I bet the locals were a bit garum-py over that...

 

For those who didn't know, the staple sauce throughout the Roman Empire of old was called garum.

Garum is a fermented fish sauce that was used ... in the cuisines of Phoenicia, ancient Greece, Rome, Carthage, and later Byzantium ... The taste of garum is thought to have been comparable to that of today's Asian fish sauces.

Like modern fermented fish sauce and soy sauce, garum was a rich source of umami flavoring due to the presence of glutamates.

There's more at the link.

Believe it or not, after about 2,000 years or thereabouts, you can still buy authentic garum today.  Go check out what's available at the link.  If you prefer something slightly less fishy, British Worcestershire sauce is basically a modern version of garum.  It was developed "by accident", with a nasty unpalatable concoction left forgotten in a basement for years.  When rediscovered, it had matured into what we know today.  Read all about it at the link.

So, fermented fish sauce has a long and celebrated history . . . but one can have too much of a good thing, as the residents of St. Mary's in Canada learned to their cost.

Over 100 tanks of rotten fish sauce are finally being removed from a small Canadian town after stinking up the neighborhood for decades.

The supply of what’s been described as “the worst rotted fish you ever smelled” was left abandoned in the quaint town of St. Mary’s after the Atlantic Seafood Sauce Company shuttered more than 20 years ago.

Over the next few months, workers will embark on a $1.2 million project to drain roughly 110 tanks, each holding 3,000 gallons of fermented fish sauce.

The stinky sauce will then be mixed with peat moss to absorb the liquid, according to St. Mary’s volunteer mayor, Steve Ryan.

Trucks equipped with giant hoses will then suck up the material and deliver it to a massive pit lined with high-density polyethylene, where the waste will be buried in topsoil.

The dilapidated factory full of ditched fish sauce has wafted an indescribable smell over the town of roughly 300 people in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The liquid kept fermenting as the plant kept turning to ruin, with a blown-off roof and a wall knocked out by a storm in January.

There's more at the link.  Here's a video report on the process.

This is one time I'm truly, profoundly, deeply grateful that "scratch and sniff" technology hasn't made it to the pages of the Internet yet - or to the screens of our electronic devices!

Peter

Er... about those berries...

 

I was amused to see this list over at Raconteur Press's Substack.  Click the image for a larger view.

I've used literally all of them - they're more common in English-English than in American-English.  To one, however, there hangs a tail (you should pardon the expression).

Shortly after I came to this country, thirty years ago, I noticed a number of references to berries that I hadn't encountered in South Africa.  There were blueberries, and white mulberries, and more.  However, although I occasionally heard the term "dingleberry", I never saw one.  Intrigued, I asked a family one day (with whom I was staying for a few days) where I could find "dingleberries".

You can imagine my puzzlement when the father cracked up laughing, the mother had to leave the table with her hands clasped to her face and her shoulders shaking from suppressed merriment, and the two daughters blushed red as roses.  When Dad stopped laughing, he explained the true meaning of the word ( for the benefit of non-American readers, it's the third meaning of the noun in the list provided).

My innocence shattered, I declined the opportunity to sample a dingleberry pie . . .

Peter

I smell a large, hairy, stinking rat...

 

Guess what?

The woman suspected of trying to blow up a Ukrainian tycoon in Monaco has been found shot dead near Kyiv.

Anastasiia Berezovska, 39, was named as the prime suspect in the attack on Vadym Iermolaiev, a Ukrainian property magnate, at the end of last month.

Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) said on Tuesday that her body had been found overnight near the Ukrainian capital with gunshot wounds to the head and pistol casings nearby after an international search.

The SBU added that an acting officer from Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (HUR) had confessed to killing Ms Berezovska with the assistance of a former law enforcement officer, and that he had acted on his own initiative without informing superiors.

There's more at the link.

So . . . the "official" story is that the alleged perpetrator of a bomb attack on a self-exiled Ukrainian oligarch (who appears to have a great deal of money at his disposal, suggesting possible probable underworld activity) is herself dead under mysterious circumstances, with "an acting officer from Ukraine's military intelligence agency" confessing to her murder.

Translation:  Ukraine was known as (and probably still is) one of the most corrupt countries in Europe.  I'm betting that the oligarch in question wasn't sharing enough of his profits with his intelligence agency partners;  or, possibly, they wanted in on his criminal network and he wouldn't let them.  They decided to rub him out in retaliation.  Their chosen emissary wasn't efficient enough to accomplish that, although her bomb did severely injure him.  When she was identified in the news media, somebody decided to close her mouth permanently so that she wouldn't give away incriminating (and possibly lucrative) secrets.  A "fall guy" is going to take the blame for her murder, probably because he, too, wasn't sharing enough of the profits from his own illicit activities.

I suspect my impromptu translation is far more accurate than all the news reports now spreading about the incident.  Watch to see which (if any) of the oligarch's activities are taken over by "new" Ukrainian bosses, and figure out to whom they are loyal, if not to him.  I strongly suspect a takeover bid by corrupt Ukrainian intelligence people is under way.

Peter

Quote of the day

 

From Theodore Dalrymple, writing in City Journal about the abysmal architecture of American embassies:

The new American embassy in Maputo (Mozambique) ... [has] a facade that looks as if a giant Parmesan cheese is expected to fall from the sky at any moment and will need grating as it lands.

The offending building (click the image for a larger view from the US State Department's Web facilities):

One can only cringe in sympathy with Mr. Dalrymple . . .

Peter

A different way to look at inflation

 

Inflation hits the contraceptive market!  Reuters reports:

Malaysia's Karex Bhd, the world's top condom producer, plans to raise prices by 20% to 30% and possibly further if supply chain ​disruptions drag on due to the Iran war, its chief executive said on ‌Tuesday.

Karex is also seeing a surge in condom demand as rising freight costs and shipping delays have left many of its customers with lower stockpiles than usual, CEO Goh Miah Kiat told ​Reuters in an interview.

"The situation is definitely very fragile, prices are expensive... We ​have no choice but to transfer the costs right now to ⁠the customers," Goh said.

There's more at the link.

Well, "inflation" sort of goes with the territory of condoms, so to speak, so for prices to match reality is logical, I suppose.  The same might be said for "dragging on".  However, regarding the "very fragile" situation, I daresay that's inimical to the product!

Sometimes the jokes almost write themselves . . .

Peter

Not false advertising - just different transatlantic meanings

 

I enjoyed a BBC article on the various ways and means British workers had used to wake up in time for their jobs.  Here's how it begins.

During Britain's industrial revolution, new factories faced a need for strict timekeeping – including far more specific start times for workers.

A worker arriving even five minutes late could hold up an entire assembly line, losing their employers' profit. They needed a means to wake up on time, especially in the darker winter months, and while early alarm clocks existed at this time, they were far too expensive for a typical worker.

Factories tried using whistles and bells to wake and summon workers, but they often proved unreliable. Instead, an entire profession dedicated to awakening people sprouted up: knocker uppers.

These human alarm clocks would work their way down streets and sometimes whole neighbourhoods knocking or tapping on windows, or shooting peas at them, says Arunima Datta, associate professor of history at the University of North Texas. "They would stand there until they got a response from their clients, they wouldn't move."

In fact, jobs akin to knocker uppers have been used in many other societies around the world, says Datta, especially in Muslim communities during the holy month of Ramadan, when people needed to wake up early to pray and have their first meal before dawn.

Throughout history, people have had plenty of other inventive ways of waking up, from simply keeping roosters to clever candle clocks that dropped needles into metal trays every hour. 

Learning how these past societies slept and woke up could even help us improve our own sleep – and awakenings – today.

There's more at the link.

I had to smile at the mention of "knocker upper".  In England, that expression meant a job that woke up workers so they could get to their jobs on time.  In the USA, however, to "knock someone up" means to make them pregnant.

My mother always used to smile broadly when she heard the expression.  During World War II, she was in England "keeping the home fires burning" for my father, who was fighting the war overseas.  She acted as a "knocker upper" for her colleagues from time to time:  they took turns at waking each other up to be on time for their jobs.

When the first American troops arrived in Britain in 1942, they were enthralled to learn that there were actually job openings for "knocker-uppers".  In fact, some of them tried to apply for part-time employment as such at the Labor Exchange, thinking the expression meant in Britain what it did in the USA.  You can imagine their disappointment when they learned it had nothing to do with sex!  The British thought the Yank servicemen were weird, but funny, and used to joke with them about it.  "Yes, I'm a knocker-up, mate, but not that kind of knocker-up!"

I'm still amused by the thought.

Peter

Doofus Of The Day #1,128

 

Today's award goes to police and tax authorities in South Korea for an epic blunder.

Soon after South Korean police posted a press release boasting about seizing $5.6 million worth of cryptocurrency from 124 wealthy tax evaders, cops realized that they had mistakenly posted images that made it possible for a thief to quickly steal most of the seized assets.

. . .

Clearly legible in the photo, the note contained a complete mnemonic recovery phrase that anyone can use as a master key to move assets off the cold wallet to a new wallet without any additional PIN or permissions required.

. . .

It’s possible that whoever took the cryptocurrency just seized on an opportunity after seeing the cops’ failure to redact the images while scrolling through the National Tax Service’s press releases at dawn. It’s also possible that bad actors are closely monitoring South Korean police cryptocurrency announcements, following what The Block reported was “a series of crypto custody lapses.”

There's more at the link.

OK, I have to admit, that's a special kind of stupid.  Boasting about seizing over $5M from a felon - then posting clues enough to allow another criminal to steal what the cops had just recovered?  Why do I never have the luck to come across photographs like that when I need them?

Peter

The lighter side of relationships

 

This cartoon is a fun reminder of the early stages of relationships, when one is still finding out about the other's haps and mishaps, mistakes and corrections.  Click the image to be taken to a larger view on the "Foxes In Love" Web page.

Ah, memories . . . !

Peter

Cognitive dissonance - ammunition edition?

 

Fellow blogger Eaton Rapids Joe mentioned Republic Ammunition in a recent post, particularly their low-cost primers.  I took a look at their product line, and was intrigued to find this.

Er... um...

I can understand wanting to give your better half (?) a Valentine's Day gift that expresses your love.

However...

Is it wise to give your (current) better half a Valentine's Day gift that he/she can use against you if they (or you) decide that he/she/you is no longer their/your better half?

Not the sort of "target market" in which I'd like to participate!

Peter

Fire in the hole!

 

Well, with a news report like this:

Hospital evacuated after 8-inch WWI

artillery shell discovered in patient’s butt

... what other common expression could I possibly use to headline this post?

(Those understanding artillery and/or explosive terminology can doubtless provide other useful terms to describe the situation.  Being a family-friendly blog, at least some of the time, I shall refrain - but with difficulty...)

Peter

So... what sex am I, again???

 

I went to a local hospital this week to pick up some CD's containing recent diagnostic imagery.  I duly reported in, and was directed to a small office, where someone would meet me with the CD's.  After a few minutes, a very pleasant young lady came in, handed me a brown envelope, and assured me that everything I needed was inside.

Being a trusting sort (NOT!), I opened the envelope. pulled out the printed records, and glanced at the first line.  One word jumped out at me.  It read, "HYSTERECTOMY".

I blinked, and looked again.  Sure enough, it hadn't changed.  I looked up at the nice lady, patted my (over-ample) belly, and said, "I may look pregnant, but I assure you, I'm not - and I've never had this surgery!"

She blinked in her turn, glanced at the paper, and turned beetroot-red.  "Oh!  OH!  I'm sorry!  I must have picked up the wrong envelope!  Wait just a moment!"

I waited, grinning.  The envelope had not had any name on it, so I presume they'd simply filed them in roughly alphabetical order based on the printed records inside.  In due course, she returned, still slightly pink, and handed me another envelope.  This time, the right records were inside.

I asked, "Do we need to look at the CD, to make sure it doesn't have happy snaps of a hysterectomy instead of my spinal scans?"

Her blush deepened.  "Er... I - I don't think so?"

I left it at that and departed, still grinning.  When I got home and told my wife, she almost collapsed, she was laughing so hard.  We're both looking forward to finding out what images another doctor might see on the CD when he reads it!

Ah, the joys of (mis)filing systems . . .

Peter

Oh, nicely played, sir!

 

It seems Ukraine's secret services (whatever they call themselves) have scored one for the home team against their Russian equivalents.

As far as the Russians were concerned, they had got their man.

Denis Kapustin, one of the most prominent anti-Putin Russians fighting on behalf of Ukraine, was reported dead on Dec 27, assassinated by a drone on the southern front.

He had long been hunted by Moscow and the price on his head reflected this: Russian intelligence services had offered $500,000 (£370,000) to anyone who killed him.

Russia paid this out after news broke of the successful hit this week. But what Vladimir Putin’s intelligence services did not know was that they had handed the money directly to Ukraine.

. . .

Mr Kapustin re-emerged – alive and unscathed – in a video posted by Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR).

“Welcome back to life,” Gen Kyrylo Budanov, head of HUR, said with a wry smile. He congratulated Mr Kapustin and his team on a successful operation to deceive their Russian adversaries.

It turns out HUR, along with the RDK, had hatched a plan to fake Mr Kapustin’s death and claim the $500,000 bounty from Russia for themselves, to be used in Ukraine’s war effort.

There's more at the link.

I wonder how many drones Ukraine will buy with that money?  Last I heard, I seem to recall that their locally-manufactured FPV drones were about $4,000 per copy.  If so, $500,000 will buy 125 of them . . . enough to administer rather a lot of explosive headaches to Russian forces across the front line.  I wonder what the soldiers on the receiving end will have to say about their intelligence service's donation to the enemy?  If we could hear them, we might learn some interesting new Russian words . . .

Peter

It's the entitled attitude that gets me...

 

I can only hope she was hauled away in handcuffs - after being hosed down so that the paint didn't get all over the police cruiser!

I've seen that same attitude in many so-called "porch pirate" videos.  They blame the person who put out the booby-trapped package to catch thieves, but never themselves for stealing.  I can only blame their upbringing, for never teaching them right from wrong.  If I'd tried that as a kid, my parents would have laughed at me, then whaled my ass off for stealing, then taken me back to the scene of the crime to invite the residents to give me another whoopin' - just in case I hadn't got the message by then!

A tip o' the hat to the anonymous reader who sent me the link to that video clip.

Peter

Doofus Of The Day #1,127

 

Today's award goes to a particularly dense TikTok user who filmed herself committing a felony.  She threw a stolen gun off the Cross Lake Bridge in Shreveport, and then posted the video on social media.  That was a bad idea.

You can watch another brief video of the proceedings at X.com.  It's giggle-worthy, as are the comments about it from other viewers (you need to be logged in to X to view them).

Peter

Doofus Of The Day #1,126

 

Today's award goes to a bank robber in Ohio.

A 42-year-old man was arrested Friday morning after robbing the Huntington Bank on West State Street, marking the city’s first bank robbery since 2010.

According to the Alliance Police Department, Jauan L. Mason, recently moved to Alliance from Akron, entered the bank around 9:20 a.m. and claimed he had a weapon. He demanded cash and fled on foot with approximately $400 in one-dollar bills.

Police responded immediately and searched the area. Patrolman Paul Vesco located Mason walking on South Union Avenue near State Street. Mason had changed clothes and was carrying the stolen money.

. . .

During his arrest, he reportedly asked police to deposit the stolen cash into his jail commissary account.

There's more at the link.

It's weird how many criminals regard what they've stolen as theirs.  "If I steal it, it's automatically mine!" - except that the law doesn't see it that way.  I've encountered that attitude time and again among prison inmates during my time as a chaplain.  I'm sure the police had a lot of fun pointing out to him that his deposit was going to be a big fat zero.

In this case, kudos to the teller who kept several big bundles of $1 bills in his/her drawer.  It looks like a lot of cash, but in actual value it's not worth much.  The robber simply grabbed the big bundles, doubtless congratulating himself on his score, and ran off with them without counting them.

Peter

Is it possible for a politician to be even more cretinous than usual? Oh, yes...

 

The politician in question is Cory Booker.  Basically, if it moves, as far as he's concerned it's Fascist, and must be condemned as such.  It would help - greatly! - if he actually knew the meaning of the word Fascist, as illustrated a couple of days ago, when he appeared on a podcast titled "The Anti-Cult Club".  He came up with this gem of political wisdom:

Yes, indeed.  I've never heard of any "old African saying" that "sticks in a bundle can't be broken" - and I'm a damned sight more African (having been born and raised on that continent) than Senator Booker.  However, I do know the meaning of the Latin word "fasces".  According to Wikipedia:

A fasces is a bound bundle of wooden rods, often, but not always, including an axe (occasionally two axes) with its blade emerging. The fasces is an Italian symbol that had its origin in the Etruscan civilization and was passed on to ancient Rome, where it symbolized a Roman king's power to punish his subjects, and later, a magistrate's power and jurisdiction.

The image of fasces has survived in the modern world as a representation of magisterial power, law, and governance. The fasces frequently occurs as a charge in heraldry: it is present on the reverse of the U.S. Mercury dime coin, behind the podium in the United States House of Representatives, and in the Seal of the U.S. Senate; and it was the origin of the name of the National Fascist Party in Italy (from which the term fascism is derived).

So, when Senator Booker uses the image of the fasces to illustrate opposition to fascism, he's heading in precisely the opposite direction to what he means.  I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.  Far too many of our politicians, on both sides of the aisle, behave in precisely the same way.  It's as if election to office knocks several dozen points off some (but fortunately not all) politicians' IQ scores.

Meanwhile, if you're logged into X, go enjoy the whole thread in which Sen. Booker's gaffe is discussed.  It's giggle-worthy.

Peter

Can't fool Grandma!

 

There's a wonderful video clip on X showing a perfectly healthy young man pretending to be disabled and begging for money . . . until his grandma comes along and catches him in the act.  The result is comedy gold.

Peter

I've heard of a stool pigeon, but a stool parrot???

 

As I'm sure most readers know, the term "stool pigeon" is used to refer to an informant who provides police with information about criminals.  I've no idea how it came to exist;  I can't imagine most pigeons I've seen sitting still on a stool where someone might sit on them!

Be that as it may, a parrot turns out to be the stool pigeon in a British case.

A loud-mouthed parrot snitched on his owner by squawking drug-dealing slang in video footage found by cops — leading to a massive crack and heroin bust in England, police said.

“Two for 25, two for 25!” the feathered rat chirped in the footage, according to cops, who said it was code for the price of dope.

A drug ring of 15 people in Blackpool was taken down by the tiny yellow bird — who was also seen in videos playing with drug money — after police seized gang leader Adam Garnett’s cellphones, according to the Lancashire Constabulary.

Cellphone footage led them to the home of Garnett’s girlfriend and number two, Shannon Hilton, where her phone featured videos that amounted to the parrot squealing.

Videos allegedly show Hilton teaching her less-than-cagey critter to say “two for 25” — apparent payment for bags of the dope — “in front of a child” and “the parrot playing with money, which was gained through their illegal activities,” police said.

There's more at the link, including a video clip showing the bird at its informative best.

Another British slang term is to "do bird", meaning to serve a prison sentence.  In this case, once the courts have had their say, that may be a rather more appropriate term than usual for the crooks concerned!  On the other hand, I hope the police will find a new (and safer) home for the parrot.  Its former owner(s) are unlikely to be feeling charitable towards it . . .  What's a witness protection program for birds called, anyway?  A bird sanctuary?

Peter

Tourniquets: they work, but they have dangers of their own

 

I was interested to read an article about the use of tourniquets in Ukraine, particularly because it contrasts between their use in a rapid-evacuation situation (such as US troops mostly encounter) versus taking hours or even days to reach anyone more advanced than a field medic.

The tourniquet has saved many thousands of lives and limbs in war zones around the world, but misuse of the device is causing huge numbers of excess amputations and deaths in Ukraine, say top military surgeons.

Captain Rom A Stevens, a retired senior US medical navy officer who has served in Iraq, Afghanistan, and East Africa, estimates that of the roughly 100,000 amputations performed on Ukrainian soldiers since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, as many as 75,000 were caused by improper use of tourniquets.

“I’ve seen tourniquets that have been left on for days, often for injuries that could have been stopped by other methods. Then [the patient] has to have their limb amputated because the tissue has died,” Captain Stevens told The Telegraph.

Tourniquets are strong bands used to stop catastrophic bleeding by cutting off blood flow, and are standard issue for most modern armies.

But if left on over two hours, they can cause tissue death, meaning the arm or leg which has the tourniquet on is no longer viable and requires amputation.

The device became standard-issue in the 2000s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, where rapid air evacuation to military surgical teams was possible in under 60 minutes. If the tourniquet was unnecessary it was removed, and no harm was done.

But in Ukraine, where the skies are infested with drones, injured soldiers are evacuated by land, often far exceeding the safe time window for tourniquet use.

This critical delay has caused tens of thousands of amputations, say experts, many of which were unnecessary because the injuries didn’t require a tourniquet in the first place.

There's more at the link.

I remember our field first aid training in the South African military.  We didn't carry IFAKs (Individual First Aid Kits) - just a single field dressing, a bandage that could be tied in place over an injury to absorb at least some of the bleeding and keep contaminants away from the wound.  Field medics carried a relatively comprehensive kit, with more supplies available aboard our transports:  but none of them were at the level of a medical station or field hospital.  If we were lucky, helicopter evacuation might be available, but not always - our air support was frequently hundreds of miles away, and had to thread its way through the most comprehensive Soviet air defense system outside the Warsaw Pact.  It might take hours to arrive.  For that reason, if a medic applied a tourniquet, he would usually try to note down exactly when it was tightened, and make sure that a record of every time it was tightened and loosened accompanied the patient whenever possible.  That way, permanent damage to the limb might be avoided.  It didn't always work.

It worries me that I see so many "civilian" IFAKs being marketed today.  I have no problem with as many people as possible carrying them;  it's far better to have them available on the spot rather than miles away.  However, relatively few of those carrying them have had any first aid training at all, let alone how to deal with serious blood loss.  The use of blood-clotting powder or bandages is a case in point:  another is the use of a tourniquet.  Neither is as easy as it looks, and one can inflict a lot of damage by doing the wrong thing.  For untrained users, I think of individual IFAKs as being useful supplemental kit for a paramedic or EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) or firefighter or police officer (both of the latter are usually trained in first aid to at least some extent).  If he/she runs out of their own supplies (not impossible where more than one or two casualties are involved), they can offer your IFAKs to provide additional essential gear.

The entire article is worth reading to show how a battlefield situation affects what gear may be useful, and what might not.  A tourniquet is very valuable indeed under certain circumstances, but as noted in the article, might lead to a much greater injury through cutting off the blood supply to a limb for too long.  I hope it motivates those who carry a tourniquet without undergoing training to at least watch a video or two on the subject, or perhaps motivate them to get proper training from local instructors.  One could even attend evening classes for a semester or two and graduate with a basic EMT qualification (like, for example, this course), which puts one head and shoulders above those less well trained.

Peter

Murphy is a weather law in Texas

 

Texas weather is . . . unpredictable.  From the Iowa Park Journal this week:

They planned their roof renovation on the basis of a clear weather forecast.  Had they never heard of Murphy's Law???

Peter