The Inquisitions

Aloysius the Border Leicester ram looked around the field at all fifty of his cute and fluffy satisfied conc-ewe-bines who were knee-deep in abundant but dry summer grass, and he baa-ed out loud at how wonderful his world was.
 
Then he decided to celebrate with a drink.
It was 96 degrees in the shade.
Firstly he snouted-down the float valve to send a burst of water bubbling through the trough so it would have extra froth on top.
He preferred it that way.

Their world was a single paddock which contained everything that the sheep thought they needed, and none of them ever felt an urge to look through the fence, or, Ovine God forbid, break through it and discover that Old McDonald had five acres of lush irrigated rye and clover growing on his farm just beyond the next ridge.

It is therefore no coincidence that the word 'flock' was adopted by religious organisations to describe their congregations of faithful adherents.

The 'pastoral staff ', an object which is part of the Episcopal Vestments of Bishops in the Catholic Church is a replica of a shepherd's crook, and is used as a symbol of power over the "flock".

The Roman Catholic Church has historically needed to use much greater force than a pastoral staff to prevent it's parishioners from venturing into the intellectual topography beyond it's constrictive boundaries.

"Inquisitions" were committees of Little Theological Hitlers charged with the responsibility of rounding up the strays, and having them clonked on the head with a four by two plank of wood when other methods of convincing them to remain within the confines of the Catholic paddock failed.

1. The Papal Inquisition

Established in 1233 by Pope Gregory 9.

Erasmus the Tinker trotted around Italy on his horse in the year 1235 providing a unique service repairing leaking pots and pans with his patented sealant concocted from Vesuvian Spotted Toad spleens.
 
He was put to death by the Church after inadvisedly whispering to
Mrs Ciccione, the owner of an extremely holey frying pan who also happened to be an undercover informant to the tribunal, that the story of Adam and Eve  "was a bloody great big load of unmitigated codswallop".
Two Popes later in 1252, Pope Innocent 4, a gentle caring humanitarian and devoted earthly representative of God, authorised the use of torture by his Tribunals.

Gaius Apuleius Gaggio, a shy and sensitive used chariot salesman, (who also enjoyed an occasional cup of coffee) was suspected of having heretical tendences in 1253.
Additionally, there was a rather well worn track of evidence in the grass starting at the back door of his house, to suggest that he might have been servicing, after hours, some of the aforementioned Mrs Ciccione's needs which were not always being attended to by Mr Ciccione, a merchant seaman.

He was tethered inside the apse of the church just behind the altar and rigorously interrogated for seven hours, but a full confession only came forth after his testicles had been connected to the terminals of a truck battery in the following sequence;
Right to +ve, left to -ve.

2. The Spanish Inquisition

In 1480 the Church endorsed King Ferdinand the 5th and Queen Isabella's dubious idea of launching an Inquisition which, over a period of three centuries, executed 30,000 people for heresy, polygamy, seduction, smuggling, wearing your underpants inside out, and not cleaning the blue lint out of your belly button.

3. The Holy Roman and Universal Inquisition

It was a particularly bad day for Pope Paul 3 in 1542 for two reasons.

Firstly he had received an unusual item in the mail.
It was a bundle of pamphlets hot off somebody's newly invented
'printing press'.
They were invitations for all the Priests and Bishops to join the Roma Club de Spogliarello for  'Steamy Friday nights of raunchy revelation.'

Shocked, appalled, and just a tiny bit aroused at the prospect of attending, he retired to the Sistine Chapel for meditation and guidance from God.
 
No sooner had he opened the door, than a trail of paint spatters led his eyes ever upwards to an intoxicated Father Pius, with his black cassock in disarray revealing all manner of atrocities, suspended beneath the ceiling on ropes, holding a paintbrush in one hand, having obviously spent a lot of time enlarging certain anatomical features on Michelangelo's male nudes.

Upon being discovered, Pius swung himself back onto an upper parapet whilst attempting to sing a slurred rendition of the chorus of  'Oh what a lovely bunch of coconuts', in Latin.

The Pope immediately rushed off to the Apothecary, swallowed four aspirin and six valium, washed them all down with a bottle of mead, then declared an Inquisition to counter the dissemination of 'subversive' information from all the new-fangled printing machinery which threatened the Church's domination and control.

The prospect of free expression and mass-produced literature for all people scared the Papal crap out of him.

This Inquisition remains in place today, although in 1965 at Vatican 2, it was renamed 'Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith', and it no longer interferes in the lives of the laity.

The Catholic Church Administration today has a full-time job just trying to prevent it's own clergy from widening the narrow 16th century tunnel of doctrine into something that might be vaguely appropriate and useful for the 21st century.

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In the broader perspective of the universe, whatever happens in this field of human endeavour will most likely prove to be little more than a conceited and impertinent irrelevance.

The history of willow pattern plates

(Parental guidance recommended;  contains erotica and sexual references suitable for 15 year old boys.)

China pioneered the process of manufacturing superior quality porcelainware from fine white clay mixed with silicates and fired in high-temperature kilns. 
This technology remained solely in the hands of Chinese artisans until the eighteenth century AD. 

A feature of this pottery was the intricate fine-lined artwork which often depicted scenes illustrating Chinese legends.

The blue and white Willow Pattern plates became popular in the West during the 19th and early 20th century, and original specimens have become highly prized and extremely valuable collectors items.

The plate pictured above however was mass-produced in China during the 1990's. What follows is the modern day story of events which led to it's design.
 


Hu Sung Dat was the Managing Director of Jonah (Asia) Pty. Ltd.,
a company based in Beijing that imported, then processed, raw
seafood from Japan before reselling it in cans bearing the
"Nippon Whalesong" logo.

Hu's Headquarters were in an architecturally pleasing three-storey replica of an ancient Chinese pavilion located beside a landscaped garden dominated by an attractive water feature. Decorating the reception lounge in the office were some genuine artifacts dating back to the Ming Dynasty, including one purportedly owned by Emperor Yung Lo himself.

Hu's daughter, Mee Sung Dat was a precocious nineteen year-old who had the unbridled hots for her Father's secretary, the ruggedly handsome Mr Chang.

Mee Sung was bountifully endowed by Mother Nature with waist length silky black hair, an hourglass figure that according to those with intimate knowledge possessed significantly greater capacity on the top half than the bottom, and legs that went all the way up to where her femur was connected to her pelvic girdle bone.

It was these long and shapely legs that carried her today discretely up the thirty two steps in the fire-escape stairwell to the third storey office of Mr Chang, where she perched herself seductively on the corner of his desk, waiting expectantly for him to perform his daily thorough debriefing.

Chang diligently and dexterously devoted himself to this mutually rewarding ritual.
Mee Sung was the most beautiful girl in all of Beijing, but her normally radiant face today made Chang go all wobbly at the knees.
Just that very morning she'd had studs inserted in her eyelids, nostrils and lower lip and each puncture wound was still dripping tiny coagulating rivulets of blood.

Chang accordingly decided to start operations at the opposite end.
He slowly and sensually worked his way up from her nine slender toes (one had been accidentally amputated in a panda trapping mishap seven years previously) to her athletically smooth calves and thighs.

Then beyond.

Quivering uncontrollably, his hands slowly loosened the belt of her faux-leather mini-skirt revealing to him for the very first time an exotic expanse of unexplored territory interrupted only by a single tattoo in the centre of her left buttock.
One five-letter word.
An indelible and permanent memento of Mee Sung's teenage infatuation with pop singer Sting.

This was not immediately apparent to Chang because the Mandarin-speaking tattooist had misspelt the name by using a "K" as the final letter.

In this moment of temporary befuddlement Chang accidentally and unknowingly pushed the intercom button on the front of his desk which allowed Mr Hu to overhear the muffled duet of synchronous lust-fuelled heavy breathing and groaning coming from his secretary's office.

The workers at Jonah (Asia) Pty. Ltd. had all signed an Employees Contract which detailed ten misdemeanors under the clause "Inappropriate Conduct", each item of which constituted grounds for immediate termination. Misdemeanor Number 7 was;
"An employee shall NOT, during the course of his normal duty be discovered with both hands full of tits which belong to the boss's daughter."

Avoiding the large swinging sword in Mr Hu's hand also constituted an immediate incentive for Chang to speedily leap out of the office window following Mee Sung onto the nearby limb of a weeping willow tree, before sliding down the trunk and running across the old arched bridge with Mr Hu in hot slashing pursuit.
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Mr Wang was an 83 year-old bachelor who lived in an apartment across the road. He had recently bought a 35 optical-zoom camera specifically to spy on his 75 year-old spinster neighbour who was, according to Wang "still a pretty hot chick".

Witnessing the confrontation unfolding across the road on the little bridge, he immediately took a photograph which became the inspiration for all modern Willow Pattern plates.


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A somewhat older and arguably more accurate legend pertaining to Willow Pattern plates can be found here.