It's A Bad, Bad, Bad, Bad World

But We Knew That Already
Actually the title is a riff on a film that the younger whippersnappers amongst you are probably totally ignorant of, so I shall have scotch my joke by explaining it, shan't I?
     "It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World" features just about every South Canadian comic actor going in the early Sixties, plus a few proper character ones, too.  Art?

They even have a Brit in there.  See if you can spot him.

     This mismatched gang of odious pikers and dubious hikers are all after Smiler Grogan's treasure, and I'll leave you at that, because it's not what today's post is about.
     No, for today we are talking about "Bad".  Not in the street argot sense of Bad Meaning Good, for Conrad is loath to pander to such scurrilous traffic-boosting persiflage - unless it brings in an awful lot of new visitors, which, to be honest, is unlikely.  I cannot see the youth of today casting aside their mobile phones in favour of a blog that delights in using words straight out of Compton Dickens, that obsesses unhealthily over nuclear bang-making equipment, and which never stops promoting either weasels or The Comsat Angels.
     But what do I know.
     "Okay, that's what it's NOT.  What IS it?  This "Bad" of which you speak, o elderly yet still handsome scribe," I hear you quoth.
    Pausing only to admit that flattery does indeed work wonders, I shall explicate.
     German place names, is what I refer to.  As in "Bad Neustadt".  Art?

Not bad.  Of course it is Bad, except - o you know what I mean.

     Now, as with the Teuton surname "Blech", what is unamusingly prosaic in German becomes incredibly hilarious in English.  
     The explanation is quite simple: a German town name prefaced by "Bad" means it is a spa town and officially recognised as such.  Bad derives from the German for "Bath" and we here in the Pond of Eden acknowledge this with the town of Leamington Spa.
     One for all you balneomaniacs out there.

Bad Meaning Dire
Although that ought to come with the warning "Your Mileage May Vary" for, truly, one man's meat is another man's poison, and what is a movie to you might be a reason for me to poke that other fellow's eyes out with glowing coals rather than torment him with it.
     What am I venting about here?  Films that the Flophouse Facebook contingent have stated where others have detested them.  None of these leprous celluloid offspring were known to your humble scribe.  "Jupiter Ascending"?  "Wet Hot American Summer"?  "Smokin' Aces"?

Wet Hot American Summer

     Well, you know how it is, the Curse of Perverse.  Bad, eh?  Deemed loathsome by the rest of the world?  Critically dismissed?  Conrad will just have to inspect them in the interests of skeptical analysis.

Jupiter Ascending

Anaglyphs
To which the rejoinder, if spoken aloud, has to be "Oh, she does, does she?"  Well if it's Anna that's alright.  The corollary to this would be "That's okay then," to which might be added the reprise "But the rest of you - you I'm watching closely.  CLOSELY!"

Anna, glyphing.
Possibly.

     To return to the sensible (however briefly) there are two types of anaglyph.  One is type of raised decoration, usually of a small and portable design, familiar to the Greeks of Victor Davis Hanson as either prized property or purloined plunder.
     That name?  From the Greek, of course:  "Gluphein" which means "Carve" and "Ana" which means "Up" and thus to "Anagluphe" and "Anaglyph".
     Or, if you want to be bang up to date, the modern anaglyph is a picture that generates a 3D effect, produced by presenting two different pictures, each with a slightly different perspective, one picture in green, the other in red.

Edna, sniffing

On This Day
Well, never one to refrain from gloasting, three years ago the daily traffic on BOOJUM! for the 29th of January had been a whole 3 people.  You may judge how things have changed round here with yesterday's total being 524, or over x170 the 2014 total.
     That's not the only significant change here, as the creature I was wont to call "The Small Domesticated Wolf" also arrived at The Mansion on this day three years ago.  Art?

Sweet and petite

     She has settled down considerably since then, and now exudes a casual air of "You Humans Are Here To Entertain ME", which - well, which is pretty close to truth.

Smokin' Aces