A Short Lesson In Teuton

For Lo! We Are Back On The Details Of Prof Bartov's Work

'Hitler's Army' because I made detailed notes and you're going to get their benefit, like it or not.  Probably not.  

     Okay, onto the short lesson in Teuton.  Since we are dealing with the meat grinder battles of attrition on the Eastern Front during the Second Unpleasantness, I wondered what 'Meat grinder' was in Teuton.  Art!

Sorry.  Couldn't resist*.

     'Fleischwolf'.  Which sounds peculiarly appropriate, since Ruffia now and the Sinister Union then are/were both awash with wolves.

     ANYWAY Ol' Ommy focussed on two contrasting Teuton divisions: one was the extremely bog-standard 12th Infantry Division, the other being the totally not-bog-standard Gross Deutchland regiment, later a division.  We shall look at the 12th first.  Art!

12 Infantry Division symbol

     Like most infantry divisions in the land of the Teutons, it was based on a geographical location, that being Pomerania.  Where the dogs come from.  

     The 12th was no stranger to combat: it had fought in Poland, suffering 900 casualties; it also fought in the battle of France in 1940, although I can't find a specific casualty total.  Let's look at an ideal depiction of a Teuton infantry division pre-Operation Barbarossa.  Art!

     Theoretically it would total 17,200 men and officers, in three infantry regiments, each of three battalions, each of about 1,000 men.  Also, 5,375 horses - so much for the mighty mechanised Wehrmacht, hmmm? - and 942 motor vehicles.  This Table of Organisation and Equipment, TOE, in no way reflects reality, because men would always be off on leave, on training, off sick or injured, or just plain dead.  War will do that.  Art!

     Teuton stubble-hoppers during the beginning of Operation Barbarossa.  Note that, in the Sinister Union, the 'road' is a dirt track and, once again, horsed Teuton transport.

     When the 12th began the invasion, as part of Army Group North, it was at a strength of 14,073 men and 336 officers, so already understrength, probably due to losses in France not being replaced.  By early November each infantry regiment had to dissolve a battalion, as they were not getting replacements.  By 14/12/1941 NOTE PROPER DATE FORMAT their losses amounted to 4,200 men, leaving 11,351 men and 287 officers.  Art!

     The 12th was then unlucky enough to be surrounded by Sinister forces in their 1942 counterattack, in the 'Demyansk Pocket', along with five other divisions, as shown above.  Under siege for 81 days, there are no figures for what 12th Division's losses were, but the total overall for the units in the cauldron was 55,000, so if we average that out, possibly 9,000 casualties as a maximum.  However, read on.

     By April the 12th had suffered so many casualties that it took troops from wherever it could find them, leading to one battalion having soldiers from 17 different units, and 17 companies being led by NCO's instead of officers.  

     We now have definite figures for losses in May 1942: 9,272 men and 341 officers, so 6,000 men down from establishment.  By August the losses reached 10,897.  Ol' Ommy gives a flavour of how intense the fighting along Army Group North's front was: During December 1942 one regiment, reduced to a third of it's nominal strength (793 men), lost 614 men.  The 12th's 'Sturm Battalion' was left with 36 men and one officer or 5% of it's original roll.  Art!

"This holiday abroad is s-"

     Once again not getting any replacements, the 12th was shunted to the Lovat River front, where it's strength had fallen to 4,822 men and 171 officers.  You might wonder why the Teutons kept this skeleton force in existence, rather than split it up and redistribute it amongst other formations.

The Lovat River then and now

     Because Herr Schickelgruber was convinced that keeping these skeleton divisions around would fool the Sinisters every time.  Hint: it didn't.

     ANYWAY AGAIN there the 12th sat for over a year until June of 1944, until it was completely destroyed in the Sinister's Operation Bagration.  

      This long, sorry tale of woe in warfare comes down to the Teutons underestimating the Sinisters, whom they knew to be tough opponents going back to the eighteenth century, and overestimating themselves.  Also, it proves that  'Bewegungskrieg' (as the Teutons actually called it) tended to have very high casualties whilst in progress.  These unpleasant facts were camouflaged during short campaigns but came into harsh focus for the endless war in the East.

     We didn't even get to deal with Gross Deutchland.  Maybe tomorrow.  I bet you can hardly wait.

Remember Mister Jimmy?

The grizzled hard-as-nails process worker whom manglement tried to replace and sack, and whom ended up costing them at least a million dollars.  This was because the business had run out of the electronic control modules that Jimmy and Jimmy alone could make, they were up against deadlines and had to accede to the ex-owners flat statement that they paid him a seven-figure number to come back and train a batch of new ECM workers.  Art!

     PEN, the narrator, mentioned in his original tale that the new manglement might have broken the law and that he'd update if there was any more news.

     There was more news.  As Jimmy put it in rather saltier language, "Those <very rude swear redacted> didn't know who they were dealing with, they sure as <another redaction> do now."

     Manglement realised things had gone badly wrong when the workers tried to unionise, which failed but lit a fuse under the management staff.  They restructured and things improved considerably, sufficient for Jimmy to return, BUT he had conditions.  O boy did he have conditions.  Art!

     Jimmy wanted two of the problematic higher-ups gone, which had also been the position of a lot of other workers as well.  Two weeks after he came back they were walked out  of the plant by security and warned never to return - see above for corroboration.

What's This?

Allow me to put up an illo that just caught my eye on the BBC website.  Art!

     I am unfamiliar with 'Hozier' - possibly a Canuckistanian? - or Jessie Buckley, but a dinosaur like myself actually possesses a CD or two by Brucie.

     ANYWAY what I was surprised at was that MacGowan was dead, firstly because it would be hard to distinguish between him alive or deceased, and secondly the news of his demise three years ago completely passed me by.  Art!

     How he outlived Kirsty McColl is a mystery for the ages.  You know, the other half of their duet on "A Fairytale Of New York", the best and most unseasonal Christmas song ever.  Art!

     Since the song is a perennial favourite at Yuletide, he must have made a mint in residuals and royalties over the decades, which explains how he could afford to get his pegs fixed.

Ewwwww!

Conrad, as we all know, is the world's biggest coward, all the more so about anything to do with his eyes, which squeamishness made for an icky moment last night as I was watching 'Falling Skies'.  Art!

     This unappealing little beggar is an alien 'eye worm'.  The backstory is that Tom Mason deliberately gave himself up to the aliens in order to ensure his son Ben was no longer affected by the remnants of an alien harness that had been plugged into his spinal column.

     Well, Tom brought back an extra guest - the above worm, in his left eyeball.  Doctor Glass has to remove it with tweezers - Art!

     Yuck a duck.  They restrain him but you get the perspective of his feet thrashing around, hinting that this might, just possibly, be a painful experience.

     The question of what was it doing and are there any more? is left open to speculation.

Finally -

Ending with another pearl of poison wit from Ambrose, here we are:

"Army, n: A class of non-producers who defend the nation by devouring everything likely to tempt an enemy to invade."

*  I think this translates as "Revenge against the Ukrainians!" and "I didn't realise -"

Sticking It To The Manglement

Yes, Another Torrid Tale Of Corporate Cretinocracy

This tale is related by Peripheral Employed Narrator, hereafter PEN, who worked in a factory he coyly refuses to name, as is usual with these tales of South Canadian idiots in management positions, because - litigation.  Initially, things were peachy, as the business was run by the original owner, who had been there for decades.  Art!

     'Twas a fair-sized business, too, numbering about 250 workers, running in three shifts 24/7.  One of the most appreciated perks was time off for those who had been there in excess of 20 years: 8 weeks paid time off and 2 weeks personal time.  If true, this is remarkably tolerant of the employer, as most greedy business owners across the pond feel it's like a personal insult if an employee dares to take time off.

     Enter Jimmy.  PEN describes him as 'grissled' when I think they mean 'grizzled', since he'd been with the business for 43 years.  He was the living embodiment of Bus Factor Two, as only he and a single manager knew how to make a specific sub-component, essential for the production line.  You may be able to guess where this is leading.  Art!

That's Jimmy at the back

     The came the words no employee likes to hear - the owner was retiring and selling the business.  'Nothing will change,' he lied.  Or he was duped, one of the two possibilities.

     Of course the new management made changes.  They sought to immediately cut the wage bill by firing those close to retirement, including that manager who could also make the Macguffin, and chopped leave entitlement to 4 weeks all in.  However - that word I love so much! - they VERY UNWISELY allowed leave to be called in by phone without getting it pre-approved.

     Realising that they are now in a Bus Factor One situation, manglement bring in a 'backup' for Jimmy.  Art!

     Their intent is obvious; have Jimmy train this noob, then fire him and save on his salary.  Jimmy pre-empts them by calling in on noob's first training day and informs that he is taking all 10 weeks of accumulated PTO.

     Ooops.

     There was a small amount of Jimmy's patented sub-component in storage, but manglement were not happy at being brought this close to the wire.  Jimmy wasn't happy with how they had been treating him, so during his 10 weeks off he applied for other jobs and got one.  Three days after being due back he rings up and informs manglement that he quits.

     This is a very serious problem.  The word 'patented' above is not mere hyperbole, these parts could only be made under licence by an approved technician.  Whom the business no longer employs.  Suddenly production is brought to a halt.

     Ooops.

     The stored parts run out.  Manglement gets desperate.  Desperate enough to contact the now-retired owner, who proved to have been hoodwinked about the changes they had imposed and was frothing with ire about them.  He charged them over a million dollars to come in and train new hires and they had to pay, or go out of business completely.  NB   PEN later informs that the business had been worth $500 million when manglement acquired it.

     PEN further informs that Jimmy and ex-owner made an 'electronic control module' that was mounted in a sealed unit made of epoxy resin.  It might have been possible to reverse-engineer it were it not for the back orders piling up and time being critical here.  Art!

     There were further comments from other Reddit readers, notably asking if manglement had tried to get Jimmy back, even as a consultant?  PEN guessed that they tried, and Jimmy wasn't interested or bothered, given how he and his 15 fired ex-colleagues been treated.

     An example of how manglement treated Jimmy was when he'd already clocked off and was in the car park ('parking lot' for any South Canadian readers out there), heading for his truck.  Out comes his boss, who wanted him to go back in, clock on and do another 3 hours work.  Jimmy waited in his cab until Bottomhole Boss got up close, then hauled a '40' out of his in-cab cooler and necked the whole bottle, all the while giving BB a dead-eyed look.  Art!

A '40'

     The car park was a vacant lot owned by the city, not company property, so BB had no recourse but to walk back in as Jimmy burned rubber and gravel out of there.  Also, this happened on a Friday.  As PEN states, doing this instead of a simple 'no' makes a more impressive statement.

     There is a coda to this that may come later.  I bet you can hardly wait.

Conrad's Succintness Impresses

Art!

     NO!

     Next.

Not Not Aeroflot

Conrad is sanguine about Britons using the Ruffian state airline to fly into or out of This Sceptred Isle, as they were banned from the UK's skies back in 2022 and have never returned.  Ha!  

     Art?

     Within Mordorvia itself, Aeroflot is becoming more and more a case of Ruffian Roulette.  They have been cut off from genuine spare parts for their stolen Boeing and Airbus fleet, not to mention software updates and patches, which has led to planes becoming so unsafe that manglement are ordering employees not to report any malfunctions, lest planes become grounded.  Because flying a dangerously unsafe aircraft and jeopardising the crew and passengers is of less concern than making a profit?  This fly-or-die policy has been in force for a year and, allegedly, applies to other airlines as well, whom are also suffering from sanctions and lack of maintenance.  Art!

     That, gentle reader, is a Boeing fuel filter, costing up to $135 and needed one per engine.  Thus over $500 for a 737 IF they are available, which they aren't in Ruffia.  Aeroflot policy?  Rinse them out and reuse them whilst crossing fingers.
     Currenly, Mordorvia manages a partial workaround by importing some spare parts through the UAE, Turkey and China.  Problem is, this takes longer and adds to the expense, at the risk of having counterfeit parts sold on.  Not only that, spare part suppliers are now requiring tail numbers for the aircraft they are destined for, meaning anything Ruffian will be cancelled.  Art!

     It has cost the state $12 billion in subsidies and loans to airlines, so the solution is now to soak the flying public by increasing air fares by at least 15% and up to 30%, because once again the serfs must pay for the Tsar's war.

You What?

Conrad is once again baffled at the apparent expectation of knowing whom some celebritute is, when I have no inclination to know and even less to click on their link to find out more.  Art!

     Who is she?  No idea.  Nor do I want to know.  Conrad is horrid that way.  Next!

A Variation On The 'Too Unsafe To Drive Away' Scam

You ought to remember this one: BOOJUM!: If I Were To Say 'Cart Rubble'

     - featuring CHINS, whom a scummy scammy garage employee tried to rip off to the tune of $3,700, failed, got fired and arrested.  Possibly confused by CHINS being all dolled-up with hair and makeup on point.

     ANYWAY another lady shared her tale in the comments.  

I took my car to a place several years ago to have the front brake pads replaced. Pretty soon a manager comes out and said the rear brake drums also need to be replaced for a total of $700. Well, I only had enough money to replace the front pads so that's what I did. I received a letter several days later listing all the items needing to be fixed. It also said if I didn't comply my car would be reported to the state as being unsafe to drive. I didn't comply and the state never told me I couldn't drive the car because it was unsafe. 

      Note the important word in the introductory line: 'lady'.  What an uncanny coincidence!  Not to mention no legal comebacks.  One wonders what a half-decent attorney would have made of this blatant extortion.

Finally-

Ending with another Biercism.

" Really, adv: Apparently."

Our Goal - Is Fred Pohl

This Is Going To Take A Bit Of Background

Especially as Ol' Fred is no longer with us, nor have his short stories or novels been made into films or, as far as I know, television serials.  AFAIK because some obscure black and white series from the mid-Sixties may have broadcast an adaptation of one of his stories.  Conrad has read a fair few of his works, some of which stick with me, some of which don't, perhaps down to the peculiarity of my mind rather than his skills as an author.  Art!

Mount Everest, modified

     I am cheating here - how utterly unlike me! - by using one of his collaborations with Cyril Kornbluth, namely 'Wolfsbane', which benefits from being a joint venture.  It's deservedly known as a classic and is now in the public domain, so you can go read it on Project Gutenberg.

     ANYWAY what I really wanted to concentrate upon was Ol' Fred's novella, which is a work too long to be a short story yet not long enough to be a novel, 'The Gold At The Starbow's End'.  Yes, I have read it, several times.  Art!

     Cover artist Peter Jones, and no, I have no idea what this mechanical contraption is, nor what it's doing.  Which is not why we're here.

     TGATSE has, at it's core, the concept of deliberately isolated humans making innovative leaps and bounds in technological development.  The isolation comes aboard a star-ship headed towards Alpha Centauri, where the crew have nothing to do but study science and solve problems.  The 'Starbow' is how they view the external universe as they proceed at relativistic speeds towards their destination, which Fred can romance about as nobody is in a position to disagree.  Art!

      Fred uses a hugely contrived analogy about how the star-ship crew are impelled to do better by having no alternative.  His explanation involved children being tasked with crossing a flat open area, either being given two planks of wood, or a single plank.  Those with two planks take ages to tie them onto their feet, and then slowly shuffle across the floor; the ones with but a single plank fasten it on in half the time and then dramatically hop across the flat open space, easily beating their better-resourced compatriots.  Conrad is unsure this would secure the multi-billion dollar funding for an interstellar research project, as otherwise NASA would be right in there.  Art!

     This is a still from 'A Material Difference', one of the 1979 episodes from 'The Rockford Files'.  Why is it here?  O I thought you'd never ask!

     There doesn't seem to be any website that details this episode, so you are all cast upon Conrad's cognition.  The plot centres around a Sinister plot to murder an inventor in Los Angeles, with Jim's shiftless 'friend' Angel putting himself forward as a hit man for hire.  The US Navy are also involved, and for why?

     'Formula D'.  With the Sinister Union unable to import genuine South Canadian denim, they created their own version, which 'wears like iron', according to the Naval Intelligence Officer above, and the inventor is now looking to make a killing whilst avoiding being part of one.  

     'Denim.  Official working uniform of the US Navy,' realises Jim.  Which organisation would have saved millions.  Another example of creating a better derivative when faced with no alternative.  Art!

'You're jamming my windpipe!'

     Where are we going with this?  You may well ask.  Well, I was contemplating the current imbroglio in the Persian Gulf, in Iran and surrounding nations, involving all sorts of ordnance including Patriots, Tomahawks and THAADs.  Which are all South Canadian missile systems, lest ye be unaware.  'Terminal High Altitude Area Defence' if you must know.  The Patriot and THAAD are defensive weapons, with the Tomahawk being an offensive one.  Art!

     Here an aside - that lettering along the side would read 'Yaia Vai' in Cyrillic, or, since it's been reflected, 'Nav Air' in proper King's English.  

     ANYWAY AGAIN back over the past couple of years, the Tomahawk has been mentioned as a possible missile given, then sold, to Ukraine, because it supposedly represents the pinnacle of South Canadian military ordnance*.

     HOWEVER! O that word again - being given, or sold, the Tomahawk comes with a weaver's loom of strings attached.  Whichever South Canadian administration was in power would invoke their right to allow strikes inside Ruffia or on specific targets, with potential kill-switch abilities to restrict targets.  Typical range is about 1,000 miles, delivering a 1,000 pound warhead, at a unit cost of about $2.5 million.  

     Ah yes, recall "creating a better alternative when faced with no derivative."  Art!

     Faced with the probability of not getting Tomahawks at all, or being overlaid with a plethora of restrictions if they did acquire them, the canny Ukrainians came up with their own cruise missile: the FirePoint-5 Flamingo.  This has a range of 1,800 miles, carries a whopping 2,250 pound warhead, and at a unit price of $500,000.  So it flies further, does more damage and is a fraction of the cost of a Tomahawk, and since it is entirely Ukrainian produced, they can blow up whatever they Dog Buns! feel like.  Art!

     That big black hole is 30 yards by 20 yards across and the orcs have been careful not to publish photos of what suffered underneath it.  Bear in mind that this is the Votkinsky Zavod missile component plant, 800 miles from the Ruffian border in Udmurtia.  Ruffian mil-bloggers have been having a squeaky bum time appreciating just how hard the plant has been hit.  Yet nary a Tomahawk in sight.

     It might have been kinder of Donnie Dorko to allow Kyiv to get Tomahawks.  Art!

Cutter - tomahawk - I'll get my coat -

     Wow, another looooong Intro, we now need picture content, stat!

You What?

Conrad is unsure what audience or demographic these people are aiming for, but it most certainly isn't him.  Art!

     NO!  No I am not.  I need to keep on working to earn Book Tokens, which other people sanctify as 'money', because Your Humble Scribe most certainly does not have £600,000 in savings, or whatever the exchange rate is with South Canada.  'Fisher Investments' - trying to reel you in?

For Those In Pearl On The Sea

Don't knock cruise travellers, for those who have never made a night transit across the Bay of Biscay, when you can feel the ship ascending and descending waves, the feeling 'nervous' is a pale shadow of the real thing.  Art!

     Here is Edna recumbent in the furry pink Dog Nest.  I think she's deigned to bless me with her presence as I'm not playing any music, DVDs or television.  Do not fret, both the heater and dehumidifier present are inactive.  Although I may blame the latter device for allowing my 'Jolly Ranchers' to become all sticky in their wrappers, which I have had to resolve by putting them in the freezer.  I apologise if none of that last sentence makes sense, tune in tomorrow on the same Bats channel.

Another Target To Shoe!

Bearing up in the middle ground, Nigel Farrago is probably spying for South Canada, as others in his party have already got dibs on spying for Ruffia - Art!

Nathan Gill, come on down for your 10 year sentence!

   #

    - and spying for China - Art!

     O well that's alright then!

     Apparently the Nasty Little Man made a trip across The Pond to see DJ Tango at his Mar-A-Lago pit, only to be spurned and turned away, as Nasty Little Man was only of import before Fat Caligula got back into the White House.  Farrago is apparently so desperate he might be going back to his constituency in Clacton in order to remind them what he looks like.

I think that's quite enough scrivel for one night.  Pip pip!

 *  NOT 'Ordinance', which is a species of administrative edict.  You're welcome.

Today We Traverse The Travails Of Torment

I Say, That Sounds Rather Forbidding, What?

In fact it sounds as if you've volunteered to venture across the Straits of Hormuz in a day-glo green pedalo, trailing a banner proclaiming 'I'd bomb the Ayatollah for less than a dollar!', covered with stickers of Bibi mooning them and playing a tape loop of 'The Star-Spangled Banner'.  Art!

     

     Mooning stickers would be too much for the algorithm.  Art!

     BUT NO!  We are not here to point out that Iran controls one of the world's most important marine choke points on the planet because all the grown ups in the room already knew that and had planned accordingly, right?

    ANYWAY we are scorning to mock these benighted poltroons, and instead are going to be focussing on far more important matters, to wit, Codeword solutions.  Art!

     No idea what's going on here, just approving that it looks spooky, dangerous  and enigmatic.  Like me.

     ANYWAY I'm going to work through a batch of Codeword solutions whilst complaining at how hard and unfair they were, except that of course - obviously! - I solved them.  

BUNGALOW: From my Collins Concise English Dictionary:  "A one-storey house, sometimes with an attic.  17th Century, from the Hindi 'bangla', meaning 'Of Bengal'.  Well, that explains the bangla music genre.  The word owes it's existence to the British living in India during the Raj, where such domiciles were built, having a veranda all around the house, all the better to enjoy air outside instead of fetid inside.  Art!

Yours for £550,000

     Here's one I walked past today whilst taking Edna for trotties.  It's now been sold and has planters and garden sculptures up.

CICADA: Not a creepy-crawly one it liable to encounter in This Sceptred Isle, as they favour warm climates, so I deserve kudos for working this one out.  Art!

How perfectly hideous

     <sigh> if you want the technical details, they are "Any large broad insect of the Homopterous family 'Cicadidae' ... males produce a high-pitched drone by the vibration of a pair of drumlike abdominal organs."  They are generally accepted as harmless, apart from their inept flight, which regularly sees them impact objects en route, and if you are the object in question, a flyswatter would be a sensible investment.  Art!

A swarm.  Singular, not definitive.

COVEY: No, the solution wasn't COVES or COVER or COVEN, but an even more obscure word.  Conrad, not being the kind of chap who puts on tweeds at the weekend and goes out with a twelve-bore, was vaguely aware that it had to do with hunting and shooting and fishing.  So it is.  The CCED states: "A small flock of grouse or partridge, from the Old French 'Covee' meaning 'to hatch'."

     Come on, really!  How many people nowadays have the time or money or inclination to go onto the moors with a group of beaters and blaze away at fleeing birds.  Just pop into Sainsbo's and ask if they have any lovey-dovey ex-covey.  Art!

EQUIVOCAL:  Another wretched derivation from the Latin <spit hack>, yet with a meaning quite sundered from the direct translation.  Which is 'Equal voices', meaning a situation where all voices are of equal volume.  The term itself means to be 'Capable of varying interpretations; ambiguous', i.e. no voice stands out as being the definitively truthful one.  Art!

     Hmmmm Conrad wonders how this worked with the Round Table and all those knights.  If everyone's voice was equal, how did anything ever get done?  Voting and cliques, one suspects.

     There are two other definitions in the CCED: for the second, EQUIVOCAL means to be deliberately misleading and vague, and you can't see a better example of it than Pete Hegseth avoiding giving any answers to hard questions over the past 10 days.  He also embodies the third meaning, which is to be of questionable sincerity and dubious nature.  Art!

JOCUND:  Conrad is unsure if this has any relation to JOCOSE, but suspects they have a common Latin root <hack spit>.  I recall Dougie, the mate, using the latter word when describing the crew of 'The Vital Spark' in 'Para Handy Tales'.  Now, looking at my CCED, I see that JOCUND is defined as "Of a humourous temperament, merry".  Art!

     Why do we have a still here from 'Planet Of Evil', one of the best-dressed sets in the whole Tom Baker era?  O I thought you'd never ask!  Because of a quote our favourite Gallifreyan comes out with - "And jocund day stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops" meaning the terrifying night-cycle on Zeta Minor has ended.

Another Not-So-Gentle-Shoeing

Yes, let me allow a picture to do the talking.  Art!

     A somewhat dishevelled, sweaty and saggy Donnie Dorko, carefully holding onto the doorframe as his balance is pretty bad nowadays.  Thankfully no tie so we are spare the hideous sight of his turkey-wattle neck being constricted into vile shapes.

More Of SPEW And SLEW

We recently did an Intro about SPEW, SLEW's soon-to-be-ex-wife, whom had filed a bogus restraining order on him in order to keep his car, whilst she lived with her boyfriend, SLAB.  Remember that, it comes into play later.

     SLEW, proving to be an absolute Chad and master of documentation, turned the tables on her and she ended up carless, jobless, penniless and homeless.

     Then came the divorce itself.  Art!

Don't ask me, I don't know either

     SPEW missed the first two court dates, thanks to living two states away and no longer having a car.  When she did turn up in front of the judge, she demanded $5,000 for any property of hers that might have been lost, stolen or damaged during the marriage.  The judge asked for receipts.  She had none.

     $5,000 disbursement dismissed.

     SPEW then wanted SLEW to pay her student loans, because It Was His Fault.

     The judge noted she'd started at college after leaving SLEW and was only there for 6 months.  Request denied.

     SPEW then wanted the restraining order lifted, as it was interfering with seeing her boyfriend.  The judge explained that, once the divorce was final, the RO would no longer apply.

     SPEW then wanted as much alimony as possible, because It Was His Fault - at which the judge dropped the bombshell that, due to her romantic relationship with SLAB - she wasn't entitled to ANY alimony.

     Ooops.  Art!

     SPEW ended up walking away with 2 boxes of random household items and 1 box of her grandmother's dinnerware, plus thousands of dollars of student loan debt, instead of the $10,000 she'd fondly imagined and years of free alimony money.  Also, by the time the court case rolled around, she would have been 6 months pregnant with SLAB's child.  What a wonderful relationship those two are going to have!

Get Thee Behind Me, Clickbaiter!

Another in our occasional series of Conrad proving how clever he can be, and also helping you to decide whether you want to watch or not.

     The film is 'Sicario', featuring 2 Brits, Emily Blunt and Daniel Kaluuya, whose South Canadian accent was so convincing I didn't realise he was from This Sceptred Isle.  It's a very good film but the Tut Factor is quite high, so not for the faint-hearted.

     And you're welcome.

Less Than Good News For Putinpot

Let Art earn his coal ration for today.  Art!

     That's General Syrski, who was nicknamed 'Butcher' when he took over, a nickname that appears to have been quietly dropped along the way.  Also -

"Despite a numerical advantage almost three times larger, the enemy is forced to postpone dates of planned operations, patch holes in defense, and redeploy troops from other directions, the commander-in-chief reported"

     This is revealing.  The orcs cannot generate enough combat power on the front lines and have to shuffle forces around rather than having reserves to cope.  One more reason the serfs of Mordorvia are getting twitchy about a new mobilisation.  Watch this space.

Finally -

That's it!