working
truebluespark, swampy, bauske, and kurst! Sorry about that, fellas. Here's your Forgotten English (© Jeffrey Kacirk):all Sir Garnet
Going well. A reference to the brilliant military successes of Sir Garnet Wolseley during the Egyptian campaign of the '80s. "How's the war? All Sir Garnet."--Edwin Radford's Encyclopædia of Phrases and Origins, 1945
Waffling on Napoleon
On this day in 1815, the exiled Napoléon Bonaparte escaped from the Island of Elba to attempt his second conquest of Europe. Edmund Fillingham King's Ten Thousand Wonderful Things (c. 1853) collected a sampling of French newspaper remarks as the general approached Paris during March: "9th--The Cannibal has escaped from his den. 10th--The Corsican ogre has just landed at Cape Juan. 12th--The monster has passed the night at Grenoble. 13th--The tyrant has crossed Lyons. 14th--The usurper is directing his course towards Dijon, but the brave and loyal Burgundians surround him on all sides. 18th--Bonapart is sixty leagues from the capital; he has had skill enough to escape from the hands of his pursuers. 19th--Bonapart advances rapidly, but he will never enter Paris. 21st--His imperial and royal majesty last evening made his entrance into his Palace of the Tuileries, amidst the joyous acclamations of an adoring and faithful people."
Apparently, they had the Iraqi information minister on their payroll.
-The Gneech