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  • Tech meets tasty

    First came the emoticon – pictorial representation of a facial expression using characters — usually punctuation marks, numbers and letters — as an adjunct to written language to express a person’s feelings, mood or reaction, without needing to describe it in detail. From the start of the 2000s, this was followed by the emoji, a pictogram, logogram, ideogram, or smiley embedded in text and used in electronic messages and web pages, likewise to express feelings, moods or reactions.

    Nowadays emojis are ubiquitous and not necessarily confined to electronic messages and web pages. They can be found on clothing, trinkets and, as your ‘umble scribe’s social media feed revealed at the weekend, baked goods. 😀

    Fruit biscuit with fruit resembling expression of disappointed emoticon/emoji

  • Ovine emissions reduction – update

    Along with dogs, sheep are believed to be one of the earliest animals to be domesticated by humans.

    According to Wikipedia, sheep are most likely descended from the wild mouflon of Europe and Asia and their domestication date is estimated to fall between 11,000 and 9000 BCE in Mesopotamia and possibly around 7000 BCE in Mehrgarh in the Indus Valley.

    For some reason, sheep are very popular on the Mastodon social media network and Thursday, 7th November, was peak sheep day, with photos and videos being posted all day, together with the customary hashtags, although these were all Welsh, e.g.#defaidodon (sheep of Mastodon). One very humorous sample is shown below.

    Post reads - One of the last coal-powered sheep. Most sheep are all electric now.

    Picking up on the theme of the post, domestication has involved a long process of selective breeding to arrive at today’s breeds, which bear little resemblance to their wild ancestors. For much of their history, most sheep were powered by charcoal before the Industrial Revolution, but this soon changed to coal due to its higher calorific value. With the climate crisis underway at present, sheep powered by electricity and renewables are now being developed; and there is even talk of fuelling them with biomass. 😉

  • Badenoch talks sh*t

    Kemi Badenoch, official portraitYesterday, newly elected Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch took part in her first Prime Minister’s questions in that role.

    However, the session did not necessarily turn out to her advantage and The Guardian’s political sketch writer John Crace took full advantage of her failings to mock her performance unmercifully.

    However, her lack of political guile was not Badenoch’s only failure at the despatch box yesterday. Her failure to understand the English language was also revealed.

    As reported by Sky News, KemiKaze (as Mr Crace terms her. Ed.) challenged Keir Starmer on remarks made by current Foreign Secretary David Lammy in 2018 about the present president-elect of the United States, the disgraced former 45th president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump.

    The prime minister and the foreign secretary met him [Mr Trump] in September.

    Did the foreign secretary take that opportunity to apologise for making derogatory and scatological references, including, and I quote, ‘Trump is not only a woman-hating Neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath, he is also a profound threat to the international order’, and if he did not apologise, will the Prime Minister do so now on his behalf?
    The remarks in question by Mr Lammy appeared in Time magazine in the year in question under the headline I’m a British Lawmaker. Here’s Why I’m Protesting Trump’s Visit to the U.K.
    Donald Trump balloon in Parliament Square protest in 2018
    Donald Trump balloon in Parliament Square protest in 2018

    Whilst Mr Lammy’s remarks could be regarded as derogatory if one’s politics tend towards the (extreme) right, like Ms Badenoch’s, there is nothing your ‘umble scribe could find in what Lammy wrote for Time that could in any way be described as scatalogical, as per her question from the despatch box.

    Is it possible Kemi Badenoch does not understand the definition and usage of that particular adjective?

    Your correspondent believes this is definitely the case. As anyone with access to a dictionary – be it online or analogue – will confirm, the adjective scatalogical has two meanings, i.e.:

    1. characterised by obscenity or preoccupation with obscenity, especially in the form of references to excrement; and
    2. of or relating to the scientific study of excrement.

    Whilst Mr Lammy condemns Trump in the strongest terms for his racism, misogyny, religious bigotry and other shortcomings, the language used is not peppered with obscenities relating to bodily functions or faeces, so how Ms Badenoch can characterise Lammy’s language as derogatory (it was honest. Ed.) let alone scatalogical is beyond the mental abilities of your ‘umble scribe, unless as intimated in the title to this post, she was using her anus as her major organ of speech. which only serves to emphasise her ignorance.

  • Susie’s quiet comment

    Susie Dent is a lexicographer and etymologist who has appeared in “Dictionary Corner” on the Channel 4 game show Countdown since 1992.

    Susie also has a presence on man-baby Elon Musk’s Twitter/X social media platform and usually posts her own chosen word of the day, which is frequently influenced by that particular day’s news agenda.

    Here is her contribution for today, 6th November 2024, following on from the news that disgraced former president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat Donald John Trump has been elected the 47th president of the USA.

    Post reads: Word of the day is ‘recrudescence’ (17th century): the return of something terrible after a time of reprieve.

    All your ‘umble scribe will say is that the US was faced with an IQ test yesterday: and failed it; abysmally.

  • Cymru, politics and the English Home Counties

    Some would argue that Wales has been an English colony for centuries, especially since Henry Tudor II’s two acts of union of 1535 and 1542.

    In more modern times the development of the British state has resulted in the creation of a colonial administrator in Whitehall in the shape of the Secretary of State for Wales, as well as a corresponding position in the official opposition’s shadow cabinet..

    Where possible these positions have usually been filled by someone of Welsh origins or having at least some tangible or imagined connection to Cymru; the current Secretary of State is Jo Stephens, who was born in Abertawe (aka as Swansea by monoglots. Ed.)and brought up in Mynydd Isa . However, this is not always possible.

    At the July general election, the governing Conservatives lost all their seats in Wales to other parties – Plaid Cymru, the LibDems and the victorious Labour Party. Overall, the Blue Team’s parliamentary representation was reduced from 344 to a rump of 121.

    Such a collapse has implications for the depth and extent of any talent pool – never a very deep or extensive body of water to begin with – available to the party leader when forming the shadow cabinet, as the Blue Team’s new leader Kemi Badenoch has discovered.

    Official portrait of Mims DaviesWith not a single Tory MP from a Welsh constituency to choose, Ms Badenoch has had to resort to picking an English MP, and has alighted on Mims Davies, the member for East Grinstead and Uckfield in Sussex, as reported by Wales Online which helpfully points out that Ms Davies' constituency is 200 miles away from Cymru's administrative capital of Caerdydd/Cardiff.

    What about that tenuous Welsh connection? It would appear that apart from having a Welsh surname, Ms Davies’ only link to Cymru is that she just happened to study politics and international relations at university in Abertawe, according to her Wikipedia entry.

    Ms Davies’ affinity to the Home Counties reminds your ‘umble scribe of the appointment of another Tory Home Counties dishonourable member to the post of actual Secretary of State for Wales – one John Redwood, who served for the best part of two years in that capacity and whose most memorable act in all that time was not know the words of Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau and attempting to mime them, a scene that was captured in video (he’s no Jeff Astle! Ed.).

    Enjoy! 😀

  • Councillor-sized bins in BS5

    Yesterday your ‘umble scribe was invited to take part in a site visit to Stapleton Road for councillors on the city council’s Environment & Sustainability Committee. Also in attendance were senior council officers, including the head of the Neighbourhood Enforcement Team, representatives of Bristol Waste Company (BWC) and Easton ward councillor Jenny Bartle. Unfortunately, only two of the members of the committee showed up, although one of those was its chair. 🙁

    House clearance fly-tip outside former Concorde Cinema on Stapleton RoadWe took the best part of an hour to wander up and down a half kilometre section of Stapleton Road, during which some all-too familiar and depressing sights were seen, such as house clearances (right) and piles of trade waste outside closed down shops.

    Both your ‘umble scribe and officers present pointed out that the area was afflicted by many interrelated problems, e.g. pavement parking by selfish motorists combined with fly-tipping makes using the footways impossible in places, particularly for those such as parent with prams and buggies, or the disabled.

    However, BWC’s community engagement team used the opportunity to plan future visits and actions to help residents present their waste and recycling properly. We were also informed how fly-tips were ranked by priority for removal, as well as the special bag collection arrangements along Stapleton Road.

    We also noted changes to the local street furniture, including the installation of councillor-sized bins to cope with the litter!

    Cllr. Jenny Bartle and a litter bin at the junction of Stapleton Road and Oxford Place, Bristol.

    The new bins have appeared at junctions close to where takeaway food shops are concentrated on this section of Stapleton Road and it appears to be part of wider efforts to replace/upgrade litter bin provision across Bristol’s Easton and Lawrence Hill wards.

  • Tory shows how to be racist without using racist language

    The British refusal to discuss reparations at the recent Commonwealth Heads of Government (Chogm) in Samoa (posts passim) is still having repercussions in national politics.

    Both candidates for the Conservative Party leadership have now voiced their opinions on the matter.

    Talking to the Telegraph, the Tories’ house magazine, the deeply unpleasant Kemi Badenoch has claimed British politicians are “too embarrassed” to oppose Britain paying reparations for slavery, which is a strange way of looking at the problem, as that is what Starmer has actually done. Moreover, Badenoch is now on record as saying: “I would not put my name to any document that mentioned reparations”.

    Smirking Bob Jenrick, a boil on the bottom of the body politicHowever, Badenoch’s arrogance and lack of contrition for centuries of crimes against humanity committed in the name of the British empire is nothing compared with the arrogant ignorance and ignorant arrogance displayed by her rival for the Tory Party leadership, Robert ‘Honest Bob’ Jenrick.

    As today’s Guardian reports, Honest Bob, who as immigration minister, infamously ordered murals of Disney characters be painted over at a children’s asylum centre, is now patronisingly stating that former British colonies “owe us a debt of gratitude for the inheritance we left them”. In particular, writing in the Daily Mail, Jenrick stated as follows in the mode typical of apologists for the centuries of crimes against humanity perpetrated first in the name of England and then later on behalf of Great Britain/the Untied Kingdom*:

    “The territories colonised by our empire were not advanced democracies. Many had been cruel, slave-trading powers. Some had never been independent. The British empire broke the long chain of violent tyranny as we came to introduce – gradually and imperfectly – Christian values.

    You managed to leave out invasion, genocide, the introduction of infectious diseases against which the locals had no immunity, expropriation of land, the imposition of lines on maps by the colonisers that cut across traditional cultural, ethnic and religious divides, divide and rule policies, systematic theft, looting and other criminal acts, Mr Jenrick. This surprises me as your Wikipedia page alleges you are supposed to have a first class honours degree in history from St John’s College, Cambridge, although your correspondent notes that the current history course at St John’s does not – except in the broadest terms – mention either colonialism or decolonisation, the latter of which was a module for honours students I took as part of the political science element of my 1970s polytechnic modern languages degree.

    I’m sorry to say this Robert, but the imposition of Christianity, the English legal system and cricket do not make up for all the misery the empire caused and you really should know better instead of indulging in the typical politician’s response to having an open – and in your case ignorant – mouth to any subject.

    Your attitude clearly displays your bigotry and racism even if you managed to avoid using deliberately racist and insulting language.

    * = Spelling is deliberate.

  • When saying sorry is too hard

    The last week has seen the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) held in Apia in Samoa. However, the meeting did not necessarily turn out in favour of the British state and its representatives, one Charles Philip Arthur George Mountbatten-Windsor, who some believe is its legitimate head of state, and ‘Sir’ Keir Rodney Starmer, head of government and leader of an allegedly Labour administration.

    The main point of contention was one of the many crimes against humanity committed by the English/British during their centuries-long invasion, colonisation and exploitation of vast areas of the world’s land surface – chattel slavery.

    The Caribbean members of the Commonwealth, under the umbrella of Caricom, have been demanding reparations for slavery for some time. Their reasoning is based on the fact that when slavery was abolished within the British Empire in 1833 (the slave trade as abolished in 1807. Ed.), the owners were compensated for their loss of ‘property‘ in the form of 700,000 enslaved persons This amounted to £20m and accounted for nearly one-quarter of the government’s budget in the year that it was paid. The emancipated slaves and their descendants were never compensated. Indeed to add further a insult to their suffering, the freed slaves were expected to work for free for the people who had already exploited them and were being handsomely rewarded for their inhumanity.

    Mr Windsor, whose ancestor Charles Stuart II granted the Royal African Company (RAC) a monopoly on all English trade with Africa, had particular difficulty in apologising for the harm his family and his state have done to Africa and the Caribbean. The RAC’s initial purpose was to trade in gold, but quickly moved on to trading in captured human beings, which became its main activity. The so-called royal family also invested in the slave trade: William of Orange (the King Billy so beloved of certain people in Ireland’s occupied six counties) bought shares in the RAC off one Edward Colston, whose statue in Bristol was toppled a few years ago and taken for a bath in the city docks. Despite his own family having blood on its hands from the slave trade, the best Charlie boy could manage was to call slavery the “most painful aspects of our past continue to resonate. according to the BBC.

    As for Starmer, he has ruled out any talk of reparation, but has indicated he is open to non-financial reparations, as The Guardian reports I don’t somehow think the Caribbean governments of Caricom will be persuaded by offers of mirrors, glass beads and other trinkets for supplying two centuries of free labour for Britain and its elite.

    Beside slavery being discussed slavery, the transatlantic slave trade and reparatory justice have all made their way into the meeting’s final communiqué (PDF) in its paragraphs 21 and 22.

    Finally, here’s a little song about saying sorry especially for Charles and Keir., which your ‘umble scribe hopes they will enjoy.

  • Font for fascism

    Convicted serial offender and fascist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who for some inexplicable reason prefers to be called Tommy Robinson, has brought out a book with the help of a ghost writer Peter McLoughlin.

    For a day the book entitled Manifesto was top of Amazon UK’s best-seller chart, according to The Guardian, is is currently unavailable on Amazon’s website.

    Cover of Manifesto written by Peter McLoughlin with interference from Stephen Yaxley-Lennon

    Whilst the cover looks like the flag of St George folded in half, the text below the title dubiously claims the book deals with Free Speech, Real Democracy and Peaceful Disobedience, whilst what Yaxley-Lennon and his supporters indulge in is freedom to be racially prejudiced, fascism and violent disorder, as the media have duly reported down the years.

    However, the most salient feature of the cover that caught your correspondent’s eye was that the title and the names of the book’s authors were all written in the Comic Sans font.

    This friendly sans serif font is popular in place like primary schools due inter alia to its assumed legibility. This font, termed notorious by none other than the BBC, has also been in existence for 30 years this year.

    However, the font has not proved universally popular, as is imparted by its Wikipedia page.

    Film producer and The New York Times essayist Errol Morris wrote in an August 2012 posting, “The conscious awareness of Comic Sans promotes—at least among some people—contempt and summary dismissal.” With the help of a professor, he conducted an online experiment and found that Comic Sans, in comparison with five other typefaces (Baskerville, Helvetica, Georgia, Trebuchet MS, and Computer Modern), makes readers slightly less likely to believe that a statement they are reading is true.

    Contempt and summary dismissal are both apposite to anything that comes out of Yaxley-Lennon’s mouth, from his pen (or in his case crayon. Ed.) keyboard or camera.

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