Guardians Of The Galaxy

Literally
As you surely know by now, Conrad is ever one for hilarious* puns and has lately been baiting possible viewers with highly amusing spoofs of football team names.  Yes, I knew all along what I was posting.  Sorry if this breaks your impression of me into a thousand shattered fragments.  You'll get over it.
     Anyway, in reference to that splendidly fun film "Guardians of the Galaxy", Take This:

Rob and Dan
Thanks, Dan.  He did it with no questions asked.

     I think you'll agree, we are indeed guardians of the Galaxy.

I'm So Excited!
Today being the First of December, I get to open my Doctor Who advent calendar!
     I sincerely hope you like Doctor Who and advent calendars, because this is going to be a regular feature for the next 23 days.
     And for the first day:

A blue Dalek

     A little blue Dalek, which looked like it opened up, so Conrad explored with a knife and - er - it wasn't supposed to open up and there's a bit missing now.

More Metro Malleting
You obviously - obviously! - realise that I mean the local chip-shop wrapper, not the Paris underground rail system or Manchester's tram service.
     I had a look at today's edition and came to the conclusion that it was 68 pages of ... well, nothing.

"Yes, sir, you are ideally-placed to work for The Metro"

     Here an aside.  This edition came with a special protective wrapper, emblazoned with an article known as "Take That".  Only three of them?  Didn't there used to be more?**
     Take That?  "Take This!" chortled Conrad as he threw it in the bin.

Is There Life On Mars?
The answer to this is not David Bowie.  It might be "yes" if you consider the following photo to be evidence enough:

Pure Life on a Mars.  Not quite the same thing.

     Conrad raises the issue because the Daily Mail***, in a fit of journalism that lives down to the bottom-feeding standards of the Daily Sport and the National Enquirer, gives column inches to the following:

'I saw men walking on Mars in 1979': 'Former Nasa employee' claims there was a secret manned mission to the red planet

• Woman, named 'Jackie', called in to US radio station, Coast to Coast AM

     Since she only identifies herself as Jackie, it's impossible to know if she worked for NASA or actually hid in a basement wearing a tinfoil hat in 1979.  A further problem is that she claims these images were television ones sent by Viking.  Which couldn't transmit television images.  To compound this, "Coast to Coast" is a paranoid gagwaffle station that broadcasts exclusively to swivel-eyed loons; you the UK public won't know it, but Conrad does because he's well-informed about wierdies.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2852829/Was-secret-manned-mission-Mars-1979-Former-Nasa-employee-claims-saw-suited-men-running-red-planet.html

     There's the link.  Oh, one other weakness about the story - why wait 35 years before telling it?

Perhaps - she saw these and was confused?

Steam Pinnace
No!  Not a brand of iron.  Actually a small boat, the term being used in an account of Gallipoli that Conrad just breezed through.  
     I know, I know, I can tell what you're thinking, but if they'd called it "The Lily Of The Valley Hill Mob" it would have too many vowels - Oh!  Sorry, you wanted a definition of a steam pinnace?
     It is a small boat carried by a much larger vessel, used for ferrying people and supplies, for landing, for travelling between other ships.  Art Department!

NO!  Get it right!

Better.

Respect The Hyphen:  Man-Eating Jam
Conrad very occasionally puts in a post about grammar.  English grammar, as English is the lingua franca^ of the world.  The vastly under-rated hyphen is one of the most powerful symbols in English grammar.  Take the above, for example.  Imagine the tagline for this film:

Terrifying.  In 1958.

     You'd pay to see that at the cinema, right?  Imagine if you got there and instead realised that the poster added in a hyphen and you actually got this:

A teensy bit gross is all

     So, remember - keep watching the pies!


* They are hilarious!  They are!
** Actually I don't care one whit, so don't bother sending postcards or texts as they will all go to feed the bin.
*** Which likes to think it's "Telegraph-lite"
^ O killing joke!  That's Latin for "french language" and it means a universally spoken and understood language.  Which will never apply to Hungarian.