The Edmondson Blog

You know you're going to have a bad Christmas when you get back from a visit to the boys room and Hitler has stolen your place.

Inscriptions from the mausoleum of Daniel and William Cormack, in the cemetery at Loughmore, County Tipperary, Ireland:

By the IRISH RACE, in memory of the brothers DANIEL and WILLIAM CORMACK who for the murder of a land agent named ELLIS were hanged at NENAGH after solemn protestation by each on the scaffold of absolute and entire innocence of that crime, the 11th day of May 1858. The tragedy of the brothers occurred through false testimony procured through GOLD and terror, the action in their trial of JUDGE KEOGH, a man who considered personally, politically, religiously and officially was one of the monsters of mankind, and the verdict of a prejudiced, partisan packed perjured jury. Clear proof of the innocence of the brothers afforded by ARCHBISHOP LEAHY to the VICEROY of the day but he nevertheless gratified the appetite of a bigoted, exterminating and ascendancy caste by a judicial murder of the kind which lives bitterly and perpetually in a nation’s remembrance.

Visi sunt oculis insipientium mori illi autem sunt in pace. [In the sight of the unwise they seem to die, but they are in peace.]

In commemoration of the removal of the remains of the CORMACK BROTHERS from the jailyard at NENAGH to this mausoleum on May 11th 1910. In the morning a solemn REQUIEM OFFICE and HIGH MASS were celebrated in the Parish Church, Nenagh, Canon McMahon presiding, and an immense number of Killaloe priests being in the choir. The funeral cortege which contained MR JOHN DILLON, M.P., MR J. HACKETT, M.P., and many others of high name and inspiring example, was by magnitude, representative-ness and observance unprecedented in IRELAND. At Loughmore, the pastor preached a funeral oration and assisted by priests from IRELAND, ENGLAND, AMERICA and AUSTRALIA, officiated at the placing of the remains here to rest in peace and honour until the day of their vindication by Jesus Christ before the whole human race in the Valley of Josophat.

Corpora sanctorum in pace sepulta sunt: et vivent nomina eorum in aeternum R.I.P. [The bodies of the saints are buried in peace; and their names live for evermore. R.I.P.]

According to Google Search Results.

Events for each year determined by the first page of Google search results for the phrases:

• by [year]
• in year
• by the year [year]
• in the year [year]
• will * by the year [year]
• will * in the year [year]
• in [year], * will
• by [year], * will

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.


On 2nd May, 1915, Lieutenant Alexis Helmer was killed by German artillery fire and was buried that day. In the absence of the chaplain. his friend, Major John McCrae, brigade-surgeon with the First Brigade of the Canadian Forces Artillery, conducted a simple service at the graveside.

It is believed that John McCrea began his famous poem In Flanders Fields that evening, writing it on a scrap of paper upon the back of fellow officer, Lawrence Cosgrave during a lull in the fighting.

Alexis Helmer’s grave was lost in later fighting and so he is one of the 54,896 names commemorated on the Menin Gate Memorial.


John McCrea’s poem was published in Punch that December and became the most famous poem of the Great War. It was the inspiration for poppies being sold in remembrance of the War Dead. He never returned home, dying in France of pneumonia in 1918.

Lawrence Cosgrave went on to become the Canadian signatory to the Japanese Instrument of Surrender at the end of the Second World War.

My neighbour knocked on my door at 2:30am this morning! Can you believe that, 2:30am?! Luckily for him I was still up playing my Bagpipes.

The Grim Reaper came for me last night, and I beat him off with a vacuum cleaner. Bloody hell, talk about Dyson with death!

Paddy says "Mick, I'm thinking of buying a labrador."
"Strewth" says Mick "have you seen how many of their owners go blind"

I've just had a letter back from Screwfix. They said they regretted to inform me that they're not actually a dating agency.

I went for my routine check up today and everything seemed to be going fine until he stuck his index finger up my bum! - Do you think I should change dentists?

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A man walks into a Welsh pub and orders a white wine spritzer.

The bar goes silent as everyone stares at him..."Where are you from, you sound English?"

"I'm from across the Severn," replies the man nervously.

"What do you do, just across the Severn?"

"I'm a taxidermist."

"What on earth is one of those?"

"I mount animals."

"It 's alright boys," shouts the barman, He's one of us."

• The fattest knight at King Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference. He acquired his size from too much pi.
• I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian.
• She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.
• A rubber band pistol was confiscated from algebra class, because it was a weapon of maths disruption.
• No matter how much you push the envelope, it'll still be stationery.
• A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was prosecuted for littering.
• A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.
• Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie.
• A hole has been found in the nudist camp wall. The police are looking into it. Two hats were hanging on a hat rack in the hallway. One hat said to the other: 'You stay here; I'll go on a head.'
• I wondered why the football kept getting bigger. Then it hit me.
• The midget fortune-teller who escaped from prison was a small medium at large.
• The soldier who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.
• A backward poet writes inverse.
• In a democracy it's your vote that counts. In feudalism it's your count that votes.
• When cannibals ate a missionary, they got a taste of religion. Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, so they lit a fire in the craft. Unsurprisingly it sank, proving once again that you can't have your kayak and heat it.
• Two hydrogen atoms meet. One says, 'I've lost my electron.' The other says 'Are you sure?' The first replies, 'Yes, I'm positive.'
• Did you hear about the Buddhist who refused Novocain during a root canal? His goal: transcend dental medication.
• There was the person who sent ten puns to friends, with the hope that at least one of the puns would make them laugh. No pun in ten did.

Easter is a movable feast, meaning it is not fixed in relation to the civil calendar, but is, in fact, linked to the Jewish Passover as the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus occurred at the time of those observances.

Early Christians relied on the Jewish community to determine the date, but by the late 3rd century some Christians began to express dissatisfaction with what they took to be the disorderly state of the Jewish calendar.

Eventually, the method of setting the date of Easter was established by the First Council of Nicaea, a council of Christian bishops convened in Nicaea in Bithynia (present-day İznik in Turkey) by the Roman Emperor Constantine I in A.D. 325. This Council is historically significant as the first effort to attain consensus in the church through an assembly representing all of Christendom.

The Council established the date of Easter as the first Sunday after the Paschal Full Moon.

The Paschal Full Moon refers to the first ecclesiastical full moon after the northern spring equinox. The name Paschal is derived from the Greek word Pascha which is itself derived from the Hebrew pesach, both words meaning Passover, the Jewish feast.

Ecclesiastically, the equinox is reckoned to be on March 21 regardless of the astronomically correct date, and therefore the Paschal Full Moon is not necessarily the astronomically correct date. Consequently, the date of Easter varies between 22nd March and 25th April. Eastern Christianity bases its calculations on the Julian Calendar whose 21st March corresponds, during the twenty-first century, to 3rd April in the Gregorian Calendar, in which calendar their celebration of Easter therefore varies between 4th April and 8th May.

King Henry VIII of England
King George I of Great Britain
King Francis I of France
King Frederick the Great of Prussia
King Herod of Judea
Czar Ivan "the Terrible"
Czar Paul I
Pope Alexander VI
Pope Leo X
Emperor Commodus
Emperor Tiberius
Adolf Hitler
Julius Caesar
Benito Mussolini
Thomas Aquinas
Johann Sebastian Bach
Charles Bandelaire
Al Capone
Randolph Churchill
Captain James Cook
Hernan Cortez
Frederick Delius
Albrecht Durer
Desiderius Erasmus
Paul Gauguin
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Francisco Goya
Heinrich Heine
John Keats
Ferdinand Magellan
Guy de Maupassant
John Milton
Edonard Monet
Friedrich Nietzsche
Arthur Schopenhauer
Franz Schubert
Henri Toulouse-Lautrec
Jonathan Swift
Voltaire
Oscar Wilde

Syphilis was long thought to have originated in the Americas and to have begun its spread around the world after Columbus's voyage in 1492. The disease may have been in Europe before Columbus, but it became commonplace after the arrival of new strains from the New World. The first European epidemic broke out in 1494, spread in part by retreating French troops after the siege of Naples.

Whatever its origins, the disease swept through the European population in the sixteenth century At its peak in the nineteenth century syphilis affected as much as 15 percent of the adult population of Europe and North America, but it has largely died out since the development of penicillin in the 1940s. While it is impossible to retrospectively diagnose with complete accuracy there is evidence that syphilis afflicted everyone on this list.

Supervision of the early Olympic marathons was a trifle lax. The winner of the 1900 event in Paris, an enterprising local baker's delivery boy named Michel Theato, used his knowledge of the city geography to take advantage of a few shortcuts down back alleys and side streets.

Four years later at the St. Louis Olympics, the marathon was held on a grueling course on a hot afternoon, and only fourteen of the original thirty-two starters made it to the finish, led by an uncannily fresh-looking American, Fred Lorz. He was just about to accept his gold medal on the winner's podium when word got around that he had hitched a lift from a passing motorist who had dropped him just outside the stadium after conveying him the last eleven miles. Controversially, his gold medal went to Thomas Hicks, whose trainers had given him a mixture of brandy and strychnine keep him going.

In 1902, the Tour de France reached an all-time low amid widespread skullduggery and outright cheating. Spectators left nails in the road in front of their favorites' rivals, while riders took car trips and even train rides. The first four riders were disqualified, including one who had been pulled along by the car in front by means of a wire attached to a cork in his mouth.

Although he finished three hours behind the first-place rider and with two flat tires, race officials declared Henri Cornet the winner.

Stella Walsh dominated the 1932 Olympic 100-metre sprint, confirming her status as the top female sprinter of the 1930s.

Forty-three years later, after becoming an American citizen and being inducted into the U.S. Track and Field Hall of Fame, she was killed by a stray bullet in a robbery.

The post mortem revealed that "she" was a he. Ironically, when Walsh lost the title in Berlin in 1936 to her bitter rival Helen Stephens, team mates hinted that Stephens was too fast be a woman and doctors were called to examine the new champion and confirmed that she was female.

Four years later, another Olympic gender-bender, Hitler Youth member Hermann Ratjen, dreams of glory for the Fatherland when he taped up his genitalia and entered the Berlin Olympics as "Dora." Disappointingly, he just misses out on the medals when he finishes in fourth place in the women's high jump.

Sports' most inventive cheat may have been Boris Onischenko, a Red Army major from Ukraine. A veteran at the modern pentathlon — a five-discipline event including fencing — Onischenko arrived at the Montreal Olympics in 1972 as a hot favorite for the gold, having won two silvers and a bronze in three previous Olympiads.

Britain's epee No. 1, Sergeant Jim Fox, was outclassed and easily outpointed by Onischenko, but complained that his opponent had been scoring without actually hitting anyone. Upon examination of the Soviet athlete's sword, it was revealed to be wired up so he could trigger the electronic scoring system with his hand and register a hit at will. "Boris the Cheat" exited the Olympics in disgrace as a new career in the Siberian salt mines beckoned.

An Englishman, a Frenchman, a Spaniard and a German are all standing watching a street performer do some excellent juggling. The juggler notices that the four gentlemen have a very poor view, so he stands up on a large wooden box and calls out, "Can you all see me now?"
"Yes."
"Oui."
"Sí."
"Ja."

This is one of those emails that has gone viral - people receive it, have a good laugh and send it on to all their friends, who then do the same and send it on to more and more friends. You may already have received it. The email goes something like:

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

A real reply from the Inland Revenue. The Guardian newspaper had to ask for special permission to print it. The funniest part of this is imagining the content of the letter sent to the Tax Office which prompted this reply!


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The reality is even more funny. If you seach H J Lee (the supposed signatory to the letter) on Google you will find this piece from The Guardian from Saturday 31 January 2004:

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How Jobs & Money fooled the world

A spoof letter, supposedly written to columnist Chris Addison by an Inland Revenue official, went further than we anticipated, writes Patrick Collinson.

It began as a spoof letter from the Inland Revenue written for Jobs & Money by back-page columnist, comedian Chris Addison. But, plucked (unauthorised, we'd add) from The Guardian's website, it has found its way into countless emails and websites across the world. You've may even have seen it in your own email box, telling you it's a "real" letter from the taxman.

The letter has spun its way on to websites from Finland to New Zealand, been reprinted in newspapers and featured in internet forums. Chat rooms in the US bemoan the fact their own Internal Revenue Service does not have the same sense of humo(u)r as those whacky Brits. One talked of the "deliciously understated" civil servant and the equally over-stated writer.

In its oddest manifestation, it even found its way back via email to Addison himself.

"It had evidently been forwarded through a number of people, each of whom had blunderbussed the thing to their entire address book. Several of my friends also received it from different sources," he says.

"I don't know what's weirder - the coincidence of somebody sending you your own writing without realising it, or the sheer stupidity of the person who originally started sending it about in the belief that it was a real letter. I can only hope nobody took up the advice on starting a small business that I doled out."

That the fake letter has found so many believers suggests we'd rather prefer it if the Inland Revenue wrote to us in this way. Even the Adam Smith Institute, bastion of right-wing economics, fell for the letter. On the think-tank's website, its president, Dr Madsen Pirie, called it a "model of manners", adding that "courtesy costs little, but it can act as a soothing oil to lubricate some of the rougher edges of modern life - even tax demands. I think its politeness is commendable."

The Mail on Sunday liked it too. We will spare the blushes of the reporter from that newspaper who rang us at Jobs & Money to ask for a contact number for Mr HJ Lee - the entirely fictitious Inland Revenue employee created by Mr Addison.

On a website called Commonsense & Wonder based (we believe) in the US, the Addison letter reappears with the comment: "You have to credit the British sense of humor, the IRS would probably knock down your door and haul you off in response to the same. Anyway, this is the funniest letter I have ever seen from a government bureaucrat."

In case you didn't see the column first time round, you can read it here. And remember, if you filed your genuine correspondence from the taxman next to the toilet in case of emergencies, this weekend is the final deadline for filling in self-assessment tax forms.

Nuts are defined as a simple, dry fruit with one seed (very occasionally two) in which the seed case wall becomes very hard at maturity. True nuts include pecan, sweet chestnut, beech, acorns, hale, hornbeam and alder.

Peanuts

Peanuts aren't nuts. They are a type of pea which grows underground. They are native to South America but now widely cultivated, notably in Georgia, in the United States. They are also known as groundnuts, earthnuts, goobers, pinders, Manila nuts and monkey nuts. Some people are so severely allergic to peanuts that eating a tiny amount can be fatal; but these people may not be allergic to true nuts. So the health warning on a packet of peanuts ("may contain nuts") is, strictly speaking, untrue.

Brazil nuts

Brazil nuts aren't nuts. Like horse chestnuts, they are seeds contained in a capsule or pod, which splits apart. True nuts don't split - the sped and the fruit are one and the same. Brazil nuts mostly come from Bolivia (in Brazil, they are called castanhas, or chestnuts). They grow at the very top of enormously tall trees, in round wooden capsules packed with between eight and two dozen seeds. When the pods fall the seeds are released.

A Brazil nut is 65 per cent oil. In a packet of muesli full of seeds, nuts and cereal, Brazil nuts always end up on top if you shake the packet; this is called the Brazil nut effect.

Coconuts

Coconuts aren't nuts. They are drupes (from the Greek dryppa, meaning "tree- ripened"). Drupes are fruit with a fleshy outer coating enclosing a hard shell containing a seed: almonds, walnuts, olives, dates and coffee. The word "coconut" comes from the Spanish and Portuguese word coco, which means "monkey face". Explorers found a resemblance to a monkey's face in the three round indented markings found at the base of the coconut.

Coconuts contain coconut water, not coconut milk. The milk is made by grating the flesh into the water and straining it. Fresh coconut water is an excellent hangover cure. It is completely sterile, full of vitamins and minerals and is isotonic (it has the same balance of salts as human blood). You could survive on a desert island eating and thinking only coconut.

Walnuts

Walnuts aren't nuts. They are also drupes. Their name in Old English, walhnutu, meant "foreign nut", from wealh, "foreign" (also the root for Wales). This was because they were introduced from Gaul and needed to be distinguished from the native hazelnut.

Because walnuts resemble the brain, they were believed in medieval times to be able to cure headaches. More recently, Nasa has used pulverised walnut shells as thermal insulation in the nose cones of its rockets.

Cashew nuts

Cashews aren't nuts. They are the seeds of the cashew drupe, a member of the poison-ivy family. The cashew's seed lining contains a powerful irritant called anacanlic acid (which is why they are never served or sold in their skins).

The botanical name Anacardium refers to the shape of the fruit, which looks like an inverted heart (ana "upwards" + kardion "heart").

Unlike Brazil nuts, cashews really do come from Brazil.

The Portuguese planted them in Goa in the late 1500s and from there they spread through Asia and Africa.

(Sean makes a mistake in the first verse.)

As I was a goin' over the far famed Kerry mountains
I met with Captain Farrell and his money he was counting
I first produced my pistol and I then produced my rapier
Saying "Stand and deliver" for he were a bold deceiver

Chorus:
musha ring dumma do damma da
whack for the daddy 'ol
whack for the daddy 'ol
there's whiskey in the jar

I counted out his money and it made a pretty penny
I put it in me pocket and I took it home to Jenny
She sighed and she swore that she never would deceive me
But the devil take the women for they never can be easy

(Chorus)

I went up to my chamber, all for to take a slumber
I dreamt of gold and jewels and for sure 't was no wonder
But Jenny drew me charges and she filled them up with water
Then sent for Captain Farrell to be ready for the slaughter

(Chorus)

't was early in the morning, just before I rose to travel
Up comes a band of footmen and likewise Captain Farrell
I first produced me pistol for she stole away me rapier
I couldn't shoot the water, so a prisoner I was taken

(Chorus)

Now there's some take delight in the carriages a rolling
and others take delight in the hurling and the bowling
but I take delight in the juice of the barley
and courting pretty fair maids in the morning bright and early

(Chorus)

If anyone can aid me 't is my brother in the army
If I can find his station in Cork or in Killarney
And if he'll go with me, we'll go rovin' through Killkenny
And I'm sure he'll treat me better than my own a-sporting Jenny

(Chorus)

Sir,
I was disappointed to fall behind with checking your blog.
Bet R. Latethannerver

Sir,
You look neat, talk about a treat! You look dapper from your napper to your feet.
N.E. Oldhyon
N.E. Oldhyon
N.E.N.E. Oldhyon

Sir,
I utterly deplore the axing of the Light Brigade in the latest defence spending review.
Arthur Leigh Gonward

Sir,
Given last month’s inclement weather, are the global warmers sure they are not barking up the wrong tree?
I. Sage

Monseur,
Votre blog est magnifique. J’adore reading it quand je suis sur la plage.
Philippe Faloppe

Sir,
All this sibling rivalry stuff with the Milibands is surely rather overdone. After all, we have always enjoyed a wonderful relationship as brother and sister, despite our radically different views on how society should be organised.
Anna Key
Oleg R. Key

Sir,
Does that great American thesbian Bruce Willis read your blog?
Di Hard

Sir,
Bruce Willis an American thespian? Having recently watched the sequel, I could have sworn he was from the valleys.
Dai Harder

Sir,
I was gratified to read the response to my letter regarding the great thespian Bruce Willis. I have checked with my friend and can confirm he is of American nationality.
Di Hard with
A. Vengance

Sir,
Dai Harder mentions the American thespian Bruce Willis. The immediate past Governor of California is of course a far superior thespian.
Albie Bach

Sir,
With the terror threat recently raised, is it just me that’s worried about a possible attempt on the Editor’s life?
Dave (The Jackal)

Sir,
We wish to complain about there being very few Shakespearean articles on your blog.
Mike Ing
Dom Farrer-Hawse

Sir,
I fully agree that there are too few Shakespearean articles on your blog.
Elsie Knorr

Sir,
I agree with your previous correspondents that your blog needs more Shakespearean references
Toby Arnott OBE

Sir,
Though I write as a chap, I can confirm on behalf of the married womenfolk of our little Berkshire town that they believe your blog should have more Shakespearean references.
Murray Wives (of Windsor)

Sir,
Cry God! For Harry! And St George!
Wayne Smoruntu
D. Breech (dear friends)

Sir,
We agree about the lack of Shakespearean contributions. This is a grave lack, and we will have to dig deep.
Alice Poryorik
I. Newimwell

Sir,
Shakespeare? What about Dickens?
(Mr.) Mick Orber

Sir,
I would like to see more coverage in your blog of Irish refuse collectors during the French Revolution.
Jack O’Bins

Sir,
I agree with Jack O'Bins reference to the French Revolution.
Marian Twinette

Sir,
With reference to the Irish bin men contribution to the French Revolution, even I could claim to be closer to the cutting edge of events than Jack O’Bins.
Gill O'Teen

Sir,
We read your blog in Ireland.
Topol de Marnun
Toby Shaw
Toby Shaw

Sir,
Your blog has reached Japan.
Harry Kirry

Sir,
As a Chinese man with a Yorkshire parent, I can confirm that your blog is read in Hong Kong.
Foo Kinnell

Sir,
We read your blog in Oz.
Walt Zing
Matt Ilder

Sir,
I can confirm your blog is read in Oz.
Dan Under

Sir,
Your blog has now reached the extremes of the galaxy.
O.B. Wonk
Hen Obee

Sir,
We can confirm that your blog has reached the extremes of the galaxy
Sue Pernova
O. Ryan Spelt

"There is a long history of David Truscott visiting this particular farm, and seeking sexual gratification while immersed in cow dung and mud," prosecuting counsel Jill Wilson told magistrates in Truro. "This farm appears to be the only place where he seeks to gratify himself in this particular manner. For years, the farmer has had to check his livestock and equipment regularly, because Truscott has repeatedly masturbated in his muck spreader, and set fire to outbuildings when farm equipment was cleared out, in an attempt to stop him from committing this lewd and obscene act. This has been going on for seven years."

Truscott had earlier pleaded guilty to breaking a restraining order, imposed after previous misconduct at the farm.

"On this occasion he was spotted naked in a field, sexually pleasuring himself amongst the mud and cow dung," Wilson continued. "When police officers arrived, they found him covered in a large amount of slurry and mud, in a quagmire, surrounded by tissues. The restraining order was made in 2009, prohibiting him from entering the farm for any reason. He seems to be in the grip of a compulsion."

Truscott was remanded in custody.