Knickers

Nothing About Katie Here Tonight, Sorry!
(Twenty male readers log off in disgust)  What I should clarify is actually the word "knickerbockers", an Americanism that became part of the English-English speaking world, contracted a little to "knickers", or ladies unmentionables.
     Technically, your average knickerbockers are baggy trousers that don't reach all the way to the ankle, typically stopping at the knee or calf.  I meant to look into them after encountering them in a short story collection currently underway.  I don't think they're much worn nowadays, although they were all the rage back in the Twenties and into the Thirties.

Ladies!  Calm yourselves!

     The name has a far longer pedigree than I realised, being invented by the South Canadian author Washington Irving, a man who somewhat unfairly had two last names all to himself.  He used the pseudonym "Deidrich Knickerbocker", starting the ball, or the bocker, rolling.
     The name "Knickerbocker" eventually came to be associated with New Yorkers, especially those of a patrician lineage*, similar to the Blue Bloods of Boston.  If you hear sporty New Yorkers mentioning the "New York Knicks" then this is an abbreviation for the "New York Knickerbockers" as presumably that's what they wore back in the day.
     Then there is the Knickerbocker Glory, a variety of dessert.

Glorious, yes.  Knicker content - not so high

     Why the name I don't know, as it is oh-so-obviously grossly unsuited for wearing about your legs.

From the ridiculous to the ghastly in one easy bound - not a problem for BOOJUM! or Conrad.  Behold -

"Attrition" By William Philpott
Sadly for Professor Philpott but happily for your humble scribe, I picked this volume up in The Works for only £2.99. Yes, inevitably it is about the First Unpleasantness, dealing with the strategy of attrition as it applied to the main players.  Bill - I can call him that as I've read his enormous tome about the Somme - doesn't restrict himself to Britain, France and Germany, he also wheels in Italy, Russia and Austria-Hungary and the minor players, too.
     The strategy of attrition, or grinding down your enemy by relentless attack, is, it is safe to say, controversial. Lloyd George came up with all sorts of wild schemes to avoid it - invading Basutoland via a space-warp with an army of were-whales, that sort of thing - but Bill's central thesis really comes down to a simple truth:  with gigantic multi-million man armies fielded by each Great Power**, it was impossible to win (or lose) the war in a day, a week, a month or a year.  You had to steel your resolve and bash away for years.

The Austro-Hungarian army.  "Camouflage" an unknown concept

     Now, a technical point.  Although "The First Day On The Somme" is widely regarded as the most costly day in terms of casualties in history, at 58,000, it is possible that France actually suffered more casualties than this in a single day during the summer of 1914, in what they called the Battle of the Frontiers.  Also bear in mind that the French army endured 1,375,000 dead over the whole war, and still prevailed.  Those who throw down the gauntlet to France today should perhaps look at these facts and shiver a little***.

Hemlock
One of the great things about being Conrad is the way things with no connection to either reality or today continually pop up in his mind.  Take this plant, for example.
     Actually no DON'T take it!  For it is uncommonly poisonous.  All of it, from soup to nuts, or, more botanically, from root to flower.  In times gone by the ancient Greeks used to use it as a method of killing off the condemned, which probably suited their tidy-minded logical ways - no blood or guts to clean up afterwards.  It's apparently a perennial plant, so you're not likely to run out of it, and if you did you could always dry some out to preserve it, although this does make it quite a bit less poison-y.

The banality of Extremely High Toxicity

     Conrad did wonder how the Greeks came to find out it was poisonous; apparently it kills off cattle pretty quickly, which must have given them a hint or two.  It's methodology is to stymie the Central Nervous System, so your heart and lungs give up and that's all she wrote.  Nowadays you could survive with medical intervention - in the time of Socrates, no such luck.  He is probably the most famous victim of hemlock.  I shan't go into his life in detail, as we would be here well into 2018, but here is a link -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socrates

Be warned, old Soc' was a heavy-duty thinker and not to be taken up lightly.

Socrates.  A.k.a. Old Stoney Face

     A few other names for hemlock are - Poison Hemlock, which is a useful distinction, apart from the problem of identifying it; Poison Parsley, again a useful description as hemlock is utterly unremarkable in looks; Devil's Bread, at which I have to say you'd be one over the eight if you consider a green spindly plant to resemble baked goods of any description.

Devil's Food Cake.  Close enough

     Now, remember what I told you - hemlock is very very poisonous.  It's not the sort of thing you can nibble at and subsequently think "Why I'm fine!  Terrific!  What a wonderful pick-you-up old hemlock is!" since as little as six leaves will see you pushing up the daisies.  Or, if you are buried in permanently damp soil with little nutritive value, the hemlocks.

Wow, we are wordy tonight.  Alright, let us have PICTURES!

Justice League of America: War
The JLA, as any fule kno, are a collection of superheroes who collectively defend America.  They have a somewhat variable membership although Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman usually feature.
     "War" sees the origins story for the JLA, essentially how they met each other.

Supes, Flash, Cyborg, Bats and Green Lantern

     Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel are missing from the above, which is a bit of a hazard with the JLA, as one of them has usually been blasted off the screen whilst blamming the spit out of the bad guys.

Batman's secret power: directing traffic

     Initially some of the team are rather skeptical of the others - Supes gets ready to turn Cyborg into a tin of hot tomato soup at one point - although they do eventually bond.

The bad guy, Apokalips.
Hey, don't blame me - I didn't invent him!

     That's the bad guy and his Magic Jazz Eyebeams of Death.  The League deal with his MJEOD - by poking out his eyes, which must guarantee a PG at least.

Captain Marvel delivers a SHAZAM! kidney punch

     Ah yes, the kidney punch.  Nowhere near as noble and heroic as a right uppercut or a left cross, but a lot more effective.

It Suddenly Came To Me
Yesterday I believe I rashly pondered on how, in Z Nation, the zombies had gotten to munch upon test pilots clad in bulletproof flying suits.
     "Zombies don't come with vanadium-steel teeth, do they?"

     Well, yes, they do.

Good lord aloft! 1200 words - I do apologise.  


* Old posh families.
** The Russian army was bigger than the entire population of several of the smaller European countries.
*** Dangerously close to politics and current affairs, so we will stop right here.