Built-In Delay

I Speak Of Friday -

I did write this Intro on Friday, except I've not had the opportunity to post it since then, so please imagine - or, if you have one of those handy-dandy TARDIS devices knocking about then please action - we are on the 28th July.

     Today is your humble scribe's last day at the Denton Centre <pause for sympathetic sighs>  and I am following a routine established for many years - poem and cake.  Actually, calling it a "poem" is an insult to the language of Dickens and Kipling*, so I call them "Pomes", which is apt enough.  Usually this vile doggerel is about someone else leaving though for today I changed the subject.

     I like to think I've been like a comet at the Denton Centre - a heavenly body that has brightened everybody's life and which is now moving on.

     Oh, and here's the cake -

     The robust Halloween Pumpkin Cake recipe, using carrots instead of pumpkins, as we have lots of carrots and no pumpkins.  Not till October, anyway**.

     Right!  Let us reset our imagination (or TARDIS) to 31st July 2017, and allow the motley to stagger forward on it's palsied old legs.

6th MG

Yes, back to the spiffingly splendidly entertaining War Diary - yes, I am lauding it up a bit, as perhaps not everyone finds it quite as riveting as I do - for the 6th Canadian Infantry Brigade Machine Gun company.  At the time the British Americans were armed with the venerable Colt 1895 MG, which see -

     That bit sticking down toward the front is the lever, which flew back and forth during firing, and which would dig a small trench if the tripod was too low.  

     Now we know what we're dealing with, let us examine the note for June 6th 1916.  "Three of our guns inflicted very heavy casualties on the enemy, firing in all 4,000 rounds."

     This note is illuminating for two reasons; firstly, it shows the Teuton addiction to counter-attacks to regain lost ground, which continued all through the war.  Secondly, it's no mean feat to manage that amount of sustained fire with the 1895, because it overheated pretty quickly - air-cooled, you see - and also because the gun oil thinned-out after firing a certain number of rounds, whereupon it would likely jam.

No!  Art, you baffoon -

     Reliability was an issue with the 1895, and I recall one user retelling how he was given complicated technical instructions to follow on how to disable his gun if in danger of capture.  His response was that it was far simpler to just chuck dirt on it.

     Doubtless minds were much relieved when the 6th MG went over to the British Vickers gun, which was a model of reliability and British engineering.  Want to RELIABLY kill your enemy stone dead?  The Vickers is your go-to gun.  The anecdote most quoted is of the 100th MG Company during the Somme, but the 6th MG, over 5 nights in 1917, fired a total of 40,000 rounds of harassing indirect fire, which is simply not possible with a Potato Digger.

A potato digger.  Close enough

I Love My Dictionary

Indeed I do!  Only today one of my new work colleagues informed us that he'd been working as a "tribologist" in  the petroleum industry in Austin, Texas.

     Nobody thought to ask him what a tribologist is or does; so Conrad decided to look it up in his Collins Concise Dictionary.

     One who studies friction, lubrication and wear between moving surfaces.

A trilobite.  Close enough.

I May Have Given Myself Away -

During the ice-breaker session this morning - have I told you I'm back working again? - one of the questions was "What superpower would you have?" and it was interesting to see what people chose.  Flight was the most popular choice, followed by shapeshifting and then invisibility.  

     I did point out that you would have considerable issues with flight, including bird-strike, collision with pylon cables, other aircraft, insects and - a major worry - unless your costume is skin-tight and extremely so, sheer wind speed will tear your clothing away.

     And my choice?  Mind control, that I may take over the world.  So - is that giving my long-term plans away?  I did say I would be a benevolent dictator*** ...

My role model!

*  DON'T mention Shakespeare

**  This is very annoying.  When I take over, it will be resolved.  Or a lot of people will disappear.

***  But I was lying

Apprehension

" - Crawling Like A Tube Train Up Your Spine"

It's a line from the song "Cymbeline", taken from the album "More" (or the soundtrack thereof) by those jolly japesters Pink Floyd.  I think it's pretty good for an old dog like me to recall them there lyrics since I've not listened to the album for years.  I think if we kick Art awake he can grace these electronic pages with a picture.  Art? <sound of boot hitting butt>

No, I don't know what it's supposed to be, either

     It's not a great album, frankly, although a couple of songs stand out.

     "Completist!" I hear you hiss, which I will take as a badge of honour.  "Is there a point to this?"

     Of course!  Just not the one you're thinking of - Conrad does indeed start his new job in Gomorrah-on-the-Irwell tomorrow, HR Services with Sainsbury's.  There.  I'm not being coy about this new employer as, technically, I'm not yet with them.  The aforementioned apprehension isn't about the job, though - that would be too easy, and, besides, these baffling things you humans call "emotions" are a closed book to your humble scribe.

     No, I'm talking "Apprehension" as the noun referring to judicial capture of a perpetrator.  Or "perp", if you will, for Yes!  we are back to Judge Dredd.

Well, are you going to argue with him?

     Conrad used to chortle with delight at the 2000 AD strips, because they were so gleefully nihilistic, and always had subtle puns hidden in the background.

"Every Empire Falls"

Conrad and 2000 AD parted ways about Prog 1,000, when it was being annoyingly didactic and PC.  Just so you know.  On Saturday I popped along to the Travelling Man comic stall at Comic Con, only to find that they didn't have any of Stormwatch, Invincible or The Goon.  Gisp*!  Nor did the actual  shop itself when I dropped in.  Gosp*!  Shades, methinks, of the Monty Python Cheese Shop Sketch.

     Anyway, so as not to leave empty-handed - because that's well-known to bring on terrible bad luck - I bought the above title.  Art?  <sound of boot hitting bottom>

There you go

     This is, frankly, complicated.  There are all sorts of political plots going on in the background, jumping back and forth between The Big Meg (as I am familiarly allowed to call Mega City One), Texas City, Murphyville and Brit Cit.  Indeed, it will take another read to allow the bits to fall back into place**.  The artwork is uniformly good, and Henry Flint appears to morph between the styles of Carlos Ezquerra and Kevin O'Neill, probably intentionally.

See?  Utter proof!

     And now we shall move on.

A Bit Of Number-Crunching For You

Conrad loves him some statistics, and in any other blog you'd probably have a pretty poor joke about statistics <insert humour-free joke> here.

     Not so with BOOJUM! for we value our mission to educate you, the public***.

     If my average daily output of words is 750, with 1,500 each for Saturday and Sunday, then that tallies at 6,750 per week.  Given that We The Editorial Staff^ began this venture just over 4 years ago, that makes

1,404,000 words to date

     Which is something to pause and ponder about.  Good?  Bad?  Only you can tell!

For your sakes, "Bad" is not an option.

For "Exciting" Read "Terrifying"

Whilst walking to and from the Comic Con in Gomorrah-on-the-Irwell - and yes, you'd better believe that your humble hack will continue to milk that event for all he can - I noticed a gang of workers dangling perilously from the top of a tall building.  They were still there when I ambled back to Picadilly, so here is the evidence.  Art? <sound of boot hitting backside>

     And now for their close up, Mister De Mille - 

Gusp*!

     It's not clear in either photograph, but they had abseiled down from the top of the building and were dangling from ropes at that window.  I know what you're thinking - "Damn, today's window cleaners have a tough gig!".  Yes, well, consider putting yourself in their place, because they'd been there for almost two hours AT LEAST.  If this image and the thought of putting yourself in their place gives you palpitations, then sorry, you are simply not cut out to be a superhero, since they spend half their work hours hanging off buildings at height.

     Again, if we were a normal blog, or a South Canadian one, there'd be a schmaltzy comment about the real heroes here, but, because this is BOOJUM! here's a picture of a Sorpion flail tank.  Art?  <sound of boot hitting bum>

Yes, there is a man sitting in that little attached box

*  Like a gasp, but with more shock value

**  Oh what a trial.  A trial, I tell you!

***  A bit.

^ Conrad, Oscar, Steve and Art.