about 4000 years ago, a great army of Kurds (from Kurdistan in Iraq) swept across the Middle East, conquering vast areas of land. They pushed westward until they reached what is the present state of Israel. There, they met staunch resistance from a small tribe of mountain dwellers called the Yerms. The Yerms were wonderful archers. They would simply wait in the hills until the Kurds passed through the valleys below, then they would shower the Kurdish soldiers with hundreds of arrows. For defense, the Yerms built a series of underground tunnels in which they could seek refuge whenever they were threatened.
After a long struggle, the Yerms were finally defeated, and the Kurds conquered the land. There was one Yerm, however, who had not given up. He decided to exact revenge. The Kurdish King had set up his capitol in Jerusalem, a city dominated by hills on the East. Through these hills there was only one narrow pass providing easy passage to Kurdistan. The last remaining Yerm guarded the pass and shot everyone who tried to get through. When the Kurdish soldiers came after him, he simply scuttled into one of the tunnels the Yerms had dug and escaped.
This distressed the King of the Kurds. Because of one lowly Yerm, no important messages or emissaries could pass through from his kingdoms in the East. The King had his military leaders identify the scrawniest, fastest soldier in the army. He called the man to his throne room one day and told him to go into the hills alone at night, sneak into the Yerm’s tunnels and capture that one last remaining Yerm. The soldier went out that very night, but never returned.
The King then identified and commissioned his second scrawniest soldier to attempt the same thing. That second scrawny soldier was never seen again. For weeks, the King kept sending out his dwindling supply of scrawny soldiers but none ever returned.
The King had become terribly discouraged when, one day, a big, burly soldier appeared before him and claimed he could capture the Yerm. The King doubted the wisdom of the move, but in his desperation he directed the big Kurd to find and capture the wily Yerm.
The next morning, bright and early, the King was awakened by the return of the soldier who marched into the palace with the Yerm slung over his shoulder. The delighted King promptly promoted the Kurd to captain of the guard, and, as was Kurdish custom, made the Yerm his personal man-servant.
As the new captain turned to leave, the King stopped him and asked, “Captain, how did you capture the Yerm?”
The big, burly soldier responded, “Sire, everyone knows that the burly Kurd catches the Yerm!”
Dear Sir
I see that this is filed under ‘humour’.
This is a serious misrepresentation. [see Trades Description Act 1856 - Humour Standards - Directive 38 - sub-section 149b]
Take this as an official warning. If such a travesty should happen again I’ll be filing a full report to the World Blog Council.
Your faithful idiot savant
Daddy Papersurfer
Salve, Magister AerChius Dudius [Bonjour Monsieur Aerchiè Dudiè]
FIRST BLAST OF THE TRUMPET AGAINST THE MONSTROUS REGIMENT OF WOMEN
ScHocking – das geDammen und das geBlasten
This is a serious, educational Blogge, much-visited by Intellectual Ladies, Children and other Erudite Animals, including [if we are lucky] a Sagacious RacCcoon and a Distinguished Cooking-Frogge
…. AND with occasional Star-Visits from her Aristocratic Grace Scarlet RegenCoaster Marchionesse de WitchHampton etc
It is outRAGEous that you should expose them to such an obliviously humorous NUP
It is this sort of thing that attracts to this kindly space those Meerkats, Evolutionists and other Rougher Elements
I flatter myself that I agree with the entertaining Pater Papier-SurFèrier on so many things
- apart of course on whether the Isle of Wight should be towed into the North Sea and sunk, in order :
*** non solum [not only] to protect unfortunate BP Executives from circumnavigating that Isle, when it only annoys vote-hungry US Politicians and when they should be diving a mile down to the Caribbean Sea-Floor with ample supplies of Leak-Plugging Plasticene
*** sed etiam [but also] to protect anxious Norfolk Cliff-Dwellers from the Coastal Erosion that would otherwise be an inevitable outcome consequent to the UK Coalition’s savage abolition of Milk-for-Nursery-Infants and of other wasteful Government expenditure
However, it is NOT that this DREADFUL nup is without humor ….. but visitors will be too busy GiGGling, instead of wailing over the prospect of the Upside-Down Continent’s electing a Prime Minister who is one of the Monstrous Regiment of Wimmin
Harrumphus, harrumpha, harrumphum
Vale [Ciao]
L’Aigle Gris
I agree with G. Eagle Esq ……. whatever he said …. [trying to remember if I'd mentioned my rather radical thoughts about towing the Isle of Wight northwards ...... must check security settings on eBay]
Yeah, what they said.
Why is the word history always preceded with ‘an’ instead of ‘a’? I seem to never understand that.
Looking into the language rules more closely, accepting that “an” is used in front of words beginning with a vowel, including the odd case of “h” words with a silent “h”, then there is the following;
“the system is: if the stress does not fall on the first syllable, then an rather than a is used. The h is not silent.
a history of England.
an historical timeline.
an historian of note
a hysterisis curve
an hysterical outburst
a hospital
an hospitible working environment”
The cases where “an” is acceptable are those where the “h” is diminished because the stress is on the second syllable.
It seems I was being an pretentious twat!
… but not in comparison with a certain Aquilan ……
I have been wondering just where the meercats are hiding.
Here they are:
http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/maverick/alpha3