Eponymously Yours, W. Skeffington Higgins

In the latest issue of MT VOID (volume 31, number 48, whole number 1756*), in the context of a discussion about "spoilers," Mark Leeper offers advice on film reviewing. I love reading Mark's reviews, so this caught my attention.

One can see that Mark has been influenced by a combination of Hippocrates and Isaac Asimov.

And you are right about spoilers. If you say in a review, "I will
not reveal the twist ending," you are already revealing that there
is a twist ending. I would say that the rules of writing film
reviews are:

1) Do not diminish the reader's pleasure when seeing the film.

2) Tell the reader only the truth about the film unless in conflict
with the first rule.

3) Tell the reader what you think about the film unless in conflict
with the first two rules.

These seem like pretty good principles.





*That's right, the Leepers and their friends have been publishing this zine for 1756 issues.

2008: A Pungent Message

I received a very peculiar e-mail today: an offer to sell a sauce factory. In India. It can also bottle pickles, relishes, and chutneys.

Your opportunity to buy a plant making and bottling sauces, pickles, relishes and chutneys.

Now due to the success of the products a full-scale factory has been set up and is in full operation in India.

You can buy this immaculate equipment, which produces 4000 bottles of 250ml (1000kg) per 8-hour shift.

Everything is here for you to start up. The price is ridiculously low, as the plant must be cleared by the last week in July.

Everything for £65000+VAT

FACTORY CONTENTS

Junheinricht 3 wheeled Counter Balance Forklift and Charger (Fully serviced) * Large Stainless Steel Table with lower Shelf * Shrink Wrapper machine + Spare Large & Small Polythene Rolls * Hillsman Bottle Blower * Sessions of York Automatic Labeller with date, batch code and bar code printer * Spare parts for labelling different sized containers (Fully Serviced) * Zebra Thermal Label Printer for outer case bar codes and Food Service Labels + 9 spare rolls of labels *Mettler Multirange Scales ID1 – weighs upto 150Kg * Small Wheeled Stainless Steel Table with lower shelf * Williams Double Door Refrigerator * Williams Walk in Freezer * Data Logger to monitor freezer temperature with up-to-date reports and software * 250Kg Steam/Oil Jacketed Cooking Vessel with Auto-Stirrer and Side Scrapers, High Shear Homogeniser and Insulated Outer Jacket (Fully Serviced) * Tricool Sheik Oil Generator *Universal Semi Automatic Filler Machine * Ferrous, Non-Ferrous and Stainless Steel Metal Detector * Universal Capper with Changeable Parts for different sized caps

Buckets for Caps * Hydrovane Air Compressor HV02

Desks x 3 * Filing Cabinet *Large Storage Cabinet *Fire Extinguishers x 2 plus health and safety signs *Storage Heaters x 3 *Dolly Trolley x 3 *Heavy Duty Plastic Crates x 50 *Pallet Racking – holds 18 pallets *Pallet Hand Pump truck (1t) *Trolley Stainless Steel Double Knee Operated Hand Wash Sink *Locker x 1 – containing white coats and disposable hats and coats *Mirror *Paper Towel Dispenser *Fan Heaters *Double Tube Insectocuter *Set of Strip curtains for Shutter doors *Stainless Steel Bin *Storage Heater x 2 *Fire Extinguishers x 2 and Health and Safety signs * Stainless Steel Shelf *ADT Alarm – Connected via redcare to local police * Brute Ingredients Buckets x 18 *Tote Wheeled Ingredients Bins x 4 *Large Utility Sink – connected to water heater *Paper Towel Dispenser *Stainless Steel Bin *Separate Mop Water Sink *Insectocutor *Hose for Wash Down *Extractor Fan *Plastic Coated Fluorescent Lighting *Plastic Clean room * Skirting *Large Stainless Steel Table with Draw and lower shelf *Storage Heater *Fire Extinguishers x 2 plus health and safety signs *Various Temperature Sensors *PH Meter *Various Utensils * Large Wheeled Stainless Steel Table with Lower shelf *Large Stainless Steel Table * White Coats x 6 *Box of Disposable Coats * Industrial Sterilising Fluid x 40 ltrs *Industrial Washing-Up Liquid x 10 ltrs

Photographs available Call or Email

Tel: [DELETED] Mob: [DELETED]

Fax: [DELETED]

Email: [DELETED]

I dismissed a brief daydream in which I move to India and become the Maharajah of Chutney.

1952: Willis and the Sauce-Bottles

Reading about this factory put me in mind of an essay penned by the legendary fanwriter Walter A. Willis, of Belfast, in 1952:

We were all the sort of people who read at meals and if there was nothing else to read we would read the lables on the jars and things on the table. We soon found that we all knew off by heart the lable on a sauce known as "H. P." Not only did this lable carry a much greater wordage than any marmalade jar, it was of immensely higher literary standard. For one thing, part of it was in French, which gave it an immense distinction in the eyes of us Francophiles. The lable had three sides. The middle one had a picture of the Houses of Parliament at Westminster, a statement that the sauce was made by Garton and Company, and a description of its constituents-- pure malt vinegar and oriental spices. On the lefthand side was the blurb in French--"Cette Sauce de premier choix...." --which we intoned with the solemnity we gave to Baudelaire and Rimbaud. And on the righthand side was a copy of a certificate by two public analysts that they had " regularly taken samples from stock and found the sauce to be in every way pure and wholesome. --signed A. Bostock Hill and William T. Rigby. " Read More...

(Thanks to Judy Bemis for putting this on-line.)

If only Willis had lived to receive this spam! He might have bought the thing himself. Sixty-five thousand pounds seems cheap, and apparently they throw in a Vat.

Imagine a factory churning out a thousand kilograms of sauce per eight-hour shift, where the copy on all the labels is written by Walt Willis! The mind boggles.

At last Willis, dressed in a white coat, working by the glow of plastic coated fluorescent lighting, could have achieved the perfect fusion of Sauce-Bottle Fandom and Fanzine Publishing. It's the fanzine you can pour on a steak! It would have been great.

1996: On Reading the A1 Label

Back when Willis's article was only a rumor to me, I set down my own thoughts culled from a lifetime of reading sauce-bottles.

( Flashback to 1996: Ruminations on Sauce-Bottle Culture )

I thank Al von Ruff for his efforts to bring me to a more enlightened state. I think I'll go now and eat something I can put sauce on.