PTSD

of ancient Scottish doctors and modern dark lagoons

Talking to (one of) my sibling(s) just now, I was informed that one of the required books in her pre-19th Century English literature class is Tobias Smollett's The Expedition of Humphry Clinker.

Since I'd never heard of Tobias Smollett, I asked Wiki for help. It turns out Dr. Smollett was a (Scottish) doctor who ran off to London to become a dramatist. Not just any dramatist but he wanted to write tragedies. Unfortunately, he turned out to be better at comedies so he wrote a few, travelled around Europe, ended up in Jamaica (after being the ship's doctor for a trading vessel headed there) and married a rich Jamaican heiress once he returned to Britain.

Why is this relevant to anything, yous ask? It isn't really. But I felt I should share it anyway.

And, to show that this post's not all about eccentric Scotsmen, here are a couple of links for you:

The Daily Show with a brief history of Blackwater and what happens when you ("we"?) have people running about overseas--people who don't answer to American or overseas laws.

And no one predicted this could be a problem? Sometimes the absolute utter nonsense of the world we live in is astounding.

Labels: Blackwater in Iraq, daily show, i want to be Dr Smollett, Scottish oddities, the incredible stupidity of some people

posted by Priya @ 12:49 AM