Dear friends, here's a rather personal question for you. Some would call it "intrusive", but I'm going to ask it anyway. Call me a bastard if you like haha! And here it is, my question, that is (!), and it's a real 'zinger'.
Growing up, who was YOUR favourite action-hero? And take care before you say anything, because your answer may reveal more about YOU than about the pantheon of action heroes itself (!). Just saying!
Your age for starters! Your answer is going to give that away, right off the bat! If your answer is Zorro, for example, as played by Douglas Fairbanks, the chances are that you're over 100 years old, one of our country's true "survivors" so I salute you - an honour, sir (or madam (!)).
Douglas Fairbanks IS Zorro, in "The Mark of Zorro" (1920)
[That's enough exclamation marks in brackets (!) - Ed]
To be serious, though for a moment (!) [Finally! - Ed], the British Dental Association has won a long and highly-deserved reputation in this country for "policing" the sometimes shady world of both main-street and back-street dental work. The Association is especially respected "in these here parts", i.e. Gloucestershire and Worcestershire, where Lois and I live, because the association was founded in 1880, mainly due to the efforts of John Tomes, born in Weston-on-Avon, Gloucestershire, and first "articled" professionally in Evesham, Worcestershire.
Fortunately "action heroes" have now been successfully and comprehensively "debunked" by modern "woke" thinkers as racist and sexist. In Wikipedia, Shawn Shimpach recalls that the origin of the action hero is rooted in the history of imperialism, with adventure stories being primarily written for boys, to imagine being men on travels and experiencing exciting action.
Shawn Shimpach, cinema buff and holder of a Ph.D.
in "Film Studies" from New York University
Adds Shimpach, "The young, white men who were (or became) the aggrandized subjects of these stories motivated the narratives through their penchant for action and resolved conflict through violence informed by grit, wits, and innate skill, securing, in each story, the future of the world for which they were responsible and in the process confirming their masculine identity."
Call me an iconoclast if you like (!) [What that? - Ed], but I take issue with the otherwise masterly Shimpach on his theory that action heroes hyave been exclusively white, or "white-ish" or even "white-to-fairly-white", as some might say.
My issue is this: What about Jackie Chan? You can't say Chan wasn't an action hero, can you - be fair!
Chan "only" (!) almost stopped the take-over of Hong Kong, when the British lease became up in 1997 - remember? But he was undoubtedly helped by the Red Army's adoption of traditional "one at a time" kung-fu attack techniques. The Onion News of the day had more on that story....
It must have been a close thing, I imagine, but in the end China managed to take Hong Kong away from us, which was a pity, to put it mildly (!), and the rest is history.
If you're the same age as me, or as my medium-to-long-suffering wife Lois - i.e. 78, your favourite action hero growing up was probably "Lemming of the BDA (British Dental Association". Am I right or am I right? Remember the iconic episode when dental secret agent Lemming, played by Eric Idle foils an attempt by "Big Cheese" (played by Graham Chapman) and his accomplices to steal some fillings from a dental surgery?
Step aside, James Bond and your ilk (!) - why not
leave it to the real professionals, like
Lemming of the BDA (played by Eric Idle)
the iconic scene in which Terry Jones (right) uses a bazooka
to threaten staff at a dental surgery, including a number
of dentists, some of them "bad apples" (John Cleese, Michael Palin
and others) together with their nurse (Carol Cleveland, left)
That much, I suspect, is common knowledge [You're living in a fantasy world, Colin! - Ed], but did you know that Thomas Hastings, the man behind the 1832 formation of the BDA's "big sister" organisation, the British Medical Association (BMA) also "hailed" from "these here parts". Bet you didn't!
But first, let's turn the clock back, to this morning (!).
Lois and I got out of bed around 8 am, and in the bathroom there was some preliminary "rough-housing" over our shiny-new correct to the quarter pound" bathroom scales. We're currently competing to lose weight, and I'm feeling a bit "out of sorts" because yesterday Lois discovered she had lost 1 lb 8 oz over the previous 24 hours, while I had lost a paltry 4 oz.
flashback to earlier this week: I showcase
our shiny-new bathroom scales from Argos
But it was later, when we took our morning walk to try and "walk off" a couple more ounces each, that, while blackberrying, we made our discovery. Yes, the house owned by Thomas Hastings - "Hastings of the BMA" as we call him (!) - is right here in the Barnard's Green area of Malvern. Here's how it played out, because pictures tell a thousand words (each!) haha.
we take a walk on the common at Barnard's Green, in the lee
of the 700-million-year-old Malvern Hills...
...blackberrying as we go....
...and discovering the house where Sir Charles Hastings,
founder of the BMA, once lived...
...and here's the plaque that proves it, which is nice.
Incidentally, just to be clear, there's no suggestion that Worcester-born "Hastings of the BMA" was any sort of "action hero", to put it mildly, and I can't find any instances of him wrestling white sharks for example. I suspect he was a mild-mannered sort of a guy. Even when the BMA sent him a paltry ink-stand for his Golden Wedding, he didn't respond by indulging in any kung-fu attacks on his fellow-directors, whether one-at-a-time or otherwise (!), which was probably the "adult" response.
I wonder..... !
[That's enough whimsy! - Ed]
21:00 We go to bed on an interesting PBS.....
[Excuse me for interrupting, but is that all you two "noggins" have done today, Colin? - Ed] [Not entirely - 2pm is "nap-time" and we did go to bed for a bit!" - Colin] [You lazy bastards! - Ed]
Prof Fletcher takes us tonight through the lives of four influential women: Hetepheres (c. 2600 BC), Hateshepsut (c. 1500 BC), Nefertari (c.1290 BC) and Arsinoe (c. 316BC). All were innovators in their own way, and paved the way for Cleopatra's prestigious position as Empress of Egypt in the Roman period.
Hatshepsut led military campaigns against neighbouring states like Nubia. And Arsinoe greatly strengthened Egypt's economy and trading links.
Nefertari was originally the "trophy wife" consort of Ramses II, very beautiful, and what Prof. Fletcher describes as the "ultimate high maintenance woman". But in all sorts of areas, she was soon outshining her husband, who was once famously described as "brilliant at a distance but essentially just a ball of gas" (!). [Funny - isn't that what people say about you and Lois, Colin? - Ed]
She was probably much more intelligent than her husband, and a better diplomat. She could actually write: we actually have a letter she wrote to the Queen of the Hittites about relations between the two empires.
Nefertari (right), with her husband Ramses, who was "brilliant
from a distance but really just a ball of gas" - what madness !!!
When she died, Nefertari was laid to rest in what's been called Egypt's most spectacular tomb, nearly 6000 square feet of it (520 sq.metres), full of images, but no images at all of her husband, Ramses, who's on almost every other building from Ancient Egypt.
Prof. Fletcher suggests that Nefertari was hoping that in the next world, she wouldn't have to listen to Ramses "wittering on at her".
So fair enough, we say!
[Oh stop wittering on yourself, Colin, and go to bed! - Ed]
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!
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