Secrets have I, many secrets...the Ancients once believed that our world was created from four
basic elements, but the truly wise saw what was beyond our world...they knew that not all could be explained
with what our eyes perceive...some knew of a fifth element...an ethereal con, what?...no, not
the movie...yes I'm sure...look, I just said that wasn't it...no, Bruce Willis has nothing to do with it...as I was saying...
what!?!...yes, Gary Oldman is a good actor...yes, I saw The Professional, Jean Reno was quite the badass...
look, can we get back to the topic!?!...thank you...the fifth element known to the ancients was...
no, I don't want to go rent it, for crying out loud! Can't I get through a single Mysteriously Powerful
introduction without you interrupting...geez!
Well here we are again. I can only assume that we continue to come together because we still hunger
for truth and enlightenment (that, plus that job at ESPN.com fell through..."no experience" my left butt
cheek..."you don't know anything about the job"...does that sound like a valid criticism to you?) Where
was I? Ah yes, a position of intellectual superiority...*pause*...well, I appreciate the response to the
challenge in the last installment, and I received several very good questions...I still need more however
(more! MORE! must have MORE! Give them ALL to MEEEE!!!) so, if you've got any new questions
send them to me, I promise not to laugh if they're
stupid...well, I won't laugh much...well, maybe I'll laugh a lot, but I promise not to show anyone else...
well, maybe only a few friends...at a dinner party...I might throw them into a public address, as the
opening joke...but I swear that I will not post them on to the internet...because how would I do that...
it's not like I have a weekly article on a website or anything...*nervous laughter*...
Well, on to the first question (that "won't tell anyone" bit to a long time didn't it...even I got tired of it...
sheesh). Our first question comes from M2Dukw (I don't even know how to start to pronounce that...),
he (or perhaps she) wrote:
Here's a history question but I'm sure it's easy for you: Where did the name for England come from?
Well, thanks for you question, and yes indeed, it is an easy one. England is a country with a long and
pretentious, uh I mean glorious past...yes glorious, that's much better. The origins of a country's
name are rarely all that complex or confusing, England is named "England" for a very simple reason...a whole
bunch of English people live there!...*pause*...Ha ha ha ha ha! I love that! English
people, get it?...No, well that's good, because it wasn't a joke. In general the reason a country in Europe
is named a certain way is that during the Mediaeval period, a bunch of people showed up, plopped
themselves down, and started calling it home. Most of these names come from their Latin equivalents.
For instance, France comes from Francia, Germany from Germania, and so on. Several
countries still use the Latin forms of their name, Austria and Russia for example. Each of those names
means the same thing, "----land" (Francia=Frankland, Germania=Germanland, etc.) In the case of England,
the people who got the naming rights were the Angles (who beat out the American Airlines bid by $22
million dollars, and offered to pay a concession royalty).
Right around 400 A.D. (none of that politically correct C.E. crap), the Island of Britain was home to
several people groups. The southeast of the country was primarily inhabited by Britons (a Celtic people), who were
part of the Roman Empire. About this time, the Western part of the Roman Empire was in a bad state, and
by 406 the last of the Roman Legions had left the island. The primary functions of the Legions was
to protect the island from Germanic pirates that ravaged the coastal areas and from the raiders that
inhabited the North of the island and Wales. With the legions gone, the Britons were left somewhat
defensless. In a typical late Roman fashion, the Britons invited a more "war-like" people to immigrate
and provide protection (much in the same way as the Franks and Goths had been invited on the Continent.)
In the case of the Britons, they invited the Saxons, a Germanic people (and actually some of the pirates
that had ravaged the coast.) Shortly after the Saxons came, so did the Angles, another Germanic
people from just north of the Saxon's original home. Like the Franks and Goths on the Continent, the
Angles and Saxons soon came to dominate the local Roman population and the Britons eventually took
an Anglo-Saxon identity (like the population in Francia took on a Frankish identity). The island eventually
came to be called Anglia (among other things), "Angleland"...say that three times quickly...
Angleland, Angland, England...and there ya go...
So that was the "off the top o' my head question, on to the second question. The "question I had to
research" comes from Metalboy (who, as I understand, was recently turned into a "real boy" by Jiminy
Cricket). He asks:
What are the DECLARED wars that the United States has been in?
Now, I was pretty sure that I knew this one off the top of my head, but I wasn't positive (at least not
enough to write it without checking), but I did turn out to be correct. The declared wars that the
United States has been in are as follows:
The Anglo-American War of 1812
The Mexican American War
The Spanish American War
World War One
World War Two
There are several conflicts that the United States has been involved in that weren't wars in the
technical sense.
The American Revolution (aka the Revolutionary War) wasn't a United States war because, well, the United States
didn't yet exist. The American Revolution was fought by British Colonial Citizens rebelling against their
government. The United States didn't properly exist until the ratification of the Constitution in 1787.
The American Civil War, while the bloodiest conflict (in terms of American lives) that the United
States was ever involved in, was not a declared war. Wars, in the literal sense, are fought between
sovereign powers, by declaring war upon the Confederate States, President Lincoln would have
been recognizing the legitimacy of their government, something he wasn't about to do. In fact, Lincoln
broke a whole lot of rules and precedents during the Civil War, and by pre-war legal thought, he was in
the wrong. That's a big ol' can of worms, so if you happen to be interested in the whole story,
send in a question.
The Korean War. This also was not a war, but a military action taken under the auspices of the
United Nations. This is the only time that the United Nations has undertaken an aggressive military operation
(i.e. not a "peacekeeping" mission).
The Vietnam War. For a whole lot of Americans, this one's a doozy. This was a "police action"
undertaken by the United States against communism. This was undertaken as part of a policy of
containment that was employed against communist powers, notably Soviet Russia. The general idea of
the policy is that Communism needed to expand to survive. If you restricted that expansion, the system
would eventually collapse...this eventually (when the USSR collapsed) became regarded as one of the
pillars of 20th century political thought.
Grenada. You're joking right?
Desert Shield/Storm, Somalia, Bosnia, etc. None of these are wars, they were all forms of UN or
NATO police action. In fact there is a general theory held by many (including myself) that the Nuclear
Age has changed the nature of war so that the outright declaration of war is too risky between Nuclear
powers, and that, barring mutual annihilation, wars will no longer be declared. But who knows, no one
can predict the future...
I congratulate Metalboy (as well as Jiminy Cricket) on asking the "question I had to research", and
for your efforts, I raise my glass...Salude!
Last week *cough, cough*, I had a fun time mocking some of the stupid/smartass questions that some
people had sent in, so I figured I'd do it again. I've also gotten some feedback that people think that
the articles are kinda short, so this should also help to pad the thing with some filler, so that the suckers
think that they're getting more...what?...uhhhh no, not you...I was, uh, talking about some other sucker...
...sucker...huh? No, I didn't say anything...why do you ask?...sucker...
Anyway, this week's "smartass question" comes from Chris Black (aka the Phantom...and yes, I do think
means the crappy movie with Billy Zane...that guy's just annoying...smarmy little grin...). He wrote:
What happened to the city of Muu? heres a tip the city was in the himalayas.and yes it
did exist. oh and by the way atlantis did exist. It was off the coast of the mediteranian sea(or
in that general area).
*pause*...*pause*...everyone take that all in?...no?...I'll give you a second...*pause*...Sooo, Chris...
your breakfast cereal talks to you, doesn't it? Don't worry, you can tell me...
If you will remember from last week...*COUGH*...Chris was the fellow who had asked "What happened to
Atlantis?"...Evidently he wasn't satisfied with my answer and decided to dig up another crackpot theory
for me to mock (but I mean that in the nicest possible way). First I'll address Atlantis (By the way, with your
detailed geographical information I'm surprised that no one's found it.)
Here's the story on Atlantis (and
it is just that, a story). Plato was the first to write about Atlantis, he described a island nation, larger
than Libya and Asia Minor combined, sitting in the Atlantic Ocean (thus the name Atlantis) just
beyond the pillars of Heracles (you know, those rocks in the Prudential commercials?). Plato described
the island as an advanced civilization and generally talked it up as an ideal (which is what it probably
was). This myth gained new life during modern times when a couple of hasty 19th century archeologists
published a couple of books on the subject. The legend has gained life since then, and is now part of
modern folklore (as well as the basis for a kickin' Donovan song). All of this despite the fact that there
is no evidence what so ever for it's existence (you'd think there'd be something laying around in the
ocean...) Currently the theory is taken most seriously by UFO nuts (and the Walt Disney Corporation)
who attribute all of the "Atlanteans' advancements" to Alien contact in Prehistory...they are also sure
that they saw Elvis at the Piggly Wiggly two towns over...
As for Muu, or Mu'a (as it is sometimes spelled), this is another one of these "Great Lost Civilizations" that
people like to fantasize about. Each region of the world seems to have one of these, and this time it's
in the Pacific Rim (sometimes it's Polynesian, sometimes it's Micronesian, in Chris' case, it seems to be
Himalayan.) The general run of these myths is that the "lost city" was once the center of a vast
empire that was incredibly advanced (for instance, the people in Mu'a already had PlayStation III*.) This
empire seems to be running quite smoothly, in the manner that fictional utopias tend to do, until one day
a great catastrophe comes along (damn catastrophes, always making trouble) and wipes out, not only
the civilization, but any and all evidence that it ever existed (although the catastrophe tends to leave
all of the fictional evidence in place, catastrophes are forgetful that way, and this is the evidence
that people today tend to use).
Hope I wasn't too hard on ya Chris, but if you write asking "Okay, What happened to El Dorado?" I will beat you...
I will beat you senseless...with a big stick...a really big stick...it might even have a sharp point...in
which case I will also poke you some...*pokes Chris*...
On to a more substantial topic, this week's quote contest winner. Once again StagCraft had the correct
answer, but he's not the winner. This week's winner was RPGMaster who provided a dense page of
information on Jean Cocteau. Congratulations RPGMaster. RPGMaster, there uh...there might be a problem with your "Naked Ghand".
You see it's in transit to StagCraft, and it's possible that he'll be upset about not winning this week...
there's a good chance that he won't want to give the "Naked Ghand" back (assuming it ever made it
through the post)...I'll let you know...we're considering legal action...maybe Johnny Cochrane ("This is
Chewbacca...Chewbacca is a wookie...")
An honorable mention goes to "John Doe" (we hope the police have some leads on his real identity) who
sent in the answer:
film maker, poet. dead french guy.
I'm not sure what you get for an honorable mention...maybe some croutons...I'll let you know...
I also got an...interesting email from Dark Templar. Now Dark Templar is a friend of mine, and I
like him a great deal...but this is just plain disturbing...
Yes King Kashue I know the quote this time and you will not deprive me of my naked Ghand...... well
unless it's a goat which is even better because I can make lots of goat Swiss cheese to fool the almighty foollios
damnation and make lots of money.......
...I mean this in the nicest possible manner...You need help...professional help...seriously...I'm not joking...
Ahh, now on to this week's quote contest. I got tired of all of the screw-ups that we've had with the
name of the quote contest, so I decided to go straight to the "top" (or the nearest to the top I can get)
and asked Despot to name the contest for me. I figured since he's a relatively "timely" person, he wouldn't
let me down on this one. So, without further ado, here (finally) is the new name for the quote contest
**INSERT CONTEST NAME HERE**
*sighs* okay, what went wrong? He sent an email? Okay, well I trust that Despot had a good reason
for this, so I'm not going to get too worried about it. So what's the email say?
"Psst...Hey Guido. It's all so clear to me now. I'm the keeper of the cheese, and you're
the lemon merchant, get it? And he knows it! That's why he's gonna kill us! We gotta get
outta here! Yea, before he lets loose the marmosets on us! Don't worry, little missy, I'll save you!"
...*pause*...okay, now I'm worried...
Anyhoo, here's this week's quote
"Youth is a blunder; manhood a struggle; old age a regret."
If you know who said that, let me know.In the
meantime we'll check on Despot and see if he's been eating paint...or even worse, Pringles...*shivers*
...those are just...unnatural...
*Though it still wasn't all that great for FPS games...but the Madden Football rocked...
great graphics...you could even see Ricky Williams' gold teeth...
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