Philmo's Friends

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[In two scenes]

The Minister for Fine Arts (to whose Department had been lately added the new sub-section of Electoral Engineering) paid a business visit to the Grand Vizier. According to Eastern etiquette they discoursed for a while on indifferent subjects. The minister only checked himself in time from making a passing reference to the Marathon Race, remembering that the Vizier had a Persian grandmother and might consider any allusion to Marathon as somewhat tactless. Presently the Minister broached the subject of his interview.

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Me (after pressing eighteen different numbers): "I've got a problem with a letter I've just received. It was addressed correctly, but it has the remains of a redirection label on it, and someone has written on the envelope, '"Incorrectly re-directed; pleased send as originally addressed.' "

RM: "That'll be what's happened, then. It was incorrectly re-directed, and the recipient has written on the envelope and put it back in the post."

Me: "Yes, I know that." (Thinks: this would be obvious to a blind baboon, with the literacy skills of a celebrity who has just got someone to ghost-write their autobiography.) "I'd like to make sure it doesn't happen again."

RM: "I'm sure it won't." (Pause, while he realises I'm not going to be fobbed off.) "But I can ask the delivery office to flag up your address, and put a note on it."

Me: "Thank you".


On a different note, did anyone see Have I Got News For You last night, with Bob Crowe?

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Life is meaningless and full of pain.

Suddenly it seems a thousand years ago when the G-Men were 5-0 and dominating. What the hell happened? Clearly I can't leave the country during football season. My teams just seem to fall apart without me.

Current Mood: sad

Here is a 1-day event with some interesting instruction available, which looks as if it may suit anyone who'd like to find out about Western arts.

Poll #1491191
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 37

What are you having for Christmas dinner?

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On this post Mr. Crozier mentions the following:

The only way to [deal with a particular problem] is by the introduction of global socialist economic polices enforced by a global government.

Here is a post by a non-American wishing American readers a happy thanksgiving day (I would like do the same, of course). The writer wonders whether this is a tradition it might be worth adopting:

It would be really nice, I reckon anyway, to have a day where people think about what they've got to be thankful for, rather than the grumbling and complaining that they normally do!

A controversial Scottish brewery has launched what it described as the world's strongest beer - with a 32% alcohol content.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8380412.stm

The historical Western martial arts community often like to present themselves as academics. For example, if you look at the SWASH website you'll see ample opportunity set aside for the presentation of lectures on the historical context of arts or on interpretations of period texts. This is hardly surprising when one considers that a lot of our material comes from texts that may be very old, involving particularly archaic language and assuming that the reader is familiar with concepts that are no longer known to our society. The ideal of academic debate is that one is supposed to welcome new information and compare one's analyses in order to improve the sum of human knowledge. As we know, this does not always happen — a recent scandal has shown that researchers are quite capable of behaving unreasonably about their research. On the other hand, there are examples of those who have freely admitted mistakes and who have consequently been well respected for it.

Many of the current or inactive members of my school are themselves academics and are consequently often involved in research into historical treatises. Often this is analysis of the treatises themselves, but can also involve research into related areas. The LSD articles page shows some of this research. Unfortunately, it seems that from time to time we inadvertently tread on people's (usually Australian) toes in our search for more information about these topics. One such occurrence was the “case of the slow hand,” which resulted in more than one acrimonious forum thread. This particular matter involved an interpretation of a text; both parties had the same text in front of them but there was disagreement over what it meant. A bit later there was the “Thomas Page affair,” in which it was found that there was no solid evidence that a chap claiming to be teaching a true Scottish highland fighting system was telling the truth and that he was in fact an ironmonger from Norwich (not too far from where my ancestors lived at the time). In both of these cases there were people whose response was that we clearly knew nothing of the topic or even how to conduct research and analysis of texts, on the grounds that we were contradicting the experts who had been studying for far longer than dabblers such as us.

One particular interest of mine at the moment is Savate of the Edwardian era, particularly for the purpose of street defence. I tried training in the modern sport variant, but despite the basic training being useful and the sparring exercises good for fitness it became more and more sportified with techniques bearing little relevance to street use. The club was clearly geared towards sporting competition, and as I was finding it quite expensive and not of much use I stopped going. Instead, I have been researching the period sources. The principles of the art are sufficiently close to pugilism and fencing so that if I can drill the physical skills well enough then I should not have too much of a problem. The main difficulty is that until 2007, when several useful books were reprinted, information has been scarce. The information that is available is in French, with the exception of a few short sections of books that have been translated.

When I was in Australia (you can probably see where this is going) a few years ago I met a chap who is a respected authority in this field. At the time I was concentrating on pugilism rather than savate, but as he was interested in Hope's New Method we discussed that topic and I gave him have a draft of a manual I planned to write but have never managed to finish. More recently, I have been bothering him to ask for advice on savate and he has kindly taken the time to suggest various useful texts for me to study. I also purchased his DVD which covers a lot of the basic techniques. This sort of secondary material is very useful indeed when trying to reconstruct something without direct access to an expert.

After reading several of the books and watching the DVD I noticed something very strange. In the books a particular kick is always shown as coming from the front leg (assuming one stands in a guard with one foot before the other) and on the DVD the opposite is true. There must be some reason for this, and I would have thought that it might have been that the DVD techniques were derived from another text to which I did not have access (there are several that haven't been reprinted) or that they were purposefully changed with reference to more modern savate techniques. In the former case I would like to know the reference and in the latter the technical reason. So, I asked why the two differed. The answer was to “please read the manuals again” with an assertion that they did indeed show the rear leg being used. In addition, I was reminded that it is not possible to learn from a DVD and that one must have proper tuition from a master (which I have always sought where possible and appropriate). I did, of course, read the manuals yet again and the source of the discrepancy was revealed:

1. The expert's translation of the instructions for performing this technique, from French to English, was incorrect.
   
2. The various pictures are sufficiently vague that they could be interpreted as a front or rear leg attack, and only comparing the text would explain which was the correct option.
   

Cute meerkat story with commercial twist.

Am simply awed by the sheer spread of the 'compare the meerkat / compare the market' advertising campaign. They must barely need to pay for ads any more, just enough to keep things rolling and the character at the front of mind, keep people saying 'Simples' and associating meerkats with insurance. The other comparison websites must be steaming at the ears.

I like to imagine the staff of the agency that came up with this one. I imagine them giggling maniacally and rolling on their backs in a giant pile of money. It's nice to see a job done well.

Current Mood: impressed

Inspired by something in my earlier posts, here are some extracts from a thrilling new D&D campaign:

( The War of Flame )

Feeling much better this morning, and off in a few minutes to celebrate Thanksgiving with friends and family.

(I am once again relying on TIVO to record the Giants - Broncos contest tonight, so no commentary about it here, please. I probably won't watch it until tomorrow).

I have a lot to be thankful for. My readers, my friends, and most of all Parris.

I hope all you reading this are similarly blessed.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Current Mood: happy

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Nov. 26th, 2009 04:27 pm Happy birthday to eldritchhobbit

Have a great day!