Jokes and Stories from this months issue.

*WILLIAM OF NORMANDY (1027-1087) was among the first European leaders to realise the importance of projectile weaponry in warfare. His archers, using short bows, were a decisive factor at Hastings in 1066, where the Saxon shield wall was broken. No one knows the identity of the archer whose arrow, flighted upwards to land among the enemy like a mortar, caught the Saxon king Harold Godwinson in the left eye. The missile penetrated his brain, killing him instantly, and the dismayed Saxons, already weary from fighting at Stamford Hill, broke ranks and fled. It was one of those decisive, pivotal moments in history. The whole fabric of British life was changed forever by that cunningly flighted arrow; for it heralded the Norman Conquest, fedualism and the reign of the Plantagenet kings.
In 1139, the second Lateran Council of Churches forbade the use of the powerful crossbow, except against infidels. It was designated "a weapon hateful to god and unfit for Christians". Knights, schooled in the art of chivalry, believed in the might of the lance, sword and mace. Battles were won by the shock of the charge. Gentlemen fought each other hand to hand. It was considered knavish and unsporting to pick off your enemy from afar. Projectile weapons democracised war. Knights did not like to dwell on the fact that heavily armoured mounted troops could be killed by mere lowborn artisans. The tension in longbows was such that arrows struck with great force, slicing through chainmail as if it were linen. A starving peasant could reduce an armoured and expensively trained horseman to crow's meat in the blink of an eye with just one well-flighted arrow.
Captured archers and users of the hated crossbow were usually butchered out of hand or severely disabled. Still many armies in Europe included mercenary Genoese and Swiss cross-bowmen. The fearsome longbow made its appearance by about 1160. At the siege of Abergavenny in 1182, Welsh archers, using longbows, pierced an oaken door four inches thick with their feathered missiles. In the same conflict one William de Braose was struck by a Welsh arrow. The missile went through the skirts of his mail shirt, through his mail breeches, through his thigh, through the mail on the inner side of his leg, through the wood of his saddle; finally penetrating deep into the flank of his horse. The arrow had to be cut on either side of his leg before he could be separated from the stricken animal. A crossbow bolt could also do this, but the longbow was much faster shooting. It took years of daily practice to make a skilled archer and only the English and the Welsh ever mastered the art on a national scale. On 25 October 1415, English and Welsh archers under Henry V completely destroyed the French cavalry at Agincourt.
*WHEN RICHARD Coeur de Lion (England's Richard I) captured Acre in 1191, he had a hundred Saracen archers blinded and returned to his enemy Paladin. Three thousand more prisoners were massacred when Paladin executed the Christian crusaders that he himself held. As the spoils of Acre were being distributed among the French and English Barons, Richard refused to allow Leopold of Austria to join in. He considered the Austrian arrogant for travelling to the Holy Lands with just 200 men and then demanding a third share in the spoils. Leopold did not forget. When Richard was shipwrecked on his return to France in September 1192, Leopold had him taken prisoner. The demand for Richard's safe return to his English troops was 100,000 marks. It was the original King's ransom, but Richard's mother, the fabled Eleanor of Aquitaine, agreed to pay it. Leopold then visited King Richard in his dungeon.
"I am going to give you a kiss", he said. The famous crusader king, chained to the wall amid his own filth, still had a sense of humour. "How much will it cost me?" he asked.
"One hundred thousand marks," said Leopold.
Richard smiled through his unkept beard. "You must be the most expensive whore in history", he said.
King Richard (born in 1157) died in 1199 from an infection following an arrow wound during his final crusade. History has been kind to him, hailing him as a great English patriot, and a wise monarch. The facts are that he only spoke French, hardly ever visited Britain, and regarded the Norman possessions in England as a principle source of soldiers for his endless crusades against the Saracens and Moors. He constantly taxed the country to bolster his war chest. Richard loved the sting of battle, and though courageous, he was often ruthlessly cruel with captured foes. The Christian crusades in 12th century Europe were a perfect excuse to exercise his psychopathic nature. We have the legend of 'Robin Hood/Lord Robin of Loxley' to thank for this version of Richard 1 as a wise and noble English King. The myth goes like this: gallant Robin and his band of outlaws are disenfranchised and left to deal with the nasty sheriff of Nottingham allied with the evil Prince Regent, (the future King John). Meantime, Richard is away in the Holy Lands fighting Paladin and his Saracen hordes on behalf of Christ. This romantic myth is perpetrated in Kevin Costner's romp, 'Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves' with Sean Connery making a cameo appearance as the noble King Richard. Good cinema fare, but not consistent with history. Richard 1 was also known to be homosexual. According to James Goldman in 'The Lion in Winter', Richard seduced Phillipe, the future King of France, in the summer of 1181 in Paris when he was 24 and the young French lad only 15 years old. In the 1968 hit movie from Goldman's play, Richard was Anthony Hopkins, and a young Timothy ('James Bond') Dalton played Phillipe.
*KING JOHN (1167-1216) assumed the English throne in 1199, and so began a Dark Age in British history. His ruthless abuse of power was finally curtailed by the English barons at Runnymede in 1215; but by then the damage had been done. After an unsuccessful rebellion against his Uncle King John in 1203, Arthur of Brittany (son of Geoffrey) was captured and imprisoned in Rouen. John had his nephew blinded when the teenager refused to swear an oath of allegiance. On Good Friday after mass three months later John visited his prisoner in his cell and, following a bitter argument, strangled the boy with his own chains. He then disposed of the body through a sewer grating.
When Mathilda de Brieuse accused him of the crime, King John had her arrested. Mathilda and her four-year-old son were then shut away in Corfe Castle and starved to death. The young boy died first. It was said that Mathilda gnawed at the flesh of her son before she too died several days later. Their bodies rotted away to skeletons before the cell door was cracked open and their sad remains buried. King John himself, (a notorious glutton), died in 1216 from a ruptured ulcer after eating a dish of eels and peaches washed down with cider. He had lost all the family's land in Normany and most of the royal treasure when waggons carrying it were caught by the incoming tide whilst attempting to cross the estuary of the Wellstream, near Wisbech, on a journey from Lynn to Nottingham. John had lost two hundred men, forty horses, the English treasures of the realm and his inevitably will to survive.
*WHO SAID, "Defeat is good"? Nelson Mandela's chiropodist.
*WHAT DID the verger shout to the painter? "Cor, what are you doing up there Michaelangelo? You were only told to paint the cistern in the chapel!"
*STAR TRIVIA: Which top Tennis star had a father who boxed for Iran in the 1964 Tokyo Olympics? Answer: Andre Agassi, born an American citizen in 1970. Television and movie star James Garner ('Maverick'/'Jim Rockford') gained a Purple Heart for military service in Korea in 1952. He was wounded in the backside ("the buttocks", as 'Forrest Gump' would say) by flying shrapnel and hospitalised. And yes, it WAS 'Friendly Fire'!
*WHY IS it that Americans cannot just meet people? They have to 'meet with' them. Answers on a postcard, please.
*SOME KEY buzz phases from the BBC TV soap series, 'Eastenders' explained: "Get it sorted!" (Sort it out. Work out the problem); "It's doin' me 'ead in" (It's doing my head in - I can't understand it); "I can't get me 'ead 'raund it" (I can't get my head around it - I've been thinking about it, and I still don't understand the situation).
*OVERHEARD in a bar: "Darling, this media-driven war against Saddam Hussein was a bit like Bill Haley and The Comets - 'Iraq around the clock'!"
*A NEW 'wife holding' world record? That's what they hope has been achieved in a Valentine's Day gimmick at the Ripley's Believe it or not (!) Museum in hedonistic Pattaya. This ambitious organisation at the Royal Garden Plaza is never tawdry in matters of self-promotion. On Friday 14 February, eight Thai 'husbands' clutching their 'wives' close to their chests, sweated, shifted and felt their muscles turn to mush; but a ninth contestant lasted nearly 11 hours to set what may prove to be a world record in Ripley's 'Carry Your Lover' competition. Winning the 100,000 baht first prize were Amnat Puttigo (weighing in at 80 kilogrammes) and his companion Chanantida Bunsamer (35 kilos). They were the heaviest and lightest respectively of the nine couples entered. Ms Bunsamer looked like a tiny pixie in the arms of her Goliath partner. They appeared slightly bored by the ordeal, but decided to call it quits after 10 hours, 49 minutes and 15 seconds of being ogled by passing members of the public, who came along to stare. The couples stood on 50-by-50 centimetres blocks, with no toilet breaks and a two-minutes sitting break every hour during which the men still had to carry their female partners in their laps. Most of the men shifted their arms uncomfortably around their partners as the women fanned them and wiped off the sweat.
It was a new first in the area of muscular endurance, but oddly enough, not one member of Pattaya's large community of narcissistic 'gym rats' bothered to enter. Perhaps they were too busy lifting weights and popping steroids.
Organisers at the museum, a franchise of the American-based Ripley's Believe It or Not! said that the results will be sent to the Guinness World Records organisation in London, England, for approval as a record in a new category to be known as 'Holding Someone for the Longest Time'. I understand that 'A Longest Kiss' contest (for which there is an existing world record) was junked because Thais generally do not approve of kissing in public. Snogging in front of strangers is alien to Thai culture, they tell me. ('Pattaya Mail')
*QUOTE: "President Bush has sent 200 American Special Forces troops to the Philippines to put down a gang of local terrorists. He wants them back doing what they should be doing - making Nike shoes for Americans." (US Comedian Bill Maher)
*HOW DO you establish the sex of a chromosome? You could try taking it's genes down. Yes, it's another groaner boys and girls.
*A POSTCARD from (Old Testament) David: "Hello all. Wish you were here. The big fight with Goliath is scheduled for tomorrow. Expect you've heard about all the fuss at the weigh-in. Think I have got the hang of this sling shot business, but just in case things go wrong, I have Shadrach, Medrach and Abednego waiting with javelins behind a grassy knoll." (Note: The latter three were fearsome warriors who survived the fiery furnace of Babylon).
*BRIEF MESSAGE from Samuel Morse: "Dear Dot, must dash. Love, SM."
*FRENCHMAN Tony Andre Marichaud (29) had a dramatic first trip to Thailand recently. After flying in from Paris, Marichaud and his pal Richard Henri Detroit (28) hired a taxi to Pattaya from Don Muang airport after clearing customs one fine morning. Already inebriated when they hailed their taxi, they proceeded to consume a bottle of vodka between them by the time they had reached the outer limits of Pattaya City during the two hours drive south-east. When their driver stopped for a toilet break, Marchiaud decided that it would be fun to take over the steering wheel. Cheering wildly, he and his friend drove off. In his drunken state, Marchiaud was not too bothered about traffic regulations. He drove straight out of the car park, onto Sukhumvit Road and crunched directly into an oncoming car just after 10 am. The car's angry owner ran out to remonstrate with the dazed Frenchman, who then crawled through a smashed rear window, and ran across the northbound side of busy Sukhumvit, forcing cars to swerve wildly. Eventually, he was caught and restrained by a police officer and local residents, as one of the passengers of the car he had totalled was taken off to hospital, suffering from cuts and shock. The inebriated Frenchman was handcuffed and charged with being drunk and disorderly, car theft, causing an accident and injury, resisting arrest and violence against police. The whole episode initially cost him 20,000 euros. Hopefully Monsieur Marichaud learned an important lesson: Thais are fun loving people who enjoy entertaining foreign visitors, but they do not tolerate the behaviour of drunken oafs who put themselves and others in danger. ('Pattaya Mail')
*BACK TO the beginning: "In 1066 William the Conqueror crossed the channel with his 9,000 Normans; after what must have been the most confusing role-call in history. King Harold was struck with an arrow and taken to Lewes Hospital where he was declared dead on arrival. Then he was transferred to a private clinic, where his status was upgraded to alive, but unresponsive." (Comedian Paul Merton)

davidcox@loxinfo.co.th

Remembering Tommy Cooper

Phone answering machine message - "...If you want to buy marijuana,press
the hash key..."
I went to buy some camouflage trousers the other day but I couldn't find any.
I went to the butchers the other day and I bet him 50 quid that he
couldn't reach the meat off the top shelf. He said, "No, the steaks are too
high."
My friend drowned in a bowl of muesli. A strong currant pulled him in..
A man takes his Rottweiler to the vet. "My dog's cross-eyed, is there
anything you can do for him? "
"Well," says the vet, "let's have a look at him" So he picks the dog up and
examines his eyes, then checks his teeth. Finally, he says, "I'm going to have to put him down."
"What? Because he's cross-eyed? "
"No, because he's really heavy"
Guy goes into the doctor's. "Doc, I've got a cricket ball stuck up my
backside."
"How's that?"
"Don't you start."
Two elephants walk off a cliff...boom, boom!
So I was getting into my car, and this bloke says to me "Can you give me
a lift?"
I said "Sure, you look great, the world's your oyster, go for it.'
Apparently, 1 in 5 people in the world are Chinese. There are 5 people
in my family, so it must be one of them. It's either my mum or my dad. Or my
older brother Colin. Or my younger brother Ho-Cha-Chu. But I think it's
Colin.
Police arrested two kids yesterday, one was drinking battery acid, the
other was eating fireworks. They charged one and let the other one off.
"You know, somebody actually complimented me on my driving today. They
left a little note on the windscreen. It said, 'Parking Fine.' So that was nice."

The sign below is genuine!
Thanks to Roger Perrin Chairman for Life, Hamilton Accies Supporters Club, Hong Kong Branch

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