Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Tuesday, May 26. 2020

Today's Earwig: The Quartermaster's Song

More accurately from the German, "earworm." Anyway, the Quartermaster's Song was a WW1 Brit marching song which became a Brit Scouting campfire song, and later a US Scouting and ordinary campfire song. Also, a good car song. All with varied lyrics.


I have no doubt that the WW1 versions were bawdy. I heard "There was Hank, Hank, givin' himself a wank in the store...". The magic of a tune like this is that you just make up all the verses you can think of to keep it going. 


The silly refrain about "My eyes are dim, I cannot see.." is great, but here are some of my favorite lines:


There was tea, tea, but none for you and me in the stores...


There were snakes, snakes, big as garden rakes in the stores... 


There are eggs, eggs, eggs with hairy legs in the stores...


There is gravy gravy, enough to float the Navy in the stores...


There are rats, rats, big as bleedin' cats in the stores... 


There are rats, rats, with bowler hats and spats... 


The Shadows rocked this tune long ago. Really good.


A version from the late 30s from Murgatroyd and Winterbottom 


Burl Ives' version 


A kids' version from Cardiff - well, watch it on the youtube offered:




Posted by Bird Dog in Music at 14:15 | Comments (7) | Trackbacks (0)

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It was cold roast duck that makes me want.........a sandwich. :-)
#1 dcjuggler on 2020-05-26 16:09 (Reply)
We're here because we're here because we're here because we're here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DngSe0HwstM
#2 Hugh Evan-Thomas on 2020-05-26 16:22 (Reply)
My grandson who played football in high school asked me what position did you play papajoe and I replied saxophone and we rode to out of town games with girls on our buses. We sang about gin, gin, gin that makes you wanna sin, in the halls, in the halls, as well as cold roast duck, and whisky that makes you frisky and on and on for miles and miles in the late 50's and early 60's. Meanwhile the chaperone moms in the front of the bus pretended they were deaf.
#3 OldTexan on 2020-05-26 19:15 (Reply)
And the chorus I remember goes: "My eyes are dim, I cannot see; I have too many beers in me".
#4 Frances on 2020-05-26 20:10 (Reply)
I grew up on the SF peninsula and learned it as:

Beer, beer, beer that makes you want to cheer
On the farm, on the farm
Oh it’s beer.......
.....on the Leland Stanford Junior farm. Etc. ad infinitum
#5 Oldav8r (Link) on 2020-05-26 22:58 (Reply)
Oscar Brand recorded lots of old military humor songs, findable on the net and worth listening to.

My favorite is "Blinded by Turds"
#6 Fred Z on 2020-05-27 08:52 (Reply)
OMG Fred. Love it. I laughed so hard my wife yelled at me because I was disturbing her telework conference call.
#6.1 dcjuggler on 2020-05-27 10:50 (Reply)

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