That's Today's Coincidence Sorted

Or At Least The First Of Them
I'm sure you recall my latter post of yesterday, going on about a lack of suitably pithy and entertaining phrases about the state names of South Canada - I ended up explaining how Florida got it's name.
     Two minutes ago, I opened "Webster's" and - Hay Pesto!  There in the left-hand column of Page 844*, is -
     - "Louisana".  The state so named after King Louis XIV of France, in 1682 - by the French who settled there, I hasten to add, not by the British (who owned a lot of South Canada at the time) who were probably at war with France.  That seems to have been the default condition for the two nations.
     There is also the "Louisiana Purchase", where the South Canadians bought Louisiana from the French, at a cost of about $7.50 per square kilometre, in 1803.
      That exhausts my stock of knowledge about Louisiana.

"Gravity's Rainbow" By Thomas Pynchon
In the spirit of intellectual enquiry, and because you can't trust Tom not to muck around with people's names, I approached Stan at work about a character name, that of the Soviet spy Vaslav Tchitcherine.
     Stan is actually "Stanimir", from Bulgaria and thus familiar with Slavic surnames.
     "No," he sadly informed me.  "It does not mean anything."
     <Sad Face>
     BUT!  Butbutbut - I did catch Tom out.  He made a mistake!  And Conrad spotted it, clever me.  Tyrone Slothrop is trying to get past a Russian checkpoint, and a Stalin tank rolls past.  Tom describes the gunner behind the 76mm mounting ...

Stalin Mk. 3
(Ignore the flying saucer in the background)

     Ha!  Wrong!  The Stalin tanks were armed with either an 85mm or, far more commonly, a 122mm main gun.
     This is the Picador 1975 edition, so this flaw might be corrected in later ones.
     I'll get back to you on that.

Okay, what is Michael Pena's character called in "Fury"?  Get it right.

Whilst Going Off At A Tangent
I would like to apologise for last night's post ending rather abruptly.  It had taken me ages to get even as far as I did, and the Late Night Swipe was still to come, so I rushed it a bit.  Well, a lot, actually.
     Still, it did bring BOOJUM! within a whisker of 16,000 hits.
     
16,001, Actually
Yay!  Whilst writing this scrivel, some noble viewers have pushed us past the 16,000 mark.
I know you lot are an empirical lot and you'll want evidence, so -

Vindicated utterly!

     There you go.  I know I write BOOJUM! because it amuses me, yet it's still nice to see that other people out there also appreciate it.
     Not sure what this says about your state of mind, mind ...

Sprong.  Who Knew?
I made up this wonder weird material for reasons that probably seemed clear at the time yet which now escape me.  It's supposed to be a strange metallic alloy of sorts, with unusual properties -

- like being Safe-For-Dogs

     It also seems to make Dutch people leap in the air -

- whilst also decapitating them

     Sprong.  Who knew!

Today's Cake Is:  Banana Bread
There were a lot of bananas going gently brown at the bottom of the fridge, so after a gentle hint from Wonder Wifey ("MAKE BANANA BREAD!") your humble scribe and baker set to.  Normally I amend the recipe, using only 3 bananas not 4, and adding in 4oz. of flour to balance.

     Not today - I only had exactly the amount of flour as called for in the recipe, as it was Gluten Free Self Raising and it's not the sort of thing you find on local shop shelves.  So the four brownest bananas got used, and we'll see how well the bread turned out later on.

A Blast From The Past
Two years ago I skipped the blog on Friday 19th July as I was out in the city centre having that sinister 3-letter word, FUN.
     Ah, and a year ago the whole post was quite hefty in terms of word count, so it would be cheating to post the whole thing here.  I shall post an extract -

Powers

     No! Not United Utilities, nor the Essex Water Authority, nor the Cruachan Dam in Galloway.  No.  This is a comic series created and owned by author Brandis and artist Oeming, in a world where superpowers are not quite common, but not unusual either.  There had been an attempt at a pilot last year, if not the year before, which came to naught, but now casting is taking place for a television series.  Susan Heyward is in the frame for Deena Pilgrim.

     Here we have Deena Pilgrim:

     In the comic, Deena is a petite blonde white lady.  As is immediately obvious from these photos, Susan is black, but - crikey! - it's not possible to determine how petite (or not) she is.

     Is this important?  Yes, actually - she is the counterpoint to the main character, Christian Walker, who is a gigantic brute of a man with a very long and shady history.  Deena is a moral and physical contrast, so it will be interesting to see who gets cast as Christian - if David Prowse were around, Conrad thinks it would be him.

     Of course we now know that Sharlto Copley is your man Christian.  Art?  Put down that coal and get us a picture -

For once, Art Department gets it right.

     Whilst Sharlto isn't a skinny little wraith, he's clearly not the hulking brute that Walker is in the comic - a change that casting and reality both influenced, I feel.  And Susan Hayward is quite petite.
     Anyway, within the first 5 minutes of "Powers" you have violence and swearing, meaning it's not going to be like DC comic's adaptations.  Conrad has only seen the first episode, and that a while ago, so part of my television education is going to be sitting down and watching the lot.




* This is the 17th edition.  Just so we're clear.