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It is a little clunky, but the lawyers tell us it is useful, in case we find ourselves in the middle of a twelve year court battle over alleged defamation. Like the one between Dr. Michael Mann and a columnist who was awarded compensatory damages of a million bucks.

We were kind of stunned by the results of this clear legal formality, since we are accustomed to saying what we wish, with the sole exception that we mean no malice to anyone and have only the best wishes to anyone who has lurched this far into the non-italicized text. Like last night.

The bunkroom at Big Pink normally shuts down processing around 1900 each evening. We refer, of course, to the 24-hour timekeeping that originates in an observatory in Greenwich in the UK. It is a relic for when Britain considered itself one of the world’s great empires, and they were not ashamed to say it.

Most of us were inclined in our beds- what we call “racks” in deference to old habit- and were actually fumbling around to find the remote broadcasting control device and turn the day off. Instead, something remarkable happened on the flatscreen mounted at the north end of the building. A well-meaning elderly fellow appeared on the screen in a series of images in which he castigated other political figures in our nation. We note he did not use a disclaimer in his remarks, so we all may be at risk for reliance on the remonstrations from the podium.

Splash was the only one of the Section who actually worked the Hill in his more youthful days, and claimed that was the motivation for the tattoo of a shorter disclaimer on his left arm, separated by a question mark on the sternum with the conclusion neatly printed in blue italic script on his right bicep.

He has a request pending to the Legal Beagles about whether the permanent application of disclaimerhood actually needs to be visible to be effective as a defense in litigation. That is a winter-season issue, since the short-sleeves of summer enables at least some of the ink to be visible to casual viewers for their protection. Or that of Splash.

There was an interesting display of emotion on the flatscreen. Impassioned emotion about the location of some pieces of paper in a variety of places. Apparently the matter is of some consequence in other legal proceedings regarding two types of material classified by act of the Government. We were unable to distinguish the specifics on those, though the elderly individual was said to be irritated about them.

Rocket shouted something from a distant corner of the darkened bunk-room about how strange it was. At a decibal level of ’75,’ he proposed a common-sense remedy. He thinks a disclaimer should have been run as something called a ‘Chyron.’ That would be the solution to the common memory lapses associated with age and respectful decline. Specifically, the ‘chyron’ is a caption superimposed over usually the lower part of a video image. Noise levels on can be split between whatever the elderly person is saying and a verbal amplification of the disclaimer running below it. Disclaimers emitting at a level between 70 and 80 dB are not considered dangerous, although the expert audiolgists testify they can sometimes be irritating or even annoying. This is especially true if you are trying to focus on something such as when you are working or attempting to manage an empire under fierce external pressure.

We watched the flatscreen pitch to the end, which featured a virtuous conclusion about something, though neither the well-intentioned speaker nor our part of the audience could quite recall what it was. Or where it was placed for storage.

As a group, we intend to have chyron tattoos for the arrival of Spring. It possibly could protect all of us.

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