Turkey

Gobble-gobble (Which is turkey speak for WTF is that red thing hanging down over my eyes)

Turkey is one of those words which can have many contextual meanings.

Probably the most widely used refers to the large bird of the genus Meleagris, originally from North America, but now common as a domestic fowl around the world.

When I was a boy, Turkey was virtually unknown on dinner tables at Christmas, where chicken was the usual choice, and it wasn't until the mid 80s that it really became popular in Scotland.

I must admit, although the meat is plentiful, it doesn't taste as pleasant (it's far to dry and bland) to me as a good roast chicken,  I used to (and still do) love the side dishes.  The chipolata sausages, the roast potatoes and parsnips, the buttered sprouts, the fantastic gravy, and of course, the magnificent bread sauce.

The bread sauce has caused a few heated arguments chez TSB, and I've referred to it a few times before, so I won't bore you with another repetition.  Let's just say that I get a wee bit grumpy if bread sauce, PROPER home-made bread sauce, does not make its essential appearance at the Christmas Dinner table. 
Actually, my Beloved didn't use the word grumpy. 
She selected and used rather more evocative words that time. 
Words I cannot bring myself to repeat in case I shock any readers of a more delicate constitution.

However, back to Turkey.

Another use of the word also comes from the USA.  Turkey can be used to describe a person or thing of little appeal; dud; loser.

I can think of a few people who could be described thus

Guess who?

Again from the USA, but widely used elsewhere, it can be used  in the theatrical sense as a show which flopped.



But the largest use of the word is probably to describe the country.  Jammed between Europe and Asia, with Greece on the North, Syria and Iraq to the south, Turkey is a land full of contradictions, with a mostly Muslim population but a secular (for the moment) government. 
 

 
It's also full of people who like me.
 
I have no idea why I'm becoming popular in the Republic of Turkey, but I know, and can prove that I am.
 
Every now and then, when I gain a few moments of peace in this madhouse we call Nuoava Lazio High School, I check my wee blog.  Today I checked the Stats.
 
WTF
 
460 hits in one day, on one page.  All from Turkey. (For those of you who have never looked at that area of Blogger, go into the dashboard and look at audience, with the Day button selected at the top right.  You will be shown a map of the world, with the biggest audience countries colour-coded green.
 
I saw this.
 

That green blob in the middle is Turkey.

The other slightly paler green-shaded countries, the USA, UK, Canada, India?, Aussie and NZ. I somewhat expected most of them, although I must admit India was a bit of a surprise.

But Turkey???

More investigation was needed.

They were all (or mostly all) looking at an old and quite short (for me) post from April last year.

I had noticed a sudden upswing in hits on the blog and was a bit dismayed that not that many left a comment, so I decided to put a special page up, just to ask casual viewers to leave a comment.
 

Any sort of comment.

I was expecting a few "Great, keep it up", 
even some "What a load of crap"
and probably a "Piss of you atheist bastard, your going to burn in Hell" (I've noticed that for some reason, the religious nutters cannot spell or punctuate.)

I got nothing.

But I've got 460 hits on that page.

From Turkey.

I can't figure it out.

Have a look and maybe tell me what you think is causing this phenomenon.

The page is Would you bastards viewers please leave some sort of comment.

I just don't know.


BTW, as I used the spellchecker before releasing these words to the world (and Turkey), I spotted a mistake.  Well actually the blog interface spotted it and highlighted it yellow.

The word it spotted was dsimayed, so I clicked on it to select dismayed, but it also offered an alternative word.  It offered  TACHOMETER

Sometimes I just don't understand.