Hatred is an affair of the heart; contempt that of the head.

An abandoned gun emplacement and a lighthouse (in your backyard). Blinking Billy Point, Sandy Bay. May 2011.

The above gun emplacement was originally intended to stop the Russians (not the Soviets, but the Russians). Yes, at the outbreak of the Crimean War the nervous folk of Van Diemens Land were quaking at the thought of the vicious Imperial Russian Navy. Alas, they were not really very interested.

Which leads me to today's Sunday Top Five: My Top Five Invading Hordes That I Wouldn't Be Too Fussed By!

Finns, Swedes or Norwegians: any Scandinavian invasion would be welcome. They're a friendly mob, and have plenty of good-looking sheilas with liberal attitudes to beach attire. I think we'd cope.

Liechtenstein: let's face it, it would have to be some kind of corporate takeover by European tax exiles.

The Holy Roman Empire: any 'Empire' that manages to go by such a name despite the fact that it was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire, must have something going for it.

Supermodels: [Ezra picked this one. See above]

McDonalds: oh wait...

Comments

Roddy said…

There was a certain amount of paranoia doing the rounds at that time. The Russians for whatever reason at that time was the great bogeyman.

29 May 2011 at 19:03

Kris McCracken said…

It was just as much the case that when the Russian Imperial Navy were doing a goodwill tour just after the Crimean War, the Tasmanians realised that they were in no position to resist any kind of takeover.

It turned out that the Russians had no designs on that front anyway…

30 May 2011 at 08:41

Hold me now, oh hold me now, until this hour has gone around. And I'm gone on the rising tide, to face Van Dieman's Land

Theme Thursday again, and this one is rather easy. I am Tasmanian, you see, and aside from being all around general geniuses - as I have amply described previously - we are also very familiar with the concept of WATER. Tasmania is the ONLY island state of an ISLAND continent. That means, we're surrounded by WATER. That should help explain why I take so many photographs of water . Tasmania was for a long time the place where the British (an island race terrified of water) sent their poor people most vile and horrid criminals. The sort of folk who would face the stark choice of a death sentence , or transportation to the other end of the world. Their catalogue of crimes is horrifying : stealing bread assault stealing gentlemen's handkerchiefs drunken assault being poor affray ladies being overly friendly with gentlemen for money hitting people having a drink and a laugh public drunkenness being Irish Fenian terrorist activities being Catholic religious subversion. ...

Something unpleasant is coming when men are anxious to tell the truth.

This is the moon. Have I mentioned how much I adore the zoom on my camera? It's Theme Thursday you see, and after last week's limp effort, I have been thinking about how I might redeem myself. Then I clicked on the topic and discover that it was BUTTON. We've been hearing a lot about the moon in the past couple of weeks. Apparently some fellas went up there and played golf and what-not forty-odd years ago. The desire to get to the moon, however, was not simply about enhancing opportunities for Meg and Mog titles and skirting local planning by-laws in the construction of new and innovative golf courses. No, all of your Sputniks , "One small steps" and freeze dried ice cream was about one thing , and one thing only : MAD Now, I don't mean mad in terms of "bloke breaks record for number of scorpions he can get up his bum", no I mean MAD as in Mutual assured destruction . When I was a young man you see, there was a lot of talk about the type of m...

But when the strong were too weak to hurt the weak, the weak had to be strong enough to leave.

Can you believe that it is time for Theme Thursday already? Today we are not talking chocolate , toddlers , mess or ignominy . No, today we're dealing with ANIMAL . Now I could have posted a picture of a possum, numbat, wombat, wallaby or any other furry killing machine that roams our fair isle, but I figure that I'd use a far more deadly creature as an example of an animal . Some people - I know them as fools - have chosen to embrace that highfalutin idea that human beans are for some ungodly reason superior to animals. Of course, what these imbeciles seem to forget is that were are simple animals ourselves ! Anyone with a baby, toddler, teenage boy or Queenslander in their household could tell you this. Look at Henry [above]. One chocolate frog in the back of the car on a sunny day and all of a sudden it's Elagabalus meets Bacchus for a quick shandy in the Serengeti and we're down on all fours carrying on like a cat in heat. Fair dinkum, anyone who chooses to ...

This will hurt me...

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