Dear bugs,
Please stop flying into my eyes. It’s annoying, and given the frequency of the occurrence I can’t help but presume (seeing that the rest of my head has no lack of room in which to collide with, and yet miraculously remains consistently impact free), that the eyeball assault is a deliberate act on your part. Which would make you all dicks. Please stop being dicks, bugs. Or else.
No doubt you’re now wondering why you should stop, and by what possible means I, who am only one, could possibly force you, who are legion, to cease your icky tirade against my eyeballs. To this I say: annihilation.
Before you balk, let me remind you that I am a mediocre artist of little recognition, and if history has taught us anything it’s that when mediocre artists of little recognition go bad, they go bat-shit-kicking-babies-that-are-holding-handicapped-puppies-bad.
Understand: I will burn the world down to get you. I will level forests and mountains and cities. I will poison oceans and flood deserts, and I will salt the earth behind me as my fiery rampage marches on, only pausing to bask in the perpetual twilight of mushroom clouds and nuclear winter skies as the earth begins to sickeningly keel out of its delicate orbit. And then, when only I and the most resilient of cockroaches remain, it and I will briefly and desperately struggle against one another, until it inevitably dies with my hands around its thorax.
I will then lay myself down and watch the hazy glare of the sun steadily shrink away into the infinite distance, and as the radiation poisoning forces the sight from my eyes, I will giggle to myself, and my laughter will be the sound of the end of the world.
Stay out of my eyes, bugs. —Picked Carapice Out Of His Eyelashes For The Last Time
This article appears in Aug 16-22, 2012.
You’ll have to go through me first..
Oh, it is SO on:
http://cinemaknifefight.files.wordpress.co…
http://listverse.files.wordpress.com/2011/…
http://cache.io9.com/assets/resources/2008…
http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lrlorlkC…
I like the troops, Ivan. The best of the best!
I’d like to see the OB take on ONE of those.
you’re a big baby, op
It is a very well written bitch, and honestly, who hasn’t wanted to nuke the whole rotten ball of crap over a minor irritant. >: )
QUIET YOU FOOL! You’ll only succeed in angering them! Threaten them at your own peril!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKbFb6TPVEA
Although, props for using both babies and handicapped puppies in a single adjective.
(Anyone know the best way to clean nose coffee off of a flatscreen monitor?)
it is a LOVELY composition. and yeah, who couldn’t get murderous about ants, the arrogant buggers marching across my floor heading for anything, anything they can get their little mandibles on. i had sugar in a glass canister, with a rubber seal inside the lid and they got in! i don’t know how many i have choked out because they skittered up into my cup of coffee on my desk. and they do target you, OP. i know they do. ants can jump, they fling themselves at my arms and legs when i am trying to snuffle them up with the vacuum. for you, i would suggest wearing eyeglasses. geeze, i wrote a po-em about cockroaches years ago, i wonder if i can find it, ‘t’was a sonnet.
OB, might I suggest some sunglasses & bug spray, instead of mushroom clouds…we all have to share this miserable rock. Now I’m going to sit on my deck to feed the mosquitoes.
I love the little buggers. Sure, horse flies and mosquitoes test your patience but their incredible adaptibility not to mention toughness is awe-inspiring. I nuked a cold dinner the other night for two minutes and when I took it out, there was an ant on the plate. Amazing! Fleas, ever smack one of those beasts crawling up your leg? You smack hard enough to make your leg sting and the flea just jumps away.
Luckily for all of us, the way in which insect breathes (little tubes through the exoskeleton) plus the amount of oxygen available in the atmosphere keeps them small. For else, they’d be writing bitches about us getting in their eyes.
^^^ you mean all those movies that scared the macaroni out of me when i was a kid were made-up???? that one with the spider’s leg moving past the kid’s bedroom window……..
and small may be an eleastic term..when i lived in unnamed tropical isle the cockroaches were the size of my hands, and FLEW around. aiming at my face, like OP.
Bahaha, Troodon. They’d be getting US in THEIR eyes.
My imagination is going to have fun with that idea for the rest of the day
At the very least, I hope that we have convinced the OP that ,in this case at least, the nuclear option is apt to cause more problems than it will solve.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjiOb8WZoEo
Poor Paul Winfield has never had very good luck with creepy crawlies.
http://adland.tv/n1rv4n4g8/poster/fly1.jpg
ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh cockroaches! and hey! how come HER white pants stay white after dumping the bike?
Ummmm – a metaphor for the unbreakable purity of the human spirit?
Or lousy continuity on a low budget stank-epic. As the late great George Peppard once said: “Sure I’ve done some crap. Face it, sometimes you’re lucky to get crap”
You know there’s a species of mite that lives exclusively on your eyelashes, right OP? There’s at least 4-5 little mite butts sticking out around the follicles. When you go to sleep tonight, they’ll crawl out, fuck on your face, and go back home(which is inside your face) to lay eggs.
nothing worse than riding your bike or cycle or even an atv, with an open face helmet on. those fucking thing seem to zero in on the eyes or mouth, and only when you have either of them open.
in stewiacke last year, had a fucking hornet fly up into my closed in helmet, holy fuck, i stopped and ripped it off and tossed it down. just as sure as fuck, didn’t a lone flying one get me in the neck.
those little fucks should all be eliminated from the face of the earth. the only good bug, is a dead one. and those little fucking pharoh ants are into everything this year. just killed a half dozen, crawling on my monitor. wet weather seems to bring them inside more and more every year.
i have about 50 traps set to get them, plus the borax bait sites, and still they come. i know a guy that just paid over a grand to try and get rid of them. notice that i said try.
try motorcycle with no windscreen and open face helmet…. on the highway.
they sting like someone tattooing your face.
this is why I encourage more bats and spiders…
I don’t see many bat boxes here.
Go on and eat those little devil bastards.
I hate full-face, I hate 3/4’s, I’ve lost count how many time I got stung with one of those on. I wear a shorty, and will always have a wind screen…it deflects a lot more than just bugs (wind, rain, rocks, birds).
Oh dear, it’s almost 10:00am…time to get ready for work =)
brain bucket all the way.
I don’t ride enough highway to warrant a windscreen…
and I like the breeze at slower speeds to cool me down in the hot summer months.
You get your bike on the road yet, zZz?
A HITLER METAPHOR
“Before you balk (sic), let me remind you that I am a mediocre artist of little recognition, and if history has taught us anything, it’s when mediocre artists of little recognition go bad, they go bat-shit-kicking-babies-that-are-holding-handicapped-puppie-bad.”
“Understand: I will burn down the world to get you.”
Although the commenters didn’t seem to be aware of it, the poster is clearly modelling himself on Adolf Hitler. It has nothing to do with bugs but everything to do Hitler’s “Gotterdamerung” in general and his “Judenfrei” Germany in particular. Yes, history has taught us when artists of little recognition go bad, they indeed do go “shit-kicking bad.”
Hitler had studied at the academy in his adopted city of Vienna where he had settled after his service in the German army in WWI. His paintings were quite technically accomplished but strangely stark and vacant as no people were shown on his deserted Viennese streetscapes. Instead of becoming a recognized artist as he had hoped he was reduced, to his deep embitterment, to becoming a house painter, a bitterness compounded by his virulent anti-Semitism which he drank in along with his coffee in the Viennese cafes he frequented where such anti-Semitism was the the perevailing “weltanschauung.”
It’s too bad we disregarded the lesson that history tried to teach since Hitler indeed did try to burn down the world to get not just the Jews but the rest of us as well
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
so, you’re a bug^^
Lolz @ Smeagol
http://adaptershack.com/m/files/i252.photo…
RSVP
: Paingirl (08,21, 5:40PM)
Well yes, Paingirl, I suppose you could say so. But look at the word “cockroach.” That was not accidental. In Nazi parlance its meaning was clear. It meant Jew, “Juden.”
I have just photographed a very nice cover (in philatelical parlance that means an envelope with its stamps and cancellation marks) celebrating the formation of the Axis with Rome in 1937 but I can’t seem to post it on Bitch. It’s in my computer so if anyone can provide help I would be grateful.
I have travelled a fair bit all over Germany on various occasions and my last trip involved, among other things, a search for Nazi artifacts such as this. I am not a Nazi but I do find the period fascinating. When I saw a store dealing in stamps and suchlike I would rehearse my German and enter. I would say, “Haben Sie die Briefmarken von dem Hitler Zeit, bitte?” (Do you have any stamps from the Hitler period, please?”) You’d be suprised at how many storekeepers looked around them, lowered their voices and said, “Ja, wir haben die Briefmarken.”
I felt like a conspirator.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
MM, you just get creepier and creepier.
you have to put the picture on something that can be linked to. like a website, blog, or youtube. then copy the url and paste it into your comment.
typical of one group to call their enemies cockroaches. the Hutu did it to the Tutsi. see Hotel Rwanda, I am sure you would find it ‘fascinating’ .
When I was a kid my family was so poor that while sitting watching TV at night, with only the light from the television,I had cockroaches crawling on my legs.I hate bugs but I did eat garlic buttered mealworms and chocolate ants once to teach my son that insects could be eaten.
I’m a little bit in love with whoever wrote this.
“I would say, “Haben Sie die Briefmarken von dem Hitler Zeit, bitte?” (Do you have any stamps from the Hitler period, please?”) You’d be suprised at how many storekeepers looked around them, lowered their voices and said, “Ja, wir haben die Briefmarken.”
I felt like a conspirator.”
Well, now we know where Frederick Forsyth got the inspiration for “The Odessa File”
And thus did Godwin’s Law come into full effect.
A HITLER METAPHOR (II)
The question, of course, is not whether the poster is modelling himself on Hitler. That is obvious. The question, rather, is whether or not he is taking himself seriously. If not, then ha, ha. But if he is, then avoid going to the movies in Colorado.
: Good dog Molly (08/21, 8:809PM)
Well no, Good dog, it’s not a matter of getting “creepier and creepier” but simply seeing the obvious for what it is.
The whole thing of posting the Hitler cover on Bitch sounds complex. I used to upload pictures on my Chronicle-Herald blog but there was, after downsizing, a mechanism to do so but this is not the case with Bitch. If you can provide more details I’ll give it a shot but otherwise I’m afraid you will all be the losers since it is spectacular. At least I think so. It was sent from a stamp dealer in Berlin to one Herr Lichtenberg in Basel, Switzerland, on a 6X5 brown envelope sporting four circular first-day cancellation stamps (the Nazi Swastika overlying the Italian fascist axe-and- rods symbol inscribed “Staatsstreffen Mussolini-Hitler”) and carries the boldface inscription, “WER EIN VOLK RETTEN WILL, KANN NUR HEROISCH DENKEN,” which I have as “WHEN A PEOPLE HAS THE RIGHT WILL, IT CAN ONLY THINK HEROICALLY.”
It is resting beside me now as I write, in an album of stamps and postcards – yes postcards! – from “der Hitler Zeit” and which I have imaginatively entitled “Hitler Heads.”
I think you are wrong in comparing your Hutu “coackroach” reference to the Nazi’s “Kuchenschabe,” their slang for the Jews. They are not in the same league, not just in terms of the numbers of people dispatched but also in terms of a background of extensive and historically lengthy anti-Semitic literature.
Let me know if you can come up with any specifics on uploading to Bitch.
: Boru (9:33PM)
Sorry to hear about your unfortunate experiences with cockroaches in your youth, Boru, but you clearly have used your experience to advantage with the instruction you provided to your son.
: ferocious_snail (11:59PM)
And you wouldn’t be the first female to go for Hitler, fs.
: Ivan Sonofabitch (08/22, 6:48AM)
Jesus!
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
^^^ and doesn’t it always. creepy, really creepy.
MM (08/22, 9:32AM)
Gesundheit.
Coincidentally I’ve just started reading “Hitler’s Willing Executioners”. Goldhagen’s research is impressive, but he is clearly a longwinded pedant who uses the English language as if he has a personal grudge against it. Or, he’s being paid by the syllable. Sound like someone we all know and love?
yep vastie… had quite a few good runs… and no new scars to report.
really helped clear my mind through some of the tough times lately.
I do enjoy riding much more through the fall though.
it’s cooler out and the scenery is much more vibrant.
plenty of fun left to be had for this year.
I’m looking forward to the fall. Hopefully the weather stays half decent. I’ve been riding to work and back on the good days. Have gotten caught in the rain a couple of times, which is bound to happen living here. I consider it good training. But like you say, it’s like therapy on 2 wheels. Clears the mind and let’s you escape for awhile. My only regret is that I didn’t get a bike before now.
It’s working well. Just took it in this morning to get the oil changed. Called me about 45 mins ago to say it was done and “that will be $250 please.”….*COUGH COUGH CHOKE!* I’m in the wrong fucking business.
If you’re ever up for a ride sometime, let me know. That goes for you too, Hugo.
$250 for an Oil change???!!! Oil & filter = apx $50.00, that’s $200 labour? Where the fuck was that?
I’m pretty much done work daily at 3:00pm, I’m always up for a ride.
that makes no sense…
go you have a golden oil filter?
is your engine running on liquid platinum?
man, I would never set foot in that place again.
oil change kit at crappy tire is 15 bucks… and the oil and filter is about 50… a hour of your time saves you $200. youtube that shit and learn how to perform basic maintenance to your baby.
Orgasmatron – Leo Strauss calls what Smeagol did “Reductio ad Hitlerum”, or “Argumentum ad Hitlerum”.
“According to Strauss, the Reductio ad Hitlerum is a logical fallacy that consists in trying to refute an opponent’s view by comparing it to a view that would be held by Adolf Hitler or the Nazi Party.
Reductio ad Hitlerum is a form of ad hominem or ad misericordiam , a fallacy of irrelevance (I like that one), and a a variation on reductio ad absurdum, in which a conclusion is suggested based solely on something’s or someone’s origin rather than its current meaning.” – Wiki.
A HITLER METAPHOR (III)
: Good dog Molly (08/21, 9:33AM)
I didn’t understand your post, Good dog. Was it a non-sequitur or did I miss something? Doesn’t WHAT always? Anyway, thanks for the pointers about getting my cover posted on Bitch. I don’t know what I would have done without you.
: Ivan sonofabitch (9:46AM)
Ah yes, Daniel Goldhagen’s “Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust.” I’m not sure about your claim to the effect that he was a “long-winded pedant with a personal grudge against the English language.” (Any support for that, by any chance?) Anyway, Harvard University where he was an Assistant Professor of Government and Social Studies at the time of the book’s publication in 1996 (when I bought the book) must have thought he was pretty good.
I agree with his hypothesis that the ordinary Germans were in fact willing executioners and not the dupes of any Stanley Milgram experiment nor of Hannah Arendt’s “banality of evil,” i.e., just doing their jobs. As a matter of fact this ties in with my last trip to Germany where, in addition to my other pursuits, I was interested in exploring the paradox of Germany. At one level, the paradox consists of the very highest cultural contributions to Western civilization – science, philosophy, music and so on – and on the other the “contributions” of Hitler, Goebbels, Himmler and the rest.
At the individual level I hoped, as you might have guessed, to penetrate the “German mind” which provided the seedbed for the lower part of the upper level of my paradox, if you folow my meaning. I found that there is something, indefinable but nonetheless there, which is very hard, even “Hunnish” about the Germans. They really do think, as far as I could determine, that the rest of us are at least a “step down” and the Jews, well just don’t ask. One does wonder whether the recent acts of contrition have permeated down to Goldhagen’s “ordinary Germans.” Yes, one does wonder.
Here’s a little task for you, Ivan. As I’ve already indicated the German for “cockroach” is “Kuchenshabe,” i.e., “cake-roach.” The reference is culinary whereas with us we employ a gendered approach with “cock-roach.” Why is that? Why do we use the prefix “cock?” There is no “cuntroach” so does this mean that we are being misognyistic?
Write back with your thoughts. You will be marked.
Try to avoid being a long-winded pedant with a personal grudge against the English language.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
MM..
The word ‘cock’ is actually German in origin, meaning male bird. It was eventually adapted to mean aggressive people (where the term ‘cocky’ comes from).
I can only assume cockroaches were called by their name because of their aggressive behavior.
Anyways, that’s my guess, anyone else got a better one?
In the name of sacred feminism I will henceforth refer to them as cockroaches AND cuntroaches in order to avoid giving offense and to cleanse myself of the thoughtcrime that somehow a female roach cannot be every bit as dirty, filthy and disgusting as her cis-male oppressors. As for those transgendered Blattarians who identify as both male and female, or as neither I am at a loss. So, taxanomically speaking, I will ignore them, since , no doubt, their preferred destiny is to scuttle about the Halls of Academia and not under my refrigerator when I turn on the kitchen lights.
Hmmm – an endorsement from Montrealman. Not looking too good for Professor Goldhagen. He may wind up being re-gifted to one of my less irritating in-laws.
sheesh, the word comes from ‘caca’ meaning kakapoopy in spanish. gender free kaka.
and wiki confirms my BDA sightings of the buggers by cap’t john smith in 1640 something, who was disgusted at their defilement of his casks. they haven’t gotten any smaller or more polite over the centuries.
A HITLER METAPHOR (IV)
RSVPs
: Captain Crunch (0/21, 3:52PM)
Good work, Crunch, but did the German etymological derivation of “cock” as a male bird carry its fully-gendered significance as it does in English? Did the Germans snigger when they said it? Can, in other words, you trace its etymological trajectory from German to English through time? Write back soon.
: Ivan Sonofabitch (4:59PM)
Not bad Ivan. I’m giving you a pass although I found your reference to “cis-male oppressors” and “Battarians” to be over-reaching. Let’s say 6o% with room for improvement.
In my previous post I was going to add to my penetration of the German mind with a little anecdote but became distracted. So here it is. There are standard rules of engagement which one must observe with one’s interlocutors in Germany to the effect that if you are shouted at, or otherwise abused, you must shout back. I note (I’m looking at my diary notes) that the incident occurred in Frieberg in southern Germany, the same town where I bought my spectacular cover, the one “Good dog” helped me so much to post on Bitch. Anyway, we were in the “Milano,” a pizza restaurant which, of course, we ordered but it was not that good. Rather than say nothing as I would have done in Canada I shouted, “Das ist schlecht!” (“That’s bad” or more like “That’s shit!”). The waiter, who had previously looked down his nose at us as stupid North Americans was taken aback, put out of countenance you might say. He was totally servile from then on. I puffed up my chest in true German style. That’s the way to treat them! Shout back, Ivan, shout back!
If you failed to endorse Goldhagen Ivan, it’s not looking so good for you.
: Good dog Molly (5:05PM)
Good dog, you must struggle to achieve coherence. “BDA sightings of the buggers by cap’t john smith in 1640 something…? Struggle, Good dog, struggle. You can do it! (And thanks for the help posting my Nazi cover.)
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Beautiful cathedral in Frieburg. I had a lovely thick smoked pork chop and sauerkraut in a restaurant across the square from it. I kept my good manners and and therefore didn’t get treated to Zyklon B on my apfel strudel.
Interesting counterpoint to your story. My parents were living in an apartment in a small town outside of Lahr in the mid 80’s. Previous tenants were younger Canadian servicemen who had not made a good impression on their neighbors with loud partying and doing household chores on Sundays. One elderly couple were quite cool to my parents until Dad shoveled their sidewalk and driveway after the first snowfall. From then on it was Kaffee und kuchen every Sonntag. Interesting chap. He didn’t speak English but I knew what he meant when he pointed at himself and said” Zwie jahren Kreigsgefangener im Russland.”
La cucaracha, la cucaracha,ya no puede caminar porque le falta, porque no tiene marihuana pa’ fumar. Ya murió la cucaracha ya la llevan a enterrar entre cuatro zopilotes y un ratón de sacristán.
That’s the Spanish version of one my favourite cockroach songs. The English version goes like this..
The cockroach, the cockroach can’t walk anymore because it’s lacking, because it doesn’t have marijuana to smoke. The cockroach just died now they take her to be buried among four buzzards and a mouse as the sexton.
I would say whoever did the translation had enough marijuana to smoke.
In addition to being longwinded and pedantic, Goldhagen also adopts an almost hectoring tone which is also familiar. I fully expect him to end each chapter with “You did understand that, didn’t you Ivan? Did you have to move your lips whilst reading?”
Something tells me that that “Hitler’s Willing Executioners” will occupy a seat of honour at the next summit, so that we may state without word of a lie, that Montrealman made the scene.
A HITLER METAPHOR (V)
: Ivan Sonofabitch (08/21, 3:52PM)
Guten Abend. Yes, I suppose the German mind can blow either way. Given to extremes, one might say. My experience of Lahr was only “en passant” since we, quite literally, just passed it by. We were sporting a CDN sticker on the back of the Volks bug with Quebec plates which we had brought over from Montreal to serve our transportation needs while living in Spain. Anyway, we were driving through southern Germany and noted that we were being followed by another car with Canadian military plates. I expect he thought we were military as well since, as we kept going past the Lahr turnoff, I could see him looking puzzled. He might have actually scratched his head. Well, it’s not much, but that’s my Lahr story. To make up for the shortfall, I’ll tell you my Berchtesgaden story.
We were lined up with “Jiggs,” our female Portuguese Water Dog, at the entrance to the high-speed elevator which would whisk us up to the Eagle’s Nest, Hitler’s retreat of Kehlsteinhaus at the top of the mountain. To get to the elevator one had to pass through a long narrow tunnel which slave labour had accomodatingly built for Hitler’s convenience. Anyway, we were waiting in line behind a German couple. Jiggs smelt something interesting. Before I could restrain her, she had shoved her nose up the back of the woman’s skirt who then became skittish, to say the least. Her husband thought it was a huge joke and fell about laughing. Very Gemutlicht and all that. We stared straight ahead as if unaware. But that’s not the end of the story.
When we got to the top of the mountain and finished walking around, we visited the gift shop in Kehlsteinhaus. I was wearing a pendant in the form of a circle made out of four overlapping heavy hammered nails measuring about four or five inches diameter. Behind the counter was an old woman whose eyes brightened when she saw it. “Ah,” she exclaimed, ” ein Hackenkreuz, hein?” I hadn’t thought about it before but, yes, I suppose it did bear a resemblance to a swastika. So that’s my Berchtesgaden story.
: Troondon Formosus (8:36PM)
In spite of the fact that I have lived and worked in Barcelona I cannot speak with any authority about Spanish cockroaches. I don’t suppose you’d be able to manage a Youtube video of you singing the Spanish version by any chance, would you Troon? You might also dance about spastically as an added touch.
: Ivan Sonofabitch (08/23, 7:13AM)
Guten Tag. Goldhagen “Hitler’s Willing Executioners” as my proxy at the next summit? You mean the actual book occupying a chair?Would it be on a cushion? It sounds a bit surreal but you certainly have my permission. However, one does wonder about its reception by the others. For example, do you think that Persevere would appreciate it? She’s not much of an ingtellectual , you know. A bit pedestrian, if the truth be known. However, if you do happen to see her at the summit, would you tell her that her navel is, increasingly, becoming an oject of desire?
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Guten Morgen, Herr Manner vom Montreal. My parents also visited Berchtesgaden. Mom sent me back a souvenir booklet which featured, among other arcadian images, pictures of Adolf, mit Eva, mit kinder, mit Blondi, even mit eine junge hirsch.
Persevere has never yet made it to a summit, although all are most welcome. We’ll draw lots for who gets to sit next to your surrogate. Perhaps an essay contest to determine who merits the privilege. A Caesar will be ordered and placed before your empty space. Unless you prefer some other brunch cocktail. Keep it affordable, please. Us underclass might be known for overspending our fixed incomes on alcoholic oblivion but we do have our limits.
zZz/Hugo – I have a Yamaha V Star 1100 and Yamaha, in it’s infinite wisdom, thought that it made perfect engineering sense to put the oil filter directly behind the forward cylinder header pipe and right side floor board. So, what should normally be a quick and simple job on most motorcycles, becomes a 2 hour nightmare on mine because you have to remove these obstructions to just get at the filter.
I could have done this myself but aside from the time involved, you run the very real risk of stripping your header bolts, not to mention that you have to replace the crush gasket each and every time your remove the header pipe. (they’re not reusable)
So, I took it into the big bike shop in Dartmouth, (rhymes with “Bro Michael”) and got them to do it for me. Just over 2 hours labour at $80 an hour adds up pretty damn quick. (Hence the high $$ bill)
However, this will be a one of as I got them to install an oil filter relocation kit, (bought new and still in the box previously from a friend who was selling his v star 1100), that moves the oil filter to a specially designed bracket that bolts to the front down tube of the frame. So, now I can (and will) do my own oil changes as a 2 hour nightmare now becomes a 20 minute dream.
Next maintenance project – valve adjustment. I think I’ll take a crack at this one myself.
we did a valve job on our 1971 mini, we used the manual for our instructions and it actually worked
A HITLER METAPHOR (VI)
: Ivan Sonofabitch (08/23, 9:52AM)
An excellent idea about the next summit, Ivan. And yes, drawing lots to see who would sit next to the book sounds eminently fair although the essay contest sounds more intellectually substantial. I leave the decision to you.
As far as the aperitif goes, I don’t go for mixed drinks – I’m not even sure what a “Ceasar” is – or booze for that matter, but a nice bottle of German/Alsatian Riesling would go down very well for my proxy. I’m sure Goldhagen has had his share.
But I have an idea. What about making it a Hitler- themed party with “Picked Carapace,” the “insect bitcher” as guest speaker? He could elaborate on his plans to eliminate the “cockroaches”. We could all come in Nazi costumes of our choice. I’m sure you’d favour that of a Wehrmacht officer but I’ve always been partial with the black uniform of the SS. The skull on the cap and all that.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Actually, by 1939, the black uniform was pretty scarce, most branches of the SS having switched to field gray. Panzertroops wore their distinctive short black jacket and trousers, of course, but even this was produced in the seasonal camouflage patterns pioneered by the Waffen S.S. It must be said, without in any way diminishing the evil of the Nazi period, they did have the coolest uniforms, weaponry and music.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEIm3pe5wbA
RSVP
: Ivan Sonofabitch (08/23, 5:58PM)
Sorry for not getting back sooner Ivan but I had to spank a few commenters over on “From The Heart.”
Well, isn’t that a bitch. The black uniforms were out by 1939. I hope they still sported the skull cap. Sieg Heil!
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Oh yes, the Totenkopf was standard cap insignia until the end. Panzertroops of the Heer (Army) wore a similar skull badge on their lapels, the skull being a traditional symbol of German Hussars. Captured tankers in their black uniforms and Death’s Head collar tabs were frequently mistaken for Waffen SS and treated accordingly.
As British squaddies say “If you haven’t got a sense of humour, you shouldn’t have joined.”
GOOD NEWS IVAN! HERE’S MY “HITLER COVER”!
Let me know what you think. Do not restrain your praise. There’s more if you’re interested.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
I must admit, a most impressive artifact MM. More fulsome thanks are due to Good Dog Molly, for her tech support. Limitations of budget and space have limited my collecting, or accumulating to be more accurate, to books. However, certain things have fallen into my hands over the years. I have a Wehrmacht “Gott Mit Uns” belt buckle. Some of the curios that my Dad has procured for me in the course of his career now reside in various military museums in Ontario. And by pure dumb luck I own an autographed copy of a self-published autobiography by Brig. General Paul Tibbets, pilot of Enola Gay.
Do you have any Zeppelin stamps? A recent issue of Aeroplane contained a notice of a large auction of airship memorabilia taking place in London this summer. Doomed to remain on my bucket list, I’m afraid.
A HITLER METAPHOR (VII)
Glad you enjoyed it, Ivan. It is pretty spectacular, isn’t it.
I have quite an extensive collection of covers, interesting stamp cancellations, postcards, currency, one medal, and assorted memorabilia from the Nazi period. I was thinking of putting these up online at two- or three-day intervals to jazz up my avatar scene. Let me know if you would be interested in having a look. I’m not sure about the Zepplins but I’ll check it out.
I also have extensive collections in other areas which might be of interest.
I was being a bit tongue-in-cheek about Good dog Molly’s technological input, but if she wants to claim credit that’s fine with me.
My next visual is a coloured postcard of Hitler’s annexation of the Sudetenland. It’s quite dramatic and it’s ready to go.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Hmmmm – my wife is about to tuck into a double chocolate brownie. I believe I shall “annex” the ethnically Germanic portions of it.
By all means – keep posting your memorabilia, but remember – at the end of it, the whippets must return.
NAZI-ERA ARTIFACTS
2. POSTCARD: Hitler annexes the Sudetenland, 1936.
Czechoslovakia was created in 1919 by the Treaty of Versailles which ended World War I. It included Slovakia, Moravia and Bohemia. In Bohemia, bordering Germany, there existed a group of German-speaking “Sudetens” which Hitler “freed.”
The inscription reads, “We thank our Fuhrer.”
Wir Danken unserm Fuhrer – with a rousing rendition of this old classic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MReV9dkAVhY
“super-duper supermen ” <3
RSVP
: Ivan Sonofabitch (08/25, 9:08AM)
Ah yes, Spike Jones I believe. Impeccable taste, Ivan.
I’ve just uploaded 15 more photos von dem Hitler Zeit. I’m thinking of a 20 Mark banknote – very nice – or the celebration of the Anschluss – also very nice – for tomorrow. Any preference?
I found my photo of the Sudetenland annexation a bit small on my laptop. Do you have a desktop and if so, how was the size? Anyway, practice makes perfect.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI-ERA ARTIFACTS
3. Banknote: 20 Reichmarks, Berlin, June 18, 1939.
Pick’s “Standard Catalogue of World Paper Money”: Germany #185. “Brown. Woman holding an eidelweis.”
Traditionally, the German suitor climbed the mountain, plucked the eidelweiss, and presented it to his beloved. The beloved female symbolizes Germany. Guess who her suitor was.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
The eidelweiss is also the symbol of German Gebirgsjaeger – Mountain Troops and is worn on the side of the Bergmutze peaked cap:
http://p2.la-img.com/1022/19079/6467338_1_…
I have a contemporary Bundeswehr Eidelweiss badge courtesy of my parents time in Germany. 1 CDN Mech Brigade Group was twinned with a Bavarian mountain battalion in Munich and the folks attended one of their festive days. I have pictures of my Mom holding an Uzi and a P-1 pistol – postwar copy of the wartime Walther P-38.
Very nice image, MM
Ivan.
Are you a ‘Forces Brat’?
Yup. Me Old Dad served 37 years in the Army. I didn’t follow him because of back problems – specifically a broad streak of yellow running from top to bottom. >; )
But it did leave me with an interest in military history and an everlasting respect for those who serve.
My ex was Navy(submarines) for 20 years,we were married for 22 years.
I have a lot of respect for women like your Mum who raised children while her husband was away.There was no emails or cell phones or even “Honey I’ll call on Wednesday” because long distance calls were far too expensive to talk about how shitty her days were going…Then of course ‘Murphy’s Law’ always kicked in when the husbands away,children gets sick,the furance breaks down and the Allotment didn’t show in the bank because the GD Pay Office Fucked up. Your Mum would’ve had to take care of all that and the children while alone in Germany mostly with no supports and no family close by.
Like I said I have a lot of respect for older CF wives.
I hit the jackpot with parents, so for me, the life was mostly good. My Mom always had a strong independent streak. Dad spent a year in Egypt in 1966, 9 months in Cyprus in 1974, innumerable exercises and training courses. We got by. I remember once getting in a minor scrape with the military police and being brought home in one of their staff cars. Dad was on an exercise in the Mohave Desert at the time. As soon as the car left the driveway, the phone was ringing – one of our neighbors. At the time I thought “Freakin’ nosy bitches” but it took a while for me to understand. They just wanted to make sure that Mom hadn’t got “The Call”.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
: Cover: Celebration of the “Anschluss,” Germany’s absorption of Austia, 1938.
The figure on the left symbolizes Austria, the predominant power in the Austro-Hungarian Empire which collapsed in 1918 at the end of World War One. The figure on the right symbolizes Germany or, more properly, Prussia which did not exist as a separate state until 1870 under the leadership of Bismark, the “Iron Chancellor” who, in his “Blut und Boden” (“Blood and Iron”) speech observed that, “Not by majority decisions are the great questions of our time decided, but by blood and iron.” Bismark meant business as the creation of the state of Prussia was the result of three wars.
Under the cancellation stamp (Innsbruck, March 10, 1938) we see the inscription, “Heute Volksabstimmung in Osterreich, 10 April 1938” (“Today (by) the vote of the people in Austria, 10 April 1938).
Note also on the two 6 Reichpfennig stamps showing the symbolic figures of Austria and Germany arm-in-arm. The surrounding script reads, “Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Furher” (“One People, One Empire, One Leader”). These words do not have the same connotation in English, particularly the mystical meaning attached to “Volk” where it assumes the deeply romantic dimensions of the soul of those who lived in the mist-enshrouded “Schwarz Wald” (the Black Forrest).
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Very interesting MM. One small correction – Blut und Boden means Blood and Soil and was, in fact the motto of the Reich Ministry of Food and Agriculture in addition to being a key element of the Volkisch ideology used by the Nazis. Bismarck’s speech was Blut und Eisen.
Yesterday’s image of the jungfrau and her eidelweiss brought to mind a documentary I saw on PBS many years ago. “Degenerate Art” about the Nazi’s Entartete Kunst exhibition. One of the commentators who had grown up during the period pointed out that while the Nazis, declared everything that they did not like to be “pornographic”, what he found, as an adolescent male was that the idealized neoclassical nudes and statues by people like Arno Breker were far more in keeping with the sexualized image of the human body that typifies pornography. Sort of like the marble equivalent of an airbrushed, siliconized Playboy Playmate.
Keep ’em coning, Professor.
Keep ’em “coming” – not coning.
I got see my fair share of the mist-enshrouded Schwartzwald in the 4 weeks I visited my parents. They were into Volksmarsching – nothing sinister or jackbooty – organized weekend walks through the countryside, with logbooks, waystations, rewards for completing 10 or 20 km. routes and gemutlich good times at the local bierstubbe afterwards. Pilsener, wurst and oompah bands. The land of Goethe and Schiller also gave the world The Chicken Dance. Let Goldhagen write about that infamy.
I logged 60k. in 3 weekends. The parents came home after 3 years with over 3000 kms each
RSVP
: Ivan Sonfabitch (08/26, 10:31AM)
You’re right! Damn my History teacher! An interesting comparison of Nazi art and the sexualized images of the human body. I know I was always aroused by it (the art, not the airbrushed Playboy bunny). I promise, I’ll keep ’em coning.
(By the way, my last entry was #5. We must keep “alles in ordnung.”
(3;20PM)
Were your parents digitally “self-tracking” to know that they had walked 3000km in three years? I’m reading Nora Young’s “The Virtual Self: How Our Digital Lives are Altering the World Around Us” (2012). Most interestingly for me, she speaks of the philosophical implications of self-tracking where the “quantified self” erases personal, subjective memory. As a consequence of our digitalized, individual “Data Maps,” she writes,”… it takes us ever further into the realm of the objectified self. Not only are we written out and documented, we become a self that is comprised of statistical information.” You might want to engage your parents on the concept of “the objectified self.”
Now I’ll check the “Artifacts” to find something suitable. No Zepplins Ivan, but other military hardware but right now I’m not in the mood.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Nothing digital, no. Usually a series of checkpoints/reststops where your card was stamped by an official and at the end of the march, your logbook was verified by yet another official. All very Teutonic and efficient. Alles ist in ordnung, indeed. I remember at one reststop I slaked my thirst with a bottle of Afri-Kola, whose logo was a stylized white palm tree, most reminiscent of the insignia of Rommel’s Afrika Korps:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm…
minus the Hakenkreuz, of course.
Gott Im HImmel! Donner und Blitzen! Who directed this commercial? F.W. Murnau?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wokjKUxoWN8
Quite frankly, I felt none of those things. I was simply wondering why the last 5 kilometres of every verdamnte Volksmarsch in Germany were invariably uphill.
NAI ERA ARTIFACTS
5. Stamp: Issued March 26, 1943. Nazi Flag and Children
To commemorate the “Tag der Verpflichtung der Jugend” (“Day of Youth Obligation”) when all German boys and girls had to take an oath of allegiance to Hitler.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
The 1934 Party Congress at Nuremburg, immortalized by Leni Riefenstahl in “Triumph of the Will” saw Hitler Youth and Bund Deutscher Madel units gather from all over Germany. It seems they took the word “congress” to heart. Some 900 pregnancies supposedly were the result. In German the initials B.D.M. were said to mean either “Soon-To-Be German Mothers, “Commodities for Men” or “Boy, Mount Me!”
RSVP
: Oberst 1, Ivan Hundersohn (08/26, 4:47PM)
I believe I have the postcard to commerate that event, Ivan. Not Leni but the “act of congress”. However it will have to wait until tommorow. Guten abend.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
6. Postcard, Olympic Stadium, 1936.
It seems I didn’t photograph the postcard showing the gathering of the youth groups so we’ll have a look later. In any case it wasn’t German boys and girls in 1933 having multiple boy-girl grunts and producing 900 babies but a gathering of youth groups from all over Europe in Vienna in 1942. There’s no record, as far as I know, of the production of little bastards. So you’ll have to be content with the 1936 Olympics.
Note that I am now, through the marvels of technology, once again “Monsieur de Montreal” which involves a loss of over 1000 of my comments. I’ve lost my identity!Montrealman, Montrealman, where are you? We love you!
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
I thought it was the Quebec Provincial Language Police who made you change your name.
I have a model of LZ-129, better known as the Hindenburg on the shelf where I keep my Zeppelin and Airship books. It sports the Olympic rings of 1936 on it’s sides as well as large swastika banners on it’s tail. Because the kit was manufactured by Revell Germany, and because display of the hakenkreuz is illegal there, the tail surface decals consisted of a red rectangle with a white circle. I had to source the swastikas elsewhere.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
7. Magazine, “Deutsche Infanterie,” Berlin. October, 1938.
Front Cover: Frauleins coming onto a soldier.
Yes Ivan, it was an out-of-body experience but here I am again in my own skin. As it turned out I did photograph the youth festival in Vienna in 1942 and I’ll post it down the road. Things in general were pretty confused this morning.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
8. Postcard.
“23.9.1933 Erster Spatenstich” (“First Shovelful”)
“23.9.1936 1000km Autobahn fertig” (“1000km of the Autobahn ready”)
Note the Munich (“Munchen”) cancellation stamp with the inscription, “Hauptstadt der Bewegung” (“Capital City of the Movement” i.e., Nazism).
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
9. Stamp and Cancellation Mark, Berlin, 25 November, 1941.
Cancellation Inscription: “Europas Einheitsfront Gegen Den Bolshevismus” (“United European Front Against Bolshevism”).
Hitler is looking a bit tired. Do you think Stalingrad had anything to do with it?
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Doubtful. German forces reached Stalingrad in the summer of 1942 and Paulus didn’t surrender until February of ’43.
Question – Was the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact commemorated with a stamp?
RSVP,
: Oberst 1 von Hundersohn (08/28, 3:20PM)
“On August 21 (1941) Hitler hurled a new directive at his rebellious General Staff. General Halder’s report reads, ‘The proposala for the continuation of the operations in the East do not accord with my intentions.” What Hitler wanted, in addition to capturing Leningrad and making contact with the Finns in the north, was “to clear the Black Sea coast, take Rostov, and seize the Maikop oil fields and to push forward to Stalingrad, thus severing Stalin’s last link with the Caucus.”
Runstedt, it was said, “laughed aloud.” (William L. Shirer, “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich,” p. 858-9.) This was my reference to Hitler’s “worried look.” I thought you would have picked it up.
The answer to your second question is, “No,”
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Sounds like you’re over-reaching Professor, but no matter. At any rate, Adolf had a very simple solution for Generals who didn’t share his vision. He fired them, as he did to Halder and von Rundstedt(several times). The main strength of Shirer’s work lies in his description of the rise of Hitler and the N.S.D.A.P., events to which he was a frequent witness. As a history of the Second World War, there are far better, more recent works, which make use of information to which Shirer would have had no access.
For those interested in that period I would recommend:
http://www.amazon.ca/In-Garden-Beasts-Amer…
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
10. Cover, 20.4.1942. Hitler Portrait and Munich Cancellation Stamp.
Outer circle of cancellation stamp:
“Munchen: Mit Dem Fuhrer Zum Seig” (“Munich: With the Furher to Victory”)
Inner Circle: “Hauptstadt der Bewegung” (“Capital City of the Movement”)
Center: Stylized “S” of the “SS.”
A pleasure as always,
Cheerio!
* Hitler Birthday Issue, April 30, 1943.*
Nice Professor. I wasn’t aware of the presence of party slogans on the cancellation stamps before you started posting these. Interesting.
monsieur, wouldn’t your historical artifacts be more useful in a museum?
dude, that is one bad-ass mofo of a bike. Like you, I’d definitely ride that thing every day.
I’ll be hitting the rally on mine this weekend….
http://www.cyclechaos.com/images/3/37/900b…
Yamaha, while misguided at times, have a metric shit-ton of power…
you could tow a truck with that thing.
Glad someone had the brains to come up with that kit though…
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
10. Postcard. The Dusseldorf Industrial Exhibition, 1937.
On reverse: 29.8.37 19-20
“Schaffendes Volk” (“An Industrious People”)
“Grosse Reichsaustellung Dusseldorf” (“The Great Reich Exhibition Dusselorf”)
Nr. 1 Eingang – Fahrenstrasse (Entrance No 1. Main Street)
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
RSVP
: Paingirl (08/29, 10:01AM)
Well, it all depends on what you mean by “useful.”
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
paingirl – “monsieur, wouldn’t your historical artifacts be more useful in a museum?”
Smeagol – “Well, it all depends on what you mean by “useful.””
pg, he’s saving them to give to someone who appreciates them for what they are, you know like an apt pupil or something.
http://planetaua.net/uploads/posts/2011-07…
^^^ no one catches it like King.
Ahem*cough cough* You realize that you’ve just cast me in the Brad Renfro role.
And I thought you guys were my friends >: (
RSVP
: Oberst 1 (08/29, 6:11PM)
Jesus.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
That’s the second time you’ve invoked His name in response to a comment of mine. I don’t know whether to feel pride or shame.
RSVP
: Oberst 1. (08/29, 7:50PM)
Feel shame.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
You’d be surprised how often I hear that. You really would. >: (
RSVP
: Oberst 1 (08/30, 7:09AM)
But do know why? I can tell you why in the present instance. It consists of two words and is found in the sentence, “For uttering a _______ _______.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
12. 6 Reichmark Stamp & Vienna Cancellation Post Mark, 10 April, 1938.
Inscribed “Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer, Wien” (“One People, One Government, One Leader, Vienna”)
Bought in London together with stamp album at age 14 while visiting relatives in England. Can you imagine?
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
13. Medal with Campaign Ribbon and Envelope: “Kreigs Berdienstkreuz, 2 Klasse, 1939.” (“War Service Cross, 2nd. Class, 1939.”)
Another of my purchases in London when I had just turned 14. On the other side of the swastika is the date 1939 indicating, unless anyone can demonstrate otherwise, that it is from the Polish campaign. My father, who had a few medals of his own, put the ribbon on the medal.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Merit_Cro…
This is out of my field of expertise, but perhaps the 1939 refers to when the medal was struck, rather than when it was awarded. The ribbon is not a campaign ribbon at all but rather the ribbon of the Iron Cross, this decoration being institued in 1939 to replace the “Non-Combat Iron Cross” of WW I. It appears ,from the wikipedia article to also have been awarded for “meritorious” non-combat service. Quite a few of the names on the list of famous recipients did not come particularly close to the whiff of cordite and more than a few of them are Allgemeine S.S.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
13. Stamp and Munich Cancellation Mark, 1944.
“Deutschland Wird Siegen!” (“Germany Will Conquer!”)
“Gross Deutches Reich” (“The Greater German Reich”): Included countries annexed in Eastern Europe.
Ivan: Thanks for the input. I was beginning to think I was talking to myself.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
15. Stamp Commemorating the 20th. Anniversary of the Beerhall Putsch, Nov. 5, 1943 and inscribed, “Und Ihr Habt Doch Gesiegt” (“And Despite All You Were Victorious”). Encircled by Reich Office stamps.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
16. Postmaster’s Sheet of One Hundred 6 Reichpfennig Stamps.
A magnificent display.
Note on #15, the “Beerhall Putsch.” In 1923 Hitler stood up on a table in Munich’s Burgerbraukeller – it’s stil there, I know from first hand experience – fired a shot into the ceiling, and proclaimed a revolution to overthrow the government of Bavaria. The attempted coup failed and Hitler was imprisoned in the Landsberg Prison where he wrote “Mein Kampf” (“My Struggle”).
Anyway, I had seen the facade many times from films I had shown in class. My wife and I happened to be driving through Bavaria and, looking out the window of our blue Volks, what did I see? Yes, it was Landsberg Prison! I pulled into the forecourt and, as it was lunchtime, we had an alfresco meal. I noticed movement in the upper windows. We were being observed, but we managed to leave without incident.
…and your waiter was Rudolf Hess.
RSVP
: Ivan de le Legion (09/01, 9:29AM)
Why yes, how did you know? He was on parole from Spandau.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
17. Banknote: 5 Reichmarks, 1942.
Pick’s “Standard Catalogue of World Paper Money,” #186.
“Red-brown. Youth at right. Watermark 5 straight up at left.”
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Ivan
Most people don’t know this but Hugo Boss designed most of the Nazi uniforms in his teens Hitler (as a “artist”) himself recognized Boss’s talent for designing.
His company manufactured uniforms for the police and the post office prior to 1933 and after that for the Hitler Youth and the S.S. (of which he was an honorary member) I haven’t found any evidence that he actually designed the uniforms. Although it must be admitted, they had the coolest looking uniforms. Practical too. The Waffen S.S. were the first military formation to use camouflage combat uniforms and produced them in reversible, seasonal patterns.
A post war de-nazification hearing pronounced Boss an “Opportunist Follower”, gave him a heavy fine and deprived him of the right to vote. A lot of his wartime work was performed by forced labourers under pretty appalling conditions.
Montrealman: – could he at least recommend a decent Riesling?
RSVP
: Ivan de le Legion (09/01, 8:37PM)
Absolutely, Ivan. Try “Domaine Barmes-Buecher, Riesling Herrenweg,” 2010. Wettolsheim, Alsace, France. ($27.05 at the Societe des Alcools du Quebec (SAQ).
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
18. Postcard: “Kammeradschaftsblock der Deutchen Reichspost” (“The Comeradeship Block of the German Post Office”), Saar Cancellation Stamp, 21 August, 1941.
The setting is “German Hall,” Berlin, which hosted various groups of all sorts.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Why thank you Professor. Most helpful. When my parents lived in Germany, their other neighbors were a staunchly upper middle class couple named Rudi and Hildegard. Nothing ostentatious, they voted Christian Democrat and treated themselves to a new Mercedes every other year. Their son was a typical university snot named Jochen who smoked Gauloises, listened to American Blues and affected that fashionable leftist contempt for everything that had given him such a cushy lifestyle. They set my parents up with their personal vintner across the border in Alsace and so, the folks returned to Kingston with some 200 bottles of various whites. Nice people.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
19. Postcard: “Goethes Gartenhaus in Weimar” (“Goethe’s Garden House in Weimar”)
“Besucht Thuringen, das grune Herz Deutschlands” (“Visit Thuringia, the green Heart of Germany!”)
In addition to Goethe – did Hitler make a Faustian pact with the devil? – Weimar was the capital city of Germany’s Weimar Republic from its defeat in World War One in 1918 until it was overthrown by Hitler in 1933 when he moved the capital back to Berlin.
You’re welcome Ivan. 200 bottles, eh? None left, I suppose.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
HITLER & LIZA MINELLI
In spite of numerous requests received for additional information, I have found no evidence to the effect that Hitler sang harmony with Liza Minelli in the making of “Cabaret.”
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
They were gone within a year, Professor. Parents learned to live large while they were away.
Ivan
Someone from NSCAD told me that Boss’s early portfolio sketches from his teens depicted almost all of the exact styles used in nazi uniforms. I’m not sure how accurate Mike’s information is. Given the very subjective nature of the subject and this claim I’m sure I might be wrong. Anyways, just thought people might find it interesting.
Ivan
Good for your parent’s,they deserved to live the high life.
As the result of 200 bottles of wine did they have any siblings for you?
Ha ha – No Boru. Their Germany posting came late in life, after I was out on my own so they were unencumbered by offspring, or the prospects of any more. As a result they enjoyed every minute of it.
I’d be sceptical of that Daniel, but I really don’t know. If you look at the black Allgemeine S.S. uniform, it’s not particularly different in cut from the Field Gray of the Wehrmacht. Black was chosen for the S.S. to differentiate it from the brown uniforms of the S.A. (Sturmabtielung – Storm Troops) and also because it was a)intimidating and b)impressive looking on parade. The S.A. wore brown shirts because they had access to a large stock of WW 1 surplus uniforms that had been manufactured for the German forces fighting in Tanganyika. The Nazis exploited the German fondness for uniforms (Every branch of the civil service had one) and ,as a consequence, even combat uniforms became quite elaborate and distinctive. Uniquely in WW 2, German soldiers wore their medals and decorations on their combat uniforms which proved an unexpected boon for both intelligence officers and souvenir hunters.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
20. (a) Top and center: “Das Braune Band von Deutschland 1934-1944” (“The Brown Ribbon of Germany 1934-1944”)
(b) Bottom Right and Left: “Grosser Preis von Wien, 1944. ‘Freudenau'” (“The First Prize of Vienna, 1944. ‘Happiness'” – the name of the winning horse).
The paradox of the Third Reich, at least for me, consists of ordinary social activities like horse racing existing in a political context of pure evil.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
21. Photograph: Back cover of “Deutsche Infanterie,” October, 1938. (See #6)
Hitler the Rock Star: “Sudetendeutsche Jugend umjubelt den Fuhrer” (Sudetetenland Youth Joyfully Greet the Fuhrer”)
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
22. Postcard with Vienna Cancellation, 20 April, 1938.
“Des Fuhrers Geburtstag” (“The Fuhrer’s Birthday”)
The postcard is cancelled but contained no address and no message and so never sent. It must have been a collector’s souvenir piece. Nice. A man after my own heart.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
23 Postcard: “Grundungstagung des Europaischen Jugendverbandes, Wien. 1942”
(“Basic Training of European Youth Associations, Vienna. 1942.”)
It would have been interesting to see if any European countries were not represented. Judging by the diagram, only Sweden and Britain. (Switzerland is obscured.)
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Not surprising. Dutchmen, Danes, Norwegian, Finns, Belgians (Flemings and Walloons), French, Latvians, Estonians, Lithuanians, Bosnians, Croats, Albanians were all represented in the ranks of the Waffen S.S. Even renegade Englishmen of the Britisches Friekorps, about 50 or so expatriate followers of Moseley and bored P.O.W.s. Cossacks, and anti-Communist Russians under General Vlasov. Turkomen, Georgians, Crimean Tatars – some more “voluntary” than others. Indian followers of Subhas Chandra Bose and his Indian National Army, although the Japanese had more luck recruiting from their supply of Indian P.O.W.s. Even Franco, smart enough to avoid being drawn into the “Axis” of fascist powers sent a division of volunteers to fight on the Ostfront.
One of the more facile tactics of postwar apologists for the Waffen S.S. was to posit it as a forerunner of N.A.T.O. What can’t be denied is that the Wehrmacht was a lot more diverse than you might think
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
24. Stamps: Some World War Two Battle Scenes.
Ivan, would you have any similar tank or plane models hanging by strings from your bedroom ceiling?
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Regrettably, SOBova is decidedly cool to the notion of model planes hanging in the matrimonial chamber. >: (
And the only aircraft hanging in my mancave (Op Centre: Alpha) are those types from which me Old Dad spent his time in the military leaping out of.
However – here is a breakdown of what you have displayed:
Upper Left: A Gebirgsjager (literally “Mountain Hunter)) of the Hoch Alpen Korps. You can see the eidelweiss insignia on the side of his Gebirgsmutz.
Upper Right: An Arado 196 floatplane. Used for scouting and coastal patrol but also embarked on naval vessels like Bismark and the commerce raider Atlantis. I built the Airfix 1/72 scale kit when I was a wean.
Centre: An early model Sturmgeschutz (Assault Gun). Built on the chassis of the Panzerkampfwagen III and mounting a short barreled 75mm gun. I do have a 1/72 scale version of this type as well as a pair of successive variants equipped with the long barreled 75 mm anti-tank gun and a short barreled 105 mm howitzer.
Bottom Left: An 81 mm mortar crew. They appear to be wearing the mottled camouflage of the Waffen S.S.
Bottom Right: Fallschirmjaeger (literally “Hunters from the sky”) Paratroops. The last large scale German airborne operation was the invasion of Crete in 1941 where they sustained such appalling losses in the face of British defence that Hitler was loath to use them in in that role again. For the rest of the war they fought as ground troops, most notably at Monte Cassino and in Normandy and Holland. They preserved their combat effectiveness and esprit de corps to the very end of the war in such a manner that , as with the Waffen S.S., captured paratroopers were automatically graded Category 4 – Unrepentant Nazis – by Allied Intelligence officers and P.O.W. interrogators.
*Disclaimer – the above was typed out entirely from memory (No Googling) so any linguistic or factual errors are mine, and mine alone.
This will be on the mid-term.
RSVP
: Ivan Sonofabitch (09/05, 9:03AM)
Many thanks for the comment, Ivan.
I thought I would leave “Battle Scenes” up until tomorrow morning. It’s unlikely, of course, but someone out there might actually want to learn something.
Thanks again.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
25. Stamp: Soldier’s Head, March 10, 1942. “Helden Gedanktag” (“Hero Thought Day”)
Does it make sense to speak of a German soldier who fought on behalf of an evil, murderous regime as a “hero?” The paradox of ordinary and even brave people under Nazism continues.
Paradox indeed, Professor. If ever there was a German who could reasonably expect to be the object of uncompromising hatred from Canadians it was Brigadefuhrer Kurt Meyer. An early member of the N.S.D.A.P., a prewar officer in the Waffen S.S., a highly decorated combat veteran of the Russian Front, youngest divisional commander in the German Army and the first high ranking officer to be tried as a war criminal, for crimes committed against Canadian soldiers in Normandy. Found guilty and sentenced to death by a Canadian Military Tribunal.
Yet, it was a Canadian General, Chris Vokes who commuted his death sentence. It was Canadian soldiers who smuggled his wife and daughter into his prison cell on Christmas Eve, 1946 as he was awaiting confirmation of his death sentence. He served part of his sentence in Dorchester, where by all accounts he was a model prisoner; learning English and working in the library. It is a matter of historical record that on, at least, one occasion he was paroled into the custody of the Canadian Military where he took part in a theoretical exercise on combating the Soviets in Arctic conditions. And when working as a salesman for a brewery in Germany after his release he was, on several occasions, a guest in the Canadian officer’s mess at Soest where the question of purchases no doubt took all of five minutes and the rest of the evenings were devoted to re-fighting various campaigns with salt cellars and cutlery on the immaculately starched white tablecloths..
It’s a complex issue question and one for which an answer may possibly be found to exists somewhere between the Scylla of Blanket Condemnation and the Charybdis of Hypocrisy and Double Standards. I know that I haven’t found it yet.
NAZI-ERA ARTIFACTS
26. Stamp: Hitler addressing the Reich’s Party Day, April 28, 1939. Issued in commemoration of the Day of National Labour. The surtax was for Hitler’s National Culture Fund.
Yes Ivan, the loyalty of the “military brotherhood” often transcended the sides in the war which is understandable, at least to a degree. However, I was thinking from the Nazi civilian perspective in which the term “hero” would imply complete moral relativism. While the “hero” might indeed be a hero from a purely military perspective, it is difficult to consider him as such from the broader ideological, i.e., the Nazi perspective, even if he himself did not happen to be a Nazi.
Thanks for your reflective comment.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Perhaps. I find it difficult to imagine ,say, Hong Kong veterans enjoying the same bonhomie with the Japanese whom they fought against, and surrendered to. I guess, despite being a personification of those things that came to represent the evil of Nazi Germany, “Panzermeyer” was a man of physical bravery and undoubted personal charisma.
Perhaps a better example ,for thought, might be the men of Allied Bomber Command and the Nacht Jager pilots of the Luftwaffe. I have nothing but the highest regard for those men of the Commonwealth who volunteered and trained as aircrew, flew the Lancasters, Halifaxes, Stirlings and Mosquitoes over the Reich and sustained heavy losses in order to diminish the Nazi ability to wage war. Their task, given the technology at hand and the strategy devised by Air Marshal Arthur Harris was to drop massive amounts of high explosive and incendiary bombs on populated urban centres in order to destroy industry, housing, civic infrastructure and people. Yet, I also admire the courage of their opponents who sought to shoot them down. Were the Luftwaffe pilots fighting to preserve the Nazi Regime, to keep the trains running to the east, or simply to minimize the amount of destruction being heaped on their own cities? Was “Bomber” Harris immoral to attack German industry and workers by attacking the cities where they were located? Or ,was he “moral” in believing that area bombing would shorten the war, possibly bringing it to an end, without the kind of murderous, land war stalemate that characterized the First World War?
Several decades of reading on the subject and all I know for sure is that, I am not competent to judge, only to attempt to comprehend.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
27. Stamp: “Der Furher in Seiner Gebertstadt Braunau 12.3.38″ (The Fuhrer in Braunau, His City of Birth 12.3.38”)
I’m not sure why, but Hitler is looking particularly rogueish in this portrait. Did he come from the wrong side of the tracks?
An interesting comment, Ivan. In respect to “Bomber” Harris and his “carpet bombing” of Germany in general and the firestorm in Dresden in particular, one is faced with yet another paradox: Does it make sense to speak of a “justifiable atrocity?” I’m not sure who would be “competent” to judge these matters or even what being “competent” would mean in this context but, on the other hand, that is not to say that we are bound to silence.
Thanks for your thoughts.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
Perhaps Adolf had been listening to The Threepenny Opera and imagined himself as Mack the Knife. (Unlikely, I know)
Interesting that you should mention Dresden, since it has achieved an almost mythical status, to many, as a repudiation and condemnation of the Allied Bombing campaign. Yet, many of the reasons for it’s symbolic status as an “Unnecessary Atrocity” are false.
The myth is that at the time of the bombing , the war was all but over, Germany was defeated, Dresden itself was a rustic backwater of quaint architecture and fine porcelain, utterly unconnected to the war.
Well, the war still had 2 months to run. The Nazis had, 1 month before,launched an offensive in the Ardennes, and were preparing to launch another in Hungary. The Soviets would lose more men in the taking of Berlin than they lost in the entire Battle of Stalingrad. A lot more Allied soldiers would die between February 13th and the German surrender.
As far as Dresden is concerned, it was not a backwater of the war. It was a major transportation hub with no less than 4 major railyards. Every train carrying soldiers and munitions to that sector of the Ostfront had to pass through it which is why the Soviets urged Churchill to attack it. According to the 1942 Jarhbuch produced by the Nazi equivalent of the local Chamber of Commerce, Dresden possessed no less than 140 factories and businesses contributing DIRECTLY to the war effort, including the massive Carl Ziess Optical firm. In the 1933 elections, Dresdners voted for the N.S.D.A.P. in numbers slightly above the national average. And according to the 1936 national census, Dresden had a Jewish population of some 2000. By 1945 that figure had been reduced to about 60, including the diarist Victor Klemperer, who were either in hiding or awaiting final orders for deportation. One of the unintended consequences of the raid was that the local S.S. headquarters and it’s files were obliterated. Those fugitive Jews who survived the attack were able to, like Klemperer and his wife, lose themselves in the mass of refugees fleeing westward and survive the war.
The reasons for Dresden’s ascension of Guiltless Martyr status are varied and complex. It’s place in Western popular culture has been fixed by 2 very disparate individuals; novelist Kurt Vonnegut and maverick historian David Irving. Vonnegut experienced a worm’s eye view of the attack as a P.O.W. and subsequently wrote Slaughterhouse Five, quoting Irving as a source. Irving, long before becoming infamous as a Holocaust denier, was crafting a reputation as the bad boy of British revisionist history. His mistake was to use the facts and figures issued by Goebbels’ propaganda ministry to produce vastly over-inflated estimates of casualties. He didn’t make use of the primary sources, the figures accumulated by the local party, police and military officials. A recent German commission, puts them at approximately 25,000, heavy yes, but a far cry from the half million mooted by Irving.
After the war Dresden came under Soviet control and by the time the Cold War hit full stride, this “vicious nest of Hitlerite serpents” had become “Proletarian victims of the Capitalist West and it’s pitiless Military Industrial Complex” Germans, East and West, could console themselves that they too, were victims of an atrocity and no just perpetrators.
“Dresden was our Hiroshima” became a popular saying, especially among the Left. The Vietnam generation, with it’s particularly narcissistic tunnel vision was only too happy to embrace that view. It should also be pointed out that scarcely was the rubble of Dresden starting to cool, that Churchill, with his eye on the postwar world was already beginning to distance himself from the air campaign that he had been such an ardent supporter of. And it was his successor, Clement Attlee, who served on the Committee that picked and approved bombing targets (including Dresden) who would deny Bomber Command their own campaign medal and fob Harris off with a baronetcy when all other senior British Commanders were knighted.
Cowardice and hypocrisy all around. The men of Bomber Command deserved much, much better. For a far superior analysis of this topic than I could ever provide, interested readers should check out:
http://www.amazon.ca/Dresden-Tuesday-Febru…
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
28. Stamps: Child Greeting Hitler on his Birthday, April 20, 1940.
A very interesting post, Ivan. When I saw your reference to “Bomber” Harris I immediately thought of Dresden because of Victor Klemperer’s marvelous two-volume diary, “I Will Bear Witness” (1998). I also noted your reference to Kurt Vonnegut who published the non-fiction “Armageddon In Retrospect” (2008). I have never read David Irving for the reasons you mention.
After reading your post I thought it would be fun to review my record of casual reading which I have kept on file cards for the past ten years. I usually read about 50 books a year and note that about 20 of the past 500 have dealt with Nazi Germany in one form or other. The closest I came to the Dresden bombing would have been Randall Hanson’s “Fire and Fury: The Allied Bombings of Germany, 1942-1945” (2008) of which, sadly, I remember little.
My other readings fall into two groups, narrative accounts of particular WWII events and individuals like Anthony Beevor’s “Stalingrad” (1998) and “The Fall of Berlin” (2000), Ian Kershaw’s “The Myth of Hitler” (1987) and Richard Evans’ “The Third Reich at War” (2001), to name but three.
My favourite type of reading about this period, however, is first-person accounts of
life under the Third Reich, or trying to escape it. Books like Christabel Bielenburg’s “The Past is Myself” (1989), Anonymous’ “A Woman in Berlin” (2005) – her story immediately after the Red Army’s brutal take-over of Berlin when a woman’s choice was to fuck or starve – and Sebastian Haffner’s “Defying Hitler” (2000), to name but three.
Thanks again for your excellent comment.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
29. Stamp: Woman Mail Carrier, Issued May 3, 1944.
With the men away at the front(s), the women took over many jobs in the domestic labour force.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
‘Strewth, Professor. Our reading habits are most similar. I, too, like Antony Beevor, and Richard Evans, as well as Cornelius Ryan and Stephen Ambrose. There is a copy of Kershaw’s “The End” on my night table, just waiting to be cracked open. For my birthday this week my beloved SOBova gave me a copy of the superb British documentary “The World At War” on DVD., which I religiously watched on C.B.C. on Friday nights back in the early 70’s when it first aired.
As for your latest post, it’s true that German women assumed some of the jobs vacated by men during wartime, but Hitler and Goebbels were resolutely opposed to the large scale mobilization of Aryan women in industry, preferring to use slave labor from occupied countries. Sadly, the Nazi equivalent of “Rosie the Riveter” was invariably a starved, brutalized Pole or Ukrainian. I just finished Christy Campbell’s “Target London” about the development of the V-Weapons, whose only material impact to the war effort was that more people died building them, than died under them.
Re: Kershaw – “cracked” is merely a figure of speech. In the Ivaniverse people who crack the spines of books, fold over page tips to mark their spot, or highlight with yellow marker are less than fully evolved forms of pond life, who may have their place in the biomass, but shall never be allowed anywhere near mein kinder.
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
29. Stamp: Woman Mail Carrier, Issued May 3, 1944.
German women took over many jobs on the domestic front while the men were away on the military fronts.
(In spite of the picture being posted, I could find no evidence of the accompanying text, such as it is. Cyber-technology marches on.)
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
POSTSCRIPT
RSVP
:Ivan Sonofabitch (09/08, 9:07AM & 9:18AM)
Sorry for the duplication. After posting the mailcarrier on “Artifacts” I went over to the C-H “Opinions” where I regularly spank the columnists Marilla Stephenson and Gail Lethbridge. After spanking Marilla I returned to “Artifacts” and found the picture but no text. I then posted another text, such as it was. I then saw your comments and wrote another comment and was about to post it when the electricity went off! So now I’m back, briefly.
Yes Ivan, our tastes, at least in Third Reich material, do seem similar. While I didn’t mention many books, one I should have mentioned was George Mosse’s classic, “The Crisis of German Ideology.” You might find it a bit too philosophical but, then again, maybe you won’t.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
30. Stamp: “Armed Warrior,” issued 30 April, 1940.
Although there was a strong symbolic connection with the knight in Nazi mythology associated with the mediaeval First Reich – Hitler was often portrayed in armour – this knight seems to have a space-age look to him.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
31. Stamp: Jan.30, 1941. Portraits of Benito Mussolini & Adolf Hitler. “Zwei Volker und Ein Kampf” (“Two Peoples and One Struggle”)
Issued as propaganda for the Rome-Berlin Axis. Note the “Fasces,” the Axe & Rods symbol of political and judicial authority of ancient Rome adopted by Mussolini.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!
NAZI ERA ARTIFACTS
32. Postcard: The cancellation date of 20/4/38 at the town of Passwalk, the site of “Kreigslazarett des Fuhrers” (The Fuhrer’s Military Hospital”), indicates early preparation for the coming war.
A pleasure as always.
Cheerio!