17. Oh well, if you insist. Bang!
************
And now for something a bit different.
Munguin and Andi have been having secret meetings over the last few weeks. Needless to say a lowly employee like me was not privy to these executive discussions (although I heard the odd word as I delivered cocktails, canapés, etc.) It was all above my exceedingly meagre pay grade.
However, Munguin is now pleased to reveal that he is minded to offer a coat of arms to some readers and has employed our most renowned genealogist to design them, with no expense (I know you were expecting “spared” to be the next word, but, well “no expense” is more accurate.
Three Munguinites are to be so honoured today, with (if you behave yourselves) possibly more to come.
Seriously, grateful thanks to AndiMac, who not only draws us cartoons and writes us poetry, but also designs coats of arms.
So with only a brief flourish …
Besides Andi, grateful thanks to John, Erik and Brenda.
MUNGUIN'S NEW REPUBLIC 
I’ve been waiting for hours… trying to avoid getting an even worse reputation as a clever clogs by being first in yet again. Thought Don Don might have beaten me to it by now, or some early riser in another distant corner of the Munguin Empire, but no.
Let me therefore lead the way in congratulating our new heraldic inductees on their well-deserved honours, and Andi for such splendid work as Munguin’s Lord Lyon – particularly the most apt Latin mottoes. Only one word of caution… in a Republican Empire, is this not a dangerous precedent? Where will it lead? A Ladyness Colonel Untruthie of our very own? No, MNR honorees could never even begin to rival the Hordes of Louse. And as Tris rightly points out, no expense has been incurred in their creation and maintenance, unlike their ignoble ermine-clad counterparts.
As another day of Bulgarian sunshine advances and the temperature heads for a 5pm high of 34C, Andi’s poem is equally appealing. Can’t we reach a pre-Brexit trade agreement? Last time we saw rain of any consequence was 18 months ago, when my clansman and fellow Sgiathanach Donald was visiting from Glasgow. Covid scuppered his return this year, and with it his rain-making skills. Drought now prevails as a result, and even the wasps are parched, as you will see from SS when Tris and I manage to restore photie sharing capabilities.
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Munguin’s view is that as long as there is no change of name an honour is quite within the bounds of his republican views. Down with titles, he says.
But as for a coat of arms… well, he says, what good would a coat be without arms? And who would argue with Munguin?
Well, to be fair the weather has improved here. August has been horrific. There has been little in the say of sunshine and a lot in the way of rain.
I can’t remember ever having to have heating on in the house in August, but I have on several occasions this year. And although it’s not coming don in sheets today, the sky is grey and it’s not feeling that warm.
Maybe it’s Donald’s fault?
Aye as ever, its the wildlife that suffer most in these matters, John, but I know that you guys will be looking out for them and sharing human supplies with them to the best of your abilities.
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Looks like the chancer reads this notable missive.
Just for a laugh he’s doubled the price of plastic bags.
It’s said that he’s going to increase tax to pay for the virus’ costs.
The Broonie idea is next, raid the Pension Pots and sell off the spare Gold in the BoE.
And they’re going to have fines for parking on pavements.
Handcock says he’s going to change the law to let nurses give injections.
The doris says he’s going to take charge of , well what?
As the cartoon says, maybe 2020 will just be declared a non-runner, start again next january with an oven ready year, 2020.
To solve the problem the englander’s will just have a vote on a NEW Union Act for both Kingdoms, with a majority already decided of 80 for both votes.
Love the sky website for the news, a week after the event parts of Scotland are flooded, that will be Loch Ness and other water holes. Weeks old ‘news’ still to be read.
Just clearing up the loft and came across old newspapers used to protect some old cups, hell Rolls Royce is bankrupt, who would have thought the German’s would own the car divisions. The French the water companies along with the power stations and the fish quota owned by the EU. Railways
Don’t panic folks it’s all just a bad dream from history.
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A new act of union would be an impossibility, but that, of course, won’t stop Mr Cummings from trying it on.
Joanna Cherry will go to court with it, probably with Jo Maugham, and, I suppose Dominic will get rid of the Supreme Court and appoint himself arbiter of all things…
Well, OK, that’s taking it too far, but I suspect as Ms Cherry said, way to get everyone in the legal profession behind independence…
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More funnies from Jimmy
“A lamp post near me has gone missing.
I’ve sellotaped posters on all local cats.”
“My dog is almost 13.
Do you think he’s old enough to tell him that he’s adopted?”
“Went yo the snooker club yesterday.
I got a 147.
Its the only bus that goes that way.”
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LOL. I love the one about the dog…
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What a lovely idea to create Coats of Arms for people. However for the sake of those of us, otherwise known as me, who are a bit slow on the uptake can we have some clues or captions.
I thought the last one was BlP because it was in French and the others were in Latin, but then I saw the feet. So I thought should I be deeply honoured? But then I don’t like to presume.
The first one foxed me for a while but is it a bearded Edinburgher? As for the middle one, nope still not getting it. It’s me being dense rather than the artist’s fault though! I’m going to kick myself when you tell me as it will be so obvious. Like I say slow on the update.
So on behalf of everyone, thank you for your hard work Andi, what a talent you are. And how kind of Munguin to commission such work.
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Well, we have to be fair here, it was Andi himself who came up with the idea and presented it to Munguin.
After negotiating the usual fees (you know about them PP, what with the log jam of Czechs, Poles and Icelanders in the post) publication was secured.
I think you and BlP will have to get married because it has to be for both of you. Don’t worry. Munguin says for a not-too-exorbitant fee you can have the reception the the Towers’ grounds.
Bang on with a certain Librarian.
As for the third one… I have to stay it stumped me too. But the translation of the Latin should solve it.
Life ………..?
A well known Sunday morning phrase.
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OmG!
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Nescio quid dicam.
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Nihil dice. 🙂
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So because I’m a scientist and not one of you multi lingual types, I’d to look that up. I now know that Nihil dice is a form of freeware.
“Nihil Dice Roller Cross-platform dice roller for multiple RPG systems”. So there!
Who said Latin is a dead language…
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Geeez… STEM minds!
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“. . . multiple RPG systems . . .”
Rocket-propelled grenades ???
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“Rocket-propelled grenades”
I don’t think you want to roll them dice Don!
For the non STEM amongst us Role Playing Game.
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Sounds a bit more user friendly!
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Non fuit ego.
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Tui disimilis 😉
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PP, No20 is indeed intended for yourself. Heraldically (E&OE) it can be described as – Argent, base sable, a giant panda proper displaying paws. Motto ‘Toujours blanche et noire’ (Always white and black). Supporters dexter and sinister, bamboo shoots and Scottish saltires all proper. As the arms are based on an association of names, heraldically representing Bugger the Panda could be quite challenging :-).
You’re on the right track with 18. I’ll leave it to others to have a go before revealing the answers.
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Before I saw, your post, Andi, I may have given the game away…
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And I’ve managed to put myself in moderation again, argggh. I actually got the middle one before you said anything. I tried finding a translation of the Latin but got nowhere or I’d have got it immediately. It finally dawned on me that the chains being broken were the clue.
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Thanks, PP, I hadn’t actually copped to that!
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Once in chains but now a free man 🙂
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Freed by Soppy Sunday!
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PS: I think them sharing is the best outcome. certainly trying to heraldically represent BlP’s name would provide a challenge.
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(There is also a hint in the “e”s on blanche et noire!)
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““e”s on blanche et noire!)”
French Higher was a LONG time ago. I’m not sure it’s fair that I have to share because of obscenity laws though. I mean not to get all second wave feminist on you, but the woman has to share and the men don’t. Pah!
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GRRRR.
Now now, PP, chill…. or Munguin won’t reward you handsomely for your next article.
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“As the arms are based on an association of names, heraldically representing Bugger the Panda could be quite challenging :-).”
Oooh Matron. Mind you, some of those Greek and Indian friezes would make a docker blush.
“Toujours blanche et noire”
I thought today black and white. But that would be Aujourd’hui. Look French Higher was a very long time ago!!!
I actually think I’ve got the middle one now. A Dundonian translator? Jeez I’m thick at times!
Anyway I’m dead chuffed so I am. My very own CoA. I’m going to use it on my next article submission if I can think of anything to write. (Never stopped you before hen!),
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LOL LOL LOL. I just found this in the bin. I suspect you messed up your email address again!
Hmmm… Yep. I own up I translated Ed’s one wrongly myself and had to ask for help from Andi. Then I felt like a twerp!
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And I thought the ‘e’s were because ‘pattes’ (paws) is feminine. Too innocent!
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Ah, well, arayner1936… that is a possibility which would have to be referred to Munguin’s head of protocol.
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Indeed. Some restraint will be necessary in any heraldic depiction of BtP and I’ll thank you to avoid any temptation to use the device of a Sinister Gusset.
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Could we please stick to the proper French word order. Munguin’s Republic remains a member of the EU…
Gusset Sinister!!!! (Anyway, it sounds less scary!)
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Ah yes, but, Tris… as I know you know and I’m sure certain scientific Munguinites know too although they may deny it, name no names but watch where the eyes rest, putting the adjective after the noun is not always and in all circumstances a hard-and-fast rule. As I had it explained to me, after committing yet another linguistic blooper in la belle France, if you want to thank a man and his wife who you don’t know that well for a lovely evening, you say “Merci à vous et à votre charmante femme …” because if you say “votre femme charmante” it implies that the guy has another wife tucked away somewhere who’s not so charming and you don’t want to say thanks to.
Don’t ask me why you don’t say “Merci à vous et à votre charmant mari”, unless, of course, the couple you’re talking to are both male, or we’ll be here all night.
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Which reminds me, there’s a big difference in French between the meanings of “un sinistre imbécile” and “un imbécile sinistre”, neither of which is the same as “un imbécile sinistré”.
For 1, https://is.gd/XGDm8r.
“imbécile sinistre” means what you think it does.
“Les sinistrés” are the survivors of a disaster, accident, fire, shipwreck or some such. Something you hope they’ve got insurance for, anyway.
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The things you know, Prof Freeman (University of Antarctica).
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Knowing lots of weird stuff doesn’t necessarily make a person weird, necessarily, I always say.
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Necessarily…. yep.
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Assurance étanche…maybe.
Or maybe it’s étanche assurance.
As Pet said,
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Not to be confused with assurance étanchéité, of course, Tris: https://is.gd/BWs6aJ.
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The bard in the original French version of Asterix was Assurancetourix (Assurance tous risques).
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The personal and place names in Asterix are a delight. Alas, I no longer have my collection of French Asterix albums… Babaorum is one of my favourite place-names … Rum Baba…
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LOL. Brilliant Arayner!
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Indeed, indeed, Ed.
🙂
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Yes, quite right… some adjectives go before the nouns… une jolie fille for example…and there are other rules too which I can’t remember because I long ago forgot all the rules and now depend in most cases on what “sounds” right… just like I do en anglais. (Although I’m often left to struggle over the gender of a word a rarely use might be and although you can slip the le or la out quickly and indistinguishable … it’s not so easy with a adjective… anyways.
As Petula noted when she was talking about the fact that sometimes they called her Pétu La Clark… “They’re a funny lot… foreign, you know”
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That’s what native speakers do… and as each new speaker comes along, they analyse the language for themselves and don’t always do it the same way as their elders. Languages change that way, even when most people are literate and are taught what the “right” way is supposed to be by some authority or other. Alert Munguinites – is there any other kind? – may have noticed that “whom” has almost disappeared from use, and that “who” in relative clauses is increasingly being replaced by “that”, e.g., “He’s a man that loves his beer”. That process is further advanced in the States, meaning it’s probably the way most native speakers of English do it now.
Note to self: stop reading American fiction on Amazon; they’re highly unlikely to be impressed by your editing compulsion.
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Interestingly, though, Ed, the use of the subjunctive has all but disappeared in British English and, indeed, I seem to recall that Fowler said, maybe around a century ago, that its use was seen as ‘pretentious’.
Whereas, in American it is still in use.
(Not, in fairness, that it is dreadfully noticeable in English).
It’s a good point though, that you make that, the English that is spoken widely across the world, is very much American.
The influence of the net, and perhaps mostly Netflix.
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Fowler would probably have me down as a pretentious pedant, Tris. I insist on using the subjunctive in your unfulfilled hypothesis thingmies, e.g., if I were a rich man (but I’m not), I would / wouldn’t xyz …; if I weren’t such a nice person (but I am), I would knock his block orrf and use it for a football.
P.S. Maybe we should call a painfully pedantic fondness for the subjunctive subjunctivitis, Tris, you know, like conjunctivitis.
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LOL … yeah good idea.
I tend to use it too, and the spell check tells me it is wrong!
Silly spell check.
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Yes, quite right… some adjectives go before the nouns… and there are other rules too which I can’t remember because I long ago forgot all the rules and depended on what “sounds” right… just like I do en anglais.
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Andi, PP, and BlP, perhaps you can take inspiration from the wedding photographer who asked the bride’s parents, “Would you like them mounted?”
“No, no! Holding hands will do fine.”
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Hahahahahahahaha!
Still not sharing with BlP though!
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What happened to panda solidarity
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It’s every Panda for themselves. Look Pandas don’t have any solidarity, that’s why there are so few of us…
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🙂
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“…heraldically representing Bugger the Panda could be quite challenging…”
I’m sure you could insert something Andimac.
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Ouch, Conan!
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I hope that wasn’t innuendo, as the Japanese say, Conan.
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Double ouch. I think I feel a Golden Groan Award coming on, andimac.
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Thanks Andi. I do like Edd’s Motto!
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Pic 13: I think Boris got the “V” for victory sign reversed. But I see that even Churchill got it wrong from time to time.
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Hard to tell, Danny, Churchill was a grumpy old git, plus he was drunk half the time, so he could have just been showing people what he actually thought of them.
As for Mr Johnson?
Yeah, same things apply.
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Pity there’s no chemical cure for the personality disorders and psychopathies, because it would be such a relief to one and all if we could slip some into their Diet Coke and their champers or claret or whatever.
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Betcha their security people would be glad to do it on our behalf too.
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Ed…..A reply to your Soppy Sunday comment which failed to post. Will try it here.
Ed…..Interesting account of the New York City water system, and the other early water systems in Scotland! I tried to find out if the New York City system was the first municipal system in the USA, but some quick Googling failed me. Sometime, New York established a six-story rule requiring rooftop tanks, but I couldn’t find a date. Rooftop tanks are certainly not seen much outside of New York City, but towns and cities will generally have one or more water towers which are among the tallest strictures there.
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LOL
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Tris…….That explains it! For both gentlemen……LOL.
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See you’ve all been busy since I last visited – back from bank holiday outing, or should that be thawing outing? Coldest on record I gather, or was it just an English day off? In which case I won’t be so enthusiastic with sympathies. Although news of the cold came via Erik frae Greenock noo Suffolk who’s regularly mentioned in Laughs credits via me so I shouldn’t be too gleesome.
As a parting shot on pronouns, gender order etc, I was once invited to a whisky tasting in South Africa where experts would expound on the differences between island malts and their mainland counterparts.
First up was an apparent expert on French whisky who told us about the complexities of La Gavullin. Needless to say, not even the attraction of free whisky sampling got me back.
Now time to check on achieving a double distinction… last in on last night’s comments and first this morning. If I make that, I should try Panda emulation and le off dawn patrol comments for a while.
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Ah… we don’t have this bank holiday at the end of August, John. Here it was just another day.
I remember that Gordon Brown once proposed that this holiday be renamed Britain Day, or some such like, and we all though… oh well, another day’s holiday will be nice for us…
LOL .. about the French whisky from Islay!
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Are the banks in Scotland still following English bank holidays, Tris? I remember when that first started I was very cross about it. Imagine the reaction down south if the banks down there started taking Scottish bank holidays!
This is something else that will most certainly change in independent Scotland. We need more public holidays for sure: we’re low on the international list of those. Too much work for too little gain, and too little time off.
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Yes, Ed. The banks are closed here. It has to do with the fact that the Bank of England is closed, and apparently banks all over the UK cannot operate when the BofE is closed.
Good for our bank workers though. They get English Bank Holidays and Scottish Public Holidays.
Win.
Yes, very few public holidays here by comparison with Europe. As with many other things, down the bottom of the table.
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Huh. Because the BoE is closed, eh? A feeble excuse: if they really meant it, there would be no banks open on a Saturday, but there are. The BoE being shut is no excuse for shutting down all or even some retail banking, even if the transactions can’t be posted until the next working day.
I’m old enough to remember what a problem it was operating a bank account while holding down a job, because any time the banks were open, you were supposed to be at work – and if your bank wasn’t close to your place of work so you could get there during your lunch hour (when every other bugger had the same idea), you were out of luck. Or worse, you’d be late back, miss lunch or be unable to do what you needed to do at the bank, or some combination of the three. Oh, those last Fridays of the month…
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Yes, I think its another hangover from the past.
After all, I can do my banking at 4 am if I feel so inclined… I never do, but I don’t expect that, were I to, the governor of the BofE would rush into work and open the shop just because I’ve transferred a few quid to another account or paid my credit card.
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