Damn It To Hell - It's Jerry Pournelle!

Just Not Straight Away
We have to keep the Hamster sentinels distracted, so I'm going to tell you all about my cunning plan to point them over there -
     It began with a can of lemonade.  As you know by now, Conrad is far too fond of fizzy stuff bulging with sugar and chemicals, and finds lugging a 2 litre bottle of the stuff into work a bit of a chore.  So, buy cans as they are smaller and more convenient.
     The problem is that the cans sit in the fridge to stay cold - no leaving them out overnight to get tepid* - and consequently Conrad tends to forget them.
     Not today!  Today I had my 3d aide memoire:

Voila!  Banana!

     I enjoyed that can immensely, and my sense of cleverness even more.

Stair Rods From Hell
Actually more like "Stair Rods From Heaven", also know with irreverence and a touch of awe, "Rods From God".
     "What are you babbling about now?" I can hear you call, and also "Has he been at the liquid bath salts again?"
     Well, I remembered the "Kinetic Orbital System" whilst typing out nuclear-weapon themed acronyms, and chased it up a little.

Just like darts.
DARTS OF DEATH!

     The "Rods" in this case are tungsten darts the size of a telephone pole, with a terminal velocity of nine kilometres per second.  They have no explosive payload, they cause damage by sheer mass and velocity, they aren't banned by any treaty and due to their very high speed and sharp angle of descrnt, would be very hard to detect and almost impossible to intercept.
     The concept was created and evolved by one Jerry Pournelle when he was still working in the aerospace industry.  He's now a science-fiction author:

Yup, there are Rods From Gods in here.
And yes, that is a giant alien combat elephant.

     This is probably a very good thing for the rest of us, as lord alone knows what he'd have conjured up were he still with the aircraft industry.

"Big Game"
I saw a bus poster for this upcoming film early in the morning, and of course couldn't resist doing a BOOJUM! film review.  Of course I can't find a copy of the poster but this gives you the idea:

Sam with a sub-machine gun

     Now, Conrad is not up on hunting but I can tell you that going after big game with a sub-machine gun is rather a no-no. They fire pistol ammunition, you see, which will not kill big game, merely anger them and injure them sufficiently that they will come over to stamp on your head to see what colour your brains are.  Now - hang on - 

Is it?

     Isn't that "Pietarii" from "Rare Exports"?
    And what's this:

You what?

     I work with Dan and he's never mentioned this.  Does he have a separate side to him as an international best-selling author?

"Mason and Dixon" By Thomas Pynchon
Don't fret, I've only got 50 pages left to read.  However, I have ordered "Inherent Vice" which should arrive by the time I've finished M & D. Lucky you!
     As ever I have to check on what Tom writes as he may be creating things out of whole cloth.  So what is a "Nonius"?
     It's a type of hanging artefact, viz:

This is hanging.  So to speak

     Next we have "Crumhorne", and I'm sure the Goons used to go on about these, and sackbuts, too.

The horn of crum

     I'm not sure if you play it or herd sheep with it.
     Then there's "Liripipes", which, going by context, has to do with clothing.  It's a long-tailed hood.  And so:

NO!  Not a "hoodie" Art -

High fashion in 1415, eh?

"The Town That Dreaded Sundown"
Saw an advert for this in the Metro, with the following poster:

A sinister hooded man with a knife -

     Well now we don't need to watch it, do we?  Thanks for saving me the bother.

The Metro - 60 Seconds
Another total non-entity whose agent threw the Chip Shop Wrapper a few coins -
     I can't be bothered to continue this. Have an ice-cream machine instead:

Of infinitely greater utility than the Metro

I think we're up to about 700 words now.  It's only taken 45 minutes but I'm in a bit of a dash - Don't know if the Pub Quiz is on, and if it is, I only have till 9:00 to bake something, and I've decided on Hello Dolly Bars, which need condensed milk.  Evaporated, of which we have lots, just won't cut it - so a trip to the shops is in the offing.



* Tepid lemonade is very close to a human rights violation.
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