This is Ben Gunn. I went through hell to get this image!
I can’t say Mingo’s description in the earlier post is incorrect. First of all I’m a menace to all around me when I haven’t had my morning coffee and second it happened before I’d had my coffee (thus I have no recollection of anything). I only differ in his opinion of Ben Gunn.
Ben Gunn, as you all know, is a fictional character in Treasure Island. Ben Gunn was a hapless castaway that was completely off his rocker but not particularly menacing; a literary indication of what three years stuck on a deserted island will do to a man. Something like a smelly freak of a homeless man for whom you feel sympathy but you’re not going to let him ride in your car. At least he was pretty tame compared to the overall story arc of Treasure Island which was right and properly bloody.
(Note & Literary Recommendation: I’d like to recommend Treasure Island as totally awesome. It’s an ideal book for a young boy. Its violent and terrifying and the pirates are badass dangerous bastards. Perfect! I read it to my son as a bedtime story when he was a wee lad and he loved it. So did I. I mean this with all sincerity; expose young kids to real literature before schools get their hooks in them and beat their brains to mush. Schools tend to shove bullshit diversity propaganda or Disneyfied Peter Pan up their student’s ass until young men quit reading and stare at fidget spinners. Don’t let it happen that way! Read to your child. If he’s a boy I suggest a story that has killing and stabbing and gunshot wounds and and lying, cheating, stealing, thuggish pirates. You’re doing the world a favor. That’s an official recommendation from the Curmudgeon. You’re welcome. Also, I never read The Adventures of Ben Gunn because it’s not by Robert Louis Stevenson and sequels not by the original author are bullshit. I’m lookin’ at you Brian Herbert. Your dad wrote Dune, which was awesome, but you’ve been riding daddy’s coattails for 30 years? What’s the matter? Can’t get a regular job?)
I felt Mingo was doing a disservice to the addled Ben Gunn in comparing him to the glowering rage that is an uncaffeinated early morning Adaptive Curmudgeon. We both agreed something simian might more properly capture the moment.
Hoping to come up with a visual aid I found this:
COFFEE. NOW!
Then I searched for Ben Gunn. I remembered the old movie and AAAAAAUUUGHHHH MY EYES!!!!!
My search engine (Duck Duck Go) somehow decided that Ben Gunn is not a hapless lonely castaway in a B-grade pirate movie but rather a huge nude black dude who’s hung like a horse and rather proud of it. I was not prepared for that!
I told Mingo of my discovery and he laughed heartily at my expense. I decided to share it with you. My blog isn’t intentionally SFW but I do have a sense of decorum (after I’ve had my coffee) so I called upon the talents of 24 Nancy Pelosis to help me filter the search results. Enjoy:
I will never think of Treasure Island in the same way. Also, thanks Nancy.
Now the NSA knows you have a thing for nekkid black men.
No big deal there. They’ll just think AC is Barry Sotero.
and Pelosi too, it seems.
ugh! gag choke spew
The internet is a dangerous place for misplaced searches. I know, as I searched ‘tentacles’ one day for a costume idea from a suggestion by my wife, not any of my sick friends…. Don’t look up ‘tentacles,’ Just, don’t. For the love of God, don’t. Not enough Nancys out there to cover up what my browser showed me, and there is too much cat in me not to look.. I will never be the same….
“I went through hell to get this photo” says you. “And I believe you,” says I
Ha ha. Thanks Ben.
And that is NOT a B-grade pirate movie.
http://www.nme.com/news/music/abba-release-first-new-material-35-years-new-songs-i-still-have-faith-in-you-2304583
The squirrels are getting stronger while you ignore them. You may soon find that your homestead is as lost as Europe.
This is a disaster!
Life has me by the balls and Abba is coming out of the past to skull fuck our minds!
OK… breathe… count to ten… chill… think happy thoughts… beer and boobs, whiskey, and fishing… It’s gonna’ be OK. Rome wasn’t hosed in a day… Etc..
There’s no getting around it, the Universe needs more of the squirrel story. Obviously the resurrection of Abba plays a role in all this! However, life=balls=vice. It’s gonna’ have to wait until I’m done slaying some proverbial dragons. I’d like nothing more than to get ‘er done and hammer out “the rest of the story” but bear with me. Fate’s feeding me through a woodchipper of chaos and sometimes you have to ride it out. I won’t pull an R. R. Martin where the delays are because he’s out of ideas. I’ve got a plan and it all makes sense and it’ll get to text eventually. Hopefully before Abba gets too powerful.
Be patient and stay away from disco. We’ll make it through this.
About exposing kids to real bad-ass badguys, I remember a magazine cartoon with a couple of millenials in their ‘Twilight’ t-shirts, on a couch watching TV with a grampa figure next to them his recliner. On the coffee table is a stack of DVDs with Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Max Schreck, Lon Chaney, Jonathan Frid, etc. You can’t see the TV but the kids’ eyes are popped like half-dollars and they are scared stiff. Gramps tells them: “THESE … are Vampires!”
Also, I’d like to recommend “Admiral” (Michiel de Ruyter) as an ‘upgrade’ to the silly pirate movies of late. A bit of R-rated exposure and gory scenes, but there’s also about a dozen fleeting references to Dutch Masters paintings. In fact the lighting of the entire movie is matched to that painting style.
A pirate movie can only have two plots: the pirates are looking for treasure or loot, or the Good Guy ships are trying to bring the pirates to justice. “Admiral” shows a set of 17th century sea engagements involving several dozen ‘ships of the line,’ plus the Dutch/English/French politics behind them, and the way fleet discipline, not one-on-one pirate-ship heroics, is crucial to surprise and success. The camera takes us belowdecks to show cannonballs smashing through hardwood, as kids of 13-15 yrs old are transfixed by shards to a sloping deck. One gun crew even takes careful aim to dismount an enemy deck gun off its trunnions (They weigh 3000-4500lbm.) Edward II of England is played by Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister) who delivers perfect bombast and vinegar.
At two and a half hours long, you get your money’s worth.
Great speech from the movie here: https://hooktube.com/watch?v=IGD1Xu7rMTA
But the emergent national pride of a constitutional republic could not yet stand against a monarchy.
Not yet, or not then. But could de Witt’s famous speech to parliament, as recorded by history, have planted some of the seeds for our own documents of freedom a century later?