Stephen Darmody

@WilliamShatner Thanks Bill. Your timely posts have touched me twice this month, for Anzac Day and Bondi. I think you must love Australia. (Steve in Sydney).

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them. #AnzacDay

@holland_tom Masamichi Kitamoto ran the 5000m in 1932. In 1943 Japanese forces evacuated Lae (PNG) over the Saruwaged Range. Kitamoto reconnoitred the route. Hundreds died. (viz "DDay New Guinea" - Phil Bradley)

My all-time favourite Olympian: Margaret Abbott, an American studying with Degas & Rodin in Paris who entered a golf tournament in 1900 without realising it was part of the Olympics. She became America's 1st female gold medallist; but died (in 1955) without ever realising it.

@jamesrbuk @holland_tom @rhysdgriffiths Found that in Wiki.

@holland_tom Masamichi Kitamoto ran the 5000m in 1932. He reconnoitred a trail across the Saruwaged Range to evacuate Lae PNG 1943. Hundreds died

The 1st athlete to cross the finish line in the 1904 marathon was disqualified when it turned out he’d gone part of the way on the back of a truck. The ultimate gold medalist won despite his coach having dosed him with an elite sports drink of egg whites, alcohol & strychnine.

@holland_tom "He once defeated actor and film director Charlie Chaplin at table tennis, playing with a butter knife instead of a bat."

Is this legend for real? Apparently, he refused to become a professional sportsman because it would have been ‘vulgar’, & died of respiratory failure, HAVING BEEN A HEAVY SMOKER ALL HIS LIFE.

@holland_tom Wasn't he from Gotham City?

I learn that Melbourne was originally going to be called Batmania. A wasted opportunity...

@holland_tom It has been claimed that up until then there were more Gaelic speakers in the world than English speakers. Queen Elizabeth 1 could speak Irish.

“English-speakers grew over sixteen fold in 1790-1930, from around 12 million to around 200 million... In the long 19th century Anglophones bred like rabbits.” #ReplenishingTheEarth

@holland_tom I've always understood that the Irish could be said to have colonised Scotland, hence the linguistic connection. Is that incorrect?

@DarmodyStephen It was the Scots who did that, not the Picts. The Picts supposedly came from Scythia.

@holland_tom Hi Tom. I wonder if you'd elaborate on how the Picts "had ended up inventing an Irish ancestry for themselves".

@holland_tom Hilarious!

"I was wondering why he wasnt talking about marvel" twitter.com/Kyle_joseph07/…

@gibbsemanning @ReturnedFTF ALSO: A 1st Battalion cross in Double Bay Uniting Church in Ocean Street Woollahra AND A replica cross for a WA battalion in St Anne's Anglican in Ryde (the original was returned to WA).

3 churches in Sydney hold wooden crosses from Pozières: 17th Bn at St Thomas' Nth Syd;18th Bn at St John's Gordon; the 19th at St Luke's Clovelly. All these crosses were markers to enormous loss of life

@gibbsemanning @ReturnedFTF ALSO: A 1st Battalion cross in Double Bay Uniting Church in Ocean Street Woollahra AND A replica cross for a WA battalion in St Anne's Anglican in Ryde (the original was returned to WA)

@gibbsemanning @CWGC @ReturnedFTF @STwSS @Fr_KeithDalby @clovellychurch ALSO: A 1st Battalion cross in Double Bay Uniting Church in Ocean Street Woollahra AND A replica cross for a WA battalion (the original was returned to WA).

No other battle the AIF have fought would seem so well represented though wooden Battalion crosses now on Australian soil @CWGC @ReturnedFTF @STwSS @Fr_KeithDalby @clovellychurch