Since the first edition of surely the greatest work ever produced by a Government committee, the King James Bible.
(Three BBC progs about the production thereof here)
It's a Cracker
2 hours ago
"Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold" - W.B. Yeats. "We're doomed !" - Private Frazer. "Like scrolling through a decade's worth of Daily Mail editorials in 20 minutes" - TheLoonyFromCatford
I, that hearty was and hale,Am troubled, sick and like to fail,Enfeebled by infirmity;Our pleasure here is all vainglory,This false world is but transitory,The flesh is bruckle, the Fiend is sly;Timor mortis conturbat me.The state of man does change and vary,Now sound, now sick, now blithe, now sorry,Now dancing merry, now like to die;Timor mortis conturbat me.Nought of this earth here stands securely;So trembles worldly vanity.Timor mortis conturbat me.On unto Death go all estates,Of Court, of Church, all potentates,Both rich and poor of all degree;Timor mortis conturbat me.He cuts the knights down in the field,Timor mortis conturbat me.That warlord merciless and wildTears from the mother's breast the child,
And sorrowing he leavès she;Timor mortis conturbat me.The captain in the strongest tower,The bowered beauty, all takes he;Timor mortis conturbat me.He spares no lord for elegance,Nor clerk for his intelligence;His deadly stroke may no man flee;Timor mortis conturbat me.Logicians or theologers,Timor mortis conturbat me.
In medicine the best practicians,
The leeches, surgeons, and physicians,
Find Death to have no remedy;Timor mortis conturbat me.Poets and playwrights of our daySpared not for their great faculty;Timor mortis conturbat me.The noble Chaucer, of poets the flower,The Monk of Bury, and Gower, all three;Timor mortis conturbat me.The good Sir Hew of Eglintoun,Also Herriot, and Wyntoun,All taken out of this country;Timor mortis conturbat me.Of ballad-making and tragedy;Timor mortis conturbat me.Alas ! He would not even leaveTimor mortis conturbat me.That wrote Adventures of Gawain;Sir Gilbert Hay - ended is he;Timor mortis conturbat me.He has Blind Harry and Sandy TraillSlain with his shower of mortal hail,Timor mortis conturbat me.That did of love so lively write,Timor mortis conturbat me.And gentle Roull of Corstorphine;Two better men you'll never see;Timor mortis conturbat me.Timor mortis conturbat me.And he's now ta'en, last of all,All men might wish he'd left them be:Timor mortis conturbat me.At point of death lies verily,Great pity that such thing should be;Timor mortis conturbat me.Since he has all my brethren ta'en,He will not let me live alone,And I shall be his next, you'll see;Timor mortis conturbat me.For death there is no remedy,That after death, new life may be;Timor mortis conturbat me.
Goodbye to one Working Men's Club.It's our very own Crow Creek Massacre - only this time the women were not spared.
Hello to three lapdancing clubs - run by a failed asylum seeker.
Having 'massage parlour workers' beating each other up over one - not something I've experienced.
I was decent in math, and Bill (Gates) was brilliant, but by then I spoke from my experience at Washington State. One day I watched a professor cover the blackboard with a maze of partial differential equations, and they might as well have been hieroglyphics from the Second Dynasty. It was one of those moments when you realize, I just can’t see it. I felt a little sad, but I accepted my limitations. I was O.K. with being a generalist.
For Bill it was different. When I saw him again over Christmas break, he seemed subdued. I asked him about his first semester, and he said glumly, “I have a math professor who got his Ph.D. at 16.” The course was purely theoretical, and the homework load ranged up to 30 hours a week. Bill put everything into it and got a B. When it came to higher mathematics, he might have been one in a hundred thousand students or better. But there were people who were one in a million or one in 10 million, and some of them wound up at Harvard. Bill would never be the smartest guy in that room, and I think that hurt his motivation. He eventually switched his major to applied math.
A new protest movement sparked by a policeman's ill-judged advice to motorists "not to leave their keys in the dash" has taken root in the US and Canada.
Thousands of people are arriving at car parks, some leaving their cars unlocked, others leaving the key in the dash provocatively - and then taking part in marches round the car park, or "KeyWalks".
The aim, say organisers, is to highlight a culture in which the victim rather than the car thief is blamed.
About 2,000 people took part in a "KeyWalk" in Boston on Saturday.
Boston organiser Siobhan Connors explained: "The event is in protest of a culture that we think is too permissive when it comes to car theft and break-ins.
"It's to bring awareness to the shame and abuse car owners still face for expressing their ownership of their own cars... essentially for behaving in a healthy and non-paranoid way" the 20-year-old told the Associated Press (AP) news agency.
Police Constable Michael Sanguinetti had been giving a talk on health and safety to a group of students at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto when he made the now infamous remarks.
"You know, I think we're beating around the bush here," he reportedly told them. "I've been told I'm not supposed to say this - however, car owners should avoid leaving the vehicle unlocked, or the keys in the dash, in order not to be a victim of car crime."
He has since apologised for his remarks and has been disciplined by the Toronto police, but remains on duty.
Some 3,000 people took part in the first "Keywalk" in Toronto last month. The Keywalk Toronto website said the aim of the movement is to "re-appropriate" the phrase "perhaps not the wisest thing to do".
"Ownership of a motor vehicle should not mean that we are opening ourselves to an expectation of theft of property or of the vehicle, regardless if it is locked or unlocked," it says.
"KeyWalks" have now been held in Dallas, Asheville in North Carolina, and in the Canadian capital, Ottawa, and are planned for Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, Reno and Austin.
Everybody, from singles, couples, parents, sisters, brothers, children and friends, are encouraged to join in.
The rallies typically end with speakers and workshops on stopping car crime and calling on law enforcement agencies not to blame victims after break-ins or thefts, AP says.
In a similarly-inspired protest, thousands of demonstrators failed to turn up at the first 'MoWalk' planned for Bethnal Green, London yesterday. The protest, where marchers were to wear T-shirts showing cartoons of Mohammed, was planned after a senior Metropolitan police officer said that anyone planning to wear a T-shirt bearing an image of the Prophet Mohammed in East London "needs their head examining", "must be tired of life" and would be "arrested for their own safety".
The aim, said organisers, was to highlight a culture in which the victim of an assault rather than the assailant is blamed. But they were disappointed with the turnout, as no marchers turned up. It is believed a mass outbreak of a little-known disease called timor mortis caused the no-show. Other "MoWalks" planned for Bradford, Burnley and Balsall Heath have been cancelled.
"Men will spend huge amounts of money on cars; will spend hundreds of hours underneath them, repairing, restoring or enhancing them; will devote their leisure time to studying them. Many people desire cars that they do not own, cannot afford and never will be able to afford. It would run contrary to everything we know about human beings if they were NOT prepared to steal them."The fact of leaving keys in your car, or doors unlocked, can be interpreted by unscrupulous and unethical people as an invitation to steal your goods or your vehicle, despite the fact that you have every right not to be violated in this way. I can see the unfortunate police officer's point - it's probably true that fewer cars would be stolen were their owners to lock them up and not leave the keys on show.