Poor old Charlie Church.

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Originally Posted by Peter

I am a fan of the old cannon, civil war era....

Although I guess my great, great, great grandfather wasn't. He was at the charge of the light brigade......

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Flashman at the Charge.

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Originally Posted by Peter

I don't want to speak for the Chief but I guess part of his answer would be that his muggers would probably be carrying a gun. You don't take a can of special brew to a gun fight....

And why special, anyway? You weren't a Super T man? :-)

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Good God, no. We always looked down on the Stuper boys. Bad Manners never did a song in praise of that, did they? After my first trip to India, I was back in Blighty for 2-3 months before going out to the Teknivals and Spesh were giving a free tee-shirt if you sent them 20 ring pulls. I wore mine without changing it for the next year and more. Teknivals in NL, Berlin, Prague and France before living in Paris and then India, SF, India, Paris, London, India, London, Prague, NL, France, London, India, St Martin, Paris, London, Columbia etc etc all in one Spesh tee-shirt. It was the long-sleeved cream coloured one.

But do you know the history of Special Brew?

The King of Denmark wanted to give a banquet for WSC to thank him for the liberation of their country, but by the time we'd stopped fighting the Japs, Atlee was in power and the Danish king wanted to wait until he was PM again.

When Lab won again in 1950, they worried that Winnie might not last another 5 years so they invited him to the banquet then.

They knew he was a alkie, but they don't have any claret of Champers in Denmark. So the king went to their royal brewers, Carlsberg, and said they'd better make a special brew in WSC's honour for the banquet. So they got their strongest beer, Elephant Beer {oh, look, Welliphants on the right side of history and theology again} and ramped it up from 7.5% to 9% and put valerian root into it so it was like having a valium with every pint.

So Spesh is the gift from the court and people of Denmark to us to say thank you for fighting fascism and helping liberate their country. That's why we must drink it. You can taste the sacrifice of all the troops from the Commonwealth and the free forces under our command, and they saving of the values of the European Enlightenment with every swig.

Again, only the armed forces should have guns and we should have Spesh. Each to his own - if Chief wants guns, not Spesh, that is their democratic right. But I prefer it our way 'round. Glad you got the Clash reference, btw. Clash and Bad Manners show the British take on these matters.

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Originally Posted by Peter

Of course. But you have to bear in mind that you would think that. You're British. I've never even held a gun. They are completely alien to our way of life.

This isn't true in America. They see it in the reverse- if that guy has a gun, I need one.

It's a conversation between two different realities. I am far happier with ours, but I don't have to live in theirs.

You are of course correct about the dysfunction in their politics. But we are hardly in a place to criticise that. Look at that ****ing bull**** in London at the weekend.

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I agree with all of that. But we had 100k goose-steppers in London and the worst they did was squirt water from a bottle at the fuzz. While in America, that kid who was espousing what are, sadly, relatively normal views over there was shot dead.

Re: "if that guy has a gun, I need one." As the Mahatma said, an eye for an eye and the whole world will be blind.

Btw, I am serious when I say that we should force them all to swap their blammers for 3" field artillery. They still have weapons to protect them from an oppressive state, but it's much harder to shoot up a school.

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Originally Posted by PSRB

Flashman at the Charge.

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One of four books every young Englishman must read and digest; would solve practically everything.

(The Iliad, Catch-22 and The Mating Season, of course, being the others).

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Originally Posted by Peter

Of course. But you have to bear in mind that you would think that. You're British. I've never even held a gun. They are completely alien to our way of life.

This isn't true in America. They see it in the reverse- if that guy has a gun, I need one.

It's a conversation between two different realities. I am far happier with ours, but I don't have to live in theirs.

You are of course correct about the dysfunction in their politics. But we are hardly in a place to criticise that. Look at that ****ing bull**** in London at the weekend.

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I agree with all of that. But we had 100k goose-steppers in London and the worst they did was squirt water from a bottle at the fuzz. While in America, that kid who was espousing what are, sadly, relatively normal views over there was shot dead.

Re: "if that guy has a gun, I need one." As the Mahatma said, an eye for an eye and the whole world will be blind.

Btw, I am serious when I say that we should force them all to swap their blammers for 3" field artillery. They still have weapons to protect them from an oppressive state, but it's much harder to shoot up a school.

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Originally Posted by PSRB

Knives, hammers, etc. It's not the gun that kills people, it's the person pulling the trigger. Unfortunately, with a larger population you will have more lunatics. Thing is 20 years ago, these nutters would have been locked up or not allowed to be such entitled bitches that think the world owes them a ****ing favour.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICG0MuzEYzw

They're playing Margate soon and hope to get in free.

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Originally Posted by PSRB

Flashman at the Charge.

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I reckon my faves were Flashman and the Mountain of Light about the Sikh Wars and Flashman in the Great Game about the Indian mutiny.

But then I would say that, wouldn't I?

Have you read GMF's auto-biog about fighting in Burma - Quartered Safe Out Here? Along with Goodbye To All That, they're my two fave war auto-biogs.

When you read that, you realise why in the Flashman books the Indian soldiers are so highly praised. In the whole series, I only found one occasion when Flashman did something for someone solely out of respect instead of for what he could gain by doing so.

In the Ethiopian one, as the army is disembarking, he sees a Sikh soldier with a campaign medal from one of the Indian battles he was in and sits down and shares a chapati with him.

Like Kipling, GMF has complete respect for the soldiers of the British Indian army. That's why his Burma auto-biog's title comes from Gunga Din.*

{*I do wish people would realise that it's pronounced Gunga Deen. All the lines rhyme with deen, not din.}

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Originally Posted by redgunamo

One of four books every young Englishman must read and digest; would solve practically everything.

(The Iliad, Catch-22 and The Mating Season, of course, being the others).

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As I said, I prefer the Indian books. But if I have to choose one Flashman book for everyone, it would have to be the first, no?

I'd also have Candide in the list of books.

Edit: And why the Mating Season over Right Ho, Jeeves? Any reason?

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Originally Posted by Ganpati's Goonerz--AFC's Aboriginal Fertility Cult

I reckon my faves were Flashman and the Mountain of Light about the Sikh Wars and Flashman in the Great Game about the Indian mutiny.

But then I would say that, wouldn't I?

Have you read GMF's auto-biog about fighting in Burma - Quartered Safe Out Here? Along with Goodbye To All That, they're my two fave war auto-biogs.

When you read that, you realise why in the Flashman books the Indian soldiers are so highly praised. In the whole series, I only found one occasion when Flashman did something for someone solely out of respect instead of for what he could gain by doing so.

In the Ethiopian one, as the army is disembarking, he sees a Sikh soldier with a campaign medal from one of the Indian battles he was in and sits down and shares a chapati with him.

Like Kipling, GMF has complete respect for the soldiers of the British Indian army. That's why his Burma auto-biog's title comes from Gunga Din.*

{*I do wish people would realise that it's pronounced Gunga Deen. All the lines rhyme with deen, not din.}

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I need to re read them all, Mountain of Light, Flashman and at the Charge are my favourites

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Originally Posted by Peter

I am a fan of the old cannon, civil war era....

Although I guess my great, great, great grandfather wasn't. He was at the charge of the light brigade......

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:-\ What was he doing there.