Back To December 1979

Let Us See What Was Contemporary 

 - in December 1979.  I shall need to use one of those 'On This Day' generators as my memory is not that good - rum and old age you know - so let me plug the date in.

     O wow!  Sorry to divert but today is the anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, an event we here in This Sceptred Isle deem positively iconic.  Art!

"The Death of Nelson"

     Actually this blog won't be published until the day after but what's 24 hours between friends.  I had a brilliant jigsaw version of the above.  In case you were wondering:  Royal Navy 1; Franco-Spanish 0.

     ANYWAY let's see - 

1)  The Sinister Union carries out a nuclear test at their Semipalatinsk site, in northern Kazakhstan.  Ha!  The SU no longer exists and I don't think Kazakhstan can be happy about inheriting a radioactive zone where over 450 nuclear explosions were carried out.  Art!

2)  Saudi Arabia raises the price of a barrel of crude oil to $24.  Oooh, that must have seemed shocking at the time.  Art!

Today's 'Trump Effect' in action

3)  'Trivial Pursuit' was invented.  I wonder if this is still around?  I haven't played it in decades.  Let me dig.  

It is indeed

4)  'Kramer Versus Kramer' is released and gets an Oscar the following year.  Conrad doesn't care if it got a clutch of Oscars, he's never seen it and never intends to as it sounds as interesting as the life in a dirty puddle.  No you don't get a picture.

5)  O yes how could we forget, the Sinister Union invaded Afghanistan on Christmas Day, presumably because everyone would be watching Christmas films on television and not paying attention.  Hot tip: it did not turn out well for them.  Art!

     Why this exercise in nostalgia?  O I thought you'd never ask - Art!

     Yes, we're back to the hit singles chart of that month and year, which I will stand in judgement on, because once again whose blog is it?
11 "With You I'm Born Again" Billy Preston and Syreeta.  I've heard of Billy Preston - a keyboard player? but no idea who or what Syreeta is.  Or was <digging commences>.  Art!

Hairstyling courtesy Finger In Light Socket

     Yup, she jitterbugged off this mortal coil in 2004.  Apparently she was a songwriter and singer and WYIBA was a global hit.  I cannot remember ever hearing it myself and would doubtless hate it if I ever did.     NO I AM NOT GOING TO YOUTUBE IT!

     I was correct about Billy, whom also shimmied off this mortal coil in 2006.

     Conrad Does Not Approve.

12  "John I'm Only Dancing (Again)" David Bowie.  Nah.  Conrad not keen on much he did pre-'Low'.  

     Conrad Does Not Approve.

13  "Is It Love You're After" Rose Royce.  No, love, it's the rent money.  As I recall, another slushy ballad with an excess of strings.  Art!

     Blimey heck Jane Kaczmarek!  Nine of the bounders.  They can't have made much money having to split it 9 ways.

     Conrad Does Not Approve.

14  "My Girl" Madness.  Not to be confused with the other 'My Girl'.  Art!

     A song about a domestic spat.  Hardly riveting stuff.  Conrad likes Madness but this is lightweight stuff, even if the album it's from, their debut 'One Step Beyond' is good.

     Conrad Is Ambivalent.

15 'London Calling' The Clash.  This is more like it!  Yes, long known to Conrad.  I recall Sir John Peel lamenting that The Clash refused to perform on 'Top Of The Pops' even when they had a hit single, a kind of inverted snobbery.  From their third studio album.  Art!

     This is the album where they really metamorphosed into a band with unique style rather than just rehashing old punk ethos.  Hark at Conrad the music critic!

     Conrad Approves. 

16 'Qui Sera Mi Vida' Gibson Brothers.  Never heard it nor of them.  Next!

17  'Living On An Island' Status Quo.  Yes indeed we who inhabit This Sceptred Isle are living on an - you may be ahead of me here - island.  I cannot remember what the song is like but am sure I heard it at least once or twice.  The title and lyrics refer to band member Rick Parfitt having to take a year-long tax exile from mainland UK on the island of Jersey and how bored he was.  Yes, I can see that; there are no fleshpots on Jersey, nor copious supplies of drugs.  Art!

18 'Wonderful Christmas Time' by Paul McCartney.  Pop musicians love love love to get a hit single at Christmas since it guarantees it will be played for the next thirty years and pay for their retirement.  Hence this song.  It is pure schmaltz and so sugary it risks giving Your Humble Scribe a hypoglycaemic episode.  No you don't get a picture.

Conrad Does Not Approve.

19 'Blue Peter' by Mike Oldfield.  I simply do not remember hearing this.  I must have done, it was a hit single in the Top 20 and I like Mike's music.  Hang on, let me Youtube it -

     Yes, as I expected, it's a version of the 'Blue Peter' television program's theme tune.

Conrad Approves.

20 'I'm In The Mood For Dancing' Nolan Sister.  I'm not.

Thanks But No Thanks

I constantly complain about how wet and rainy it is here in The Mansion-land, a hill on top of a lot of other hills, joking about canoeing into Lesser Sodom, but really - Art!

     The algorithm suggesting a set of paddles?  <sighs heavily> does it not have a sense of humour?

Mister Mashed Potato Brain Will Need To Explain

Droopy must be bitterly regretting taking out his defamation lawsuit against the BBC.  What he wanted was for them to capitulate as South Canadian television networks did, and pay him $10 million to make the suit for 'financial and reputational damage' go away.  What he got was the BBC coming out swinging with a very aggressive legal team who demanded access to all the financial records of his 400 businesses, under discovery.  The 'financial' part of the suit was promptly dropped as DJ Tango cannot afford to allow any kind of outside scrutiny over his books.  Art!

     The BBC say they want to have special prosecutor Jack Smith give testimony, which must have had Trump's legal team befoul themselves in fear.  Jack 'Scary' Smith is the prosecutor who investigated King Piggy for years and he knows where all the bodies are buried.  Thus Trump's counsel team put together an 8-page plea to the judge to block Scary as a witness.  Art!

Scary himself

     Trump's legal team are also trying to delay Pumpkinhead from giving a deposition, mainly for fear he would perjure himself 30 seconds after opening his flapping piehole.  They changed an agreed September date and are now talking about 2027, and will press to have a date as late in the year as possible.

     Bring on the wheelie-bins of popcorn!

     Also another awful picture of the Flabby Fraudster.  Art!

     In all his sweaty 300-pound glory doing the spasmic jerks he calls 'dancing'.  No, Don, you're not only dancing, you're making yourself look an utter *****.

We Are Living In The Future

Only a couple of days ago an Ukrainian soldier who had lost both feet was airlifted from the front zone - as per John 'Jack' Roberts I won't call it a 'line' - to the rear for medical attention.  Art!

     Note they have blurred out the drone's main central unit to avoid giving the orcs any ideas, as large carrier drones are the one thing they cannot do well or at scale.

     That's not all.  Art!

     This is the Ukrainian 'Sky Sentinel' system, an AI-driven autonomous gun turret that has proven to be very effective in shooting down Ruffian drones, and which is going to be put into mass production.

     Very advanced, right?  Well, hang on there, pardner.  The gun above is the South Canadian M2 .50 calibre machine gun, nicknamed 'Ma Deuce' and which originally came into service almost a century ago.  The principle 'If it ain't broke don't fix it' applies here in spades.

Finally -

Going out with a Biercism.

"Type,n: Pestilential bits of metal suspected of destroying civilization and enlightenment."

Buckle Up!

This One's A Bit Of A Waltz

CAUTION!  SINGLE ITEM BLOG TODAY

I took it from the 'r/Lounge' Youtube channel, which itself got it from Reddit, where it got posted in the subreddit "Am I The Bottomhole?".  Unlike the majority of these tales, possibly 98%? it occurs in Canuckistan, as the narrator makes clear.  The narrator, Divorcee RelAting Financial Trouble, or DRAFT hereafter, got divorced from her Venomous EX, hereafter VEX some five years previously in what she called a 'messy' divorce, when she means 'bitterly acriomnious and protracted'.  We never find out why they split, nor how long they were married for.

     ANYWAY Art!

     The Remote Nuclear Tormentor stands ready aye ready to inflict hideous suffering on those not paying attention, not paying taxes or not taking BOOJUM! seriously.

     Where was I?

     O yes.  You can judge who was the bottomhole in the relationship as VEX had 0% custody of their children.  Also, for five years he'd been refusing to take her name off their old joint account, which was supposedly his primary one, where debits for his ATV were made and his pay deposited.  Art!

An ATV

     He refused, and kept on refusing for five years, seemingly without giving a reason, apart perhaps from being a malicious bottomhole?  You see, it needed both of them to be physically present to amend the account details.

     Suddenly, and this seems to be exaggerated for drama, DRAFT got a phone call and text from the bank, saying the joint account was $949.99 overdrawn and needed funding immediately.  Say what?  Conrad rather suspects they'd have given a written warning at least two weeks before the phone follow-up.

     So, once again DRAFT calls VEX and tells him to sort this out.  Once again, he refuses since he's 'busy'.  Quite possible, as the next day he was due to leave on a 3 week trip to Italy.  Art!

Italy.  Just so we're clear

     Since DRAFT was, unusually, in the sinful big city, she went to the branch to check out her options.  There were two: 1) Do nothing OR 2) Pay off the overdraft and close the account.

     You may be wondering here, as I was, how VEX could go on a 3 week trip to Italy when he was nearly $1,000 overdrawn and needed debits taking out for his ATV.  Put a pin in that, we'll come back to it.

     Commenters mentioned that, if she had proof of her requests to take her name off the joint account, she might have legal recourse to claim the money back.  Her verbatim response was "Yes, I have written requests for this through e-mail, text messages, and letters through our lawyers.  And I can prove through statements that I did not access this account."  Also, that he had another account and she should contact her attorney.  Art!

     She also got 2 years of bank statements, which were verrrry bad for VEX as it revealed all sorts of financial information he'd never want his ex to see.  There was evidence of him hiding funds.  He had gotten a $20,000 backdated tax refund 2 years prior, when their son had been diagnosed with ADHD and autism.  DRAFT was entitled to half of that money and hadn't seen a cent of it.

     Several months of legal back and forth ensue as VEX wriggles like a worm on a hook to avoid mediation.  Eventually a meeting is arranged, before which DRAFT's lawyer issues a disclosure notice to get access to VEX's financial records.  Art!

     These proved that VEX's money situation was far, far worse than his ex had ever imagined.   He had run up $100,000 in consumer debt with almost nothing to show for it.  He racked up $700 per month eating out, or $23 every single day, amounting to $8,400 per annum.  His credit card had charges of $10,000 on it.

     As to how he afforded his Italian sojourn?  He'd opened a new account with a different bank well before leaving British America, leaving DRAFT to remedy the overdrawn account.

     Disclosure also showed he was using work - we aren't told what his work is - to hide funds.  Whether this was a tax dodge, or to avoid having to pay his ex, or both, is not explained.

     They also discovered that he was using his business's money to fund his personal legal fees.  THIS IS ILLEGAL!  It's called 'Breach of fiduciary duty'.  There was no follow-up on this item, frustratingly, but VEX's lawyers would be required to report this crime.  To wit:

"Financial Frauds and Crimes: An attorney may also disclose information to prevent, mitigate, or rectify substantial financial or property injury if the client is actively using the lawyer’s services to commit a crime or fraud"

     One can see why he didn't want any mediation!  You, sir, are a cad and a bounder.  Art!

     VEX's lawyer argued that he owed her nothing and that all marital assets had been evenly and fairly split.  DRAFT responded with pictures, valuations, receipts and quotes to prove that their house had not been properly priced, and mentioned 'Constructive trust' and 'Unjust enrichment', which made the opposing counsel sit up sharply.  Does she work in the legal profession? otherwise how would she know these legal terms?  We never get to find out what her job is.

"A constructive trust is not a traditional trust. It is an equitable remedy imposed by a court to prevent unjust enrichment when someone holds property they should not legally or fairly keep."  Art!

      The implication here, I think, is that DRAFT was threatening to get more money out of her ex thanks to him not paying her a fair sum for her share of the marital home.  

      Whilst VEX and his lawyer had a hushed conversation in the corner, DRAFT worked out how much her ex was on the hook for: $45,000 PLUS the $10,000 for the tax refund PLUS child 'Section 7' expenses of $13,000, so $68,000 in total.

     The opposing lawyer came back with sob story details that VEX couldn't get a loan, had been refused consolidation of his depts yet - rather suspicious this - he couldn't declare bankruptcy since he earned too much.  So all he could offer was his ATV, valued at $10,000.

     Eventually this was escalated up to the ATV, delivered in 14 days in good condition, and $5,000 in cash.  Art!

     DRAFT knew this result would disappoint her audience, so she explained.  This mediation meeting was the last chance to settle things before the pre-trial began.  If she had taken VEX to court she would have gotten more money, yet she'd have to shell out for lawyers.  Even if she was awarded the $45,000 she'd never have seen a cent of it, thanks to VEX being a malicious bottomhole.  You can guarantee that he'd drag out the legal process for as long as possible to make it as expensive as possible for his ex.

     Finally, she stated that this was the final chapter in a divorce that had results dragging on for 6 years and she wanted it over and done with.  "My peace of mind is priceless" as she put it.

     That's where the story ends so we never found out if VEX got into legal trouble about his financial shenanigans.  I would have reported him to the Canuckistanian equivalent of the IRS just for good measure.  But then I am evil.

Cold Storage

No! Not The Recent Comedy-Horror Film

Which I have not seen myself, although Tom and Darling Daughter have and say it's pretty good, and I concur from the trailers I've seen.  Having raised it as an issue I am now allowed to use it to bait people into reading this blog.  Art!

      So, that's what this Intro is not about.  What is it about?  O I thought you'd never ask - Art!

     It's my hilarious - laugh or it's the Remote Nuclear Tormentor for you! - take on the miscellaneous items in storage at IWM Duxford, rather than being part of a regular exhibition.  This means there are no explanatory plaques telling viewers what they're looking at, so it's down to Your Humble Scribe to inform you.  Also there is no heating in these storage hangars so they are - cold.  Luckily for us it was a brilliant day more akin to summer than September.

     What you see at the rear, rather obscured, is a Mosquito, the stellar multi-role British aircraft that the Luftwaffe hated hated hated, especially their night-fighter pilots.  It could perform any role and because it was made out of layered wood, it was comparatively light; on the other hand two massive engines were hung off the wings, meaning it could go like stink.  Art!

     The trunnions of a British 7.2" howitzer on a South Canadian carriage, one of the heavier pieces of ordnance they used.  They used old 8" howitzer barrels of First Unpleasantness vintage with an internal 'sleeve' that reduced the calibre.  Capable of hitting a target 13 miles away, firing a 200-pound shell, and tipping the scales at 13 tons, this was a serious bit of kit. Art!

     Breech end of the 7.2 and a DUKW in the background, the amphibious truck that was the Allies secret weapon after D-Day.  Art!

     Here's a 6-pounder anti-tank gun in desert camouflage scheme from North Africa, with the trail legs together for towing.  '6-pounder' since that's the weight of the shell it fired.  Once again, a 6-pounder experience was not something Axis tank crews enjoyed in the desert, as it was small enough to be easily concealed, and it's own crew could manhandle it around for short distances - something totally impractical with the 7.2 in the foreground.  In mid-1944 the terrifyingly effective APDS round arrived for it, which meant even the Tiger and Panther were vulnerable.  The South Canadians, very unusually, adopted it as their light anti-tank gun, increasing barrel length and calling it the 'How The Brits Totally Schooled Us In Light Anti-Tank Guns' '57 mm Anti-Tank Gun'.  Art!

     "How many track wheels do you want?"

     "Yes."

     Here's a Churchill Mark VII, a variant of the range with 6" frontal armour, a 75 mm gun and excellent cross-country capability.  Just visible are the circular escape hatches on the side, in case of emergencies, and the 'cradle' the hull machine gun sat in.  These were British 'Infantry' tanks intended to be slow, heavily-armoured and to accompany the - you may be ahead of me here - infantry into the assault.  Initially they were rushed into service before proper R & D had been done and suffered from serious reliability issues, so much so that Mr Churchill was not happy about them being named after himself.  Art!

     An oil tanker?  Art!

     A late-model T-34 with the bigger turret and the adapted 85 mm anti-aircraft gun, for dealing with heavier Teuton armour.  Actually it seems to be a post-Second Unpleasantness Polish model, which we will quietly overlook.  Behind it is a British Sexton self-propelled gun, mounting a 25-pounder on a Sherman chassis, a combination thought up by the Canuckistanians.  The idea was to give armoured formations mobile artillery that could keep up with the tanks.  Art!

     That'll need more than hot glue and duct tape, mate.  Art!

     YESSS!  Behold the British 25-pounder gun-howitzer, with it's service limber behind it.  These artillery pieces were in use by Reserve Royal Artillery formations up until the late Seventies, and are featured at the beginning of 30 Corps advance in 'A Bridge Too Far'.  Once again, the Teutons and Romans did not like them, especially since the RA admin, logistics, observation and plotting allowed them to fire with unprecedented accuracy and rate of fire.  Teuton PoWs in France used to ask to see the 'belt-fed' or 'hopper-loaded' British 25-pounders.  Art!

"ALL GUNS - COMMENCE FIRING!"

     And boy do they do so.  Art!

     Here you have two descendants of the British 'Cruiser' line of tanks, that were supposed to rollick around at high speed and engage the enemy whilst doing so.    The one to port is a Cromwell, the basis of a line that you can trace forward to the Centurion, and the one to starboard is a Comet, an up-gunned and up-armoured grandson of the Cromwell.  Again, you can definitely see Centurion DNA in the Comet's design.  Art!

Early Centurion model

     Thus began the British trend of naming tanks with one beginning with 'C'.

Born Under A Wandering Star

Is this a song from 'Paint Your Wagon'?  I seem to recall Lee Marvin's dulcet tones gracing the airwaves many decades ago.  One wonders how much he got in royalties across the years.

     ANYWAY today we are looking at another item altogether, about Mister Mashed Potato Brain.  Art!

     Here the senile pedophile is gingerly walking down a shallow flight of steps in order to board 'The Beast', the presidential limousine.  Art!

     He walks past the open door and keeps heading out into the Mojave Desert*.  Art!

     At this point the Secret Service basically corral him and herd him back to The Beast, as he seems to have completely lost the plot, dramatis personae and footnotes as well.  One of these people is going to publish a memoir entitled 'The President's Brain Is Hissing' in 2029.

     My sweepstake odds on Pumpkinhead making it to the end of 2026 just abruptly shortened.

     Okay, Art, bring on another terrible photo of the Nodfather!

     Make it two.  80 going on 90.  Is that his age or IQ?  Only you can tell!

     

In Collusion With Literary Allusion

Another look at works on the ancient and classical world that you really cannot do without.  Seriously!  'The Pelopponesian War' by Thucydides is still a required text at Westpoint, all of two and a half thousand years after being published.  Art!

     Actually this seems like the kind of work Conrad would like.  We have seen ancient Greece and Rome analysed into infinity; this work deals with the other nations and states that were around at the same time, including Turkey, Egypt, Mesopotamia and the Levant.  Dog Buns, stop trying to empty my wallet!

     I think the date range in the title of this work is to do with the emergence of Egyptian civilisation, and the fall of the Persian empire under assault by Alexander Meglos.  DO NOT MAKE ME BUY IT TO FIND OUT!**

     Although I do have to go on Abebooks to do a bit of checking out.  That squeaking noise is my wallet.

I Have Cautioned You, Professor!

As you should surely know by now, Conrad has a small collection of works by Professor Peter Caddick-Adams, as British a name as you can get, whom posts on Twitter about his various academic encounters and which frequently include shots of the landscape.

      Not all the time.  Art!

     I'm afraid this sounds like another set-up to relieve Conrad's wallet of it's book-tokens.  What a despicable and untoward plot-generation series***!  Dog Buns I did say it was time to check Abebooks -

    Wallet, best get used to being emptied.  Soz and all that.

Finally -

Do you have a query about Creery?  Art!

    Punch and Trudi?

*  Poetic licence.  It may be the <checks> Sonoran.

**  Please.

*** How many of these liners were there?  O never mind DO NOT ANSWER.

An Interesting Coincidence

It's A Bit Early To Be Optimistic -

But we don't seem to be doomed to die of a biblical pneumonic plague coming out of Asian Ruffia, as was deemed distinctly possible earlier this month.  I rather suspect that any cases turning up globally would be immediately pounced upon by the news media, thanks to speculation.  Your Humble Scribe was also loudly saying that this is how the television drama 'Survivors' begins.  

     What did I just come across on Youtube?  Art!

     I shall have to watch and report back to you.

     In the meantime, having my laptop mutiny, lose connection and go into Airplane mode and have to be wrestled back to normality, it's time for the Links.

2025

BOOJUM!: If I Were To Say 'Little Willie'

2024

BOOJUM!: Chipsuri De Fisiune!

2023

BOOJUM!: Rocket Davy Crockett

2022

BOOJUM!: O Noes!

2021

BOOJUM!: Sock It To Me, Batumi

2020

BOOJUM!: An Invitation To A Ball

2019

BOOJUM!: Less A Train Of Thought -

2018

BOOJUM!: You'll Need A Strong Stomach For This

2017

BOOJUM!: Julius Teaser

2016

BOOJUM!: Board Of It

2015

BOOJUM!: PINEAPPLE TIN!

2014

BOOJUM!: Today's Theme - Lily

2013

BOOJUM!: You what? You what!

Take George Orwell

He Is One Of The Most Influential Writers Of The Twentieth Century

Even people who haven't read his works have heard of '1984' and 'Animal Farm'.  Some more conservative folks might consider him to be a bit of a socialist with an odd moustache and both claims have merit.  Art!

     What they can't say is that he didn't have the courage to support his own convictions, since he travelled to Spain in late 1936 to join the anarchist POUM militia, fighting against the Nationalists - and Soviet advisors.  He was seriously injured in 1937 and was lucky to survive.  Go read the absolute classic 'Homage To Catalonia' to see the Spanish Civil War from the inside, warts and all.

     Let us abruptly jump forward 90 years and join the journalist and vlogger 'Caolan Robertson', originally from Ireland whom now lives in Kharkiv, Ukraine.  We've mentioned him a couple of times previously; he is persona non grata in Mordorvia because he reported from inside the Kursk oblast when the Kozaky invaded.  He's willing to put his life on the line to get a story.  Art!

     Incoming Ruffian artillery shell goes off nearby.

     ANYWAY I have annotated his most recent report, with a bit more input from the Institute for the Study of War and my newsfeeds, so you're going to get the lot.  I'm not sure how long this Intro will be, so suck it and see.

     So! currently the orcs are retreating in the area around Lyman, having suffered some 3,000 casualties, 250 prisoners of war and losing 177 square kilometres.  Remember what Sergeant John 'Jack' Roberts scornfully intoned: "They misreport and lie all the time".  Art!

     Putinpot claimed that the orcs occupied it on 01/09/2026.  

     Nope.  General Biletskyi, Officer Commanding the Ukrainian 3rd Army Corps, filmed himself walking the streets in broad daylight, clearly not even in drone range of the Ruffians.  Charlie Chipmunk Cheeks has claimed that Ruffia has conquered/destroyed/liberated <delete where applicable> 6,100 square kilometres of Ukraine this year.  

     How much did they really occupy?  O I thought you'd never ask!

     100 square kilometres.  That's it.  Peter The Average has absolutely no idea what's going on in Ukraine as "They misreport and lie all the time", all the way up their chain of command.   

     Back to our fresh-faced correspondent.  

     One thing that reallllly wrong-footed the Ruffians was an Ukrainian deception operation at the town of Nove, a good 100 kilometres south of Lyman, which is an important logistics hub thanks to geography.  Art!

     Those 4 cities are the Ukrainian's 'Fortress Belt' that the orcs have been grinding towards ever since 2022.  Our Man Caolan meets up with a party of Ukrainian soldiers transporting Unmanned Ground Vehicles to Druzhkivka, and asks to come along.  Art!

     As you can see, they made him wear body armour and a helmet and the soldier there with an AK-74 is not for decoration, either.  Caolan was told in the event of a drone attacking the truck, jump over the side if it doesn't get shot down.  Art!

     UGVs delivered, and how cute it looks with anti-drone netting on a drone.  In the film clip you can see the wreckage of other vehicles hit by drones, and indeed a Ruffian drone whizzed by on the other side of protective netting.  The Ukrainian crews delivering these drones do this every single day.

      What this hopefully illustrates is how important UGVs have now become in modern warfare; the Kozaky may have a manpower problem yet they are making this up with technology - the old British concept from the Second Unpleasantness of 'Steel not flesh'.  Art!

     Sorry for the murky quality.  This is a small UGV carrying an explosive payload, which is navigated into enemy positions and detonated, and it's delivered behind Ruffian lines via one of the larger quadcopter drones, either a 'Vampire' or - hilariously named - 'Baba Yaga'.  Art!

Baba Yaga

     We shall now return to the Fortress Belt, with Putinpot and the orcs being OBSESSED with gaining this territory, which is why surrendering it always comes up when the Kremlin mentions 'negotiations' spelled 'capitulations'.  Art!

     Note the date.  The orc's plan was for a two-pronged pincer encirclement, which they've tried to execute since 2022 when this was the Joint Operational Area, unsuccessfully.  Now the northern pincer is completely gone.  Oooops.  Caolan also mentions the ISW report of 01/10/2026 that confirms the Ruffian pincer plan is dead in the water.  Art!

 

     As part of the 'shaping the battlefield' process, a.k.a. 'softening them up', the Ukrainians hit Ruffian logistics to cut off any kind of supply to the front lines, notably along the R-280 motorway as shown above.  The orcs' logistics have always been their weak point and are more akin to 1926 than 2026: I haven't seen a single forklift being used by the orcs in occupied Ukraine.

     ANYWAY AGAIN the Kozaky sent in the Vampires and Baba Yagas with their cargo of kamikaze UGVs up to 10 kilometres behind the lines.  They are being very coy about how many were used, but it was enough that the orc commanders thought they were under a mass infantry assault.  O and remember that BTR stuffed full with 2 tons of anti-tank mines and driven remotely?  It was one of two, and the orcs thought they were reinforcements.  Ooops.  Not so.  Art!

     In order to try and slow the Ukrainian progress, the orcs have had to strip forces from other parts of their front line, as they just do NOT have any reserves, which creates vulnerabilities elsewhere.  Conrad calculates that they have had a consistent shortage in recruitment since December 2025, losing 5,000 men per month that are not replaced.  Eventually Mordorvia will run out of greedy, stupid orcs.  Then there's the astronomical desertion rate; wiser heads than mine have worked this out at 70,000 or about 10% of their forces in Ukraine.  Art!

     Going out with Caolan travelling at 120 PROUD IMPERIAL MILES per hour under anti-drone netting and - 

     Ruffian drone, which luckily either ignored or didn't spot them, as a convoy of military trucks would be a prime target.

Brucie's Back End

Rounding out 'Sci-Fi Art''s slideshow of Mr. Pennington's artworks, with the last two slides to show.  Art!

     No idea what's going on here, except you wouldn't catch me hanging around underneath a giant luminous air-octopus.  Googling 'Giant luminous octopus hovering over a man' didn't bring up any covers so we shall never know.  Soz and all that.  Art!

     A fine dramatic study to finish on.  I know this is a cover illustration and can detail it myself before confirming: 'Earthworks' by Brian Aldiss.  Art!

     Called it.  O and also -

Flavour Tripping!

Our nomad DJs playing in the background were performing at Ksamil, in Albania, three years ago, next to one of the thousands of old military bunkers Enver Hoxha had built to protect against an invasion.  NATO or Warsaw Pact?  Yes.  Art!

O Dear Donnie's Done Doo-Doos Again

Because he has a mashed-potato brain.  Art!

     What am I talking about?  O I thought you'd never ask!

     The old White House Press Secretary left her position in August to have a baby, which Trump was not happy about since she should give it up for adoption in order to keep flattering him in public.  They hunted around for a replacement and six days ago appointed Katie Zacharia, who for years has been claiming to be  a lawyer.  

Art!

     That's a verrrry annoyed Devin Stone, who really is a lawyer, entitled to practice after having passed the bar exam in California.  In his Youtube short he points out that investigative journalist Judd Legum searched the whole of D.C. for her bar exam results - which he couldn't find.  She lives in California but the state has no record of her ever passing the bar there.  She worked at a law firm in Beijing and implied that she passed the bar there, except the firm states she never worked on legal matters, and China does not allow foreigners to pass the bar.  She tried to backpedal and say she only offered legal analysis, not legal advice - which Devin points out are exactly the same thing.  O was he angry!

     Then Trump fired her a couple of days ago.  She lasted 5 days.  That,  Donold, is one of the consequences of hiring someone based on their looks.  Art!

     I would like to end on The Human Starfish, Steven Cheung, getting it spectacularly wrong.

"White House communications director Steven Cheung had praised her “tremendous start.” Later in the week, he said she would be remembered as “one of the all-time greats."

     Perhaps he meant 'grates'?