Large Fierce Mammal

When people speak of “manners”, they commonly have in mind some superficial behaviours first impressed upon them as something to be sure to do at Grandma’s dining room table. Just as all things of True Importance become trivialized by common usage among the Great Unwashed, we have manners, and Manners.

The Dark Sentiment uttered on Day 16 of Season 6 speaks of Manners, and most importantly their importance in troubled times, anywhere, and any when.

Dark Sentiments 2015 – Day 16: The Stranger at the Door

Tonight’s appetizer first got knees to being slapped far and wide on Day 16 of Season 5 and has become a fan favourite.

Whatever you drink with this, it should be something bubbly.

Dark Sentiments 2014 – Day 16: The Bum Puff Fairy

Previously published on October 16, 2014

“Toilet of Lampito” by Aubrey Beardsley – click to enlarge

Today’s Dark Sentiment is about things that some people permit to smell bad but shouldn’t, for there have been times and places in history, including very recent history if you get around much, when the olfactory senses have found themselves in need of assistance that has to be nothing short of supernatural.

The poem that follows was inspired by Toilet of Lampito by Aubrey Beardsley, of whom we’ve recently spoken.

The Bum Puff Fairy

By LFM

The Bum Puff Fairy comes to serve
Who speaks the righteous word.
He’ll freshen you both front and back,
And fears no size of turd.

To summon him to serve you is
As complex as it’s long,
But truly worth the trouble
For an arse that’s worth a song!

At moonlit crossroads, dig a hole,
And fill it up with rum,
Then add a bit of corn cob
That you’ve used to wipe your bum.

Next, counterclockwise spin about
Until the count of three,
Then just before you cover it,
Top up the hole with pee.

Now raise your kilt and moon the moon,
Then squat above the hole,
And speak these words as loud and clear
As with your very soul!

“Crossbow! Crossbow!
“Daddy shot a bear!
“Shot him up the asshole,
“And never touched a hair!”

Now fart three times and leap away,
The spell has come to pass!
Be speedy now, lest like the bolt
He shoots straight up your ass!

A thing of purest cleanliness
The Bum Puff Fairy is.
Every bum he cleans he makes
As clean a bum as his.

Your household full of privates,
When the Fairy sees them quelled,
Ensures that every fart and queef,
Though heard, is never smelled.

Despite his name, this Fairy’s not
Exclusively for ass.
He’ll quiet any stench from
Exudation come to pass.

He has a wee erection that
He will not leave alone,
So hand rubbed to perfection
That it gleams like polished bone.

A really small perversion though
For hygiene so profound,
But all the same you’d best not
Drop the soap when he’s around.

Tonight’s Dark Sentiment first appeared by the light of a waxing crescent moon on Day 10 of Season 4, and predates Canada’s formalized legal foray into medically assisted dying in 2016. Any choice of meditative elixir will go well with this one.

Dark Sentiments 2013 – Day 10: Death Comes to Call

Tonight’s Dark Sentiment appeared here on Day 8 of Season 3 and draws heavily on intimate personal acquaintance with a lovely and quite innocent house bearing a striking resemblance to the one atop which this particular, and singularly nasty, room abides.

Any libation bearing a strong hint of brimstone would go well with this I think.

Dark Sentiments 2012 – Day 8: The Attic Room

Tonight’s feature in our countdown to Season 11 was first published here on Day 26 of Season 2.

Hunter’s Moon is a terrible tale of primal travail, murder, cannibalism, infanticide, frontier justice, and absolute revenge. Whatever you drink with this, it shouldn’t be anything particularly smooth.

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 26: Hunter’s Moon

A word from your Host.

As our regular readers know, the month of October has a special significance to Mrs. LFM and me — Hallowe’en marks the anniversary of our marriage on the blessed 31st day of October 2008.

On the first day of October in the year 2010, we launched what has become an annual event here at LFM – 31 days of Dark Sentiments – one tasty morsel served here for each and every day in that most meaningful of months.

In keeping with tradition then,  each day of October in the thrice accused year 2020 we will again be publishing articles and items, music and movie reviews, film clips and book recommendations, memories and artifacts, all connecting straight back to the dark side. Some will make you laugh, some will trouble your dreams, and some will prevent sleep as we delve into the unknown, the misunderstood, and the better left alone.

As we spiral down into the revelries of this eleventh season, it behooves me as your not so gentle Host to acquaint, or reacquaint as applicable, those who find themselves here with the Dark Sentiments vibe by way of hand picked selections drawn from the catalogue of sins seasons past.

So now, in the spirit of all that’s unholy, pour yourself a spirit of your own and settle back with this draught from the past, first published here on Day Nine of Dark Sentiments, Season 1.

Dark Sentiments – Day 9

If my parents did hire a professional, I know she didn’t look like this because, even at the age of three, I would have remembered.

I was three when my parents bought the house on Lunenburg’s Cumberland Street where I grew up. It was a Cape Cod style house located in the “Old Town” section, and had been built in the late 1700’s or early 1800’s. The perimeter of the house rested on a foundation of whitewashed native slate, its center on a massive, cavernous stone bake oven that at one time was used for the purpose its name implies. My parents kept the entrance blocked up with a purpose-built wooden door to prevent drafts and only once was I ever inside it. My father one day caved to my youthful spirit of exploration, and we both stood inside for a while, wondering at the days when such an appliance was a necessary item of daily use.

Because I was so young at the time we took up residence, I have no firsthand knowledge of the strange events that disturbed my parents nightly, beginning after darkness fell on their first night in the house on Cumberland Street. I learned of them long after I reached school age, one night at our kitchen table, with both my parents as contributors – something came several times nightly, up the cellar stairs, and stopped at the door. It never came in or touched the latch, and when the door was opened suddenly, an act that would have sent anyone standing there careening back down, nobody was there.

My parents consulted the previous owners but came away with no more explanation than that it was a noise the old furnace sometimes made, which was all well and good except the furnace wasn’t running and the number of steps heard exactly matched the number of cellar stairs, every single time.

Ever the precocious child, meaning in this case “curious and persistent to the point of driving all about to the brink of insanity”, I inquired as to why, after so many years, I had never heard the footsteps myself. What caused them to stop? My father and mother exchanged the kind of glance that all children come to recognize as parental reluctance to to be truthful, and then my father replied that when the new furnace went in the sounds stopped, leading everyone to the conclusion that the explanation provided by the prior owners had been right after all.

I never learned the complete truth, but I do have a theory. My parents did something, or caused something to be done, that fixed their problem.

As a child, I was very aware of the all pervasive belief in my town in witches and enchantments. My family lore contains all manner of procedures designed to identify and thwart the efforts of a witch, and several citizens were occasionally spoken of in hushed tones as being practitioners of the dark arts who could be retained to assist those afflicted by evil designs and unwanted spirits. For example, a man I only ever heard referred to by the name of “Boo” Oxner was known to be a skilled wart charmer, employing magick to remove and keep away persistent eruptions of what was then a common ailment. Something I only learned of after his death because that was the first time anyone would speak openly of him. I learned he plied his craft on the condition that his methods never be disclosed under penalty of the worst plague of warts imaginable, not only for the whistle blower but his entire family as well. Even though his skills were mentioned after his death, and several people of my acquaintance — my Father included — admitted to having been his successful subjects, none would take the chance of speaking a word of what he did to them. Boo being a specialist, I doubt it was him, but I have always suspected my parents eradicated the cellar dweller with professional help of the kind one knows better than to speak about.

I’ve already discussed some of this lore as well as the hold the old ways had on Lunenburg, my father, and the people in general who lived there during my childhood, in a previous article published here on 6 September 2008 titled Musings as Hallowe’en Approaches. Clicking on the title will take you there and I invite you, dear reader, to give it a glance, whether first, second, or tenth. You will also learn a few things about why I am the way I am.

Sweet dreams.

The title of today’s utterance is taken from Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s favourite code phrase, and delivery, for signalling to his audience that they are being lectured to. From not enough physical distancing to people owning things he is ideologically opposed to, he’s used the term before and no doubt will again, hopefully at some point soon, in reference to himself. Until then, he really needs to stop writing his own lines.

I absolutely refuse to declare myself to the world as belonging to any particular school of political thought — something in these divided times that has come to be used as the yardstick by which may be measured the worth of anything one says, does, or may have ever done or come to do. To do so is to explain where no explanation is owed, permitting others to apply labels to their advantage and your detriment. Asked at election time if I intend to vote out of pure self-interest or, alternatively, with an eye to the Greater Goode, I will answer with an enthusiastic, “Absolutely!” Asked if I intend to vote for one party as opposed to another, my answer, accompanied by the appropriate Polish gesture, will be, “Is there a train running here?”

I have previously written on the topic of labels and my hatred of them as they have come to be used as a shortcut around, and absolution for, willful lack of understanding:

“Written words are visual guides to the making of sounds that, when uttered aloud, convey meaning. An example is the word “label”.

“A label can be a physical object that, when applied to another object, conveys important information about it. What it’s made of, how to use it, how long it may be kept, and the best means of storage before use or consumption. Things like that. These sorts of labels abound in today’s world and are vital to navigating the perils and pitfalls of acquiring and using the commodities we take for granted to feed ourselves and our families, clean our homes, ourselves, and possessions, and maintain our surroundings. To wipe our bums and blow our noses. Cure a headache.

“And then there’s the other kind of label. This kind also abounds in today’s world, but less as a means of conveying important information than as a short cut around understanding. Understanding requires a desire for knowledge, and a willingness to be observant. To think and draw conclusions. Unlike labels of any description, these attributes are not common in the world. If this type of label is applied to a controversial thing – a firearm for example – or worse yet, a person, the label alone comes to replace the true substance of that to which it’s applied. That’s how we get terms like “gun violence” for example, flying in the face of the fact that violence doesn’t come in flavours, and notwithstanding the implement that is used to bring it about, there is only violence, and it springs exclusively from the mind of its perpetrator

“Similarly, there is no “gay love” or “straight love”, there is only love. There is no ‘gay marriage’ or ‘mixed marriage’, there is only marriage. There are no ‘women’s rights’ or ‘gay rights’, there are only rights. In not one of these examples is there justification for tagging violence, love, marriage, or rights with a qualifying label branding it as something different from every other expression of it. The term ‘racial hatred’ doesn’t define a special brand of hatred. There is only hatred, and ‘racial’ is the excuse for its existence – a label. The same goes for ‘religious intolerance’.” ~ Worldly Wisdom Wednesday – Beware of Labels

As I have watched Justin Trudeau flummox his way through his time as Prime Minister of Canada, now highlighted by his leadership of the government in the face of the current pandemic crisis, he has done nothing to change my impression of him as a creature of pure ego and ideology, at least insofar as his public life has intersected my private one. As such, he has shown himself ever willing to seize credit for a popular outcome in the moment, even as he defers the inevitably negative fallout for a time when getting re-elected is not going to be an option anyway.

In this latter behaviour he differs not at all from the general herd of politicians who know their tenure comes with an expiry date so there is no time to waste padding the nest before that happens. Where he does differ is in a way that seems endemic to him — his decisions clearly spring from the belief that as long as you and those under your command are convinced the cause is noble (meaning it fits their world view), then any act of policy is justified and not only can, but must, be pursued with utmost vigour, sidestepping as necessary any pesky entanglements with how things are supposed to be done. Questionable motives exposed, there is always the path of contrition, and I have never seen any politician, let alone a serving prime minister, so prone to self-absolution by disingenuous apology.

(more…)

These are fraught times strewn with fears; both the named and nameless. This is nothing new. As in other times past when the barbarians weren’t merely at the gates but dwelt among us, the thinness of the veneer called civilization offers little contest to genesis of a mindless rabble bent on the taking of advantage and the settling of scores, real and imagined.

In my article titled The Best of Yourself, published here as part of the 2016 edition of my annual A Long Winter’s Night series, I quoted my Esteemed Friend Master At Arms James Keating:

“Think of your death now. It is at arm’s length. It may tap you any moment, so really you have no time for crappy thoughts and moods. None of us have time for that. The only thing that counts is action, acting instead of talking.

“Our death is waiting and this very act we’re performing now may well be our last battle on earth. I call it a battle because it is a struggle. Most people move from act to act without any struggle or thought. A hunter, on the contrary, assesses every act; and since he has an intimate knowledge of his death, he proceeds judiciously, as if every act were his last battle. Only a fool would fail to notice the advantage a hunter has over his fellow men. A hunter gives his last battle its due respect. It’s only natural that his last act on earth should be the best of himself ….” ~ Master At Arms James A. Keating, Hermitage – The Power of Solitude

The Hunter Jim refers to is a being far transcending the cruelly murderous engine of mayhem that haunts the imaginings of the Disconnected, and of whom I concluded:

“You don’t get to pick when the fat lady sings, and so as with Jim’s hunter who, ‘… gives his last battle its due respect,’ start treating your every act as your last, so it can Truly be said of you that your last act on earth was the best of yourself.”

Now take those thoughts to heart as we conclude with Ascension — (more…)

Source: http://www.home-designing.com/rustic-bedrooms-guide-and-inspiration-for-designing-them

Yet horns of war and strife now blow,
And echo through the land.
Loud enough, I hear them yet
From where I choose to stand.

For Peace is in that place, you see,
That strife is furthest from,
But no vantage have I ever found
Whence I can’t hear its drum.

~ The Woodsman’s Song ~

Rustic Snooze is not a real place in the sense that wood and stone are considered as the benchmark of real. Still, if you need it enough, it will find you, and you can find rest there.

Rustic Snooze

By LFM

Tired of all the madding nooze?
Facebook filled with foul peeyooze?
Need a spell of sweet repooze?
Find it here at Rustic Snooze.

Other inns have better vyooze,
Pedicures to pamper tooze,
Drinks made from exotic jooze,
For patrons long bereft of clooze.

If brow first’s how your life wind blooze
And rougher roads are those you chooze,
Don’t look for us, we’ll call for yooze,
With all you need at Rustic Snooze.

Here enjoy the finest booze,
Strong dark ales and hearty stooze,
Pulchritude of fairest flooze,
The kind you’d take to shop for shooze.

We’ve games of chance to win and looze,
A band that plays the darkest blooze,
And when comes time to doff your trooze,
A lullaby of lowing cooze.

At morning when the sun has rooze
You’ll find the light to rooster crooze,
And with it lessened worldly wooze,
As skins of onion peeled from Yooze.

However many nights to clooze
A guest may need to quell his throoze,
Stay as long as you may chooze,
Your room awaits at Rustic Snooze!

Source: https://www.lawyer-monthly.com/

“Growing up, I was always ahead of my contemporaries in my skills with the written and spoken word. To my great fortune, that gift was recognized and cultivated by a succession of exceptional Teachers. While I can’t pin down the date beyond the certainty that I was still in elementary school, I remember a day of epiphany. One of many I’ve had so far, this one respecting the power of words, and the awesome responsibility they place upon those who wield them.

“On that day, and in a flash of insight that made itself felt both mentally and physically, I came to the realization that, at my whim, I could influence the way another person felt or thought, in the short or long term, with the mere placement of a punctuation mark. The choice of one word over another, or their simple juxtaposition. When speaking, to one person or a group of any size, I could conjure even greater effect by combining words with the supporting expressions of intonation, body posture, gestures, and eye contact. As my understanding grew, so did my power, and with that the Spirit of the Thing Itself revealed new secrets to me in the form of timing, rhythm, the use of humour, and the all powerful pause.” ~ Worldly Wisdom Wednesday – The Way of Communication

Taking my words as quoted above, the average bloke might think I’m referring to something politicians and bureaucrats understand and wield entirely too well.

And that bloke would be wrong. (more…)