buffering; please wait

It occurred to me after re-reading my earlier parkrun post, which included a picture of me lumbering sweatily towards the finish of my first-ever parkrun in 2013, that I was wearing my Welsh dragon Buff on my head and that furthermore there were probably a whole raft of photos from various outdoor activities over the years which feature me wearing a variety of Buffs in various of the many possible configurations. Moreover, having got a couple of Buffs for Christmas and, honestly, probably having enough of them now I thought it might be a good moment for an audit. So: pictured below is my Buff collection.

A quick run-through:

• The green bamboo-themed one at the top left is the OG, the first one I ever bought, from an outdoor shop in Keswick (possibly Rohan) in probably around 2008. Hazel bought one as well and we had an entertaining trip to a pub just up the road (possibly the Dog & Gun) immediately afterwards experimenting with the various wearing options, to the fascination of various locals.
• The red, white and blue one at top right is technically not a "real" Buff as I'm pretty sure it was from the middle aisle of Aldi, and was therefore almost certainly cheaper. Where it wins over the original one is in being slightly bigger; the extra fabric real estate is very handy if you want to make it into things like the pirate bandana or the beanie hat (see the linked video above for instructions) and have (like me) a freakin' mahoosive cranium. 
• The Welsh dragon one is probably the one I wear the most - you can see that I'm also wearing it in the Llanfoist Crossing parkrun photo in the previous post, for instance.
• The blue one was slightly bizarrely (but awesomely) given away as a free gift when I ordered some cheap maps from Dash4It.
• The one with the Norwegian flag on it was purchased in Oslo when we stopped there on the cruise we went on in July 2023.
• The YesCymru one is a recent replacement for one I had previously (further investigation reveals it was Christmas 2020 - I'm wearing it in the post-COVID Riverfront parkrun pic in the previous post), lost for a lengthy period of time, found in a slightly musty state in my golf bag to much rejoicing and then promptly lost again almost immediately. Commendably they are only a fiver on their website, though, so I just bought another one.
• The parkrun one was a Christmas present from this year, a sort of bonus item alongside the 50-parkrun commemorative T-shirt I also got.

A few bonus Buff-wearing pics, respectively these depict: the original green one, looking at a map with baby Nia halfway up Gray Hill; rocking a textbook pirate bandana cooking up some spicy noodles near the Ystradfellte waterfalls wearing the blue Aldi one; me (wearing the Welsh dragon one) and Hazel at the top of one of the Buttermere fells (either High Stile or High Crag); some heartwarming family shit featuring me wearing the YesCymru one (the old one, before the start of the lose/find/lose again cycle) and another parkrun one, this time of me wearing the Norwegian one while struggling to muster a sprint finish in (successful, as it happens) search of a PB at Riverfront. No pictures featuring the other two yet, though I expect I will wear the parkrun one to a parkrun at least once during 2026; seems only fair.

oh no, it's moby derek

A couple of further items related to Moby-Dick - firstly the 1956 Gregory Peck film, while the most famous adaptation of the book, certainly isn't the last word on the subject, far from it. There were film adaptations as early as 1926's silent The Sea Beast (featuring the immortal dialogue intertitles pictured here), later talkified as 1930's Moby Dick. Both films starred John Barrymore, but of course as admirable as Barrymore is, all anyone wants to know about these (and indeed any) adaptations is: how rubbish where the whale effects? From the brief clip I've seen I would say: not great, but not as rubbish as you might think. As with any effects achieved using a combination of scale models, carefully-shot articulated body parts and stock footage of real creatures there are some jarring scale transitions, from mildly irascible trout to something the size of a house, but this is hardly a problem exclusive to 1930s films; Jaws suffered from it too.

Subsequent to the 1956 adaptation there were several more, including a TV movie in 1998 (starring Patrick Stewart as Ahab and featuring a cameo from Peck), a film adaptation in 2010 starring, bizarrely, Barry Bostwick aka Brad from The Rocky Horror Picture Show as Ahab, and a TV series in 2011 starring William Hurt as Ahab. Anyway, here's the lowdown on the various whales in each of those adaptations:

• 1930 - not bad, considering, though not particularly white
• 1956 - appropriately gnarled and wrinkly and scarred and harpoon-laden and overall pretty good, considering, though a bit rubbery
• 1998 - surprisingly rubbish - presumably some early CGI but far too clean and smooth and just generally fake-looking
• 2010 - utterly ludicrous, no doubt intentionally since this was a film by The Asylum, the company that brought you the Sharknado series, not to mention Mega Shark Versus Giant Octopus
• 2011 - again, a bit CGI, but much better

That's restricting ourselves to films specifically named Moby Dick, but there are other works which owe it a debt, notably the 2015 film In The Heart Of The Sea, which is actually a rendering of the true story of the demise of the whaling ship Essex in 1820. So not a direct adaptation of Moby-Dick, but since the novel borrowed heavily from the Essex's story, and the film seems to focus on the battle with the whale rather than the subsequent murder and cannibalism activities, it's an adaptation in all but name.

Other non-filmic works have taken inspiration, or maybe just a name, from Moby-Dick, notably Led Zeppelin's instrumental song of the same name, which was mainly a vehicle for John Bonham to indulge in that most reviled of rock traditions, the drum solo. A just-about-tolerable four-and-a-half minutes in its original studio incarnation (about three minutes of which is drum solo), it was expanded to interminable length in concert, presumably to allow Plant and Jones to wander off and have a cup of tea and Page to bang a couple of under-age groupies. The version on the definitive Zeppelin live album How The West Was Won is 19 minutes long, which is a larger amount of time than I'm prepared to sacrifice to listening to a drum solo, as thunderously legendary a rock drummer as Bonham was. The other obvious song to mention here is Mountain's Nantucket Sleighride, inspired by the story of the Essex and which I see I've already mentioned here, as well as cashing in a couple of cheap gags, which I now feel that I can't do again here. Oh well, no use "blubbering" about it, hahaha.

Lastly, Moby-Dick is another in the intermittent sequence of books featured here which contain a map, a list which includes The End Of Vandalism back in mid-2019 and this list of books from around five years earlier which includes a few books I own which haven't appeared on this blog as well as A Small Death In Lisbon, The Name Of The Rose, Faceless Killers and Sunset Song of those that do. The map just shows the Pequod's voyage from Nantucket to the site of its eventual demise in the mid-Pacific. Here it is:

pirate merchandise

Having trouble achieving an authentically piratical tone in your e-mails on International Talk Like A Pirate Day? Try plugging one of these into your laptop.....

shiver me timbers

I hope you've remembered what day it is today. If so try taking the Pirate Personality Test (see below).

You are The Cap'n!

Some men and women are born great, some achieve greatness and some slit the throats of any scalawag who stands between them and unlimited power. You never met a man - or woman - you couldn't eviscerate. You are the definitive Man of Action, the CEO of the Seven Seas, Lee Iacocca in a blousy shirt and drawstring-fly pants. You’re mission-oriented, and if anyone gets in the way, that’s his problem, now isn’t? Your buckle was swashed long ago and you have never been so sure of anything as your ability to bend everyone to your will. You will call anyone out and cut off his head if he shows any sign of taking you on or backing down. If one of your lieutenants shows an overly developed sense of ambition he may find more suitable accommodations in Davy Jones' locker. That is, of course, IF you notice him. You tend to be self absorbed - a weakness that may keep you from seeing enemies where they are and imagining them where they are not.

What's Yer Inner Pirate?
brought to you by The Official Talk Like A Pirate Web Site. Arrrrr!

yarrr!

Just so you've got plenty of time to rustle up an eye-patch from a piece of black card and some old knicker elastic, glue a stuffed parrot to the shoulder of your overcoat and practise brandishing a gold telescope and saying "yarr-HAAARRRRRR" a lot, this is advance warning of International Talk Like A Pirate Day, next Wednesday (September 19th). More info here, as well as here for UK residents.

It's a pretty self-explanatory festival, really, just involving, well, talking like a pirate. Hints can be found on the websites above, but broadly speaking think Robert Newton as Long John Silver in the classic film of Treasure Island, or possibly Tom Baker (pictured right) as Captain Redbeard Rum in Blackadder II, but definitely not Johnny Depp in the Pirates Of The Caribbean films (save that for International Talk Like Keith Richards Day, as soon as someone invents it).

So, if you work in a call centre, say, try amending your usual anodyne phone greeting to something like: "Yarrrr! This be Brian of the good ship Acme Insurance. How can I be helpin' ye this fine seafarin' day? A free tot o' rum wi' every policy, yarrr. You don't get that with the scurvy dogs at Direct Line."

There's a Bristol connection, for those that don't know, which is that the Admiral Benbow pub at the start of Treasure Island is generally accepted to have been based on the real-life Llandoger Trow down by the Floating Harbour, a pub which is very much still open today, though missing a couple of end gables after these were blown off by the Luftwaffe, the filthy swines. It's all been tidied up and made good now, though.

Plenty of piratical events are planned, both on the high seas (well, maybe) and for the more landlubberly inclined. Personally I'll be splicing the mainbrace, sinking a noggin of rum with a comely serving wench, and trying not to get keel-hauled (those barnacles really smart). Yarrr!