J & M better laugh now while they can. Some day, not soon enough for some of us, they will be about as relevant as old Thor is now. Hey, at least I hear that Thor was in three, yes 3 movies recently. I only have second hand information on this as I have not been to a movie theater in ages. I also avoid most movies on what passes as TV these days. I prefer music and the interwebs.
The boys better watch out because Thor is well buff. The only reason he’s not kicked their asses is that he’s recently been working out at the gym and is feeling a bit *thor*!
Okay, folks, I spent quite a while thumb typing on my phone to post the last comment on the previous thread. Either nobody has seen it, or nobody found it interesting. I need closure here. Acolyte? Haggis? Son of Glenner? Help me out, mates.
I think the stature of Thor is a nod to Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Novel “Small Gods”, though I admit I haven’t read that one yet. I’m saving it for my deathbed, so I have something to look forward to, eh. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Gods
Gotta love puns used as ridicule, and nobody does that better than Author.
Oh dear, DH, surely you don’t need us to validate your erudition? FWIW, I did find your explanation of the Chinese date system very interesting. It’s also interesting that it seems most countries have adopted the same calendar – how did that come about?
I personally think we should all change to Isaac Asimov’s World Season Calendar. It would make the whole thing so much simpler, and remembering days and dates from one year to the next would be easy. Each date would fall on the same day each year. Only downside is that it would probably put calendar printers out of business.
Haggis, thanks for that response. Was I sounding needy. It’s not so much that I need validation of my (very limited) erudition. More that I find communicating with the cyberspace void rather disheartening. I often feel like I’m a comedian on a wide stage facing an utterly black auditorium. I think there’s an audience out there. Sometimes I hear breathing. But I get very little feedback and few comments. I can’t remember when was the last time I got a comment on something I posted on my site, one reason why I’m posting infrequently. And it’s why I feel at home here in the C&B. Conversations can happen.
Thanks for that link to the Isaac Asimov World Seasons Calendar. Now there was a man of eclectic interests and amazingly wide erudition. His calendar makes a lot of sense. As for putting calendar printers out of business, the Internet and computers may have that handled, though I do still see them for sale occasionally.
On the Asimov calender:
Something like it (may even have been the inspiration) really WAS in effect under Napoleon:
12 “months” of 3 “decades” (with a decade-end every 10 days) per year.
The last 5 (leap years 6) days were “off-days”, which could be, at the wish of the employer, be exchanged for any other day, but, only if and when it could be shown to be needed by the employer’s business. The example being a baker’s need to supply bread at least every other day.
actually it was NOT Napoleontic, but Revolutionary, and Year I was the year of the French Revolution (1789).
Its main 2 goals were the removal of religious days, and the promotion of the digital system.
(with respect to that last one, Anglosaxons, and especially USAans, still have some catching-up to do)
The Revolutionary calendar was not a hit with the populace and for a very simple reason. Under the old calendar workers got off one day in seven. The Revolutionary calendar was metric, i.e., decimal, and workers got one day in ten free. This was not popular with the working classes who made their unhappiness known. Remember that sabotage was originally a French word with sabot referring to the wooden shoes workers wore.
@HfB, “I personally think we should all change to Isaac Asimov’s World Season Calendar………and remembering days and dates from one year to the next would be easy. Each date would fall on the same day each year.”
Ooh no, I like that my birthday does fall on a weekend at least sometimes. Under Asimov’s system, it’d always be a Monday, which could never be a good thing 🙁
I do like that Asimov managed to increase the number of Friday the 13th’s there are in a year from 3 max to 4 definite though. Obviously no-one on this site would ever want to inconvenience the superstitious, now would they? 🙂
“Only downside is that it would probably put calendar printers out of business.”
Nah, you’ve obviously not met my wife and her “I can write it down quicker than you can put it in that thing” cronies then? If an event isn’t on a paper calendar, it doesn’t exist to her, no matter how many devices you sync.
@Me: “Under Asimov’s system, it’d always be a Monday, which could never be a good thing ????”
I got that wrong (Asimov’s calendar isn’t as simple as we thought, it turns out). It’d be on C26 (hint hint), which is a Thursday. Even worse, possibly.
I don’t know…, I kind of like the fact that our seven day weekly cycle goes back unbroken to Roman times. I’d want a really good reason to change it, and I don’t see one for the Asimov system.
Thor decides to have a night off from Valhalla and slum it on Earth, before long he’s picked up a girl and that go back to her place. In the morning, after a long night of passion, he decides that she should know who she’s been entertaining and announces,
“I’m mighty Thor”
“Yeth tho am I but it wath fun wath’nt it”
Some Dude & others: I don’t understand why you ask why the Mighty Thor is now so small. Author (through the barmaid) explains it in panel 2 of the strip dated 20 December 2017. It’s the whole point of that strip.
Grumpy: I too like the occasional guest appearance of a deity such as Ganesh or the likes of Moses and Joseph Smith. I think of myself as an equal opportunity atheist, not solely agin the Abrahamic faiths.
Happy new year to Author and all regulars, lurkers and occasional visitors to the old Cock & Bull pub.
Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods” could serve as a useful reservoir of interesting obscure deities who could make occasional guest appearances on the J&M strips, which I would welcome, but, Author, please don’t overdo it.
For all the calendar discussion:
The only thing that bothers me is that the months from September through December are months 9 through 12, when they’re etymologically 7 through 10. I guess we have a couple of idiot Latin dictators to thank for that.
Just watch: You-know-who will introduce a 13-month year. Between June and July we’ll get Trumpenth. All months will have 28 days except Trumpenth, which will have 29 days, or 30 on leap years. Trumpenth will be yuuuuuge! The biggest month! The greatest month. Everyone takes their holidays in Trumpenth!
Afterthought: Donald Trump’s birthday, which was heretofore June 14 (165th day of the year), will now be Trumpenth 25. Trumpeth 25 through 29 (and 30 on leap years) will be a national holiday.
@Son of Glenner. All I got from one episode of American Gods was extreme violence in slow motion, there must be better sources for obscure Gods than that.
A nice explanation for why the latin off by two numbers persevered was that until 1751, the year changed on March 25th. (so 1751 was a short year). so they really were the 7th-10th months of the year, and all the latin speakers were content.
A shame there wasn’t a fifth panel. It’s very likely a bolt of lightning would be hitting our two “heroes” while Thor sips his beer. You know what they say – Payback’s a bitch!
Jesus & Mo (the characters) are absurd, blinkered, and oddly very sweet. J&M (the cartoon) is brilliant: sharp, delicious, irresistible. Salman Rushdie
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J & Mo is the funniest and most consistently thought-provoking cartoon strip on the Net. In a saner world, it would run in a major newspaper. Nelson Jones, Heresy Corner
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Wittily captures much of the absurdity of religious apologetics. Mano Singham
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Often hilarious, frequently wry, these cartoons do what all the best cartoons do: they tell the truth through humour. Terry Sanderson, NSS President
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August 28, 2024
He’s presumably Grumpy.
J & M better laugh now while they can. Some day, not soon enough for some of us, they will be about as relevant as old Thor is now. Hey, at least I hear that Thor was in three, yes 3 movies recently. I only have second hand information on this as I have not been to a movie theater in ages. I also avoid most movies on what passes as TV these days. I prefer music and the interwebs.
The boys better watch out because Thor is well buff. The only reason he’s not kicked their asses is that he’s recently been working out at the gym and is feeling a bit *thor*!
Boom Boom!
It is hard to see
An old divinity
They only last so long
Their believers are gone
Following the latest trendy opportunity.
Thor comeback, “Hey Jesus, I hear the crowd is looking for a hammer.”
I like to think that little storm cloud is Thor getting ready to send several thousand volts of electricity through their sorry asses.
Why is Thor so short? Do deities shrink as their relevance wanes?
AoS: Took a while for the penny to drop?
I still don’t get why Thor is so short.
Okay, folks, I spent quite a while thumb typing on my phone to post the last comment on the previous thread. Either nobody has seen it, or nobody found it interesting. I need closure here. Acolyte? Haggis? Son of Glenner? Help me out, mates.
I think the stature of Thor is a nod to Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Novel “Small Gods”, though I admit I haven’t read that one yet. I’m saving it for my deathbed, so I have something to look forward to, eh. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Gods
Gotta love puns used as ridicule, and nobody does that better than Author.
Schtup! – Hammer time!
Oh dear, DH, surely you don’t need us to validate your erudition? FWIW, I did find your explanation of the Chinese date system very interesting. It’s also interesting that it seems most countries have adopted the same calendar – how did that come about?
I personally think we should all change to Isaac Asimov’s World Season Calendar. It would make the whole thing so much simpler, and remembering days and dates from one year to the next would be easy. Each date would fall on the same day each year. Only downside is that it would probably put calendar printers out of business.
Haggis, thanks for that response. Was I sounding needy. It’s not so much that I need validation of my (very limited) erudition. More that I find communicating with the cyberspace void rather disheartening. I often feel like I’m a comedian on a wide stage facing an utterly black auditorium. I think there’s an audience out there. Sometimes I hear breathing. But I get very little feedback and few comments. I can’t remember when was the last time I got a comment on something I posted on my site, one reason why I’m posting infrequently. And it’s why I feel at home here in the C&B. Conversations can happen.
Thanks for that link to the Isaac Asimov World Seasons Calendar. Now there was a man of eclectic interests and amazingly wide erudition. His calendar makes a lot of sense. As for putting calendar printers out of business, the Internet and computers may have that handled, though I do still see them for sale occasionally.
On the Asimov calender:
Something like it (may even have been the inspiration) really WAS in effect under Napoleon:
12 “months” of 3 “decades” (with a decade-end every 10 days) per year.
The last 5 (leap years 6) days were “off-days”, which could be, at the wish of the employer, be exchanged for any other day, but, only if and when it could be shown to be needed by the employer’s business. The example being a baker’s need to supply bread at least every other day.
The 7-day-week concept was forcibly abandoned.
Addendum:
actually it was NOT Napoleontic, but Revolutionary, and Year I was the year of the French Revolution (1789).
Its main 2 goals were the removal of religious days, and the promotion of the digital system.
(with respect to that last one, Anglosaxons, and especially USAans, still have some catching-up to do)
Dr John the Wipper:
The Revolutionary calendar was not a hit with the populace and for a very simple reason. Under the old calendar workers got off one day in seven. The Revolutionary calendar was metric, i.e., decimal, and workers got one day in ten free. This was not popular with the working classes who made their unhappiness known. Remember that sabotage was originally a French word with sabot referring to the wooden shoes workers wore.
@HfB, “I personally think we should all change to Isaac Asimov’s World Season Calendar………and remembering days and dates from one year to the next would be easy. Each date would fall on the same day each year.”
Ooh no, I like that my birthday does fall on a weekend at least sometimes. Under Asimov’s system, it’d always be a Monday, which could never be a good thing 🙁
I do like that Asimov managed to increase the number of Friday the 13th’s there are in a year from 3 max to 4 definite though. Obviously no-one on this site would ever want to inconvenience the superstitious, now would they? 🙂
“Only downside is that it would probably put calendar printers out of business.”
Nah, you’ve obviously not met my wife and her “I can write it down quicker than you can put it in that thing” cronies then? If an event isn’t on a paper calendar, it doesn’t exist to her, no matter how many devices you sync.
@Me: “Under Asimov’s system, it’d always be a Monday, which could never be a good thing ????”
I got that wrong (Asimov’s calendar isn’t as simple as we thought, it turns out). It’d be on C26 (hint hint), which is a Thursday. Even worse, possibly.
I don’t know…, I kind of like the fact that our seven day weekly cycle goes back unbroken to Roman times. I’d want a really good reason to change it, and I don’t see one for the Asimov system.
Thor decides to have a night off from Valhalla and slum it on Earth, before long he’s picked up a girl and that go back to her place. In the morning, after a long night of passion, he decides that she should know who she’s been entertaining and announces,
“I’m mighty Thor”
“Yeth tho am I but it wath fun wath’nt it”
Author: Like this idea of a guest deity.
Some Dude & others: I don’t understand why you ask why the Mighty Thor is now so small. Author (through the barmaid) explains it in panel 2 of the strip dated 20 December 2017. It’s the whole point of that strip.
Grumpy: I too like the occasional guest appearance of a deity such as Ganesh or the likes of Moses and Joseph Smith. I think of myself as an equal opportunity atheist, not solely agin the Abrahamic faiths.
Here, in Central Europe, the year 2018 has begun.
May it bring each of you all you can wish.
And may we enjoy the C&B for another year!!!
But I’m still wondering if we are going to get to see more of him! Ha ha, get it? More of him???
Ah, nevermind…
Happy new year to Author and all regulars, lurkers and occasional visitors to the old Cock & Bull pub.
Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods” could serve as a useful reservoir of interesting obscure deities who could make occasional guest appearances on the J&M strips, which I would welcome, but, Author, please don’t overdo it.
For all the calendar discussion:
The only thing that bothers me is that the months from September through December are months 9 through 12, when they’re etymologically 7 through 10. I guess we have a couple of idiot Latin dictators to thank for that.
Just watch: You-know-who will introduce a 13-month year. Between June and July we’ll get Trumpenth. All months will have 28 days except Trumpenth, which will have 29 days, or 30 on leap years. Trumpenth will be yuuuuuge! The biggest month! The greatest month. Everyone takes their holidays in Trumpenth!
Afterthought: Donald Trump’s birthday, which was heretofore June 14 (165th day of the year), will now be Trumpenth 25. Trumpeth 25 through 29 (and 30 on leap years) will be a national holiday.
@Son of Glenner. All I got from one episode of American Gods was extreme violence in slow motion, there must be better sources for obscure Gods than that.
Jobrag: I meant the book. I don’t know much about the TV series.
@Laripu
Yes originally it was months 7-10 before 153 BC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregorian_calendar
A nice explanation for why the latin off by two numbers persevered was that until 1751, the year changed on March 25th. (so 1751 was a short year). so they really were the 7th-10th months of the year, and all the latin speakers were content.
A shame there wasn’t a fifth panel. It’s very likely a bolt of lightning would be hitting our two “heroes” while Thor sips his beer. You know what they say – Payback’s a bitch!