Tubular Bells And Gas Warfare

I Know What You're Thinking ...
... and no, I haven't been at the baking brandy.  The link is tenuous, perhaps, but it's there.
     Okay, brief biographical moment.  The first music that Conrad bought was a tape cassette - now a part of technology's historical past - of "Tubular Bells".  Here's the famous front cover:

 - and here's the much more relevant back cover:

See what's burning there?

     Bones, actually.  Burning bones.
     Now, I don't expect you to know this, but the end product if you burn bones is a substance known as "Bone oil", or "Dippel's Oil" after the chap who invented it.  Quite why you'd go about burning bones in the pursuit of science is another question -
     Anyway, it stinks to high heaven, horribly nasty by all accounts.
     So, the perfidious British used on occasion to bombard the hapless Hun trenches opposite with bone oil-filled bombs and shells.  The clueless German soldiers, thinking this hideous fuming gas was yet another wicked invention designed to kill them stone dead, donned their respirators and waited for the bombardment to stop.  After the gas would come the British soldiers with their nasty sword-bayonets -
     - except the British soldiers turned up in the middle of the bombardment, unhampered by gas masks, since bone oil is non-lethal, and Hay Pesto! captured the trench.

Biggles And Gas Warfare
Well, almost.  I stretch the point only a little.  Okay, in "Biggles and Co.", our intrepid aviator is asked to form an airline for the purposes of transporting gold bullion from England to Europe; there have been several thefts of attempted transport already and the hapless bullion dealers are at their wits end.

Captain James Bigglesworth.
Actually on the small side in height, but made out of steel cording.

     Inevitably, Biggles gets forced down and the crooks tootle along armed with machine guns and steal the gold from his aircraft.
     Except our intrepid airman is two steps ahead: the real gold is in a secret compartment in the fuselage, the crooks have made off with a load of old iron.
     "But wait!" you cry - perhaps wail, maybe even quibble - "What of this gas warfare you mentioned?"
     If you don't keep interrupting I'll get there.
     In the second transport flight, Biggles gets a warning phone call shortly before take-off - a box of ingots has been left behind, it's being rushed to the airfield with an armed police escort.
     Later, in the flight over the Channel, an apparent fire breaks out in the cargo compartment and Biggles and Ginger have to make an emergency landing on a French beach.
     This is where Biggles reveals that he, at least, is familiar with gas warfare.
     "Stannic chloride!" he growls, getting a whiff of the "smoke" as that familiar criminal car toting machine guns appears.

Vindicated in every detail!

     Stannic chloride, or tin chloride, is a liquid that forms dense smoke on contact with air, and was used in The First Unpleasantness to create smoke screens.  It's non-lethal, if not pleasant to breathe.  Obviously that box of ingots was a fake, designed to give off smoke and make the aircraft land at a pre-determined point.
     So the crooks bundle aside the boxes stowed in the hold and loot the secret compartment.
     Which, explains Biggles later over tea and biscuits*, was their second mistake.  The secret compartment was full of boxes of old iron, the real stuff was in the cargo hold all along.

That's a lot of text.  Next up - pictures!

Saturday Morning At The Breakfast Table

<exasperated sigh>

     No sooner had I put my tray of books down than Jenny appeared, directly in the line of fire, you might say.  Obviously putting herself in a tactically advantageous position were I to turn my back on the ice cream** or crumpets.

The ice cream in question.

"Nuclear Hurricane"
This was a film title on the television Guide.  Not just a hurricane, o no!  this is a NUCLEAR hurricane.
     I just have to pop on over to IMDB to see what on earth it's about.
     It only scores 3.2 so it's pretty bad.  Allow me to copy the plot precis:

A "highly sophisticated computer system" at a nuclear power plant goes crazy. To make matters worse, it develops a capacity for reason and malice while a tropical island storm is blowing into town.

     Well, there you have it, that hoary old cliche The Mad Computer.  Not only Mad, but Sentient.  And also Evil, to boot.  I bet it inflates your energy bills, too.

The cover in Swedish.  Only ''cos I couldn't find one in Finnish.
 - and the plot only mentions a storm, not a tsunami ...

I Beg Your Pardon?
There is a channel on the Guide called "True Entertainment", which instantly breaches the Trades Descriptions Act by listing it's first show as "Little House On The Prairie".  That TV programme ought to come with a health warning:"Danger!  Viewer discretion advised!  This programme contains an excessively high dosage of saccharine, sugar and schmaltz, leading to tooth decay and waistline expansion."

"I stopped watching "Little House" and dropped 10 dress sizes!"

     Well there we have it, the 60 minute limit, and I had so much more nonsense to write!
     Maybe later.  For now - Tally ho!



* It may have been whisky and soda, it's been a while
** Banging my own drum again, but the Strawberry and Yoghurt ice cream is verrrry nice.