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Sloshi

2022-09-08T07:46:14Z

2dtom:

The martial art practiced by only the hardiest and most worthy Fools and Clowns. This has a long history pre-dating the formal establishment of [[Fools' Guild]]s in Quirm and Ankh-Morpork. Anyone doubting this should reflect that clowning is, at bottom, a carefully modulated and choreographed process of insane violence, where nobody gets hurt. (''Physically'' hurt, at least). '''''Sloshi''''' is essentially clowning without the moderation.

It has its origins in the hinterlands of [[Überwald]] many years ago, where travelling companies of clowns would fight for the choicer sites. (While the {{NDC}} does not specifically say this, anyone travelling in Überwald has other perils to contend with, such as [[vampires]], [[werewolves]] and feral [[banshees]] and must need some sort of a defence against them...). Eventually, this became a form of formal duelling among Überwaldean student clowns in the town of [[Müning]], where the scars of a sloshi fighter were worn with pride. (but only in very close company, as while sloshi fighting involved a measure of protective clothing, in Müning the buttocks were left bare. This also became the noun for the act of demonstrating one's sloshi scars - '''''müning'''''. A similar basic thought process is thought to have been responsible for the name of the Quirmian clowning centre at [[La Sorbumme]].

It is on record that the Fools' Guild has provided a Regiment in the past that has marched - memorably - to the defence of [[Ankh-Morpork]]. This would have included many clowns well-versed in sloshi techniques. In fact, a seventh-nose Dan and sloshi-sensai, such as [[Uncle Bootsie]], was capable of slaying seventeen Pseudopolitian mercenaries in a single mêlée, armed only with a ladder and two buckets of wallpaper paste. It is said, although only by clowns, that when this was first demonstrated on the field of combat, forty-one other mercaneries were incapacitated by laughter and overpowered by the rest of the Clowns' Battallion in addition to the seventeen slain by the ladder and the paste.

[[Mavolio Bent]] was only resurrecting this tradition when he slew two Assassins with a pink balloon and incapacitated several onlookers at [[Moist von Lipwig]]'s trial - with, indeed, the traditional ladder closely followed by ''eight custard pies in the air at once''.

==Annotations==
"Sloshed" is used figuratively in English to refer to someone being drunk. In this context, Sloshi could be read as a Discworld analogue to the Chinese martial art of Drunken boxing, a styles of Chinese martial arts that imitate the movements of a drunk person.

The scars associated with Sloshi (as well as the practice of keeping the buttocks bare) is likely a reference to the of Academic Fencing practiced by some students in Central European universities. Academic fencers would fight without facial protection, with the resulting duelling scars being was as a mark of their class and honour, due to the status of duelling societies at German and Austrian universities at the time.

==Annotation for non-English speakers==

Sloshi is a homonym for ''sloshy''. The verb to slosh means ''To spill or splash (a liquid) copiously or clumsily: for example, to slosh paint on the floor''. Or indeed across another clown's face.

[[Category:Discworld concepts]]

Sloshi

2022-09-08T07:40:07Z

2dtom:

The martial art practiced by only the hardiest and most worthy Fools and Clowns. This has a long history pre-dating the formal establishment of [[Fools' Guild]]s in Quirm and Ankh-Morpork. Anyone doubting this should reflect that clowning is, at bottom, a carefully modulated and choreographed process of insane violence, where nobody gets hurt. (''Physically'' hurt, at least). '''''Sloshi''''' is essentially clowning without the moderation.

It has its origins in the hinterlands of [[Überwald]] many years ago, where travelling companies of clowns would fight for the choicer sites. (While the {{NDC}} does not specifically say this, anyone travelling in Überwald has other perils to contend with, such as [[vampires]], [[werewolves]] and feral [[banshees]] and must need some sort of a defence against them...). Eventually, this became a form of formal duelling among Überwaldean student clowns in the town of [[Müning]], where the scars of a sloshi fighter were worn with pride. (but only in very close company, as while sloshi fighting involved a measure of protective clothing, in Müning the buttocks were left bare. This also became the noun for the act of demonstrating one's sloshi scars - '''''müning'''''. A similar basic thought process is thought to have been responsible for the name of the Quirmian clowning centre at [[La Sorbumme]].

It is on record that the Fools' Guild has provided a Regiment in the past that has marched - memorably - to the defence of [[Ankh-Morpork]]. This would have included many clowns well-versed in sloshi techniques. In fact, a seventh-nose Dan and sloshi-sensai, such as [[Uncle Bootsie]], was capable of slaying seventeen Pseudopolitian mercenaries in a single mêlée, armed only with a ladder and two buckets of wallpaper paste. It is said, although only by clowns, that when this was first demonstrated on the field of combat, forty-one other mercaneries were incapacitated by laughter and overpowered by the rest of the Clowns' Battallion in addition to the seventeen slain by the ladder and the paste.

[[Mavolio Bent]] was only resurrecting this tradition when he slew two Assassins with a pink balloon and incapacitated several onlookers at [[Moist von Lipwig]]'s trial - with, indeed, the traditional ladder closely followed by ''eight custard pies in the air at once''.

==Annotation for non-English speakers==

Sloshi is a homonym for ''sloshy''. The verb to slosh means ''To spill or splash (a liquid) copiously or clumsily: for example, to slosh paint on the floor''. Or indeed across another clown's face.

"Sloshed" is also used figuratively in English to refer to someone being drunk. In this context, Sloshi could be read as a Discworld analogue to the Chinese martial art of Drunken boxing, a styles of Chinese martial arts that imitate the movements of a drunk person.

[[Category:Discworld concepts]]

Iodine Maccalariat

2022-09-08T07:34:43Z

2dtom:

{{Character Data
|title= Miss Maccalariat
|photo= Stanley Baxter as Macallariat, 1972.jpg|Iodine Maccalariat(Miss)
|name= Iodine Maccalariat
|age=
|race= [[Human|Human]]

|occupation= [[Post Office]] Office Manager
|appearance= Spinster Schoolteacher

|residence= [[Ankh-Morpork]]

|death=
|parents=
|relatives=
|children= At least one daughter
|marital status= married (maiden name retained for professional reasons).
|books= {{GP}}, {{MM}}, {{CAM}}
|cameos=
}}

She is the ferocious office manager at the [[Post Office]], ruling Post Office counters with a rod compared to which iron would be as sugar candy. All members of Post Office Staff from the [[Moist von Lipwig|Postmaster]] downwards live in dread of her censure, except perhaps [[Stanley Howler]], for whom she may have a maternally protective streak.

She reminds Moist of one of his primary school teachers. The one you get in Year/Grade Two, after you have been lulled into a false sense of security by the sweet old spinster, in his case Frau Tissel, who runs the reception class (What might, for American readers, possibly be compared to kindergarten?) who never raises her voice, lets you play with the plasticene, indulges you, cleans up those little accidents that happen, and sneaks in some sound teaching on the sly so that you don't know education is happening.

Then, suddenly, expecting more of the same the following September, the Second Grade happens and your teacher is a slightly embittered child-hating old witch called Frau Shambers, who glares in disapproval and shouts at you and makes you sit up straight and tells you this is where school really begins. She is severely dressed and does her hair up in that horribly-remembered [[Überwald]]ean manner called ''[http://biology.clc.uc.edu/fankhauser/Cheese/schnecken/thmb/schnecken.html schnecken]'', where the hair is meticulously coiled up into a shape resembling a snail sitting on guard over each ear. You soon realise, if you are a six-year-old Moist von Lipwig, that no good can come of this, and the memory, of being expelled from the warm Eden of the kindergarten to the cold hard wooden benches of Education, will sit with you for life.

Thus, you are putty in her hands when she appears at the Post Office in the Maccalariat uniform of sensible shoes, thick black hairy stockings, the baggy cardigan, the severe glasses, and "the expression like an early frost", demanding her proper vocation, which is to terrify the living daylights out of anyone seeking to steal the stationery, the pens, or the ink.

In appearance the Receptionist From Hell, she is terrifyingly efficient at her job, and has her spiritual sisters the [[Multiverse]] over. There is the doctor's receptionist seeking to safeguard her employer from the inconvenience of actually having to see any patients (and certainly not YOU, you horrible NHS-resource-consuming malingerer). Then there's the desk receptionist at any large corporation who is more implacable an opponent to your getting into the building, or seeing the person you wish to see, than the whole of the security force combined. One of her more subtle weapons, on a par with [[Vetinari]]'s waiting-room clock, is the slightly soiled hanky she keeps up her sleeve, and which she will bring out at the right strategic moment to derail your train of thought.

She will demand that the proprieties be respected to the last dotted "i" and crossed "t", and will, for instance, demand that the [[Golems|golem]] tasked with cleaning the Ladies' lavatories (and they ''must'' be acceptably, ie impeccably, clean) be recognisably of the female gender herself. As the issue of golem gender has never been raised before, least of all by the golems themselves, this gives rise to the social experiment called [[Gladys]], who is, in her impeccable gingham dress and in the new attitudes inculcated in her by the Post Office girls, more than acceptably female. ([[Ankh-Morpork]] ladies know street theatre when they see it and collude to completely feminize their golem workmate, with interesting consequences).

As {{wp|Dilbert|Dilbert}}-creator Scott Adams describes in cartoon and in prose, she is the embodiment of the Doorway Demon, who must be placated to gain entry into the Office-Perilous. Had the [[Octavo]] had a Maccalariat guarding it and not its mere panoply of Dread Demon, Sigils and [[Seal of Eightfold Stasis]], that rogue spell would never have dared try to get into [[Rincewind]]'s head, and the subsequent history of the Discworld would have been different. In fact, the dreaded Gatekeeper Demon built into the lectern would have recognised it was outclassed, and handed in its notice, prior to returning to the cthonic [[Hell]] from whence it was summoned.

All Maccalariats are "Miss", even the ones with husbands (choked gasp) and children (you mean...as in ''plural'' of child?).

Miss Maccalariat is also high on ther committee, if not the Chairman, of the [[League of Decency]], described in {{CAM}}.

The sole example encountered so far in the novels is Miss Iodine Maccalariat at the Ankh-Morpork Post Office, although what is the possibility of her having sisters, or daughters even, called Fluorine, Chlorine, Bromine and Astatine?

The {{AMPOH}} lists a Heroine of the Post Office called Miss [[Honoria Maccalariat]], by context an ancestor. An interesting side-note honours a Miss [[Amelie Willet]], who whilst not having the family name appears in attitude and demeanour to be a Maccalariat in all but name. In fact, [[Alexandra Willet|the wider Willet family]] appear to have all the sterling personal qualities to be noted and avoided in the Maccalariats, and the casual observer could speculate on a family association.

== Annotation ==

The name '''Maccalariat''' may borrow from the French {{wp|baccalauréat|baccalauréat}} (or its later European and International versions).

The end of the name may also be a pun on the word "lariat", another name for a lasso (from Castilian, la reata 're-tied rope'). Being named after a tool that is used to restrain someone would be appropriate.

[[Category:Discworld characters|Maccalariat,Iodine]]
[[Category:Supporting characters|Maccalariat,Iodine]]
[[Category:Human characters|Maccalariat,Iodine]]
[[de:Iodine Makkalariat]]

Worralorrasurfa

2022-09-08T04:27:40Z

2dtom:

A coastal town in [[XXXX]] rimwards of [[Bugarup]].

Renowned for a bonzer surfing beach, but beware of the coral reef, (especially if attempting to surf in a ballgown and high heels), and the home town of [[Petunia the Desert Princess]]. It also has a banana factory that employed [[Neilette]] before she took to the road with [[Letitia]] and [[Darleen]].

==Annotations==

Worralorrasurfa could be a referrence to [[wikipedia:Surfers_Paradise|Surfers Paradise]], Queensland, Australia. The name was changed to Surfers Paradise in 1917, contributing greatly to the flow of tourists from across the world who flock to visit, despite great surf being found across much of the Australian coast. Much like a certain [[Bear Mountain]] in [[Lancre]] everyone is making too much money to consider changing the name...

The naming of Worralorrasurfa also matches a common naming conventions of Australian coastal towns. The prevalence of repeated or rhyming syllables in the name matches places such as Tamarama, Woolgoolga, Woolloomooloo, Woy Woy, Goonoo Goonoo, and Watanobbi.

[[Category:Discworld geography]]