The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret - 72: Jingo Pt. 2 (Does Neptune Need a Pedicure?)

Episode Date: January 17, 2022

The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret is a podcast in which your hosts, Joanna Hagan and Francine Carrel, read and recap every book from Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in chronological order. This week, Part 2 of our recap of “Jingo”. Bedsteads! Pheasants! The enraging futility of war! Find us on the internet:Twitter: @MakeYeFretPodInstagram: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretFacebook: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretEmail: [e-mail]: www.patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyefretWant to follow your hosts and their internet doings? Follow Joanna on twitter @joannahagan and follow Francine @francibambi Things we blathered on about:The Annotate Pratchett File - Jingo/r/thalassophobia - redditThe Art of War by Sun Tzu - The Internet Classics Archive@SheldrickTrust - TwitterSt Elmo’s Fire (captured by RAF @99Sqn) - TwitterMusic: Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com 

the book kind of speaks for itself most like this section. So yeah, the research, but it's just kind of unnecessarily icing hat on a hat as you will. Like a two hats Joe, you mean? Just like two hats Joanna, except she's not unnecessary. No, I'm completely superfluous on the business card. Did you say your shoes broke? Yeah. Oh, have those cute like black leather ankle boots? Literally just the bottom came off like the whole sole and heel is all one piece and it like it was hanging on by about an inch. Don't get me wrong, they were cheapy ones and the sole was already cracked, but it was like, I must have obviously it was coming week and then I knocked it as I got into

the car or something. I noticed when I got to the office and it was like, oh, you weren't walking, that's something good. Yeah, no, at least I didn't I had a lift in and a lift back. But I was just having to kind of really say orcs at the office. Yeah, especially because I have to go up and down so many stairs. I take it for granted that I always have still toecaps in my car now. I used to always like have a pair of flat ballet flats in whatever bag I was carrying, but as I don't go out in shoes, I can't walk in usually anymore. I don't carry. Weirdly enough, your sensible shoes mean you don't have any spare sensible shoes. You should start carrying emergency flats again because I tend to buy cheap boots that break.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm just glad it's where DMs at all times. Yeah, I know. But sometimes they're not quite the look I'm going for. And by that, I mean, I've only got one pair of DMs. I just need to buy more DMs in the different looks I like to go for. Yeah. Yeah, you can get healed ones and everything now. It seems a bit against the spirit of the thing, but they do look cool. I really like them. The problem is every time I think about buying a new pair of DMs, I remember the breaking in process. What was the brand of boots I was loving the look of, but they don't do vegan ones.

I'll get back to you on that. Cool. Yeah. I bought some Rocket Dog like little black sort of ankle-y cowboy style boots to replace the ones that broke today because I need a pair of black keeled ankle boots since they are the only shoe I wear rather than dog martens. Yeah, I do brogues usually, don't I say? Yeah, I can't pull off brogues. Something about my... Mustang, that's what the boots were. It's really nice, mustangi boots. You know, you can get some smart-ish zip up ankle boots. Yeah, I'm usually pairing them with a ball gown anyway, like a casual boot with a ball gown.

Shoes are the hardest part of aesthetic for me if it's not DMs because I can't really wear heels for more than an hour or so without my feet screaming in pain unless they're boots. Even with boots, I can't wear a heel over like three inches. It's funny, isn't it? Because the first few years I knew you, you were never not in heels. Never. And I was literally in the kitchen. Yeah, but I was in so much... The only reason I wasn't in constant total agony is I drank so much that I think I am anesthetized to my feet. Also, at least twice in the time you've known me, I have ended up severely laid up with a sprained ankle.

Yeah, I was concerned about you when you moved into this flat, but it seems like you're coping okay with these stairs. They're not too bad. They actually don't really freeze. Oh, good. Occasionally, the steps... They're kind of rough enough. I think they're rough enough and then the path sort of out the front of the flats and the little steps going up to mine.

I think it's just got enough of a windbreak that it doesn't freeze. I was reading, walking down the stairs earlier and kind of caught myself like, no. That's how you die. I used to do this kind of shit when I was a kid. I used to walk to school reading. Yep. I don't think I was bouncy as I was. I think if I fall down the stairs, it'll really hurt now. I'm just going to look where I'm going.

Oh, aging. Some unexpected downsides. See, I'm at least quite padded, so when I do slip downstairs, there's a lot of me to bounce. You're quite skinny, Francine. Don't fall down the stairs. But then I seem to have slightly better bones when it comes to falling over. Oh, that's not fair. I don't fall as much weirdly because I'm clumsier than you. Yeah. So I've learned to catch myself at an early age.

As I'm just graceful enough that I fall badly. You know, just enough about staying upright to be dangerous? Something like that. I very nearly pitched face first on the floor while doing yoga earlier. Fantastic. I haven't done the standing split thing for quite a while, but is that coming? Yes. The thing is, I used to be really, really good and could really confidently get up into a standing split, hold onto my calf and have my hands on the floor, bend my face right down to

my knee and not really have to think about it. And in my brain, thought I could still do that. My body told me to fuck all the way off. Yeah, yeah. And just tried to throw itself forward when I took my hands off the floor. The static equivalent of when you actually tried to step on a step that was not there. Yeah. Beautiful. Anyway, Pratchett is an author we like.

Yeah. Yeah, that's something we have in common. I'm trying to throw some vaguely podcast-relevant shit into a soft open. Good. I feel like I read some stuff about him recently and it's just slipped out my head again. Not really Pratchett related, but we had a very nice time going to a local ballgame cafe yesterday. Oh, we did. That's nerdy enough to go in this bit, I think. Yeah. Yeah. We played Settlers of Catan for the second time and Joanna won by an astonishing amount.

I got a brick monopoly early on and I cashed in. I had no chance of winning, which almost made it more fun because it was Ben. Just watching Chaos. Both of them. Well, not you actually, Joe. You kept very calm as he got slowly more hysterical towards the end. The thing is, I think Sterling and I are both very competitive, but you know how when I get really angry at something, I get super calm and polite at it? Yeah.

Yeah. Is that what was going on? Yeah, I feel like that. I'm not that I was angry, but I feel like it's the same thing when I get competitive is that I just get more calm and polite the closer I get to winning. Oh, I need to get you a coffee of tact because there's Benny Vidi Vici. I mean, it worked. Yeah, it did. And then we did play one game of Scrabble, which I won because

we had now a last and I thought I would make myself feel better by picking the game. I had a pretty good chance of winning. I knew I was not going to win, but I had a nice time. My new computer's arrived as well, but I haven't set it up yet. Is that your weekend's task? That's Sunday is going to be building, well, setting up the computer and building the chair. That's right, because you've got further nerdery tomorrow, haven't you? I'm going to play more board games tomorrow.

I don't know what games I'm playing tomorrow. I'm quite excited to find out. I'll cut this bit. Back in things that listeners are allowed to hear, January is a terrible month for being constantly bombarded with diet culture stuff. So I hope all our listeners are being very nice to themselves and eating something delicious. I don't know how you want me to segue to that from board games smoothly. The board game cafe serves food?

Sure. I'm just going to put a bleep for 15 minutes in the middle. Yeah, why not? I'm sorry. I can't do anything more helpful today. No, you're fine. You're fine. That's actually pretty funny.

As long as the listeners are having a nice piece of cake or a biscuit or something. I want to make sure they're all... If you're not listeners, if you want to snack, feel free to pause and go and get a snack. Yes. We encourage snacking, although we try not to snack during the podcast, because of the noises. Should we grab a snack and then should we make a podcast? Okay, snack then podcast.

Good. Podcast. Good, fine. Hello and welcome to the Two Shall Make You Threat, a podcast in which we are reading and recapping every book from Terry Bratchett's Discworld series, one as Simon in chronological order. I'm Joanna Hagen. And I'm Franty and Carol. And this is part two of our discussion of Jingo.

Yeah, it's a good book. It is a good book. Good part. It is. I'm enjoying it. Good part. I regret making this section quite so long, or I regretted it when I was doing my notes. And I was like, I must be nearly up.

No, 50 pages to go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Those 50 pages were read. Many a break. Many a post-it. More than usual. More than usual. Thoughts.

Notes on spoilers. Before we get started, we are a spoiler light podcast, obviously heavy spoilers for the book Jingo. But we will avoid spoiling major future events in the Discworld series. And we're saving any and all discussion of the final Discworld novel, The Shabbat's Crown, until we get there. So you dear listener can come on the journey with us. In a U-V-S looking underwater machine. I think it looks dubious.

I think it's quite snazzy. Well, it depends where the elevator is. We listened to Sergeant Colon. I never listened to Sergeant Colon. I think that's for the best, yeah. Not he's talking about a census, this book. He's quite sensible at the moment. We'll see if he stays that way into the final section.

Anyway, sorry. Follow-up. We have a good follow-up comment, don't we? Have you got it handy? We do. We do. Yes. Sondvergal, our resident good at commenting commenter.

Sorry. Pointed out that I was going on about JFK and it said he'd noticed Franz Ferdinand and hadn't made JFK. And I hadn't really noticed the Franz Ferdinand connection. No, I don't really think about that connection. Yeah. Yeah. But obviously, the assassination that sparked the war that was already simmering in the background

mixed my metaphors a bit there. Went from a spark to a damp one. Well, I suppose if you have a little spark and that lights the gas hob and then you bring something up to like a gentle simmer. Yeah. Cool. Cool. And then the gas lights and explodes into a war.

Yes. Well done. Good. Sorry. Sorry, I know. Foreign titles. They looked up the German title. This one is Fliegen die Fetten, derived from the saying der Fliegen die Fetten,

which Sander Vogel says literally that sends the rags slash scraps flying, meaning that they're such a harsh hand-to-hand fighting or just commotion or like a war in general excitement that your clothes tear apart from the strain put on them through the movement. My clothes have never spontaneously fallen off during a commotion. Well, should know, never mind. And they also mentioned it might be a pun based on something that happens a bit later in the section three, so I won't mention it yet just in case anyone's reading along. Excellent.

But thank you, Sander. Yes. Thank you. Excellent as always. Yes. Right. I forgot to look up translations for the other ones, so I'm glad someone did it. Yeah, that's fine.

Maybe I'll do that next week. Sorry, I'm fucking with my mic bit. There we go. Awesome. Francine, would you like to tell us what happened previously on Djingo? Absolutely. Previously on Djingo. From the depths of the ocean came an island.

From the island came a squabble. From the squabble came a diplomatic crisis. Ankmoorpork and Klatt both lay claim to the small, salty and sulfurous Leshp, much to the annoyance of Commander Vimes as the associated political Tom Fulery has already resulted in two murders and attempted assassination and yet another moment of marital bliss marred by misdeeds. Unrest is blowing in on sea winds and there doesn't seem to be any way to stop it. Ooh. Right.

How about this time? In this section. Good luck. Lots of stuff happens. Didn't it? Yeah, yeah. In this section, the embassy is on fire. Vimes rushes to the rescue and with the assistance of a mysterious figure,

he makes it to the roof of the embassy, despite technically invading clatchy and soil in the process. Meanwhile, Carroton Angwer continue investigations as they find a clove at Aussie's place and Snowy slopes body in the company of a suspiciously empty notebook. Post-rescue and somewhat singed, Vimes wonders what happened to his mysterious assistant, disappeared into the night with a figure over his shoulder. Vimes continues to puzzle out the perplexing case, despite interruptions from his disorganiser and civil ruminates in her library as angry clatchy ends attend the watch house on behalf of the Gorough family. The disorganiser takes Vimes' harsh words to heart and predicts an appointment at the city rat's chamber.

Mrs. Cake predicts a future of Nubal women for Nobby as Vimes heads to the palace. Veterinary has apparently stepped down for the duration, leaving rust in charge and martial law in the city as clatch officially declares war. The recovering Prince Kufra has been kidnapped. Vimes is stood down and no one's prepared to take his place. Soldiers parade, Colin reminisces and Nobby receives a white feather. Vimes wakes up to find a reminder from Veterinary that he is in fact a knight and after brushing up on chivalry he wraps up warm to head out and kick some arse. Carrot and Anger escort the Goroughs to the docks as the family sees the wind blowing and prepares to leave Ankmoork. They notice 71 hour armade at the helm of a ship,

taunting them and Angwer plans to go wolf to take a look. Colin and Nobby patrol until they find themselves incompetently kidnapped by Leonard of Querm on behalf of his lordship. They're taken to a mysterious dock and with a little encouragement from Veterinary join an expedition on Leonard's cleverly designed underwater fish thing. Rust strategizes badly as Vimes recruits for his own regiment with all the watchmen of course volunteering of their own free will. The librarian delivers Sam a book by General Tacticus and he once again works on the case before the imp informs him of an upcoming emergency meeting with Carrot and little bottom informs him of Fred and Cecil's secret mission. Wolfie Angwer sneaks on to armade ship only to find a

self-court in a silver collar. The emergency meeting with Carrot takes place, the ship is sailed and Vimes plans to do what he does best and chase armade possibly all the way to Clatch. The disorganiser gets mixed up in the trousers of time as Vimes commandeers Jenkins ship and set sail. The beggars guild keep Rust informed and to save face Rust sends the armies of Ankmoork on to Clatch. In Clatch Prince Cadrush plans his armies around Anks incompetence while Vimes gives nautical chase and Angwer struggles to keep the wolf thoughts at bay. The disorganiser delivers appointments from another timeline as some ungulance fire rages at sea and magical storms swirl. Angwer gets human, finds Prince Kufra on the boat before striking out at sea and armade

heads to shore alone as Vimes' ship makes a crash landing while vicious dregs watch the shores. Meanwhile Lennar's boat submerges in the marine world as they travel under the island of Lesh and learn that its current elevation might just be temporary. Vimes travels over the dunes only to find himself surrounded by dregs. After a brief battle he finds himself a kindly kept prisoner as the dregs possibly do what armade commands. As Vessenari and his ragtag bunch of marine misfits make it to Clatch, night falls in the desert and Angwer rejoins the watchmen just in time to spot the soldiers surrounding them and suggest an alternative to attacking at dawn. Helicopter and loincloth watch then? I'm going to say the boat's an underwater helicopter.

Okay, it rotates. It does. It's a rotating part. Exactly. It flies through bubbles. It does fly through bubbles and we've added soap to make it extra bubbly. Yeah. I forgot to look up that thing about dolphins, I'm sure it's right. What, that they fly through their bubbles? It's nice, I'm not sure how scientifically accurate it is. It sounds like something it might be, doesn't it? I think they just swim. Okay. Well, I like the sound of a shovel-headed dolphin anyway. I do like the sound of a shovel-headed dolphin. That seems appropriate, Frank Moorpork. And like then a hammerhead shark could have a little friend.

Right. Oh, also for Helicopter Watch you pointed out the book Stopping the Arrows is an evolved billion-to-one chance. I think the colon's great-grandfather has, was it a Bible? Yeah, there we go. This belonged to my great-grandad, he said, holding up a small prayer book. He was in the scrap we had against Pseudopolis and my great-grand gave him this book of prayers for soldiers because you need all the prayers he can get, believe you me. And he stuck it in the top pocket of his jerkin because he couldn't afford armor. And the next day in battle, whoosh, this arrow came out of nowhere.

Wham, straight into the book and it went all the way through to the last page for stopping. Look, you can see the whole pretty miraculous character greed. Yeah, it was, I suppose, but the sudden he looked ruefully at the battered volume. Shame about the other 17 arrows, really. That made me chuckle. Yeah. There's also a million-to-one shot mentioned by detritus, I think, on the boat. Quite possibly, yes. When he was thinking about shooting the other one, but that's not as fun. It is less fun. That's just boat shooting.

It's just boat shooting. Hoomangas doesn't shoot a boat of an evening. I shoot a boat every evening. It's quite challenging as I live in a fairly landlocked area. So, quotes. You are first because mine is literally one of the last paragraphs of the section. Yes. Speaking of boats, that's what mine is. What's this thing called? Third colon? Has he followed the patrician up the ladder? Well, because it is submersed in a marine environment, I've always called it the going under the water safely device, said Leonard, behind him. Which, I know, it's a joke made again and again with Leonard of Clam,

but I don't know why that one caught me off guard quite so much. I was properly giggling, so I just picked that. How about you? I think you picked a slightly more serious one. Oh, yeah, I went more dramatic this time. This is on page 281 in my version. Uh, the knight is always old. He'd walked too often down dark streets in the secret hours and felt the knight stretching away and known in his blood that while days and kings and empires come and go, the knight is always the same age, always eons deep, terrors unfolded

in the velvet shadows, and while the nature of the talons may change, the nature of the beast does not. I just thought that was a really good, sort of almost horror building moment in the midst of what's generally all quite funny. I mean, about a page later, Angwer burst into the camp completely naked. Yes. Almost a little callback Togfather as well, isn't it? The ancient darkness. And there's a fear in the darkness. The joke about the knight is old. The knight is always old. That death makes. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's probably right.

Um, but also it was reminded me of all the creepy deep sea underwater stuff, which, as you know, is one of my favorite topics of both horror and science. Elasophobia is a whole subreddit for that. I'll link it. Except I also think it's all really cool, terrifying, but cool. And I like learning about how eyesight works in fish. Yeah, you do. Well, we'll have a bit of that. Yay. Color language. Little bit of that. A little bit. Just a bit. Just a tad. A touch.

Right. So. A tentacle. A tentacle. What? Characters. Characters. We'll talk about some, some new and some brief revisits, and then we'll do some proper revisits. First up, shout out to Stooli, which I think is the first time we've met nolls on the disc. I believe so.

Which seem to be strange, rubbish eating type creatures. Also, doubling as informants. About the size of a man, but bent almost double. Covered with hair or rangs, or quite possibly a matted mixture of both that was so felt in unwashed that small plants had taken root on it. So they're sort of sentient compost heaps. Yes. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I was trying to remember the gardener's name. Modo. Modo would probably employ one to help him out in times of peril.

Also, there is a line somewhere about Stooli the noll having a bit of grass growing on him, which means he's a grassy noll. So another little JFK link there. Very nice. Very nice. Oh, and like Stooli is sometimes used to slang for like stall pigeon, which is an informant for the police. Who else we have? Oh, Dorfel. I don't really have a lot to say about Dorfel. I'm just glad he's present.

Yes, it's a, as Colin said, handy to have a ceramic constable. Yes, especially in case of fire, especially as I think more pork lacks a fire brigade because they would have just started having fire, setting fires themselves. Yeah, do you know what? I'm sure I've heard of something like that happening somewhere, and I've got to look into it. Yeah, that one didn't make it into my notes because I got distracted by other things, but I did plan on looking at historical precedents of fire brigade. And then we've got the disorganiser, which A, is quite sweet to see it back,

but B, the subplot of it getting mixed up with the disorganiser from the other trousers of time where Vaim stays in Angkor Pork is one of my favourite of all the disc world, like they're all subplots, narrative device things. Yeah, no, it's one of the really cool, like starts off quite funny, turns weirdly poignant very quickly. Yeah, you tell, he just really wanted to play with the concept of the trousers of time. I feel like it's also through a personal organiser. I felt like there's also possibly he had two different ideas for how this book could go,

and this was a way of doing the best one, but having the other one in the back pocket and getting just a little bit of it in. Yeah, I mean, a lot of what does happen would not have happened, obviously. Yeah, but some of the stuff that like, there's a really great scene with it, I'll talk about next week when we get onto that section that I love, and I can see him writing a version of that book. And four little fella, four little gremlin, nearly got put in the wash, nearly got eaten by a dragon, this is a sentient being, Vymes.

He's doing his best. Give him away, don't murder him. I'm amazed he's not become a member of the watch yet. Yes. I like the idea of this kind of appointment phase space where all potential appointments exist. It's very library, isn't it? L space kind of. Yes, I like to think about what potential appointments are floating around for me in phase space. Facticus.

He's a soldier. He's a good one, known for it, kind of hated for it. It's kind of the going back to the Pratchett thing of, and here's some common sense. Have you read the article? No, I'm some of it, like the book is taking inspiration from. Yeah, yeah, basically. And then obviously if anybody beat you, it's...

Julius Caesar. Probably, maybe. Someone made it up because it sounded clever. Yeah, something like that. And then went and conquered somewhere. Yeah, the idea of sitting with us as Oris joined to find three C words or dictionary, whatever it was. Yeah, I like that.

That did make me chuckle, but I also just like Vimes is refusing to accept. It's just like, I mean, he must have been a wanker who did something like that though. He just, he must have been, he must have sat and come up with something because it's something you can't picture a noble general doing. And it's almost like Vimes trying to spot the really human side of this person. Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, generally it stands in stark contrast to rust. Yeah, and I feel like that's kind of the idea,

is to give something else to put rust up against or to paint rust up against. I just like the idea that he kept conquering everywhere. They got so sick of him, they passed him off to another kingdom, and immediately he went, right, well now I'm going to conquer you. Like it's quite petty. Yeah, but no, it's not petty. That's the thing though, isn't it? The point is, it's like, it sat there,

and now his job was to find out who was the biggest military threat and a single pork. It doesn't have time to send to mentality. Yeah, good point. Next one, Veterinary. Oh, yes. This is good fun. I mean, interesting, interesting section for Veterinary, isn't it?

It's the first time we've seen him outside of politics, really. It's one of the things I do really like about this book. It's the first time we see Veterinary taking more action in events than just being in his office. Yes, he is. I think we noted last time this was the first one, he didn't get conspiracied out of power, but nonetheless, he does step down and out of the A plot, I suppose.

And he seems to be necessary, doesn't it, if it's going to be an more pork effecting plot. But now he would fix it. He is the Deus Ex Machina. So now he's underwater. Yeah, it's nice to have him going off to Machina somewhere else. Machinate. Deus Ex Submariner.

Yeah, that works. Machinate seems to be the word. A waste of seeds. Deus Ex Submarinate. Lovely Submarinate on this steak, darling. But yeah, no, the picture painted of him is just really cool as well, just the idea of him sitting in the lamp light, reading all these drawings,

and he's scientifically thrilled by the whole thing. It's quite fun to see what looks like Veterinary enjoying himself outside of... He's not manipulating anyone directly. I mean, Leonard is not so much manipulated as just quite happy to go along because it's fun. And Nobby and Cola haven't been manipulated so much as told. Yeah, very little manipulate.

Well, it's kind of their special talent. Obviously, guards, guards, vets and uris taken out of the action against his will because he's imprisoned. And similarly, feet of clay, he's somewhat taken out of the action because he's poisoned. Although in both cases, it seems pretty clear that he could have gotten out of these situations at any time. And he's still specifically manipulating vimes from that position he's put into.

Yes, very elegant and simplistic manipulation. Yes. Nonetheless, a kind of hint almost, isn't it, rather than a manipulation. It's almost like vimes wouldn't have been manipulating on this one. It was just a remember who you are. And then stepping back from the action to go and do something else. And it feels like a bit... It's good character development in that Veterinary's gotten confident enough in

who Vimes is and how the city will run that he can go and not be in the city for a few days and go and do whatever this direct action is he's taking instead. Yeah, that's a good point. He's gotten... Veterinary's Tarrier has been trained. Yes, very much so. Prince Khadram. Prince Khadram. He's the one at home, is he?

He's the one back at home. Yes, we've got Prince Khalif as the diplomat. Prince Khalif is the ambassador. Prince Kufura is the attempted assassination kidnapped by a 71-hour armad. Prince Khadram is the... By a mystery kidnapper in action too. Well, not really. I mean, he's on the boat with 71-hour armad that Angra finds him on.

I don't think it's a spoiler to say that 71-hour armad put him on that boat. Prince Khadram is very, very not impressed with Angkmaupok's military strategy. Yes, it's definitely one of these... Oh, we're the savages without good military, are we? Okay, come and see, I guess. That's some of the old... I don't know, it's an odd one, isn't it? Like, it seems like they're basically neighbors and have kept no track of how well Clatch is doing.

I don't think that... I think Vettanari knows exactly how well Clatch is doing. I think people like Lord Rust, who is the one deciding to attack their most heavily fortified city, doesn't concern himself with it because he doesn't think that there's any kind of thing to be kept track of. As far as he's concerned, they're all just wandering the desert with towels on their heads. Yeah, Prince Khadram, I think at this point, is still coming across as the kind of reasonable above it slightly character.

We'll learn more about him next week. Sort of an, oh, well, this is what we'll have to do, I suppose, character at the moment. Then on to someone who's a bit more actionable. We've got Jabba, the wise man of the dregs, or this particular group of dregs. I feel bad saying dregs because it sounds like I'm calling them like the dregs of the bunch. I think that was the idea. It's also some etymological length to another tribe, but yes, I think dregs is fine. Yeah, it's now that extra available.

We don't know that the relationship between the dregs and 71-Hour Ahmed, we just know it's implied that he's given them some instructions vis-à-vis Vimes and gang. But I feel like Jabba has learned enough to keep running the little tests. And there's just one little line I really love later on, which is when Vimes doesn't react to having let his cigar off a piece of burning camel dung. In the dregs eyes, the judges grudgingly held up a couple of eights. Yeah. And then who else do we have?

Well, let's, speaking of Lord Rust. Streak of piss. Streak of piss. God, I love that scene. And I said, and I said, and I said, you can put it where the sun's not shine. I said, the best is, obviously, after that scene, and Vimes goes home to sleep. And when Sibyl wakes him up, she says, yes, Sergeant Colin's been around these times. Oh God, did he tell you where he told Lord Rust to put this badge?

Actually, yes. Three times. Yes. This seems to be weighing on him. Again, Lord Rust is literally like one of my least favorite but best written characters. Because again, his ability to remain so determinedly blinkered, that you want him to secretly be a bit of a, like a carrot type character, where he's got some hidden spark of intelligence.

But then you keep digging and it's just more and more and more stupidity. Yeah. And Vimes is sort of in a monologue thinking of his moral code. You could own a street of crowded houses where people live like cockroaches, but you'd die before you descend to forgery. Yeah. In that quitting scene, he just sort of looks at detritus, doesn't know how to have a conversation with Troll, so just keeps going.

Yes. Because there cannot be a Troll there. Yes, just erases that from his universe continues. When it finally gets a bit too much to him, you then get the great line of, you had the look of a lawn mower just after the grass had organized a workers collective. Carrot. Carrot, yeah.

There's a nice moment early in this section, page 136, where Angwer is sort of speculating about Carrot. Because a lot of what we see of Carrot comes from Angwer's internal monologue. So there's this feeling that the greater part of him was always deep inside looking out. No one could be so creatively dumb without being very intelligent. And it occurred to me reading that, and I was trying to make a note about the fact that most of what we see of Carrot is from Angwer or Vimes's internal monologues. We never see Carrot's internal monologue, or we really haven't so far.

Not since guards' guards. No. And I think that's quite, no. Because his character is constantly this mist of mix of simple and everyone's good chaps, and deeply intelligent, and almost a bit too good at manipulating. Yeah. I mean, it would ruin the mystery, wouldn't it?

Oh yeah, I'm not. I know you're not complaining to me. You're not under attack. I feel very attacked. I just came here to have a nice time. The hat will protect me. Not when I was attacking you about now. No, it would ruin Vimes's mystery, wouldn't it?

I like reading Vimes speculating about like the... No, never mind. Let's just move fast. And there's a lovely moment again where Angwer was sort of thinking about their relationship, and she's like, I mean, he doesn't do big romantic declarations because that's because he assumes he said it once, and I'll remember it. And if I brought it up, he'd tell me exactly when he said it and what date, and probably what the weather was like that day.

Yes, if I changed my mind, I'd have told you, of course. Sheddled it in. There's something quite sweet about it. Yeah, quite sweet, but also like sheer excuse for not being romantic. Buy us some flowers, carrot. Jesus. Take her out for a nice meal at... Not at the Dwarf Bread Museum.

Not at the Dwarf Bread Museum. It does take her on interesting days out. Yeah, no, he's in his way romantic, I suppose. There is something very romantic about Dwarf Bread. Poor Angwer. She's had a fucking day of it, isn't she? She had a horrible day of it. I was trying to work out like he must have had it on hand, especially rather than just coming

coming up with the idea and happened to have silver collars for the dog. Like he would have known ahead of time that Dwarf had a... Had a werewolf. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I feel like that would have been something he'd planned for. Yeah. He probably also has, I don't think he can have much for zombies and golems. No, no, there's only so much he can do with a massive, ceramic, immortal beastie.

Maybe he had a hammer. Yeah. Anyway, vimes. Fimesy vimes. Speaking of immortal beasties. He gets a good moment of when the Clatchians come to have a go because he took the Gorus back to the Watch House and they've seen it as the Gorus being arrested. If Clatch was a very big place, there was room in it for all sorts of people,

including the short chap in the Red Fez who was practically vibrating with indignation. So I was like, oh, if I'm going to treat all people equally, then I've got to accept that there are petty dickheads who will not listen to me on every side as well. Yeah, well, it's the old... The kind of pendulum swing, isn't it, that often when an undirect presented group gets introduced into, say, media, they get portrayed as weirdly always virtuous, and then it swings the other way and you get the constantly evil gay characters for a while. It's a really big discussion, I see, in the queer community a lot.

Some people who make... And I can't remember the name of the game, but it's an indie game. It's not one I've tried. We're talking about the fact they were getting criticized that their game was homophobic, because there were a bunch of evil gay characters, and they were like, we're a queer indie game company. Everyone who worked on this game is queer. Having decent representation means we get evil gays too. We had fun writing the evil gays and the good gays as a mix. Yeah, I think the Magnus Archives got a couple of complaints from the Usuals,

but they were like, it's a cosmic horror. I can see both sides were... What do you want from me? It's problematic that so many villains are somewhat queer-coded, especially across Disney films and things. Yes, I would say that's a bit different than including explicitly queer characters who have different personalities. Oh, that page before I forget also has one of my favourite made-up words, which is, infest, the infest man. Oh, lovers. I think I had a fez. Oh, no, I gave my fez away. Where did you give your fez? Who did you give your fez to?

I've got a friend who dresses up as the Doctor a lot, and there's like a whole thing about the Doctor wearing a fez. I suppose he'll get more use out of it. Well, that's what I thought. I never really wear my fez. No, you are rarely infest. You could have done with it this year. I could have done, but oh well, I'll have to live without my fez. There's also, I like as Vime's thinking through things, and there's this thought process he goes to about us and them. He's thinking about the case, and he's thinking, you know, this is definitely a crime. This isn't about just a war, but someone really

wanted the Prince dead and paid to have us in Snowy Killed. And he starts wondering if those people set fire to the Embassy as well. And he comes on the, he wants there to be conspirators, because it's much better to imagine men in some smoky room somewhere, mad and cynical with privilege and power plotting over the brandy. Because otherwise you might have to face the fact things happen because ordinary people are capable of going out and doing horrible things to other ordinary people. Yes, it is a shitter of a reality. It is, but it's also, you know, just as Ain't More Pork are looking to blame evil clatchy and suddenly for everything that's wrong with the city as this shift happens in the politics. Vime's wants there to be evil people

rather than, he wants there to be an other, he wants there to be a them that he can point at and go, they're the bad ones. Not that he wants it to be a race, he just wants there to be some sort of them to point at. In his case, it's powerful people with brandies. Yeah, and he's not wrong now that they didn't do everything. They didn't do all of it. And they weren't all drinking brandy. Not this time. Not this time. And then there's just nice bits in the Vimes and Sibyl relationship. I will never not enjoy nice little bits in the Vimes and Sibyl relationship. I thought the bit of her walking down, looking at the portraits was interesting. Yes. A reminiscent of Magrap. Very much so.

But the bit where Vimes is like in the library and Sibyl brings in coffee is very sweet. It's really lovely. And that line of, you know, are you off out? Yes, I'm going to kick some ass to wrap up well then. Yeah. And the fact that she sees his, what was the line, his assaulted innocence or something as part of his essential Vimes-ness. Yes. It's nice how well they know each other and how much they care. And going into her sort of thinking about her family history and how well they did at one point have to go and find some sworn enemies because they were running low. Yes. It is one of those families. And apparently her grandfather shot Bloody Stupid Johnson.

Which I approve of. Well done, her grandfather. No, he's one of the best. He is one of the... I think all of the terrible things we could have had. He is one of the best. Well, I don't think he actually killed him. He just possibly stopped him from doing any more, any more work on the Rampkin estate. That's how I decided to do it. Yes. I've got to look into that. Yes, it's probably a Blunderbass or something, wasn't it? Yeah. It's a cartoon style of being peppered in the backside as he runs out. But I like the idea of her grandfather just walking out, seeing Bloody Stupid Johnson starting on some absurd fountain that somehow shoots

cherubs 80 feet into the air and gets her gun out. Get off my property. It's good enough for the patrician. I feel like Fettinari didn't choose it though. He just got like the palace with the job. There were patricians before this one. There were. But I feel like, you know, they got what they deserved. Anyway, so yes, Sibyl loves Sibyl. Who else do we have? We have Colin and Nobby again. Colin has a full-on, like back in my day, things were better, very rose-tinted glasses moment that feels like it really harks back to guards' guards, where it seems everyone sort of started doing the, you know, it was better when we had kings, that kind of thing.

It's interesting that Colin is generally such some pathetic character and he has bits like this but he needs Nobby there. I'm glad he has Nobby there to be a little shit. And to be a foil to him. And he's one of the people, yeah, it's harder to give him the benefit of the doubt or be sympathetic to him when he's saying things like, look, Nobby, we're all send done. They ain't the right colour and there's an end to it. I think I mentioned this section, this in the last week's episode, but it was this quote I was thinking of with Nobby going, well, what is the right colour? Because you're sort of brick red. What colour am I? Yes, white supremacy, shut down. I'm not desperately trying to make excuses for

him, but trying to understand why the character's sympathetic. I think part of it is when he's floundering in that conversation with Nobby and sort of lands on, we've got to be better than the clatchians. Otherwise, you know, what's the point of, and it's what's the point of us fighting them? And I feel like he's desperately trying to find these reasons and believe in them, because otherwise you might have to acknowledge that being particular. A lot of his youth watching his mates get arrows through the eye for nothing. Yeah. A lot of his pride in his home in his city is pointless. And I feel like that's something you see when you see like this generationally, that sort of very weird

bit of racism that happens to exist in some of the older generations in Britain is so much of, well, I've kind of got to double down because otherwise I'd look really fucking stupid for being so patriotic. Yeah, there's a lot of it in our generation as well. There is, but obviously, yes, you're right, there is a big dip in it generationally, luckily. Thankfully, let's hope we eventually get rid of all of it. Now we have our new dynamic duo of Reg and Visit. Never thought I'd see Reg Shuby a hardened skeptic, but here we are. I feel like he's just so determined to be, you know, those dickhead atheists.

Yeah, it's a combination of being contrarian, you know, those dickhead atheists that are just so willing to tell you that they're an atheist and that you're wrong. Mm-hmm. When I say that, judging them very harshly, because I briefly was one, when I still am an atheist, I'm just not a dickhead about it anymore. Yeah, I find, I feel like that side of me would probably come out more readily if I were forced to work with Constable Visit. I feel like that side of me would come out less on the disc, what with the gods actively

throwing the bolts at atheists. Yes, being an atheist does take quite a lot of willpower on the disc. It's interesting that Visit seems to acknowledge the existence of many other gods. Yeah, well, I feel like the offlerian, not the offlerians, the omniians have got a lot more tolerant after the events of small gods. Yes, but I always kind of got the picture that they tolerated the other religions, but obviously they're wrong. But yes, it is working out which gods are responsible for what.

So he's got more of a grip on reality than I thought he did. I feel like maybe he's got a bit cosmopolitan like more hawk and is now happy to preach the good word of several gods. Yes, yeah, well, that's all the more pamphlets. Yeah, the more pamphlets, the better. But I like some of the Constable Shoe determinately explaining why all of these miracle rains actually are completely logical explanations. Miracle rain of rain.

Speaking of, there's a magical rain of elephants. One elephant, but it's splashed. Yeah, I forgot to look for a relevant element for that. I tried to skip over it, so as not to think about splashing elephants too much. Ah, that's fair. Well, I always do anything. We won't get it. So instead of an irrelevant fact, I'll tell you to go and look at the

David Sheldrick Weld Lifecrust Twitter because it has lots of videos of cute baby elephants. Yay! Which is an elephant fact of a sort. Yes. It's a fact that... They're cute baby elephants. Yes, yes. Yes.

Okay, have you got empirical proof that that exists? Yes. Because it might just be a phenomenon. It's probably just... Rain of rain we had. Yeah, well, probably. Water was evaporated from the ocean, blown through the sky, condensed around the nuclear lie when it was cold air and precipitated.

No, I think it's just Twitter. Speaking of, I can't remember if I made a note of this later on. So I very much enjoyed when it started raining bedsteads. Bed ofs and broodsticks. Bobbing along. Bobbing along. Also relevant to... Yes, they are bobbing along on the bottom of the beautiful briny sea.

Yeah, beautiful. Mysterious and squid filled. I find that beautiful. To better peek at the absurd geological phenomenon and creatures of the deep. Yes. Doesn't scan as well. So yeah, so locations. We're taking a peek under Leshp's skirts.

It's Sulfurus. It's Sulfurus down there. Sulfurus and cavernous. Yay. I don't really regret the skirts. Yeah, no, moving on. Moving on. Sulfurus, cavernous, and it looks like it's only floating temporarily.

Yeah, which we've seen through seaweed clues and through the fact that we're now underneath it. It's made of pumice. Yes, it's an exfoliating island. Yes, for Neptune to give himself a pedicure. Yes. Does Neptune need a pedicure? I thought he had a tail. My thing of Triton.

I have no idea. Am I thinking of Disney's The Little Mermaid? Anyway. Actually, no, I think you're right. I think you might have been a fish man. Yeah. Never mind. Carry on.

He's got that vibe. Karen, we'll skip over it. We will skip over it. And we also go to the Clatchy and Desert. Yeah, one more about Leshp. Slightly more about Leshp. Oh, sorry. Just interesting to note at this point that it seems to be several.

Architectural skulls of civilizations built on top of each other. Yeah, there's like a strata of architecture. Pretty cool. I like this idea. The Clatchy and Desert. The Clatchy and Desert, we go there. It's hot. Full of dregs.

And then cold. Cold at night, which is not surprising. There's deserts tend to be. I really liked the description of the beach. There's not even really a beach, just like a hem for the land. I can see it in my hat, yeah. Water's got to wash up somewhere. As you know, this isn't the first time we've been to Clatchy in the Discord books.

We were there in Sorcery. Sorcery? Yeah. Yes. But there's less random magical towers happening this time. Yes. Yeah, that's all that's to see at the moment. And we learn a bit more about the dregs and their particular

sort of political situation where they don't really want to be forced into being part of Clatch. Thank you so very much. Which I think one thing I didn't mention talking about Prince Cadrum, but is you can get enough of a sense of his character when Vines works out that Prince Cadrum is trying to drag Clatch kicking and screaming into the century of the fruit bat. Yeah. Yeah. We should know by now that dragging things kicking and screaming into centuries is a bad idea.

Like an imperial red culley. That's no good. That's no good. I don't give red culley the keys to a kingdom for good and sake. Oh, God, no. They seem to have his little magic tower. Yes, yes. But yeah, they're an interesting culture.

And again, we'll get to learn more about them next week. Yeah, we'll go into the dregs in a bit more detail next week, but I wanted to nod to them in the desert now. Yeah. It's interesting to see Pratchit when he tries to put like several, well, I say tries to put several cultural references in one. And I suppose it makes sense that most of what he's doing are desert peoples. So yeah.

Yeah. Dregs. Cool. Let's have a break because he may be able to tell by the fact that I'm scatty as fuck. I've got the stats of a migraine and I need to go and take some painkillers before it goes any further. Okay. Little bits to be liked. Little bits to be liked.

Little world building detail that I enjoyed is Angra was talking to Carrot about whether he's ever thought about leaving Inkmoorpork because apparently a lot of other cities nearby are now headhunting Inkmoorpork watchmen. Yeah. Which just is how much the watchers advanced from where it was in guards' guards, where it was the four of them to the point where it's so well regarded that they're being headhunted. Yeah, it's something that keeps evolving. And I was trying to remember if that ever happened to the historical parallels,

the British Bobbies, obviously. Yeah. I wonder if we exported any. I don't really want to think about the British police, to be honest. So I just try not to and think of the watch as a completely separate entity that has nothing to do with it. Yeah, yeah. The ones I were referencing were better than some of the other ones, but that's not to say much at all. Yes.

But yeah, so I like that as a world building detail. And then and then and then and then. Ah, yes. So foreign gravy. Tell me about foreign gravy, which is a phrase. This is obviously Colin being a bit shit again. And he says to Bynes, if you run for late supper, Mrs. Goreff's doing goat and rice and foreign gravy, which is a way to describe, I suppose, a curry is what they make or something along those lines.

But I noticed a linguistic argument about the word curry. Sorry, my hat's falling off on Reddit the other day, because arguments about food happen on Reddit a lot and they're fucking great. I forget to look at food drama. You know, I've got to get back on that. I really wish I mean, there's cooking circle jet, but I wish like subreddit drama and hobby drama. There was a specific food drama one. Yeah. That would be great.

But yeah, so the argument was happening. It was about an article from the Atlantic about the colonial origins of the word. Right. Fuck the hat. And the words fuck the hat. Yes. Yeah. Colonial.

The colonial origins of the word curry. Whether it's racist to now use the word curry, which I feel like. Oh, I've heard about that on the radio. Yeah, it's developed a lot, but I thought it'd be interesting to look at where the word curry comes from, which is from around the 1500s when the Portuguese invaded Goa. And it was words like curry and curril, which originally actually meant types of spice blends back that long ago, but came to mean almost a generic word for sauces. And that's where we start.

Which is kind of what gravy is. Well, exactly. Gravy also comes from Grava in the French. Started as meaning pan drippings, but has also evolved, especially in American cooking, to mean any kind of sauce, depending on the parts of America and arguments about what is a gravy. Because some Americans in some parts of America will even refer to a tomato sauce for pasta as a gravy. Right. And then obviously you have things like white gravy, which is the whole biscuits and gravy confusion.

Yeah, I like white gravy. I like white gravy. So gravy has become like a generic sauce word, and that's what curry became as well. And obviously then it becoming a generic word for Indian food, definitely colonialism, bad. Yeah, it's the whole, there's no such thing as a curry, really. No. Because I was trying, when Jack brought up that he'd had that argument on the radio, I was trying to think of an equivalent that we do with anything else, and I can't really.

No, it's the only time where such a wide range of dishes under one name. No, in every other anglicised foreign cuisine that we have, like Chinese, we'll say Chinese. Yeah, we'll call it Chinese food. Yeah. You wouldn't say we're getting a fried rice? Yes. Even if you were gonna.

Yeah. I do quite fancy some special fried rice. That's neither here nor there. So yeah, so I just thought that was a nice little interesting thing to look at, especially looking at the origins of curry, because it's not just in England that it's come to me in a generic term. It's also in Japanese cooking, like things like katsu curry. Yeah, and Thai.

Yeah. Thai curry, yeah. Yes, that is interesting. Good. Somewhat starts with the Portuguese. And then one other one of mine was when Colin was talking about his old regiment, and apparently they were nicknamed the pheasant pluckers. Yes.

And that is one of my favourite little tongue twisters. Go on, can you do it? He's not the pheasant plucker, he's the pheasant plucker's son, and he's only plucking pheasants because the pheasant plucker's done. Alternatively, he's not the pheasant plucker, he's the pheasant plucker's mate, and he's only plucking pheasants because the pheasant plucker's late. Oh, I thought you were going to give a rude alternative. No, obviously, the joke as it is, and we're using the term joke very likely,

is that if you say it wrong. Somebody suddenly. You might end up saying pleasant fucker. Ho, ho, ho. Ho, ho, hey, hey, get it? It sounds a bit like penis. Sorry. What was a little bit you liked, Francine?

Stop me. Is this one of those ones? This book actually is full of bits that I have remembered, just as like core discworld concepts or quits or lines or whatever, and one of them is the footnote that says, One of the universal rules of happiness is always be wary of any helpful item that weighs less than its operating manual. This one and your next one are two of the things, two of the core concepts from Jingo that just stick with me.

Substitutions. Which is auto-corrected substitutions I see in the dog. I don't spell check things for unseen. I mean, that has been spell checked. Yes, it has. That's the problem. No, auto-correct does me really badly because I never check it in the summaries, which means I keep accidentally almost referring to Leonard of Quirk.

Substitions are things that no one believes in but are nevertheless true. Yes, examples in the book are... It'll get better if you don't pick at it and sometimes things just happen. Which is nice. I think I might be superstitious. Yes, I'm also a little superstitious even though I try very hard not to be. I can't stop myself from greeting magpies. But I think practically would approve of that as well. I feel like I don't even greet magpies out of superstition so much as just courtesy.

Yes, quite so, quite so. It's when you know your superstitious is enough to greet magpies but you don't want to omit it to yourself so when you're in public and it's just a really... Little cursory salute. I almost feel like that's weird or I do that sometimes. What do people think I'm doing now? Well, I like to think they just think I'm scratching my head or something. Oh, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But you assume that the magpie knows the difference. Yeah, magpies are very intelligent birds. Yes, unlike people. Also, not all magpies because I have had them fly directly into my window and then fight on the balcony. I know it's two for joy but they're screaming at each other and they just head butted a window. What does that mean? Oh, my handy hint around that is just not to clean the windows very often.

I don't. Oh, okay, they're just... Yeah, they are big windows. We've got St. Angulant's Fire in our little bits we liked list but neither... It doesn't have an initial next to it and I can't remember if I put it in or... Oh, it's me. Oh, it is you. I thought it might have just appeared by itself.

Also possibly that but I've got some notes about it so I hope it was me. Yeah, it's really cool. I really like the description of it especially the black edges of it. Because that's the other side of darkness thing that Pratchett likes to go on about, the absence of something. God, I'm doing really well today aren't I? But yeah, obviously that is a reference to two things. One thing being a discworld reference.

There's St. Angulant, there's our hermit in the desert in Small God. Whose story I forgot in a previous, previous book. But in real life... Sorry, I mean on Round World. An Elmo's Fire is a weathery phenomenon which is pretty similar to that described here. Fewer kinds of sardines I think generally. But it's an atmospheric electric field thing that looks like this kind of green or blue fire and it is often noticeable during thunderstorms and volcanic eruptions which makes it particularly...

Relevant to last week in Ferdinandia. Yes, and possibly this Lesh thing. I know it's like a different planet but it's just like Sulphurus and Humus. There's a hint of volcanic around the years. Also it's often accompanied by hissing or a buzzing sound. So I'm thinking like maybe you got some in the flat. Yeah, maybe that's where my sound quality's bad. Maybe that was my problem a couple of months ago.

Yeah, just an Elmo's Fire. But it sounds like something that would happen and I wouldn't notice, let's be honest. That's fair, that's true. I would just assume that something was leaking again because it's my flat. Yes. Anyway, I'll find... I'll see what I can find as in cool imagery of an Elmo's Fire and then I'll put it in the thingy. If seaweed's wet, that means it's about to rain.

Or has started. Or has started. Yeah, I put that down because A, it made me go and just giggle out loud. Yeah. And B, obviously it's not a Mean Girls reference because it is... Okay, but you immediately thought of Mean Girls too, right? I did, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like I had the SQN or something.

Let's just know that if you haven't watched Mean Girls, it has its issues. But I really, truly do recommend it to anybody because it is just fucking ridiculous and amazing and I love it so much. The Amanda Safer, it's perfect straight face delivery of my breasts can tell if it's going to rain while they can tell if it's raining. It is ever so good, ever so good. I always wonder how much of, like, I'm weirdly attached to that film just comes from a nostalgia thing and then ever I find myself sticking it on again.

It's like, no, it's really funny. Largely thanks to Tina Fey. Oh, yeah. Anyway, yeah, that was literally just another thing that made me giggle. Excellent. Go on to bigger things if you so desire. Would you like to talk about some historical what's it? Yeah.

The historical parallels are kind of, there are some specifics, but I want to talk a bit more vaguely than usual, not just because I've been strapped for time this week, but because I do find it interesting how Pratchett's kind of pulled in so many periods over such a long time and over so much of the world. And it's also a bit depressing that they're all similar enough to be able to put in this one coherent, recognisable throat, almost. And not in the sort of shit way he did in Interesting Times where he distilled many, many millennia of history into a sort of bit of a cheap parody,

but in a just, there are so many bits of this in history that are similar because it's so cyclical. Yes, yeah, exactly. Yeah, it's a, I mean, war's not a concept. It's a phenomenon rather than a culture that's being distilled here. And that is pointless fucking wars and imperialism and not really colonialism even, but yeah, let's go. Jingoism. Jingoism.

That's it. Got the name of the thing in the thing. Oh, the thing. Yeah, well done. Good work. But yeah, I mean, you read it and just, well, it's like some vagual saying like that he came out with Frans Fernand in his head at the start and we came out with JFK, but you read these bits and it's like, I'm getting flavors of Crusades.

I'm getting World War One through here. Again, just all of it, various Middle Eastern bits. I know I've talked on here before about how upsetting it is to read about the Crusades and you realise some of it could have been in last week's news. Yeah, very much so. Yeah, and then just the one specific bit I'm kind of wondering about, so I'm putting it out there to the listeners, was the Gebra. I think I read somewhere that the pun might be Al-Gebra.

But what it's referencing as a city, I was wondering, is it more likely to be Dubrovniks? That used to have like the 20 foot thick walls, or is it going to be Akka in Israel? Because that was like the fortified coastal city in the Crusades, or one of them, but like they're big seas one. I think the idea is somewhat that it is just this impenetrable city, and that Rust is stupid enough to try and land there anyway. Yes, I think it definitely serves as that, but I feel like

it's also around World Reference. I feel like Tractor probably had a city in mind, even if it's not like a direct parallel. I want to know what he had in mind. And if anybody else is a mind reader, please get hold of me. But yeah, our ideas definitely do overlap here, because I think the thing that I've found really, almost shaking about this section of the book is

reading Tides turning so quickly like that, from jingoistic sentiments all about war, and a matter of days. And only partly because someone half assassinated a prince. Yes, yes, it's... It's... That's just the camel dung that lit the cigar. Very good. But I think one of the things that I really landed on,

how much that shook me, was when Rust tells Vimes to arrest every Clatchian in the city. Yeah, see, again, that's another... I don't know how often that's happened during history, but obviously you've got Japanese internment camps spring to mind to that one. Anyone who's descended from somewhere wasn't... Yeah, it's bizarre.

I mean, especially when you're talking about a place like Clatch, which is meant to be barely a country, as it were. It's a loss of states that have slowly been brought together a bit. It's an empire. It's got Afghanistan vibes. It's got parts of Africa vibes in there. Lots of tribes not really wanting to be brought together, thank you. It's an empire, but it's just people of empire from home,

rather than more port coming in and trying to turn it into a homogenous state. Yeah. Oh, because I referenced this earlier, I'm going to put this in before I forget. The dregs, I read probably a reference to the Tuareg people, who are from... They're a Berber ethnic group in the Sahara. Oh, cool. Which is why I thought it was interesting, because there's obviously some parallels

to Middle Eastern nomadic tribes, also, we're looking at some African. Yeah. And I feel like the African influence of, like you said, tribes not wanting to be rounded up. Thank you. We're all right with our boundaries, where there are, actually. Yeah. And I mean, there's the same thing about Afghanistan.

Afghanistan. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. It's wherever you get lots of nomadic tribes and mountains, you get almost the same story. You do. But yeah. Anyway, sorry.

I broke into your bit there, because I didn't want to forget it. But the tides turning were shaking. Yes. It is a worry how quickly that can happen, and how many times it has happened in history, and how quickly it can happen now. Yeah. And there was also sort of to quickly go back to that tribal point.

There was an interesting thing, carrots talking about these two bits that are technically both passive-clatched, but pretty much outlawed with each other over their holy text, because they're arguing about whether it says God or man, because they're not sure if there's a dot or a bit of flycrap. Yeah. That was a specific religious reference, I believe. That is.

Actually, I'm going to grab annotated Pratchett for that. Yeah. Well, you find the real one. I'll mention that there are many examples of this happening through history. Jack's favourite one is, I think, the Russian Orthodox Church split down the middle or something, because they had a massive argument, and like a proper war or something about how you're meant to do the cross, whether it was two fingers or something like that.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's a, people will just fucking fight. They will. It's from early Christian church, to what extent Christ has got on man. In 325, the Council of Nicea tried to sess all the question with the Nicean creed, but dispute immediately re-emerged over a single word of the creed. One school said it was, I'm not going to try and pronounce these,

but that it translated to, of one substance, and the other said it should be of similar substance, because the difference between the words is a single iota, which is the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet, and the schism between Eastern and Western churches continues to this day. Fun. Fun. If it had been an iota to the left, it would have meant olive. Oh, isn't religion hilarious?

It is. You can see why the angry atheists are. But actually, one of the really direct historical parallels that had me very willing to be angry, even though it's happening to Nobby, was the white feather thing, because that is, in my opinion, one of the more, it's not the most horrific thing that's happened via British history, because, again, colonialism. This was a thing around the start of World War I.

People who hadn't joined up were considered cowards, and were given white feathers to shame them with their cowardice. By women largely? By women largely. Men as well, the order of the white feather was founded by Admiral Charles Fitzgerald, and this was the official organization that started this. Admiral Charles, go fuck yourself. I'd like to point out in this that a lot of prominent suffragettes also were doing this.

Yeah, no, exactly, yeah. Yeah, they weren't all great. They really weren't. Lots of racism and shit there, too. But also, there was just a lot of stupidity around it. Like, men were shamed with white feathers when they were just on leave and wearing their civvies, because they weren't going to walk around in uniform when they were on leave, because they were fucking washing it.

But one of the ones that actually made me laugh slightly, this is from the Wikipedia page for it, was perhaps the most misplaced use of a white feather. So when one was presented to Seaman George Samson, who was wearing civilian clothes, and on his way to a public reception in his honor, he had been awarded the Victoria Cross for gallantry. Very good. Out of lusty efface. Right?

The World War I, in general, that whole, the feather ties very much into this. I get a very, very cross when I think of a lot of aspects of it, and that sounds like such a silly thing to say, because obviously, but especially the part where the people who ran away got shot. Yep, got executed if you have kids forced to kill other, or adults. Anyone just gone and forced into these absolutely inhuman, unprecedented situations, and they do what any animal does. Which is run away when somebody's trying to kill you.

Yeah, and they get shot for it. Well, this is the attitude that's- And it was all for shit. It was all for shit. It was all for rich people bickering in the first place. And I, oh God, I get so cross when I think about that, those poor boys. There's a section, there's a line from anger about it, you know, when you say, come back with your shield or on it.

And it's just, you know, come back a winner or not at all. Yeah, but again, bullshit, like anyone who says that kind of thing. Fucking horrific. And I think this is the thing. This is a really, this is a good book, and it's a really funny book. We both found, I could have put in a million more things in little bits we liked, just moments that made me proper laugh out loud. Every time the laughter pauses in this book though,

it really suddenly drives home how fucking shit this is. Especially moments like the Goro family choosing to leave the city, and the son so pissed off because he doesn't want to go, because he's not clatchy and he's more, he's more porky in. Yeah. It's like, I was bored here. I've never fucking been to class. I don't want to see the moon rising over the desert.

I want to hang out with my mates. Yeah, yeah. That's, it's, it's very well done though. It doesn't feel like it's whiplashing us around. It's a, or if it is, it's on purpose. It's a, no, it's a sudden, it's a sudden lull in which you can hear, hear the. Noise stuff. Yeah, you can hear the noise of the shit.

If I didn't have migraine coming on, I'd have made some really good analogies today. I just want you to know that, listen to this. I would not have, and I don't have a migraine coming on. Oh, your shoes broke earlier. Yeah, no, my shoes broke earlier. You always been a day. That's crazy.

Literally. That sounds sarcastic, but I have had a couple of occasions where my shoes are broken. It ruins your fucking day. It does. It does. There's nothing you can do about it. I saw somebody outside of the, whatever it is, the one-stop duck taping up,

not even duck taping, parcel taping up her boot the other day. And I was walking past like, ah, fuck, if I was driving, like, I wouldn't have had, I've got a spare pair of flats in there somewhere. I would have just given up, but I have, how far did she have to walk? Then she went and bought parcel tape from the corner shop to parcel tape up her boot. I know. All right. We cannot.

That's not right. Look at all the things I decide to worry about in the world, instead of the things I should. I think that's my self-defense mechanism. That makes sense. That does make sense. Maybe we should introduce a self-defense mechanism of the week. Yes.

Today, worrying about someone parcel taping their shoes rather than the horrifying existential dread that awaits us if we think about anything for more than a minute. Double-filmed up. Have we got anything else to say about the book Gingo? Oh, what? No. I could rant about, like, how horrifying war is,

how much I hate nationalism and how much this book reminds me of how shit some people can be. But I feel like the listeners have got the gist. Yeah. I think we can carry it on into next week as well. Yeah. I feel like this is my power of belief of the month. Yeah.

I've got a bit of research on stuff like chivalry and that, but I think that's more, I'll put that in next week as well, because I feel like I'm just going to dilute the main point here if I go on about that. The chivalric traditions are interesting, but I feel like they're... Yeah, they're trivia. They are. One thing actually that's worth mentioning just because it does

tie in a little bit better, and I didn't know this, is that European chivalry, the chivalric code, owed a lot to the chivalry of the Moors in Spain. So they kind of brought that culture to Europe, which I bet almost nobody who goes on about chivalry today in a serious way would know. That's good to know. Thank you.

I think then, Francine, do you have an obscure reference finial for me? I do. It is when Nobby is going on about Nubile Woman. Yes. And he's wondering where... Nubilia is. Nubilia is. I was like, pretty sure that's not the place.

Just going to double check though. But yes, Nubile etymology comes from, and I'll go back a few steps here, but it comes from Latin, Nubilis marriageable. Which came from all the Latin, Nubia, which is a cover or a veil oneself. So I guess that then led to pride. And even further back, goes the Latin root word, Nubis,

which is cloud. So it's a cloud, like a veil of cloud, and then it became marriageable. And then nowadays kind of means like available, I think. It's kind of a weird... Desirable. Available, but also kind of like one of those creepy, like, ooh, available and virginally. You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah, it feels very negotiating for your wife's kind of language, doesn't it? Yeah. But she knows Mrs. Got Boggess. Not many camels at all for her. Poor Mrs. Boggess. Oh, fucking Mrs. Cake back though. I know we didn't have much there yet.

Oh, yeah. The idea, oh, the line, I can only give you 10 minutes, I've got cabbage boiling. Yes. On the level of you'll have to speak up while I'm wearing a towel. It is.

It's the... I'll maybe laugh at that. When you'll have to speak up while I'm wearing a towel's what? Yes. We will be back next week, hopefully migraine free, with part three, which starts on page sure on 86 in the paperback with the boat surfaced

in the scummy dead water under a jetty. Oh, nice. Yep. As long as you get the word scummy in there. In the meantime, as well as reading that section and getting all caught up ready for the podcast, you can follow us on Instagram at the true shall make ye fret,

on Twitter at make ye fret pod, on Facebook at the true shall make ye fret. Join our subreddit community, r slash ttsmyf. You can email us your thoughts, queries, castles, snacks and albatrosses, the true shall make ye fret pod at gmail.com. Did very much bury that. Albatrosses.

Albatrosses. And of course, if you would like to support us financially, you can head over to Patreon, patreon.com forward slash the true shall make ye fret and exchange your hard earned pennies for all sorts of bonus nonsense. Nonsense. Nonsense, I say nonsense and some rational things.

We've got a very fun down the rabbit hole episode coming this month. We do. It's about C.S. Lewis and J.R. Tolkien. They are our Tolkien. I'm very excited. It's another one of those words I find hard to stop with if I start, they are our Tolkien.

J.R. Tolkien. Ah, Tolkien. Ah, Tolkien, fuck. I think the painkillers are working. Just in time for the episode. Marvelous. Until next time, dear listeners, don't let us detain you. Anyway, Joe, I've got to go.

All right, I'll have to rush us through the outro. You've got cabbage boiling.