Doctor What?

Phew!  It's Over
I refer, of course, to Wimbledon.  Conrad, who loathes all sports - yes, yes, we'll get to Doctor Who in a minute, be patient - all sports, except pylon-spotting and bog-snorkelling, cordially detests the amount of airtime and murdered trees that get devoted to catgut-wielding ball-bouncers.  I dub this season "Wimblenod" as it would send me to sleep were I to accidentally catch sight of it.

Wimblenod.  It's a racket

     I don't care who's playing, who won or who lost, although I do note that the women's skirts seem to have become rather indecorously short - Art?  Evidence.

The shameless ankle-baring hussy!

     In fact, were a bunch of acquisitive aliens to arrive in orbit and teleport Wimbledon away, with all accoutrements, I would put them on my Christmas card list.
     The really important thing about Wimblenod ending, however, is that this means the Beeb have declared who is now going to be playing the central role in their flagship dramamentary "Doctor Who".  And - 
     It's a woman.   I could tell from the chorus of outraged shrieking fanboys across the kingdom - funny how it's still a kingdom when Elizabeth is on the throne, isn't it*? - going NONONONONO A MILLION TIMES NO!!!
     (Yes, three exclamation marks is almost bordering on Continental levels of excitability, but dammit these people are going frantic!)

A lady Doctor

     I would just like to point out, in my iconoclastic way, that Joanna Lumley has previously played The Doctor, so this Jo D. Whittaker is hardly breaking new ground.  
     Besides which, as Sylvester MCoy pointed out (and he should know), the role of The Doctor is essentially actor-proof; anyone can do it.  Whether or not they turn out to be any good is down to the actor involved.  Oh, and the scripts.  They matter as well.
     Now, while we're being bean-counting anorak-wearing pedants, where in the Doctor Who canon do we fit Richard Hurndall and Peter Cushing?  Because <Mister Hand intervenes to prevent a very long monologue>

It's behind you!

     I think that's enough stuff for an Intro.  Let the motley totter forward on it's palsied feet!

Talking Of Tottering -
Your humble scribe made much of his doing a bit of weeding this afternoon.  I need to make the most of this as I so rarely get involved with crude mechanical chores; that's why mechanics and joiners evolved from the primordial ooze.  After an hour of mild physical exertion your modest artisan was rubbished.
     Anyway, Degsy continued the good work and The Mansion is now weed-free, so any intruding triffids will stand out.  Let's recap the "Before".  Art?

Lush tropical jungle

     Of course this means the booby-traps and tripwires will now also stand out, necessitating a whole lot of camouflage.  Art?

There are 187 SAS troopers hiding in this photo

     The bowl?  I have no idea.  It was lurking in the weeds.  Free to a good home, although the collector needs to clean it out.
     Next!

World's First Hungarian Supervillain?
Not in a comic, either.  This popped up in my head because of an inimitable line about the bad guys, who then needed some background.  So -
     In James Blish's magisterial "Earthman, Come Home", the star-travelling city of New York has an encounter with the Duchy of Gort, a planet settled by Arpad Hrunta, self-proclaimed "Emperor of Space".  'Arpad', you see, being an Hungarian name.

Close enough

     The Hruntans are irredeemable bad guys, constantly waging war on their planetary neighbours and gleefully taking on the Earth Police when they arrive, too.  They are fanatical and ferocious and care not one whit about casualties, theirs or others.  Ol' Jim puts their attitude  thus:

"Unencumbered by any snivelling notions about the intrinsic value of human life - "

     As for how they waged interplanetary warfare -

"Even a hardened killer might feel his brains crack, after watching enough men trying to put out a fire by leaping into it."

     A great line, and when a film version of ECH finally hits the screens, it will be interesting to see how the director manages this with economy.    

Something like this, one imagines

     Bear in mind that the stories which constitute ECH only came out in the early Fifties and you'll have to admit that Ol' Arpy does indeed constitute a supervillain long before anything similar turned up in either Marvel or DC.  "Emperor of Space" - quite ambitious, wasn't he?

Hang on - just got to check on the state of health of Ben Folds - phew, yes, he's alive, if a little cross about the new Doctor being a woman.

"And she's a Brit!"

     Yes, Ben, because some things are just inviolate.

Wait, WHAT?

*  Obviously because real life is not being scripted by Stephen Moffat