Conrad - Still Hates Musicals!

No, Tom, "Spinal Tap" Is A Documentary
Never a musical!  Not a musical!  A musical?  NO!
     Now that we've got that small yet compelling point out of the way, allow me to continue my thinly-veiled rant as in the title.  
     Let us be clear, explicit and avoid any misunderstanding.  Your humble scribe liketh not ye musical, forsooth.  In his eyes this dubious form of entertainment should be stricken with ague and cattarrh and festering boils, and the audiences too, just to be on the safe side.

For recognition purposes: A Festering Boil

     This being so, it is a blight and a blemish to see so many bus posters swanning about advertising "Mary Poppins".  Damn it, some of us prefer a dignified respectful SILENCE doncha know!
     Conrad is also highly suspicious of another bus-postered promotion, "Inkheart", which is pushing itself as a "family show".  This probably means SONGS, in which case - agues and cattarrhs and ferocious festering boils upon it!

The Notepad
As you know, Conrad takes a childish delight in re-using the same photograph for a different post, since he believes he's getting one over the sinister Internet-monitoring Hamster police.

The Notepad, again

      As mentioned before, rather too large to be truly convenient, but because it's floppy rather than rigidly bound like all my previous notebooks, it can be contorted-to-fit on the bus.  A minor technical point, you may feel - well not for your humble scribe doing the scribing.  Also, as it's not as discreet as a notebook - in fact it almost shouts "LOOK AT ME!  LOOK AT ME!  I'M BEING IMPORTANT! I'M WRITING IMPORTANT THINGS!"  So I may get questions asked in future.  Like, "what is that instrument in your hand and what is that peculiar assemblage of pulped trees?" from junior members of the audience.

Wow.  This whole "Charm Offensive" thing has really impacted, hasn't it?  Mary Poppins and a notepad.  Hardly shaking the pillars of Heaven.  What's next <looks at notebook> - "Beards"?  Beards!  Well, let's not pre-judge*.

Bad Beards - A Blemish Upon The Land
The epidemic of bad beards continues.  It beats me how young men think that stapling a skunk's tail to their chin renders them more attractive, and you may come back with "Conrad you have approximately 0.005% fashion sense", which is true enough yet silly is still silly.  Don't forget, those of you who swathe their head in a towel made of short curly hairs, thanks to social media those pictures of you are going to circulate the internet for eternity. 

Looks like Cthulu in disguise

     Conrad saw one remarkable example this morning that not only covered the whole of the victim's Entire Lower Face, it also had two free-flowing side streamers on each cheek that gave the impression our Hirsute Hero was trailing twin plumes of dull brown smoke.  No photo, but trust me on this.
     Moustaches are still cool, though.

PROOF!

Another Cold Damp December Morning
Today the birds are a lot less chirpy than they were yesterday.  I suspect this is to do with today's extra-special added ingredient - RAIN!
     Then there's the bus.  Or, rather, there wasn't.  With less traffic, fewer passengers, and the schools on holiday, it still managed to be 10 minutes late.  How apt that the 24 arrived at 24 minutes past on the 24th.  We should be pathetically grateful that it turned up at all.  God bless First Bus!
     No, only joking, God damn First Bus to the depths of Perdition, over in the naughty corner where the brimstone is hottest.

"Lovely!" said a First Bus Spokesdemon

Gingerbread ATAT
That's "All Terrain Attack Transport" to you, being the rather impressive beasts from "The Empire Strikes Back".  Art?

ATAT at attention

     Now, here is evidence in concrete** form that SOME people have entirely too much time on their hands.

Pretty damn good baking skills

     This, admittedly, is akin to <rapidly thinks of strained analogy> an i-pod calling out an i-pad for being a digital device.
     Incidentally, note those ATATs during the battle of Hoth.  Two of them get scragged completely before (I think) getting to debus their stormtroopers.  Given that we only see 4 ATATs in total, that's 1/2 of your infantry gone at a blow.
     Stormtrooper for the Empire:  interesting, well-paid, short-term.

Gernsback's "Flame Tank"
I came across this illustration from one of Hugo Gernsback's pulp magazines from the Thirties.  Now, if you're not interested in human beings being creatively vile to each other, you may move on, gentle reader.


     Behold the "Flame Tank", a tank that spouts directed geysers of liquid fire, lots of them, in all directions.
     "I say!" I hear you say.  "What a perfectly ghastly weapon.  Surely this will end war in our time?"
     O pious hope!  Will it?  Nope.  Conrad is familiar, you see, with the Churchill Crocodile, a real-life flame tank.  This terrifying vehicle mounted only a single liquid-fire spouter, which was quite enough.  Range?  About 100 yards.

More Salamander than Crocodile

     You may see the problem here.  Even if we gift Gernie's Flame Tank with a 200 yard reach***, it's up against AT^ guns with a range of 1000 yards.  It's also so enormous it cannot hide anywhere.  Look at it's side armour - absolutely perpendicular, making it a perfect target for AT guns.  And then there's the single, undivided, enormous fuel tank in the middle of the Flame Tank itself.  One spark ...



*  Actually yes, let's.
** <sighs, rolls eyes> yes, yes, metaphorical concrete.  The very lightest kind.
*** More limited by physics, ballistics and weather, actually
^ Anti Tank