- Ban the trebuchet! (And while you’re at it, tell that writer that 1895 wasn’t “medieval.”) H/T MJR
- Princeton opts for
insensitivity discursive rape hurting people’s itty-bitty widdle feewings free speech and free thought. And does it for the right reasons.
- Seattle. Cops. Humanity. Hm. We’ll see how this works out
- I used to know a fair bit about the pre-WWII history of aviation. I could have bored you silly with tales of how Henri Coanda almost invented a jet plane in 1910 and how Jacqueline Cochran won the Bendix Race. But I never knew this.
- It’s touching that after all they put him through that original whistleblower cop Frank Serpico still has such hope for justice. (And it certainly is a good sign that the worst gangsters are finally starting to be fired and charged with felonies rather than being rewarded with paid vacations and excuses.)
- Beaten up by thugs. Then clobbered again by insurance companies and bad federal law.
It’s obvious it’s the insurance companies’ turn to rake in benefits from socialism. Agribusiness, automobile industry, airways, banks and housing, pharmaceutical companies and med school research departments — all have taken their unfair share from the common watering hole (aka taxes). Now the insurance companies, through prior subrogation and the newer Obamacare, are out to get theirs.
Technically the laws may make this fascism, but before Obama leaves office America will be ripe for the socialistic pickings. (And if Hillary gets in office, she will put the lid on it.)
Those arrows have become genuine desert lore and tourist attractions. It’s funny how their very cool but really very quotidian origins have been so completely lost. The only ones left are the ones in places nobody cared enough about to bother tearing them up.
Thanks for the piece about the giant arrows. I never knew that.
I notice with dismay but no surprise that Princeton – after saying all the right things for the right reasons about free speech – cops out and inserts a big fat ‘gotcha’ about the right to infringe on any speech that might threaten ‘university operations’. And I suggest that in a time of enforced ‘political correctness’, defined at least partly by race and preference whining, this dedication to free speech will turn out to be mostly just ‘speech’, and not so much ‘practice’.
The castle is medieval (~1100 years old) while the boathouse is modern. So
“boathouse of medieval castle” is technically correct, if less than perfectly clear.
Yup. But “destroyed a medieval boathouse” (first paragraph of the article) is both perfectly clear and dead wrong.
Only thing I can think of is that, back in 1895, there was a faux-medievalist movement going on in the arts. So maybe the castle’s Victorian owner built the boathouse in a medieval style. To go with the castle or to be trendy. Dunno. Got me. But given the deteriorating quality of journalistic “research” these days, it’s just as likely the reporter imagines 1895 was the deepest, darkest dark age.
I didn’t know about the giant arrows, but directions/ads/greetings/locations were sometimes painted on the roofs of barns and other large buildings back in the day.
1. All trebuchets are always loaded.
2. Never point your trebuchet at anything you do not wish to besiege.
3. Keep your hand off the release lever until you are in battery and ready to fire.
4. Be sure of your target, and what is within 500 yards of it.
I have witnessed a trebuchet fling a pumpkin straight backwards, rather than towards the target. Fortunately, no car in the parking lot was damaged. Lots of fun trebuchet videos on YouTube, including one that tosses people.
Completely unrelated, but part of miscellany:
http://cheezburger.com/8476394496/party-fail-its-totally-cool-bro
1895 must of been the dark ages, I wasn’t born yet. I would also quibble with a flaming cannonball being fired (flung, released, thrown?) from the trebouchet. My experience was cannon balls were from cannon, or for use by cannon. That also looked like an assault trebouchet and should be banned.
[Open Society, the Ford Foundation and others provided a budget of $800,000 a year for four years. The city matched the annual contributions over the past two years and is trying to figure out how to pay to expand it.]
I have just the thing: a tax hike!
This program reminds me of the old midnight basketball subsidies that some in the federal government thought was just the thing to reduce city crime. Pardon my cynicism. Why don’t they just get rid of the drug laws?
As to Serpico, he is living in a dream world. There is no way to eliminate corruption in police. It is an unavoidable part of the job.
We have cops only because we have irresponsible people (who should defend themselves, not hiring the job out to others using stolen funds). Their existence only spreads irresponsibility. What should happen instead, is get rid of all the cops. If someone wants to play Russian Roulette with his own personal safety, that is his lookout. Most people will figure out that the thing to do is to go armed.
RustyGunner — LOL! They should post that at the site of the “negligent discharge.”
jed — OMG, love the pot-doggie. Wonder if that’s a drug-sniffing police dog?
Only thing I can think of is that, back in 1895, there was a faux-medievalist movement going on in the arts. So maybe the castle’s Victorian owner built the boathouse in a medieval style.
Good guess. However in 1895 England thatching was just starting to go out of style. (Railroads were making slate more available.) You can still get your thatched roofs repaired, or new ones built, today.
I only know that because I’m working on a Regency set in 1804-1829. I found this:
http://www.britainexpress.com/History/thatching.htm
Hailed at its passage in 1974 for safeguarding employees’ pension plans, ERISA now helps deny or reduce compensation to workers injured through someone else’s negligence.
“Federal law passed to safeguard X instead screws Y.” Anybody shocked?
LarryA — Oh, I know that thatching was still being done then. I was in the British Isles years ago and there was still lots of thatching being done even in the 20th century (especially in places that drew tourists by being picturesque). My only contention about the boathouse involves the article writer calling it “medieval” when it was Victorian.
Thatching could have, or might not have, been part of faux medieval styling, of course.
Well, I was thinking that dog could’ve been the guard dog for the grow site.