Casualties

The nuclear war prep pamphlet from the eighties, Protect and Survive, was apparently also a collection of short films, closely following the text of the information booklet. As I own a copy of the Imperial War Musuem reprint, I can attest that the information provided in the clip above, about disposing of bodies, was immediately followed by this paragraph:

On hearing the ALL-CLEAR

This means there is no longer an immediate danger from air attack and fall-out and you may resume normal activities.

Well, that's nice.

(Protect and Survive features prominently in A Guide to Armageddon, of course.)

Where laughing corn luxuriant grows

The Wikipedia entry for The Song of Australia goes a little heavy on the jokes. The lyrics of the song were those of the winning poem in a contest established by the Gawler Institute in South Australia in 1859, set to a tune by Carl Linger, a German expatriate and exiled 1848 revolutionary. From the article:

Publication of Caroline Carleton's poem caused an immediate controversy; that it was nice poetry, but "too tame"; one regretted that nothing more inspiring than the colour of the sky and the prettiness of the scenery could be found for the poem; one wondered "how hidden wealth could gleam in the darkness" and so on, another that it could equally refer to, say, California, while another longed for a time when such a peaceful song accorded with international politics, and regretted that the contest was restricted to South Australians, that the prize was so paltry, and there was no mention of sheep.

…

In 1924, South Australian MP George Edwin Yates proposed in parliament that the song be adopted as the national anthem. He proceeded to sing the first verse, despite the objections of his fellow members.

…

The song features heavily in the TV series ANZAC Girls episode 4, "Love", when the Peter Dawson record is played on a wind-up gramophone in several scenes, and in snatches sung by "Pat Dooley" (Brandon McClelland) while digging a latrine pit.

The lyrics themselves are absurd, as is entirely to be expected in a patriotic song, and were regarded as so at the time, at least by all the people who wrote parodies. The title of this post is my favourite line from the lyrics, but it was a hard pick.

Capital!

Oh dear. I think someone might have been hacked.