[quotes] who said these

The quotes

1. A loud noise at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other. [babies]

2. You can tell a lot about a fellow’s character by his way of eating jelly-beans.

3. It is best not to swap horses when crossing streams.

4. Awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock, from a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block.

5. It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window.

6. I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.

7. In America, any boy may become president and I suppose it’s just one of the risks he takes.

8. Enough of talking. Time now to do.

9. I had done all that I could; and no man is well pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little.

10. Mountains will go into labour and a silly little mouse will be born.

Choices

a. Raymond Chandler
b. Winston Churchill
c. Tony Blair
d. Ronald Reagan
e. Adlai Stevenson
f. Abraham Lincoln
g. Samuel Johnson
h. Monsignor Ronald Knox
i. W.S.Gilbert
j. Horace

Answers

1h, 2d, 3f, 4i, 5a, 6b, 7e, 8c, 9g, 10j

[blogfocus friday] alanders, edwardians, pollies and books

1. The Croydonian highlights the plight of the Alanders:

And this is where the Alanders have a problem. Quite a big one, actually, as the EU is intent on levying a fine for this wickedness, and "Åland and Finland have an agreement according to which Åland pays its own EU fines".

So €2m, and counting, is not an insignificant sum, and works out at about €75 per head. But how is the EU going to get its greasy mitts on the money, I wonder?

2. Charles Robertson, in Jersey, makes a second appearance with his thoughts on Politics and Special Interests:

The problem is that politicians have too much power and influence to sell. Reduce their power and you reduce their ability to favour special interests. No, this is not an argument for anarchy, simply limited government: limiting it to those things that we really need it for.

When we let government do things that can be done as well or better by other mechanisms, then it is simply an invitation for groups with vested interests to try and influence the rules to their, and not our, favour.

3. Mutterings and Meanderings is so knowledgeable on Edwardian ladies and you should be too:

Edwardian ladies had much smaller fingers than me. I don’t have particularly fat fingers, but I do have chunky knuckles. They’re the sort that are better at giving a good punch than looking elegant.

In fact, a psychic once told me: “Of course, you know you will suffer from arthritis when you’re older?”

“Can you tell that from reading my palm?” I asked.

“No,” she said, “I can tell because you’ve got big knuckles.”

I know this, but I have felt myself utterly compelled to bid on eBay for an Edwardian amethyst ring that I am unlikely to be able to force on to my finger. It’s just so beautiful and purple and old.

4. Mopsa is giving us all due warning so there’s no excuse for forgetting it:

My birthday is in November and then it's Christmas, so it is present time (yes, presents, and plenty of fuss please). But I don't get to bookstores that often these days - fairly thin on the ground in rural Devon, and Waterstones in Exeter lacks inspiration (I think it's the layout and the too neatly proffered stock), so browsing for delights is a very rare thing indeed.

Amazon is amazing but you can't pick stuff up and see if page 22 will have you giggling or groaning. So, I am after your book recommendations - what should I be sticking on my wish list?

[tramvai] with whom does the cord communicate?

Strangely quiet end to the day – hard to describe.

For a start, though it was clear and mild out there, not especially chilly, the atmosphere exuded menace, maybe it was magnetically charged and people were definitely down – the young ladies an hour or so ago especially.

My goodness it was tough keeping their spirits up and I let them go early, then did the trek down to the tramvai, stopping in at the café for a bite and the management had made the girls dress up as some sort of Egyptian servant girls and they were suffering under these heavy mop top wigs in the overheated room.

Some young DJ was dressed like a pirate and on the counter were hallowe’en jack o’ lanterns. The girls said it was an early hallowe’en party – whatever moved them, I suppose but a bit of a mix of motifs.

It took a long time to tumble to the realization that I am now genuinely alone. I realized for the first time – I don’t know any of these people any more, the girls give not a glance, people go past on their business and I go home by tram to a home which is not a home. Even if I’d wanted to join their party, even if I’d been invited, I’d not fit in.

In the light of what is coming in Europe and America, it feels even more poignant, as if we’re at some crossroads, maybe the calm before the storm [to mix metaphors] and that nothing we’ve worked for or achieved before counts for anything anymore.

I think we’re going to be surviving on our wits, [as I’m doing at the moment anyway], only bigger issues are going to be hanging on it. I remember reading of young men in the Polish ghetto surviving in an animalistic way and I’m wondering if I’m too old for this or if it’s still possible for one such as myself to survive and if so, for what end?

Seems to me there has to be some ‘coming to terms’ required and so I’ve made a list of pre-survival requirements:

1. Get physically training again as soon as possible and continue eating healthily;

2. Come to terms with being alone and losing everything of value;

3. Suppress regret and self-pity over ageing – there’s little time for this and if encumbered by a true love – that can only be a weapon to be used against you –better not to have one;

4. Construct a series of concentric redoubts:

a. beef up and maintain your support network of protective people – especially important over here;
b. own your property outright but be prepared to lose it all and to have some haven to retreat to;
c. develop a sense of purpose, a clearly defined goal, rather than drift along into old age which I fear we’re not going to be allowed to do anyway – make that goal altruistic;

5. Get some sort of inner spirituality going and put your implicit faith in hope;

6. Practise, practise, practise infinite patience and see the value in doing nothing precipitate.

That’s maybe enough to be going on with for now. It seems I’m not the only one thinking this way – two separate people asked me where was the safest place to be in the next few years and I couldn’t help thinking either in South America or here.

“Here?” they muttered, “but it’s so boring here.”

“Precisely. Just as we want it.”

[Yes I know, I know, readers - I need to get more Mutley or Flying Rodentish and cease worrying.]

[dale watch] think this will reward you

Interview with Sir Antony Jay. Really hope there’s a transcript because I can’t access video yet.

[blood, guts and offal] get yours now

Attention all Vikings:

The sale of raw material needed to make traditional slátur, blood and liver pudding, has decreased by 15 percent in one year at the meat production company Nordlenska. People seem to prefer buying ready-made versions of the delicacy.

Sheep heads, stomachs, fat, hearts, livers, kidneys and blood, are still popular. Liver was praised by a much-hyped Danish diet, so its sale has remained high. The slaughtering season ends at Nordlenska tomorrow; more than 80,000 sheep were slaughtered this year.

So rush out and buy up your offal, Sven, because winter is coming. Me? I'm off for a good long retch.

[bankers] gangsters in suits

First the news:

Home mortgage rates could rise to between 9 and 10 per cent by the middle of next year — with not one but three more rises ahead — as the Reserve Bank struggles to keep the lid on an overheating Australian economy, the ANZ bank has warned.

Now the exquisite touch:

In a rebuff to Treasurer Peter Costello, ANZ and another prominent bank yesterday declared they would not be pressured by the Government into refraining from rate rises during the federal election campaign.

As the banks faced off with the Treasurer, Deputy Prime Minister Mark Vaile also entered the fray, appealing to the Reserve Bank not to raise its official rate next month, and warning that another rise could push heavily indebted farmers over the edge.

Quiz question:

Since when has a western government had to beg a bank to do something, to be answered in such a cavalier fashion?

Which answer is correct?

1. Since the year dot. The bankers rule the earth and there’s someone else ruling the bankers. Hands up those who still think the government runs the show.

2. The government is laying the blame on the Reserve for what it approved in the first place.