"Consider Your Ways, Clown," Intoned The Clocking-in Supervisor

This Is Going To Require Ingenuity
Fortunately this is Conrad, who has enough of it for seven cats and a Nobel Prize winner - if they were all evil, that is.
     In today's blatant theft of another's talent and artistry, once again Harlan Ellison, Conrad is puzzling over the remaining story title that he knows - "Repent, Harlequin," Said The Ticktockman".  You might be able to work in Harley Quinn (from Batman), and one of the Watchmen (do you see what I did there?) and then I got a bit stuck.  Googling proved to be no help, in fact only going to prove that Ol' Harl is fond of long titles - "The Beast That Shouted Love At The Heart Of The World" being a case in point.  It would need to be very robust, that beast: conditions at the earth's core are a bit extreme.
     So I've just transposed things a bit.  What do you think?

Not entirely sure what this is.

Young People Redeem Themselves
But not Tom!  Oh no.  It's a good thing he's not coming on the canal cruise tomorrow, since he has the unfortunate ability to fall into water when he shouldn't.  Mind you, given his propensity for playing with fire, Conrad can see him having to throw himself overboard to put out the flames.
     That's not what I wanted to post about.  Art?

Returned by thankless Tom

     As I strode along, Katie stopped me and mentioned that she'd done a critique of the film for her Media Studies course.  Sophie mocked me when I asked if she'd seen it:  of course she had, and it was one of her dad's favourite films.  I mentioned Tom's criticism about the contrast between FTL travel and wide-eyed adoration of Robbie the Robot, and she pshawed him.
     "When was it made?" she enquired, to be told 1956.  "He should cut it some slack!" was her opinion.



MIRV And MARV, Things Not Done By Half
Yes, it's back to more differences between the thermonuclear arsenals of the time when O' Herm (Herman Kahn for the slightly more respectful) was writing and today, and differences there are indeed.
     In HK's time the missiles normally carried a single, often multi-megaton, warhead, meaning that you were pretty well guaranteed to destroy what you aimed at, even if you didn't hit anywhere near it.  You only hit that single target, though, which is when "MIRV" comes in:  Multiple Independent Re-entry Vehicles.  Which is South Canadian euphemism for "Lots of warheads.  Lots of them!"  and indeed a Trident can carry up to 8 warheads, or a potential total of 128 per missile submarine.  Limitation talks have kept the number of actual warheads lower than this, though that can be remedied ...

Instant sunshine, as the slang has it

     The warheads from a MIRV'd missile will fall in a particular "footprint", because they travel ballistically after being released from their carrier bus.  This is where the even scarier MARV comes in:  MAnouevrable Re-entry Vehicle.  These puppies have control surfaces that allow them to glide in a non-ballistic trajectory, allowing them to travel a lot further than the restricted MIRV warhead.  They can, in fact, come in over target and attack in a terminal homing dive, which is the most difficult type to counter.

What the heck.  Close enough.

     I mentioned Trident above.  This missile submarine is a quantum level above the old Polaris submarines, and the Ruffians (and the Sinisters before them), dislike them with a passion.  Like a sinister steel shark, these sit silently in the salty deeps, loitering with their dozens and dozens of missiles.  Then, if they surface and don't hear the Stop code, or if they surface and hear the Go code - I'm not sure which arrangement is in force and do hope their captains are slightly better-informed than I - then a lot of people are going to have the Worst Bad Hair Day Ever.  What worries the Ruffians (and the Sinisters before them) is that these missiles are no longer the inaccurate city-busters of Polaris days; no, the Trident missiles are precision enough to be used in a disabling first strike.  This, again, is completely beyond the bounds of what HK was discussing, which makes it potentially destabilising.
     Food for thought!

Art, you witless baffoon!

The Metro
This is from notes I wrote yesterday, and which didn't get published as the blog was getting a bit long.  So if you see the day "Wednesday" on a photo, don't bother elbowing your compatriot in crime and smirking at Conrad*.
     So, rather than merely mutter "The Metro" and then rinse my mouth out, I shall put a little putrefying flesh on the rotting bones of this rancid rag's reputation (apologies if you were eating your tea at this time).  
     Take this item, which can be summed-up in five words:  Taylor Swift wears a skirt.
Art?

    Sorry, is it a slow news day?
    Conrad's guessing her agent is throwing $ at The Rag to print this stuff, which is shallower than a desert stream in a drought.  Make that $$ (it's a very dull story)**. 
     Oh, and here's an advert for an event promoting itself as something children will love.  "The Night Garden".  Art?

     Quite.  Conrad, wise in the ways of the weird and the wicked, can guarantee that at the stroke of midnight:  the clowns will all grow fangs; the candy canes will acquire a cyanide tang; the fluffy bunnies will explode; and Santa Claus was The Child Catcher all along.

EVIL INCARNATE!
But with sweets.

*  Quite besides the risk of me finding out what you've done.
**  Who is this "Taylor Swift" chap anyway?  Never heard of him.