Scots wurd o' th' day

Back to Alexander Warrack's Chambers's Scots Dictionary again.

Amazing book - or "tome". Today, it's fallen open at page 252, where there are any number of words worth a ponder, and most of which I've never heard before in my life. Think I'll choose -

Haukum-plaukum (adj.) - every way equal. Not quite sure how you'd use that one. Would it be as in, he's haukum plaukum to the task, or maybe the twins' mince 'n' tatties were haukum plaukum? If anyone knows, please tell me.

Another one. Hauselock, Hausslock, n., The wool on a sheep's neck. That's easy. Thon sheep should be ashamed o' itsel' - its hauselock's desperate oan a trim.

I'm now getting curious about the roots of words. The dictionary has a pretty good introduction - which I'm only now glancing through. First thing which catches the eye is "Up until the beginning of the sixteenth century, the Scots called their language 'Inglis', which is the northern form of the primitive 'Angelisc'." And "Gawin Douglas (c. 1475 - 1522) is the first writer of any importance to use 'Scottis' as a term for his 'tongue materne'." (tongue materne! get him!)

H'anyway......one must get on.

More later.............

Spike Milligan lines

Read the first ever Goon Show script last night. Now I know I said that I don't like the Goons, at all, but there ARE some funny lines in it.

For example.

"...worry turned me grey...which gave me a peculiar appearance as I was bald at the time..."

"I paid the fine with trembling fingers but...they wanted money!" (my favourite I think)

"...now tell me the first race you ever won? / The Old Crocks Race in 1892. /But that was before you were born! /Do you imagine it was easy for me?"

(to a car mechanic) "Have you put the bonnet on? / Yorst, and I don't arf look stupid in it."

"My name is Porridge, Sir Harold Porridge. For months my team had been digging for the lost tomb of the greatest of the Pharoahs, King Tutankhamen......For two years we dug every inch of ground - then finally we received a cable from the Egyptian government. It said simply - "Stop digging Hackney Marshes - try Egypt!"

All written by Spike Milligan.

Leonard Nimoy - Ruby, Don't Take Your Love To Town

Just jaw-droppingly unexpected...

Spike Milligan

Still browsing through The Essential Spike Milligan, compiled by Alexander Games (4th estate). Mixed feelings about Spike. For me, 25% of the time (maybe more...) he was prolonged-belly-laugh funny. The rest of the time - well.
Was eager to see the TV programme last night called "I told you I was ill" recorded in 2002, I think. Tributes are usually not my cup of tea, and this one was particulary awful - so bad I switched it off.
I don't really like the Goons - possibly put off by that awful footage of Prince "grovelling bastard (according to Spike)" Charles doing his cringey Bluebottle voice.
There are also large swathes of material in the book which to me seem incredibly racist. You're not supposed to say that about Spike Milligan, but there it is.
It's not Spike's fault Prince Charles was a fan. But still.
There are however several pieces in the book which are just stand-back-in-awe brilliant - The Flasher (II) being one, and The Singing Foot being another.
He also writes brilliantly about the war, about life around and after the war, and about his mental breakdown.
He writes with an uncomfortable honesty and a humour born of despair, which is often too raw to laugh at. I can't simply dismiss him as racist. I need to find a context - an excuse maybe...if there can be an excuse...
The thing that gets me, is when he writes about being battle-fatigued "...this was a time in my life when I was very demoralised. I was not really me any more."

more later

Tuppence eats kippers and reads Foucault

"Uncle Tuppy uncle Tuppy!"

"WHAT???"  I tried and failed to rip open a boil-in-the-bag kipper without burning my fingers and sploshing kipper juice all down myself.

"What paths have brought us to the point where we are "at fault" with respect to our own sex? And how have we come to be a civilisation so peculiar as to tell itself that, through an abuse of power which has not ended, it has long sinned against sex?"

"I'm sure I don't know Tuppence. I'll put the kettle on and have a wee think about that for a minute." Hell's teeth, I thought. If this is what teaching someone to read aged thirty five does you can keep it. I'd assumed he'd stick to Swallows and Amazons till he was at least forty.

"This is brilliant uncle Tuppy! I'm expanding my brain by eating kippers and reading Foucault's "The History of Sexuality" and you know what the best part is?"

"No..."

"I'm only half way through volume one! there's another two to go!"

CS Lewis

Nobody can say I'm not eclectic.

"You're not eclectic"

"Oh shut up..."


Interesting article by CS Lewis here - mean to read it more carefully over the weekend and will comment also. Thanks to Christine for sending it.

Howl - on the road in a bath chair, sticking it to the death drive

More thoughts on the film 'Howl', which I saw yesterday.

Like most people I read the beat poets, William Burroughs and so forth when I was young. Along with Sartre and other stuff I didn't understand.

I think what mattered to me then was authenticity - it matters now too, only as I age I understand a lot more about the compromises that everyone makes.

Ginsberg talks about "the fear trap". Of being afraid of being alone and old and vulnerable.

That's realistic. And as you get older, it stares you in the face.

I sometimes say I want to live in a cave but I don't mean it. A metaphorical cave, at best - and even then I don't mean it.

I'd rather be warm, fed, and comfortable.

When you're young you can take lots of chances - any chances I took, I don't regret, even if things went pear-shaped and worse. It's good to live - and to really live. But as you get older - well. Even more so if you have children.

It might not be on to get out there on the road once you're knocking on a bit, but you can still aim for a type of authenticity. In fact, peace and quiet are conducive to lengthy spells of reflection. Perhaps being on the road is another form of self-avoidance. It's a way of sticking two fingers up at the death drive I suppose.

Don't get me wrong - I think it's a good thing if that's what you're drawn to do. Or even if it's what you drift into without thinking about it. It's a collection of experiences. I loved it when I was young, and I'm sure I would again, only I'm not in a position to do that...hmmm....

Someone gave me a good quote some years ago when I was contemplating travel. It was from the dhammapada - I must try to find it. Something along the lines of - there is no need to travel, as everything is contained in this fathoms long body of ours. But expressed much more succinctly and beautifully, of course.

Anyway - the beat poets and Ginsberg. I have a lot of time for them because they were attempting to express what it is to be alive, in the moment, without being constrained by ideas of form and convention. I don't especially enjoy reading them, but I'm very glad they got published and that their stuff is "out there" and available.

I found the film interesting mainly, personally, because of Ginsberg's ideas about writing and self expression. Easy to sneer - I don't want to.

It seemed almost like two separate films - one, about Ginsberg's ideas, which are in themselves worth a film of their own, and the second, about the obscenity trial and issues of freedom of speech. Both are inter-linked, obviously - but the film couldn't quite do justice to both.

Liked it though - thought-provoking, and far better than much of the dreck that's about.

Drone...snore....eh?? what???

The cultural marathon that is my current week continues.

Today I staggered in to Dundee and saw Howl, the film about Allen Ginsberg's poem, at Dundee Contemporary Arts. Also tottered through the Manfred Pernice exhibition/installation, and liked it thoroughly.

I say staggered and tottered as I was working last night, and got only the barest minimum of sleep which only just enabled me to find the strength to travel twenty miles...

Will give a more considered opinion tomorrow. When I've slept. Hopefully....

Fancy new-fangled music

Previous post - Dundee band The Creeping Ivies. Primitive garage rock - great stuff.

I'm hoping that Tuppence will listen to it and perhaps "move on" from his ghastly prog rock phase.

He's rebuilt the moog, you know. It crashed over the cliffs after the last debacle at his gig at the Puff Inn, if you remember (probably not, and I can't say I blame you...). But there were some tin cans left over after he constructed the CHeaSe-Buster, and so he decided to weld them together and make another Moog. Sigh.

I think he's on for the Puff Inn again this weekend. Oh dear.

The Creeping Ivies - Shake It Up

More thoughts on Chic Murray

The thing that puts me off Chic Murray is the tartan connection. By and large, I don't much like Scottish comedians. (that sounds like the beginning of a Chic Murray joke...) and I can't stand tartan kitsch unless it's completely ironic and having the total guts ripped out of it.
Scottish comedians of a certain type and generation, that is. Loathe Hector Nicol, Jimmy Logan, Duncan Macrae - all the White Heather Club and Hogmanay stuff.
I've been looking at some Youtube footage of Chic. What puts me off is the audience. My parents' generation. Reminds me of horrible Hogmanays with leering drunken men and everybody stinking of whisky and three sheets to the wind. Usually some Andy Stewart or Calum Kennedy blaring away in the background. Oh what fun. Not. I hate it for its hypocrisy and its misogyny.
So in a way, I prefer to read Chic's stuff.
I don't think he was that keen on the tartan crap himself, but hard to escape it at that time really. Personally I'd like to have seen him with no canned laughter and no tartan AT ALL - just the jokes.

More thoughts on Chic Murray

The thing that puts me off Chic Murray is the tartan connection. By and large, I don't much like Scottish comedians. (that sounds like the beginnings of a Chic Murray joke...) and I can't stand tartan kitsch unless it's completely ironic and having the total guts ripped out of it.
Scottish comedians of a certain type and generation, that is. Loathe Hector Nicol, Jimmy Logan, Duncan Macrae - all the White Heather Club and Hogmanay stuff.
I've been looking at some Youtube footage of Chic. What puts me off is the audience. My parents' generation. Reminds me of horrible Hogmanays with leering drunken men and everybody stinking of whisky and three sheets to the wind. Usually some Andy Stewart or Calum Kennedy blaring away in the background. Oh what fun. Not. I hate it for its hypocrisy and its misogyny.
So in a way, I prefer to read Chic's stuff.
I don't think he was that keen on the tartan crap himself, but hard to escape it at that time really. Personally I'd like to have seen him with no canned laughter and no tartan AT ALL - just the jokes.

Some Chic Murray quotes

All from Robbie Grigor's book about Chic Murray, "Just Daft" published by Birlinn books.

'Unfortunately, at the AGM of the Unspeakably Shy Society (Rutherglen branch) nobody was able to attend.' (possibly my favourite, as I can identify...)

'I don't care if he was the head of the Light Brigade. There will be no charging here!'

'If something's neither here nor there, where the hell is it?'

'In the Olympic village, a man wearing trainers and carrying a long stick, was asked by a stranger, ' Are you a pole vaulter?' 'Nein. I am German. But how did you know my name is Walter?'

'I was making tea in my pyjamas. I must remember to buy a teapot.'

'Ah! but what have I got up my sleeve? A broken arm if you're not careful.'

'She wasn't all there. But I thought there was enough to make it interesting.'

'I got on a bus and went upstairs. The conductor asked for my fare. 'A single to the west End please,' I said. 'We don't go to the West End,' he said. I said, 'But you've got West End on the front of the bus.' He said, 'We've got Persil on the back of the bus but we don't take in washing.'

'That boy needed a good hiding. So I took him away and hid him where they'll never find him.'

'I walked into the bedroom. The curtains were drawn but the furniture was real.'

Loads more. Like I said before, the monologue The Nose is the funniest thing I've ever read.

Best £14.99 I've spent in a long while.

Some Chic Murray quotes

All from Robbie Grigor's book about Chic Murray, "Just Daft" published by Birlinn books.

'Unfortunately, at the AGM of the Unspeakably Shy Society (Rutherglen branch) nobody was able to attend.' (possibly my favourite, as I can identify...)

'I don't care if he was the head of the Light Brigade. There will be no charging here!'

'If something's neither here nor there, where the hell is it?'

'In the Olympic village, a man wearing trainers and carrying a long stick, was asked by a stranger, ' Are you a pole vaulter?' 'Nein. I am German. But how did you know my name is Walter?'

'I was making tea in my pyjamas. I must remember to buy a teapot.'

'Ah! but what have I got up my sleeve? A broken arm if you're not careful.'

'She wasn't all there. But I thought there was enough to make it interesting.'

'I got on a bus and went upstairs. The conductor asked for my fare. 'A single to the west End please,' I said. 'We don't go to the West End,' he said. I said, 'But you've got West End on the front of the bus.' He said, 'We've got Persil on the back of the bus but we don't take in washing.'

'That boy needed a good hiding. So I took him away and hid him where they'll never find him.'

'I walked into the bedroom. The curtains were drawn but the furniture was real.'

Loads more. Like I said before, the monologue The Nose is the funniest thing I've ever read.

Best £14.99 I've spent in a long while.

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