bodgers, bag women,
badgers, fat boys, flashers, snobs
riddlers and slaggers

Britain, says James Fox, was once a place teeming with bodgers, badgers, ballers, bag women, bottom stainers, fat boys, flashers and flirters. That’s not forgetting the riddlers, slaggers and snobs. And before you say anything, these are all occupations that were once ubiquitous but are now vanishingly rare: a bodger makes chair legs; a badger is someone who etches glass; a fat boy is a greaser of axles in haulage systems, while a snob is a journeyman maker of boots and shoes.

From the book review, Craftland by James Fox review – on the trail of Britain’s vanishing skills by Kathryn Hughes.

Other cool jobs/crafts include:

Wood & Rural Crafts

Bodgers – itinerant wood-turners working in the woods, making chair legs on pole lathes.

Riddle / Riddlers – makers of riddles and sieves (mesh-framed tools for separating grain or soil).

Hurdle makers – weaving hazel into fences.

Coopers – barrel makers.

Shave horses & spoon carvers (not funny sounding, but linked to bodgers).

Metal & Industrial

Slaggers – workers dealing with slag by-products in metalwork.

Flashers – could be tin workers cutting “flash” (excess metal) off castings.

Snobs – in some dialects, shoemakers or cobblers.

Whitesmiths – tinsmiths, working in light metal rather than black iron.

Nailers – hand-making nails, often a whole family trade.

Leather, Cloth & Textiles

Badgers – cloth workers who bought cloth from weavers and sold it on (sometimes also itinerant traders in other goods).

Bag women – women going door-to-door selling haberdashery or collecting rags for paper-making.

Fustian cutters – cutting pile on heavy cloth.

Shoddy makers – reprocessing old wool cloth into new cheap fabric.

Crottlers – repairing stockings.

Whip-plaiters – making braided whips.

Stone, Earth & Miscellaneous

Puddlers – workers who kneaded clay to seal canals and dams.

Knockers (Cornish mining folklore) – but also used for mine surface workers.

Delvers – stone quarrymen.

Clod breakers – farm labouring role, breaking soil lumps.

place of tears, whisper
of me, he sang a song that
reached the hearts of men

Adapted from “The Reward” by James Weldon Johnson.

No greater earthly boon than this I crave,
That those who some day gather ’round my grave,
In place of tears, may whisper of me then,
He sang a song that reached the hearts of men.”

As it appears in Fifty Years and Other Poems by James Weldon Johnson (Cornhill Company, Boston, 1917).

According to Wikipedia, James Weldon Johnson … in 1930, at the age of 59, Johnson returned to education after his many years leading the NAACP. He accepted the Spence Chair of Creative Literature at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. The university created the position for him in recognition of his achievements as a poet, editor and critic during the Harlem Renaissance. In addition to discussing literature, he lectured on a wide range of issues related to the lives and civil rights of black Americans. He held this position until his death. In 1934, he also was appointed as the first African-American professor at New York University, where he taught several classes in literature and culture.

challenge is someone,
somehow, somewhere must call a
halt to the madness

Ever play madlibs?

The word game where you have a paragraph filled with blanks and you substitute words.

Here is today’s game.

Today’s Haiku is adapted from the closing sentence in an opinion piece in the Guardian.

The writer wrote, “The challenge is formidable, the outcome uncertain. But someone, somehow, somewhere must call a halt to the madness.”

Suppose the writer wrote …

The challenge is formidable, the outcome uncertain. But someone, somehow, somewhere must call a halt to the madness of ________.

What word or current crisis do you choose to fill in the blank?

The situation in Gaza?

The Trump Administration?

Vaccines?

The recent occasions of gun violence?

The Hot Weather?

College Football Playoffs?

College Football Player Payoffs (read NIL)?

College Football Player Trade offs (read Transfer Portal)?

The Threat of Artificial Intelligence?

I am almost happy to report that the article in question, is “As the world hurtles ever closer to nuclear oblivion, where is the opposition?“ by Simon Tisdall.

But in a WORLD GONE CRAZY, the possible list of is endless.

Use the comments to suggest you choice and I will compile a list.

The challenge is formidable, the outcome uncertain.

But someone, somehow, somewhere must call a halt to the madness.

cynicism risk
can’t believe numbers, do we
believe anything?

Adapted from the New York Times Opinion piece, What to Do When the President Acts Like a Five-Year-Old?, by By George A. Akerlof, a Nobel-winning economist where Mr. Akerlof writes:

When a government fires the umpire, we all have reason to wonder: What game are we playing? One danger certainly is that a future Bureau of Labor Statistics head might feel political pressure to fudge a jobs report. The deeper risk is cynicism, the quiet corrosion of faith in institutions. If we can’t believe the numbers, how do we believe anything?

Sadly, Mr. Akerlof doesn’t follow through and answer the question, What to Do When the President Acts Like a Five-Year-Old?

He does point out the that President should follow the rules.

He writes: Past presidents respected this boundary. Ronald Reagan didn’t fire the head of the agency when it reported double-digit unemployment during his first term.

But what should we do?

As already quoted, Mr. Akerlof says If we can’t believe the numbers, how do we believe anything?

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

All the the deeper risk is cynicism?

Deeper risk?

I was schooled in the school there are lies, damn lies … and Government Statistics.

I was schooled that during World War 2, unemployment figures were at their lowest levels ever. That they country couldn’t show Full Employment however, was due to way the figures were added up.

I always thought that I could get rid of the US Debt by telling the Government to use the long scale Billion where a billion is a million million, not a 1000 million as the US debt is now counted.

Over night, the debt would fall from $36.7 Trillion dollars to a much more realizable $37.6 Billion.

And you could believe the numbers!

Here’s how that conversion works:

Standard U.S. system (short scale):

• 1 trillion = 1,000 billion
• 1 billion = 1,000 million
  So, 1 trillion = 1,000,000 million (one million million).

Therefore:

• $36.7 trillion = 36.7 million million dollars
  (in other words, $36,700,000,000,000).

So if you’re counting a billion as a million million (which is the long scale used historically in some parts of Europe), then:

Long scale conversion:

• 1 billion (long scale) = 1 million million (i.e., 1,000,000,000,000 or 1 trillion short scale).

So in long scale, $36.7 trillion (short scale) = 36.7 billion (long scale).

Summary:

• Short scale (used in the U.S.): $36.7 trillion = 36.7 million million.
• Long scale: $36.7 trillion = 36.7 billion (long scale definition of billion).

I am reminded of the old TV Show, Yes, Minister, where the local authorities are not sending in their reports on time.

The exchange between Sir Humphrey, Hacker and Bernard goes:

Sir Humphrey: If local authorities don’t send us statistics, Government figures will be a nonsense.
Hacker: Why?
Sir Humphrey: They’ll be incomplete.
Hacker: Government figures are a nonsense, anyway.
Bernard: I think Sir Humphrey wants to ensure they’re a complete nonsense.

To repeat again, If we can’t believe the numbers, how do we believe anything?

Folks, if we have to believe the numbers … well …

As Sonny Corleone said about Luca, [ If Luca sold out,] … we’re in a lot of trouble, believe me. A lot of trouble.

But I don’t want to sound cynical.