll be allowed a post about my experience. Here goes....
If you're disappointed by this display......seriously, how could you be disappointed. You really didn't come here to see shocking photos of some old man's dick- did you?
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A Toast to a New Friend
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Posted:Oct 9, 2014 10:54 am
Last Updated:Nov 27, 2014 8:25 pm
24357 Views
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I haven't much been moved to write anything lately. I've made a few connections with new people, all of them women and so I've been basking in that for a few days. It's like rolling around in fresh clover hay with no burrs in it. When you meet someone new and click like magnets, and there's that closing switch that flashes briefly and then the energy starts to flow, lighting up synapses across the brain, it can spark an infatuation that might carry you away if you don't keep your wits about you. I don't have an over abundance of wit in store, to begin with. Witness, and witless, I've been to the altar four times- I never liked dating, I just married them. PD, my wife, is the one I was looking for but there had to be a convergence or a synchronicity for that collision to occur. PD, in her blog: "I've been married four times. I can't run to the supermarket without marrying somebody." It wasn't pre-ordained, it wasn't merely meant to happen. When the right proteins and amino acids float together and the water temperature is just right with exactly the proper amount of sunlight present life begins spontaneously and that's pretty much what happened with us, and we don't credit our existence before the event as having much meaning except as the random series of escapades that led to us conjoining. Right out of the starting gate we felt that we were two minds with but a single thought, two hearts that beat as one. Birds sang, bees gently buzzed. The very flowers which had been lolling languidly at their posts leapt to attention and arranged themselves smartly, entirely on our behalf, and bathed the new couple in that resplendent glory which is theirs to bestow. Neither of us noticed quite when our union became carved in marble but we acknowledged the monument and floated on, together.
It's a little like that when upon first meeting a friend and you are so quickly enamored of that girl that infatuation takes hold, an adolescent crush that feels as fresh and new as sunrise. One wonders how he got along all these years without knowing this woman. It is at once bracing, invigorating and as pleasantly warm and soft as a new puppy clasped gently to the breast. Every thought exchanged is savored and mulled over and put away safely, but not too far, so as to be in arm's reach at need. It will be needed often.
PD is irreplaceable. That she gifts me with her blessing for this dalliance and flirtation is a measure of her love and trust and is one reason why I am forever in her thrall. I return her trust with my own.
One friend stands out a bit proud of the others. In any good toast it isn't necessary to name the object of adoration. It is understood that she knows who she is. This is my simple "Thank you".
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I had a strange girl once too
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Posted:Sep 29, 2014 10:16 am
Last Updated:Feb 3, 2016 9:15 pm
25428 Views
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mcmaniac posted about an unusual woman he ...enjoyed...once upon a time. He asked about the odd one that I knew.
mcmaniac: "BUT SHE WAS SO HOT!!!! Eventually I could take no more. Let's hear about your "odd one"."
Just like you said, this girl was beautiful. I lived part of my youth, after we left the farm, in a little Italian enclave in a small town. Everybody called it Spaghetti Boulevard. My mom grew up there. This girl was one of us, dago through and through, so she had that dark dark brown hair and those deep brown eyes. She wasn't that tall but managed to achieve "willowy" anyway. When the weather was warm she always wore those satiny running shorts that were slit high on her hips, and loose, so you could nearly see the pearly gates if you studied hard enough. It was almost a loincloth. That's what she was wearing when she picked me up. She pulled up to the curb and hooked her finger at us- we were sitting on the stoop drinking beer- and gave the c'mere sign. My buddy was over at her window like a jackrabbit, but she shook her head and pointed at me. He was crestfallen, I could see it in his face. He was a young black stud who was pretty sure he was a sexual athlete, but he came crawling back to the stoop and said "She wants you" and I could tell he wasn't all that happy for me. I didn't move, I just stared at her, and she got out and walked over, took me by the hand and led me back to her car. It's OK to play the Joe Cool card a little bit, but overplaying it ain't likely to get you laid, so she didn't have to pull me. My dick was already hard enough to cut diamonds. She drove us to her apartment on the other side of town and led me inside. Neither of us had said a word yet, not when she kidnapped me, or in the car, or now. She took off her cami and the shorts fell off of her, no panties, and I am still proud that I didn't shoot right then and there. I don't remember getting undressed but we were making the beast very quickly, almost no foreplay. She let me know without saying anything that I had better get crackin'. She was moaning softly, and writhing underneath me with her head turned completely away from me, so I kept trying to crane around toward her face to kiss her, and then I realized she was sucking her thumb. She pumped away on that thumb all the while we fucked, and unceremoniously put it away when we finished. No cuddle time, no talk and get to know each other, she got dressed right away, so I did too. She went right back out to the car so I followed, and she drove me back to Spaghetti Boulevard. We got together a few more times, I guess three or four, and it was always the same. She didn't speak, she didn't want to listen to me, she just wanted to fuck me. It seemed like the least I could do for the poor girl.
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Mea Culpa, humorguaranteed
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Posted:Sep 28, 2014 9:43 am
Last Updated:Oct 5, 2014 12:04 am
25259 Views
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I have a confession to make, a concession too. Humorguaranteed is of course right- Mark Twain is the king of comics. But , oddly, I don't think comedy when I think Twain. He made his reputation and his career as a humorist and might have been the most famous man in the world because of it. Wodehouse wrote ONLY humor, and never had a message to deliver. A message would have been decidedly un-Wodehousian. For me, Mark Twain is in a category where he is the only member. No one else belongs next to him, except maybe Shakespeare, and Shakespeare couldn't do the dialect.
So, it's more than a little weird that I don't think comedy when I think of Mark Twain. My mother read me to sleep every night with Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn when I was small. So I suppose Twain isn't just a humorist, he is the voice of God.
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Difficult Discussions, Internet Argument and Infinite Digression
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Posted:Sep 26, 2014 9:05 pm
Last Updated:Oct 22, 2015 8:30 pm
28701 Views
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[B]Difficult Discussions Is The Topic For The Second Virtual Symposium on Sept 27
The finest comic writer in the English language is P.G. Wodehouse. He is also one of the finest writers of the English language, period, in any period. Certainly, in the twentieth century, he belongs in the stratosphere of fine writers, where the air is crisp and clear and style and turn of phrase may soar like keen eyed raptors on the hunt for worthy metaphoric prey. Perhaps Wodehouse's most well known characters are Bertie Wooster and his manservant, Jeeves. A recurring theme in the chronicles of Jeeves and Bertie is the Code of the Wooster's, which I shall not divulge in this epistle, necessitating that the reader will examine the works of Wodehouse on his own, a scholarly and uplifting endeavor. Suffice it to say that the Wooster's indeed possessed a Code, and it was succinct and rigid. It demanded adherence to a standard of deportment that was appropriate to a gentleman of his social standing.
I too have a code. It is nowhere near as ancient or as lofty as the Code of the Wooster's, but is every bit as strict and unbending in its expectation of compliance as that old and honorable creed. I am reluctant to reveal my true surname to the casual reader, so I shall assume a pseudonym, and that pseudonym will be "Psmith". It follows then, that my Code will be referred to as the Code of the "Psmiths". Psmith was another creation from the mind of P. G. Wodehouse. The P is virtually silent- in Psmith's own words, think ptarmigan, psalm and pththisis. Psmith is arguably a greater comic character than either Bertie Wooster or Jeeves, but this is not the proper forum for that argument. The reader may infer that I am a Psmith partisan, an advocate of the Psmithian school of thought. I will not here take issue with that inference.
Thus ends the first digression. In writing good pornography, as in writing good…anything… the writer is well advised to limit his "lead". The reader wishes he would get to the point. This background material, this local color, is all well and good, but get down to it, man. The public clamors for disclosure, for elucidation on the main topic. This can become a problem when the writer has forgotten the main topic. I can assure you that I am not that writer. Today's topic is "Difficult Discussions" and I beleive I am well on my way to accomplishing that feat. Thus far it has not been difficult for me personally- you may wish to disagree. This is why we have symposia. It is a "Meeting of the Minds". Such as they are. And so, onward, ending digression number two.
The Code of the "Psmith's" postulates that an internet argument is a fool's errend, and under no circumstances should a "Psmith" engage in one. It is beneath him. Trolls lurk everywhere on the web. They are not lurking unseen, which would subvert the very purpose of Trollhood. The Code of the Trolls, if you will. On the contrary, they are there to be seen, and to divert the conversation from the free exchange of ideas to the ideological equivalent of mud wrestling, albeit in a digital format. Trolls would engage the hapless websurfer in an exchange of insults in lieu of ideas by infuriating him with pointless and nonsensical diatribes on the order of "You are! No, you are! And your mother's a !" Such a confrontation cannot even end in a satisfying duel by fisticuff, as happened in the days when we frequented taverns rather than websites. It is a "who got the last word" quarrel, and is un-winnable, like Tic Tac Toe. We all know what kind of troubles Tic Tac Toe can get us into, or out of, the movie "War Games" having become part of our cultural lexicon. I am aware that the younger people who have subscribed to this website are at a significant disadvantage at this point in the discussion. They have no idea what "War Games" is about, who Matthew Broderick was, why a fine exmple of American womanhood like Ally Sheedy would be at all diverted by him, or what the Cold War was. They will surely think that I refer to an ancient and primitive video game on the Atari platform, which the more acute historians among them will be vaguely aware of. I encourage them to study these fine points, in their free time and on their own initiative. It will doubtless prove rewarding. Not being certain if this last paragraph is a full digression, I will press on. But if it is a digression, it will qualify as number three, possibly four if you are feeling magnanimous.
Being fairly sure that there were at least two full digressions in the last paragraph, I will proceed. Recently, I encountered a fine red blooded American woman on this very website who dispensed her wisdom under the moniker of Smurfnturf. No sooner had we become acquainted than she announced her retirement from the website. She indicated that anyone wishing to maintain contact with her in another venue could apply personally to her, as might a supplicant to Saint Joan, no doubt expecting that I would not take her up on the offer, and she would have seen the last of me. Knowing as I do that unpredictability is an essential tool of oneupsmanship, I applied. I would be the mutt that followed her home. What's a girl to do? She foolishly admitted me to the Inner Sanctum, a notorious social networking site which I will call AssPlace (Not its real name). I was no stranger to AssPlace, although many of the members will assert that no member is stranger than me. I hate AssPlace. I hate its inventor, I hate his minions, and the majority of its subscribers are repugnant to me. I subscribe to the Bill Maher theory of human evolution, i.e., that the majority of Americans are illiterate and undereducated morons, that it is not possible to educate them, and that every member of that majority is a member of AssPlace. But my attraction to Smurfnturf persuaded me to reactivate my account with AssPlace. I admired her wit and her intelligence. In toto, she seemed like a good egg.
It has been but a few days, but seems like a long time. I have enjoyed the brief exchanges I have had with my new friend. It is said that one must take the bad with the good. Smurfnturf is all good. I enjoy reading her posts about the doings in her life and she has so far tolerated my intrusion well. Pretty much all the rest of it is exactly as I remembered it. What I remember is boring and stupid. And now we near the heart of the matter. AssPlace is awash- and I mean flooded as Yahweh innundated the Earth in the time of Noah flooded- with inanity. Every dumbassed unread bonehead who feels he is entitled to his opinion can express that so called opinion on AssPlace. And he does it, most of the time, with impunity, because most people have their own version of the Code of the "Psmiths" and they walk away from that argument as a waste of time and energy. To what purpose does one alert an idiot that he is an idiot? What are the chances for success, even?
I subscribe to certain threads of information and data on the AssPlace, as most of the members do. These serve as indicators to other AssPlacers as to how we think, what we like and approve of. It's an outgrowth of demographic studies. It tells you how a man or a woman is likely to think, and vote, and spend his filthy lucre. One of the threads, mere propaganda really, that I subscibe to is updates on the Occupy Wall Street movement. It satisfies my need to feel that I am participating, even in a miniscule way, by "Liking" this movement. And it alerts potential allies, and trolls, that I am an unreconstructed pinko. So far, so good. I have identified myself as a Progressive of sorts, and no one really knows that all I actually contribute is sitting on the sofa in my boxers and operating my mouse. That is not a euphemism for something else. I do that too, but not while using AssPlace, and I don't much draw attention to it. And yet, in a larger sense, that is exactly what we are doing on the AssPlace when we "Like" things and subscribe to their news feeds. It's a group masturbation, a circle jerk. And we do it on a global scale moving only an index finger. Orgasm has never been easier for the masses. We are "operating our mice" the world over, simultaneously. What are we up to, five, or six digressions?
I got a news feed today from Occupy Wall Street, urging solidarity with Palestinians. A fine sentiment, that one. I also feel some good deal of empathy for Jewish colonists in the Levant, but the one does not cancel the other. When one is empathetic, it's all grist to one's mill, so to speak. But the newsfeed featured a poster with an impossibly stupid truism: That there are two billion muslims in the world, and that if Islam is a violent religion, there would be no people left on the planet. I do not think that the one follows the other. I confess to having some trouble working this out. I did try. But I can't get it to come out to make sense. I do not take issue here with the assertion that Islam is not a violent religion. Surely, most muslims are hard working and decent people, with no more than the average number of prejudices and idiotic superstitions, common among all men. And I feel safe in assuming that most muslims are no more prone to violent outbursts than the rest of us- maybe less, as they have fewer freeways. There have been violent religions, the Thuggees of India for example. There was and is some debate about whether the Thuggees were actually a religion, or whether they were merely…thugs. It is fairly typical human behavior, when faced with unpleasantness, to deny that it exists. There is also considerable range in the estimates of the numbers of Thuggee victims. Some sources claim that Thuggees had murdered two million people, while others peg the number at no more than fifty thousand. They typically strangled their victims, and then robbed them. This is frowned on in polite society, in both the Occident and the Orient. There weren't a lot of them, but this begs the question, how many does it take to reach the tipping point? Certainly there were never two billion Thugees. How many would it take for them to be considered dangerous? Personally, I think twelve or fifteen is a few too many. Nowhere near two billion. The Thuggees did not exterminate mankind. They were a minor blip on the chart of the Indian population explosion.
Human beings, even the angry and violent ones, have exhibited a tendency to copulate and reproduce. Instead of two billion muslims depopulating the planet, it seems far more likely to me that the planet might exterminate us through disease or cataclysm, aided no doubt by our habit of shitting in our own nests. But, the poster is still there, insisting that those two billion muslims, if they put their heads together and their noses to the grindstone could take into their heads the notion of eliminating all human beings. This ill advised slogan seems counter productive to me. A better approach might have been to make inquiries of Carole King with an eye to licensing "You've Got a Friend".
When I encounter a political slogan created by people who have mastered the graphics software of an obscure computer application, but have no idea how to communicate an idea, am I obliged by the Code of the "Psmiths" to merely shake my head and walk away in bewilderment? The Code is clear on this point. A part of me wishes to notify them that they are perhaps their own worst enemy in identifying themselves as halfwits. But this violates the main tenet of the Code. We are now at, not merely near, the heart of the issue. Every fibre of my acculturation, along with The Code of the "Psmiths" screams at me "Shut up! There is no way you can win this one, or even make a scratch on it." But another part of me, in direct contradiction of the Code, urges me to tell the truth, not to power, but to mediocrity. And no one will hear me. And this is why movements and organizations seek a front man, a spokesmodel. Someone attractive and famous to publicize the cause. "Hello, this is Donald Trump for Preparation H." Nothing says sore asshole like Donald Trump.
I know the demands of the Code. They are engraved upon my psyche as the words above the Gates of Hell: Abandon all hope ye who enter here. And yet, to borrow a phrase from the much admired and much sought after [blog _Lady_X_], my hackles do rise when compelled by a time honored but battered code to turn away and fight another day. [blog _Lady_X_] did not invent the phrase, but she employed it recently with acuity and aplomb. And fine looking hackles they are too. I have examined a great number of hackles in my time, and those of [blog _Lady_X_] take their place among the best. I seem to have lost count of my digressions. But who attempts to quantify infinity?
It requires more restraint and discipline than I possess to adhere to the Code of the Psmiths when confronted by certain glaring displays of dipshittedness. Maybe I should just quietly exit the AssPlace once more. No one will miss me. With a nod to Lewis Black, I am becoming an Old Yeller. Maybe it isn't the discussion that has become difficult. Maybe it's me.
Nah.
In summation, I quote another of my friends, KItkat1415 , who recently bravely wrote: [post 3490573].
I don't know yet how difficult reading this was for you. As for me, some of it was a tough slog, but I soldiered on, and here we are.
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Building Plans
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Posted:Sep 17, 2014 6:34 pm
Last Updated:Oct 21, 2014 11:39 pm
26300 Views
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Forgive me father for I have sinned. It has been six days since my last post.
I've had to re-think my shop plans. My house is small. At least the footprint- the ground floor square footage- is small. And that limits my building options. So if I build a shop I won't be able to build a bigger garage later on without adding on to my house. We have a loft and a semi finished basement room, but they don't count for accessory building purposes. So I'm doing a lot of head scratching and thinking. I have an attached one car garage, and over the last couple of years I've thought about converting it to a bedroom, and building a bigger garage. I never expected that this would get so goddamned complicated. I'm not made of money and I really don't care to get into long term construction projects, especially since I always do all this stuff myself. Borrow money and pay a contractor? I'd rather drive a nail through my foot.
I've got a big lean-to on the back of my garage- bigger than the shop I had planned. I guess I could make that my shop. But the logistics are a bit complicated- where will I store all my shit? And if I convert the existing garage, where do I store all that shit? Don't even think of suggesting that I get rid of shit. I am a life long scrounger and collector. When I have accumulated enough shit I actually do build shit out of that shit. I have two piles of scrounged lumber that will go into any building projects I might undertake. All they cost me was time and a bit of sweat.
I decided against buying the huge oak timbers I looked at. It was just getting too expensive. I needed to buy a trailer to move it and we really couldn't arrive at a price I wanted to pay. The cost was kind of scaring me. I think I can get a better deal by buying timber cut to spec from my buddy at the sawmill. I've got some very big cherry trees on the place that are getting a bit old and should be taken down. I might be able to strike a deal to have them cut for a share of the lumber. They would bring a Woodmizer portable mill right here and saw it up on the Ponderosa. A year air drying should season it well enough. That would probably be enough to build a shop, or a shed for storage, and a bedroom.
So, I'm still thinking. And re-thinking. Never let it be said that I don't plan things. And re-plan things, and sweat bullets over the fucking plan. I might not make the smartest choice in the end, but it ain't for lack of planning.
Through all of this, my wife says "Do whatever you want. Spend whatever you need to." And she means it. If she would try to thwart me even a little bit, I might be able to get something done just out of contrariness. But no, she just leaves it up to me.
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How the Polish Saved Western Civilation
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Posted:Sep 11, 2014 12:32 pm
Last Updated:Jul 5, 2016 6:27 pm
28442 Views
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O east is east and west is west and never the twain shall meet
Til earth and sky stand presently at God's great judgement seat
But there is neither east nor west, nor border nor breed nor birth
When two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the ends of the earth.
Rudyard Kipling
There was another September 11, in 1683.
The Empire of the Ottoman Turks was at its zenith. An invasion of central Europe was undertaken, with the city of Vienna as its focus and main objective. Vienna was the jewel, the gateway to Europe, controlling the Danube and the main east-west trade route. The Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha invaded with an army of three hundred thousand and laid siege to Vienna on 14 July 1683. Its defenders, the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (Hapsburg) were outnumbered and up against it. Louis XIV of France elected not to assist the Hapsburgs, who were rivals for control of europe. It looked bad for Vienna, and for central Europe
The burning question inside the besieged city was whether the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth would honor its alliance and send troops to the aid of Vienna. That question was answered on 6 September 1683 when the king of Poland Jan III Sobieski crossed the Danube with thirty thousand Polish troops. Jan Sobieski was well known to be a brilliant military commander and was given command upon his arrival- on 11 September.
The Polish cavalry camped that night atop the Kahlenberg, overlooking the city. An early morning mass was said for them before dawn. Shortly afterward the Turks attacked the walls of the city. They had weakened its defences with mines and sappers and felt that Vienna was now ripe for the picking. As the battle raged, a relief army of Polish infantry attacked the Ottoman right flank. Kara Mustafa continued to concentrate on his central attack on the city walls instead of repelling the assault of the Poles, and by late afternoon the Poles held the high ground on the Ottoman right. At this point, about five in the afternoon, the Polish lancers descended the slopes of the Kahlenberg with Jan Sobieski at their head. Twenty thousand of the famed and feared Polish Winged Hussars charged down the hill into the Turks, flying the banner of the Black Madonna and sweeping the enemy before them. It was the largest cavalry charge in history.
The garrison of the city rushed out to join the attack and forced the Turks to retreat. Tired and dispirited after the exhausting day long battle, the Ottomans limped back to the south whence they had come. Their baggage train was looted and the plunder was rich, but the accolades for Jan III Sobieski were richer. He was hailed as the Saviour of Christendom, and lived to savor his victory. He wrote to his wife: "All the common people kissed my hands, my feet, my clothes; others only touched me, saying: 'Ah, let us kiss so valiant a hand!"
Kara Mustafa Pasha was executed for his failure by strangulation with a silken scarf and his head was delivered in a vevet bag to the Sultan Mehmed IV.
The Battle of Vienna was the last major incursion into Europe by the Ottoman Turks. Jan Sobieski died in Wilanow, Poland on 17 June 1696. He had spent his life fighting and defeating the Turks. There is a very good movie about the Battle of Vienna-"The Day of the Siege: September 11, 1683".
The Charge of the Polish Hussars
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A Treatise on Age and Amorousness
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Posted:Sep 1, 2014 9:08 pm
Last Updated:Feb 23, 2016 11:18 am
30777 Views
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As suggested by [blog humorguaranteed] the topic of the first scheduled symposium shall be "Age and Amorousness." I offer this as my contribution.
Age and amorousness. What could I possibly write that hasn't been better said before? People are easily obsessed with sex, usually their own, but not always. It's also pretty easy to get fixated on the sexual habits of others. We wouldn't have Kardashians or Miley Cyruses without that fixation- clearly they can do nothing other than project a certain sexuality. When Madonna was a new phenomenon I recall women hoisting their noses into the upper atmosphere, where it is very cold, and declaiming that as long as there are men there will be Madonnas. It was just what I needed- more disapproval from women simply for being male. Some women I knew were really creeped out by Bob Dole's ad spot for Viagra. I, on the other hand, thought it was very cool that he made erectile dysfunction easier for older guys to admit to and talk about.
When men are young they will fuck anything that moves and a number of things that can't. They will also jump off high bridges attached only by a rubber band. The young man's motto is "Hold my beer and watch this!" That motto is generally believed to apply only to rednecks and hillbillies. This is an error. There is a reason the military is heavily populated with young men- their brains are not fully developed. Football is a sport for young men. Now and then you will find an older man, still believing himself to be young, still playing football. He isn't hard to locate. Google "emailed dick pics" and he's sure to come up. This also serves as a gauge of the state of brain development. The man may still be technically young.
Old men are also willing to fuck anything that moves. They simply lack the energy or the erection to do so. George Burns famously said that trying to have sex at age ninety is like trying to shoot pool with a rope. It can also be dicey finding a willing female partner as old age encroaches. Usually large amounts of money are required. I checked yootoob and found no video of buxom young women chasing homeless men down the street, overcome with lust. Put an expensive Italian suit on that same man, give him a private jet and a mansion with multiple jacuzzis, and an entourage of celebrities will magically appear. Young women will naturally want to know what all the fuss is about and thus are drawn into the trap. Once in the snare, they will actually be found competing for the attentions of a decrepit and wizened old lecher. money may not buy happiness but it can procure a reasonable facsimlie. Most of us do not imagine Hugh Hefner sitting alone in one of several bedrooms pondering what fate has brought him to, what he has become. He may do it, but it's hard for us to believe it.
If a man makes his money early in life it may alter his perspective on amorousness. It may also alter his perspective on a great many other things, insofar as it can still be called perspective. George Bernard Shaw once said that William Randolph Hearst's San Simeon was the kind of place God would have built if he'd had the money. But that is another post. This one is about amorousness. If a man can afford women, and also afford to pay them to go away, it's bound to put ideas in his head. He might just slide from monogamy to serial monogamy to open adultery as easily as I slide into the seat of a twenty three year old pickup truck. I might want to slide into a twenty three year old, but all I can afford is the Ford. Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, the consummate craftsman of the written word in English, commented on this practice, in particular as it was engaged in on our side of the pond. "Like so many substantial citizens of America, he had married young and kept on marrying, springing from blonde to blonde like the chamois of the Alps leaping from crag to crag." Here is demonstrated the beauty of quotes- I need write no more- the paragraph is complete.
It would be presumptuous of me to attempt to deliver the woman's perspective on this topic. She can speak for herself, and in fact that is the reason I got hooked on this site. I liked reading what women thought and wrote about sex. I still don't know quite what that is. I get the impression that some of them are angry about something that involves men. Apparently a number of the men are also angry about something that involves women. I think that this is an entrepreneurial opportunity for the right people to seize- a website for people who are angry with one another and wish to copulate. I'm not wishing them away from Swampflounder- I love a good rant and a diatribe is even better. I am giving this idea away for free. I don't need the opportunity. I'm content with my pickup truck. At least some of the time it still works.
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Yellowjackets
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Posted:Sep 1, 2014 3:38 pm
Last Updated:Jul 15, 2016 6:20 pm
29723 Views
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Yellowjackets are a very successful social wasp. Especially this year on my little patch of woods. I've had four troublesome nests, fortunately all ground nests and none in my house.
The first nest I discovered while trying to harvest pickles and tend to my squash plants. The squash vines had squash vine borers. The moth
lays its eggs at the base of a leaf and the larvae, a worm up to an inch long, bores into the vine and eats along the stem. You can slice the stem, remove the worm, and bury the cut portion in soil to encourage new root growth. All through this process I was annoyed by yellowjackets buzzing me. Later while picking pickles, and so standing up, I noticed the nest, inches from where I had dug soil to bury my cut vines. My heart sped up a bit at that. I had saved the squash, apparently, as the vine began to regain color and vigor, but I couldn't keep up on new infestations of worms or pick any more cucumbers now that I knew about that nest. Bending down inches from a yellowjacket nest is not for the faint of heart.
I've had luck discouraging yellowjackets by running a stream from a garden hose down the entrance to a nest, so I tried that. It got me stung on the ear for my pains. But I watched for a few days and the population explosion of yellowjackets appeared to have been stemmed a bit. Nests reach a critical mass this time of year and the number of resident wasps will spiral quicky upward in late August and September. The nest has been there all summer but it gets noticed when it seems that suddenly there are tousands of them. There really are thousands of them.
So to take my mind off the nest I was obsessing about in the garden, I grabbed my weedwacker, and attacked the tall grass around our flower beds and front fence. I almost never weedwack. I hate weedwackers as the most pernicious invention of the industrial age. Much like a snowmobile or a German motorcycle, they never work when you need them to and are always broken. But the goddess Kali has shown a fondness for torturing me so I'm sure it was she who inspired me to take to the weedwacker. I promptly found a large yellowjacket nest near the front door, a place where my Gracie likes to hang out when she is outside. I didn't get stung but I certainly animated them. It appeared to be a large nest, so that night I went out armed with a flashlight and a can of Yellowjacket Killer. The wasps are hunting during the day. They are a good thing to have visiting your garden because they kill all kinds of nasty plant eating things, especially worms, but yellowjackets are prickly in temperament and always end up engaging the gardener in territorial disputes. I am fairly prickly in temperament when I get stung and the thought of my wife or my poor puppy being smothered in the nasty little pricks made me shudder. So on my own I might have lived and let live, but I couldn't ignore a nest in such a dangerous place. So I waited till about ten PM when all the workers would be back in the nest and I ventured out to commit genocide. I got about two feet from the hole that was their entrance, an old ground squirrel burrow, and started spraying and then moved the can to about a foot from the hole. Nobody sallied out to meet me. I used the whole can of spray. For good measure I went out back to the garden and figured they ought to go to, but the lilac bush over the hole was shielding it so I couldn't see it even with the flashlight. I got a long snow scraper from the garage, the kind we use to scrape snow off our roof when it gets too deep and heavy. It has a fifteen foot handle so I wouldn't have to get too close. I pushed the lilac bough back away from the hole and I am not ashamed to say I then ran like hell, not looking back.
After a couple more hours I went back out on a reconnaissance mission. At first I didn't understand what I was looking at, but then it dawned on me that the yellowjackets had responded to the waterboarding treatment by building a new nest above ground and attached to the lilac leaves. Doughty little bastards, they are. They were busily building as I watched them, chewing and spitting wood pulp to make the papaer for the new expansion. I knew they all returned to the nest at dark but I guess I supposed that they rested. Instead they were working three shifts, non stop. I went back to the garage for weaponry. I couldn't see the entrance hole from any angle, so this was gonna be a bit dicier than the other nest. I had to drop all the workers in the first spray, and I couldn't be certain of penetrating all the way into the nest without a straight shot through the front door. I knew how Joushua felt at Jericho, or the Greeks before Troy. I went ahead and sprayed from about three or four feet, and performed what I believe is referred to as a reduced range walk up, to a foot or so. No one challenged me.
The next day I kept a scout on the enemy all day, and I had decimated , but not destroyed him. If you can't kill the queens, you fail. It isn't uncommon for a wasp or even a number of wasps to not make it home for the night. They get involved in carousing, frequenting houses of ill repute, and so on, and will spend the night under a leaf and return home in the morning, hung over. So a few stragglers doesn't mean much. Give it a day or two and they should all go away. The garden nest appeared to have capitulated, so I felt confident.
That evening as we sat in the front yard, Gracie yelped and came running to us, and lay down at our feet, sprinkled with stinging yellowjackets. We swatted them off her, surprised as she was. My wife wandered over to where Gracie had been playing and came running back, stung on the wrist. I took everyone inside and put a baking soda plaster on PD's sting and went back out to scout out the nest. A new nest was building near my apple trees, in another abandoned ground squirrel hole. So about ten last night I girded my loins once again. I armored myself with Carhartt bibs and a thick insulated hoody, tied up tight, and gloves, this time. I figured my luck had to be running out. I took a can of spray, a cup of Sevin, and a milk crate.
My method of attack was not creative. Nothing succeeds like success, so I started spraying and walked up on the hole, til the can was empty. Then I dusted the entrance to the hole with Sevin, pouring some into the hole. Any stragglers will have to walk through the dust, contaminating anything inside that hasn't already been blistered by the spray. Then I up ended the milk crate over the hole to keep Gracie from snuffling up the Sevin dust. I treated the other hole again the same way.
Today there was no yellowjacket traffic at either nest. Not one wasp. Instead I found a new nest, between my fence and the street. It's a big one. I think I'm gonna post a sign as a warning and avoid the area. I'm already the insect Heinrich Himmler. I feel bad about using such toxic chemicals to kill the critters, but I also feel a bit like Hunter Thompson after the Hell's Angels beat him up.
"Exterminate the bastards!"
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Timber
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Posted:Aug 28, 2014 12:13 pm
Last Updated:Aug 8, 2015 4:55 am
29306 Views
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I started timber shopping yesterday. I've been looking around for sources of timber for my shop
and I found a pile of sawn oak, probably red oak, but it's grey from being in the sun so it's hard
to tell. I didn't scrape it for color. There are about twenty or so twelve by twelve inch timbers,
ranging from fifteen feet down to six, and some assorted planks, all salvaged from a house project
that never got finished. The guy died and the folks who bought the property tore down the project.
If this is red oak those long timbers will weigh seven to nine hundred pounds (dry) and if it's white
oak they'll easily top eleven hundred pounds. They aren't dry. The stuff is seasoned but it's been
out in the weather so it'll be wet. There are some checks (cracks) but it's still very sound timber
and there's enough in two piles to frame my entire shop if I build it fifteen by fifteen feet. It will
need to be resawn for me to use it. Timber frames were, and are, typically overbuilt. The builders
wanted them to last. My own building will be a bit lighter, but still plenty beefy. I'm working alone
and twelve by twelve oak is a whole lot more beef than my little shop needs, and they're a bear to
move. I don't even know if I can raise a frame of twelve inch oak- I'm thinking I can't. So I paid a
visit to a sawyer I know in a little town near the timber pile and he made me a great price on the
work. The lumber is clean, not many nails, so I won't have to be buying blades for the sawmill. The
mill is about halfway between the source and my house, so that's pretty convenient, but now I need
a trailer. I've hauled seventeen foot jack pine logs in my pickup by loading the stump end in first and
wedging a four by under the gunwales of the bed to hold the ends down. But dry jack pine is a hell
of a lot lighter than wet oak. It would take me a lot of unsafe trips to move this timber without a big
trailer.
Before I make an offer on the timber or buy the trailer I have to get a plan approved for a building
permit. Each part of my plan is dependent on all the other parts coming together.I can't draw a
design until I know what timber I have to work with and I can't get a permit without
a design. So my next move is a drawing, I reckon, and then I can start haggling on a price for the
materials. I hate to jump on the first pile of timber I found, but this one is PERFECT for my needs. I
might spend a bit more but the whole frame is right inside this pile, with extra left over. It seems like
good luck to me so I guess I oughta take it. I can resaw the stuff to eight by eight and six by six
and have two inch planking left over for floor joists and flooring. The short timbers will make
excellent braces, when cut to four by fours.
So- off to the drawing board.
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A time to keep silence, and a time to speak
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Posted:Aug 23, 2014 1:21 am
Last Updated:Apr 11, 2019 7:29 pm
27786 Views
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With apologies to B.B.King,
The blog is gone baby
The blog is gone away from me.
It's been exactly sixty days since my first blog post. I had never blogged before. I was working. I worked long hard hours and commuted two hours to and from work in summer, twice that time when Lake Michigan was deluging us with snow, as is her wont in winter here. My wife has blogged for years, and she did warn me that I would not find satisfaction there. But after I retired, I felt like I needed to express myself, and I was worn out, burned out, exhausted. A sentence of life at hard labor can do that- but it doesn't have to. That sentence was not meted out to me as punishment. I chose it. I chose it because the men I looked up to, the men I loved and respected, were defined by what they did with their hands. They were hewers of wood, haulers of water, tillers of the soil. They fed their families and they wore out their bodies doing it. When they had time, they read Plato, and Emerson and Thoreau and Whitman, and they were critical. It's a fine thing to read "O Captain My Captain" by a fishing hole after a rain storm, but when the sun shines you make hay. A man who has the leisure to sit and think can be considered to have a great thing, but I believe it may not make him happy. And a man who toils and thinks only of working and getting and his legacy of goods has no time to ponder and is perhaps even less happy. To every thing there is a season.
When it came time to plant my garden, this last May, I did. And when I did, I found myself writing about it, in my head. I was a little like the people who snap photos of their lives with an iPhone, recording it for the future. "You should blog about this." When I walked my I found myself composing an essay after the manner of Thoreau…now I feel this, now I think that. "You should blog about this." There was a time that I walked with my dogs and I experienced it the same way they did. I smelled the wild onion and the mustard and I glimpsed the voles in the tall grass and we either caught them or we missed, but we moved on to the next thing, a rabbit, a possum, or nothing. The sun set and we watched and waited and were content. We slept. And the sun rose on a new day until it was time to pluck up that which we planted.
And so we lived. I had so little free time to just live, the last few years. We should be working to live but instead I found myself living to work, this time not because I chose it but because I got sucked in. I was working not to live, but to get. It was hard to give up that big paycheck that was killing me. It's easy to get a man to believe that he needs to earn just one more dollar for his legacy to his wife and kin. But I have a fine life partner. With her help, and all her support, I was able to get free again. It has taken some time to get re-oriented to what is important. What is important is how you live. If you can find some time to write about it, and share with others how you find some kind of redemption this way, that is a fine thing. It enlightens and enlivens the way we live. But a blog is just a blog. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.
I found myself thinking that a blog mattered. It became an end. I needed confirmation that what I thought mattered. It doesn't. What matters is how I live. I'm going to return to what I do well, and thoughtfully. A hewer of wood. I will occasionally write about it. I have made connections with some fine people on a website which is devoted to the terminally horny. Most of them are probably not hewers of wood or haulers of water. There are some very good writers here who express themselves in remarkably creative ways, and very often they are really funny. Making other people laugh is good enough reason to blog. If you can, now and then, make them think differently, good for you. But mind how you live.
Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
Ozymandias
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
by Percy Shelley
No, Vince Gilligan didn't write the poem for "Breaking Bad". There is no new thing under the sun.
Being new to blogging I didn't realize that I would be just background hum in a cacaphony of clatter and shouting. I had no idea that my writing skills would be so poor or my ideas so barren. Somehow I collected a dozen followers. I have always been dependent upon the kindness of strangers. Tennessee Williams loved Ecclesiastes, and so do I.
So there you have it. B.B. King, Ecclesiastes, Walt Whitman, Percy Shelley and Tennessee Williams, all in one blog post. But I dropped Vince Gilligan's name. Ratings are ratings.
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To link to this blog (kzoopair) use [blog kzoopair] in your messages.
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