Seanachai

And no girl that ever knew you knew joy, you bugger. Now be quiet, we're all after talking about grown-up stuff.

You come over here and say that, you Scots/Aussie feck! I'll reach right up your arse and pull out the wobbly bit that even lets you do poetry, you pillock. You ever try and do poetry against me again, you bastard, and I'll turn you into slurry, and I'll use the small bones to make necklaces for my Small Friends, you feck. That I should live so long, to have a putative f*cking Scotsman attempt poetry against me! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT, OGSF?! DO YOU WANT TO MATCH ME, POETRY TO POETRY?! DO YOU WANT TO HAVE A GO, YOU SCOTS GIT?!

Did that sound arrogant? Really, did it? Because it was meant to sound arrogant. Posting here always keeps me on my toes, whether it's posturing, posing, denying, damning or simply trying to make a bit of sense while pissing about. Every day that I come here, I try to post. There's been big amounts of time lately when I didn't post, because I'd nothing to give. I don't like to 'phone it in'. There will be a day when I will not be posting here anymore. There will be a day when the sun will rise, the sun will set. There will be a day when even the stupidest m*therf*cker on the planet will come here and post, and I will not be there to shake my head, and go to the kitchen for more ice. A day when Small Friends ask their Mom and Dad why Grandma Steve hasn't been to visit for so long, and when he will be coming over again. There will be a day when Sam the Dog will go into the guest room at Dalem's house, and look at the futon couch, wag his tail, and whine, because it is empty. There will be a day, my little lads, when I am gone. Probably, when all this happens, I will be f*cking dead. But with any luck at all, it will be because I'm in a stolen armoured car, driving for Cleveland, shouting "Wild Card, Bitches!" But, if it's 'the other thing' (you know, 'death'), I'd like you all to say of me, in the grand style of the epitaph of Lord Buckley: 'He stomped upon the terra', that Seanachai: Pissed upon them all from a great height. Because I do. When I am gone, go out on any clear, cool night, when the stars burn like diamonds enough to actually shine through the fecking light pollution of the sky within 100 miles of an urban area, and the breeze barely stirs stirs the leaves, and turn your faces upwards. Feel that on your cheeks, my little lads? That's not dew, you feckers. That's me.

No. When I choose to violate the rules of grammar and language, it's because I am the Bard of the Peng Challenge Thread who has chosen to do so, rather than because jumping up and down and grunting makes more sense than reaching for a style manual (as you undoubtedly had to do), like you lot of apes are reduced to. Language is like music, Boo. In the hands of the Australians, say, it's a bawdy pub ballad. In the hands of the Justicar, it's like Gregorian chants. From you, it's like a folk song. When it flows from me, Boo, it's like the 'Ode to Joy'.

What the hell is the point of the 'multi-quote this message' button? Bloody thing doesn't seem to do anything... Eureka! I have it! Of course now the problem is, I can't make it let go...

And yet, I thought she looked quite buuteefal today...

Dalem. Is a drunkard.

Hmm, hmm. For Dalem, this was almost 'Homeric'. It rhymed, it scanned fairly well, it made sense. If he can keep this sort of thing up, we might relent from the whole 'Dalem is not to versify, for ANY reason' thing. One of his best efforts. If I am to be mocked (and as we all know, I am to be mocked, because it shows that you resent the heights I have achieved, and look down upon you from), then I prefer to be mocked with decent, solid versification like Dalem has recently managed. Dalem, that was a noble effort. One of your best. Because of my association with Small Friends, I've learned the importance of 'positive reinforcement'. With Dalem as with 4 year olds like Smaller Nora (who is Dalem's favourite, because she's quite mad), it is important to praise them for things like 'not soiling themselves'.

Joe, this might be a revisionist argument. My argument above is better. Although the Justicar does make an extremely good argument about grammar, punctuation and syntax in the textual representation of language. One which is lost on most young people today, despite an ever greater usage of 'texting'. Witness the always amusing book 'Eats, Shoots and Leaves'. I've just been off the phone with Dalem, in which he and I went more thoroughly over the ground that I'd trodden with Berli earlier today. I think it was morning, or something like it. Berli is not bound to time the way the rest of us are, and it shows in his use of the telephone. If we move to a system where an electronic device can be made to shout out 'get up, you evil little sod, I want to talk to you', then Berli might abandon the telephone all together in favour of digital communication. Anyways, we talked at some length about the change that we will probably see in our lifetime (albeit for most of us something we watch as we slip away into maundering old age), of a shift in the current paradigm regarding text. Even very old people like myself, and extremely old (and largely useless) people like the Justicar, have witnessed a huge shift in the paradigm of our age from the 'written' word, to the 'typed' word, and now we are moving into an age of the 'texted' word, with hardware driving our use of written language ever faster and in newer directions. I believe it was the biologist and philosopher Lewis Thomas in his book 'Lives of a Cell', that makes the observation that social creatures create something larger than themselves that defines them, that they in fact cannot even 'see', and he felt that for humanity it was not a hive, nor an anthill, but 'language'. And that each iteration of mankind has taken this creation and worked upon it, even as bees build a hive or ants tunnel and build their nest, and made of it something whose totality they function within, but cannot completely perceive. We have created language, and it now drives every aspect of our lives. And this creation has made possible our technology, and that technology is now feeding back into the way we use language, and driving the changes in the paradigm. From the invention of cuneiform, to alphabets, to standardized dictionaries, to proper grammar, we build the hill higher, and make it more all-encompassing and powerful. And now we live in an age in which we've watched technology take over our use of language and drive it in ever more convoluted paths, from hand-written script, to one-handed texting by teenagers who operate within the bounds of the most impressive construction of human society, about which they know very little and understand even less, although it dominates their lives. We live within a society for which 'text' is the over-riding means of communication, and yet societies as a whole, even within the educated (or more correctly, especially within the more educated) portions of the globe, the society is barely literate. We are at a point where it is inconceivable to function without the written word. And yet as a society we're damn near reduced to scrawling out symbols on the ground with a stick, despite the fact that we're using cell phones and computers and such to do the scratching. What's next for Weird Betty, eh? Of course, in my conversations with Dalem and Berli, although it was every bit as erudite and thoughtful, there was a lot more swearing, and disturbing information about things like 'fleshlights' (which concept I do not care to revisit, except to say 'Behold, the Goddess of Empathy!'), and some intense discussions regarding 'why women get mad at you', and drinking and cigar smoking, and pissing while on the phone, and stuff. But otherwise it was just like like gathering at the Parthenon in ancient Greece to discuss deep and weighty issues. But without the bed sheet clothing or anyone being into young boys, and without all that abstemious stuff about watering down your wine so that you weren't mistaken for a Macedonian because you drank too much. We were all for the Macedonians. The Macedonians drank like Australians. Alexander the Great was a Macedonian, and he conquered a huge chunk of the Known World. And he was tutored by Aristotle. But he decided to be 'too Greek', and was into young boys. We discussed deep philosophical questions as though we were drunken Macedonians who were tutored by renowned scholars like Aristotle, but we avoided the whole 'young boys' thing. In other words, we were a 'credit to Western Civilization'. Not like the Australians. They were just drunk.

Yes. Let me see... I called Dalem a few hours ago, but kept being routed over to an automatic voicemail system that is, for reasons never to be made totally clear, still in place, although he does not use it anymore, nor ever accesses it. I knew this about him, so, figuring he was on his home phone talking to someone far less important than myself, I called his cell, and got him immediately. Turns out Dalem spent the afternoon/evening networking his home, setting up a wireless router, getting the computer on board, making sure everything worked, so that he could do things like 'hotseat' wargames at home, access the internet from every room, etc. etc. The only problem was, when he was all done and everything worked perfectly, he'd totally disabled his home phone/landline. Even attempts to 'put things back the way they were' didn't work. When I called him and after he explained the whole thing to me, I told him: "You're the stupidest smart person I know. You're the most incompetent capable person I've ever met". Ladies and Fools of the Peng Challenge Thread, I give you a toast: TO DALEM! No one else could achieve so much and yet fail in such an essential detail! I can't help but think of Dr. Frankenstein, who pieced together a human body and then raised it from death, but then put an abnormal brain into it. Kind of says it all about Dalem, actually. Mind, he's still a damn good host. Salt of the earth, all praise to his rum and cigars, excellent library and such, etc. etc. Wouldn't do to liken it to the occasional lapses in his politics. That would be petty. Of course, I'm a very short man. So, I thought I'd at least raise the point. To my own discredit, I admit, rather than his. Still, I'm only after saying...

Oh my gods, look! The absolute nether end of humanity insists on having a hierarchy! It's like watching the block of guttering outside an all-night take-out debate with itself about which part truly represents the least soiled and most easily hosed-out stretch...

Do you know, in a better world than this, Australia would have been settled by Americans, and all the lot of wankers that got shipped off to Australia would have been shipped to America, and we would have resettled them in the South after the Civil War. Now THAT would have been an interesting alternate history. If nothing else, Florida would be the world's largest alligator and manatee park, since there wouldn't be any development industry down there at all. No one would ever want to develop a swamp filled with Australians. Humanity would finally come to understand that the whole point of a massive swamp was God's way of giving you someplace to put the Australians.

Frankly, and it pains me to even contemplate it, there's not enough goddamn alcohol on the planet to make the three of us miss such a disruption of the natural order, let alone acquiesce to it. All three of us, in our various times, have been so completely given over to alcohol that almost anything might pass off - except this. I, myself, as a much younger man, have so thrown myself into the cesspool of drink (wine is a mocker, strong drink is ragin') that I have fallen into endless error, and endured endless humiliations, and sunk even on to the very lowest levels of behaviour. Why, there was one point in my infelicitous youth when I actually voted Republican. And, lest we forget, there was my entire 3 month 'Journey to Discover America', which all too quickly turned into my 'Journey to Discover the Cheapest 3 Liter Jug of Red Wine'. Battle Mountain, Nevada, at $3 for 3 Liters, for those who are interested. I believe it was Carlo Rossi burgundy. You are not, my little lad, an 'Olde One' of the Peng Challenge Thread. You are a scruffy little poseur. By claiming to be an 'Olde One of the Peng Challenge Thread', you remind me of General Henri Giraud, the Frenchman who would only support the Allied landings in North Africa if he was proclaimed 'Supreme Commander of All Allied Forces'. In short, Dalem, with your claim to being an 'Olde One', you have simply become...French.

The bloody indignity of having to 're-log-in', not to mention receiving an email message stating that, 'apparently I'd forgotten my password'. Forgotten it? I've never even known the goddamn thing. Stuff and bloody nonsense. Is this what the world is coming to? Under normal circumstances, I'd put it all down to the vagaries of the world we now live in. But, given that I was personally discommoded, I think that the appropriate response is to begin rounding up those most likely to have caused this security breach, and by 'most likely', I mean 'all those people who I personally distrust, dislike, or who have pissed me off'. The entire nation of America worked under exactly those criteria for eight years, recently, and I see no reason why I shouldn't be given the same latitude. I expect an email, shortly, from BFC asking for my particulars, so that those people most likely to have been involved in the hacking of the site can be identified, rounded-up, and arrested. And, in the style to which I, as an American citizen, have become accustomed, I will expect that those on the list of names that I provide to them will be subjected to a variety of 'stressful fact-finding inquiries'. These inquiries will, hopefully, result in their permanent emotional and mental trauma, or death. Now, as we all know, I am a rather jolly fellow. But that doesn't mean that, like most of my countrymen, I don't want to see my enemies brought before me in chains, whipped into submission, and then subjected to torments. In this particular case the only minor point of objection might be the 'list of suspected wrong-doers' that we end up working from. But, I am here to tell you that I personally vouch for the evil and corruption of every name on the list, that there can be no question of their involvement in matters both criminal, and inimical to the Board, and that I have absolute proof of their involvement in the hacking of the Board. Of course the proof I have cannot be presented, because it might adversely affect the ferreting out of other wrong-doers, and because it might not withstand the scrutiny of inconvenient levels of truth. I am, of course, an Olde One of the Peng Challenge Thread. Therefore, when I name names, and make accusations, and present lists, we all know that the highest standards will be applied to BFC's efforts to bring the wrong-doers to judgement. I cannot confirm the rumors that $1 Million has already been earmarked in order to establish a Department of Wasteland Security, but nor will I deny them. What I do know is, in the wake of this vicious, unprecedented attack upon the Board and all that we hold dear, that someone's going into the sausage grinder, and I have in my hand, right now, a list of names that will be delightful with sage, onion and garlic.

Oh, NOW we've noticed? After I spent the last fecking tumpty-tum years of my fecking life bringing sh*te back to the Western World, popularizing sh*te, and giving sh*te to all and sundry, not to mention making sh*te a household word in American households far beyond the purview of the Peng Challenge Thread, we've decided to wonder about not being allowed to give a fecking SH*TE anymore? Christ on a crutch attempting semaphore, what's next? We're not allowed to use 'feck' (also my f*cking g*dd*mn sack of sh*te introduction to this Thread, not to mention the Forum), which, as anyone knows, is based on 'feculent', rather than the other f*cking word. This whole 'My, what a pleasant, well-maintained vision of Hell this place is' makeover of the Battlefront forum gives me the red-ass. IT GIVES ME THE RED-ASS! HA! THERE, DID THAT COME THROUGH?! In the old days, we regulated ourselves. We knew when an expletive was called for, and when it was superfluous. We knew when it was enough to use the hated *s, and when nothing else would serve than to use 'the word itself'. We knew when to refrain from excess, and when vulgarity and excess were all that remained to be done. And if that moment had come, we went to it. And when we f*cked up, we paid the price. I paid it at more than once. AND THEN — THEN WE WERE MEN! Now, software tells us about how our contributions have been 'duly logged, and made more enjoyable for everyone'. We know that we should, maybe, speak a little more quietly. Maybe turn our thoughts more towards 'the children', and 'where our souls will spend eternity', not to mention right-wing religious lunatics. Think about how our comments on war, death, and hell should be better phrased to embrace even the most innocent, the most impressionable, the most judgmental and most ridiculous elements of online society. Hmm! What's that scent? It smells like the minty fresh breath of kissing the arse of a public that shouldn't even be on this website, and that ain't fecking buying! BRING ME YOUR MOTHERS OF TEENAGERS, AND BRING THEM NAKED! I'd like to read with them the works of Shakespeare, and the poetry of Yeats. Something their spawn have never read. And I will, dirty old man that I am, read them damn well. "A little more wine there, my dear? Perhaps something with a bit of expletive to it? No? Maybe you should, well, bend over..." I am the Bard of the Peng Challenge Thread. From high to low, I am there. Always there.

If I could get a nickel back for returning the 'container' that is Stuka, I'd use it to buy a candle to burn in church for his sad, sorry, useless Aussie soul. See if I don't.

Me, your f*cking apostle? I shall laugh about that until I stop. If we're going to dance the dance of Messiahs and Apostles, Stuka, you need to practice counting to '30' to make sure you haven't left any change on the counter, and I'm going to have to steel myself to receive a kiss from you, you awful little crawler. Pah! When I bring the blood to wash you clean, you treacherous little weasel, I'll wash you clean in the finest single malt. In my father's house, there are many mansions. And there's not a single one that will give you credit, you piss-artist.

This would be documented and verified proof that Jesus Christ got totally sh*te-faced in Oz, and chundered in some alley after a meal of all-night take-out vindaloo in Sydney, eh?

I'll be in my bunk...

Really? Well, I'd expect nothing less than a glorious death from a division of German tanks. How many turns did it take the Stuart named OGSF to kill them all? Oh, and since the Scenario was designed by you, I assume that the intent was for the German division to win...

Look, Stuka, we couldn't possibly think less of you if you were to just admit that you only post between arraignments, hearings, bail and jail time. You don't have to keep up this bizarre fiction that you're working somewhere in the desert for princely fees, when we all know that you're doing some prison jumpsuit shuffle as a poster-child for the Australian legal system (such as it is). It's okay, lad. Relax. We look forward to your next post every bit as much as if you were an honest citizen who contributed to the greater good of society, rather than being a net drain upon it. After all, it's an Australian society. Doesn't impact most of us worth a damn. And for you people, being a criminal is like, you know, a cultural heritage.

costard has read, I believe, "Stalky and Co." by Kipling. I'm a bit surprised, if I'm correct.

Still got the QB and next turn, oh Boo. Look for something in the next few days...

My buddy Bob (Big Orange Sheep!), told me a story about his dad, who was a bomber crew member in WWII. Seems they were stationed in Britain, flying missions against Germany, and the local area was famous for their brussel sprouts. They got served them with every meal, and they hated them. So, after one of their missions, they came in hurt, engines failing, and they ended up doing a belly landing in a brussel sprouts field near their airstrip, and messed it up good, but they all walked away from the landing. And they all got citations and medals for that mission, but they were told on the sly that the real reason was that they destroyed so many brussel sprouts. Of such things is history made.

Ah, ta' hell withit. Almost able to breathe again, without coughing. I've taken up playing CM again. I'm looking at you, Boo! May take up a game with Dalem, and Berli. Maybe me buddy Kerch, that none of you lot know except Lars. Fer now, I'm listening to Capercaillie and wondering about the world. Remember when you'd lived for years in hopes of playing a game like Combat Mission? Ever had that moment again since CMAK?