You Lose, Krasnaboos!

This - This Will Require A Bit Of Background

First of all, I have to introduce you to the 'Wehraboos', a species of historical wannabes whom insist that the Wehrmacht of the Second Unpleasantness was so far ahead of the unworthy opposition that it won the war (hooray for Herr Hitler and all that).
     Except that it didn't.

"I should have stuck to housepainting ..."

     Obviously there is something askew here, and it is the Wehraboos insistence that they won the war - in their own heads - because " - sloped armour -" and " - muzzle velocity - " and most especially " - rate of fire -".
     Here an aside.  If you're not interested in either logistics or machine-guns you may skip the rest of this article.  Okay, the standard rate of fire for a machine-gun in the Second Unpleasantness was a cyclic rate of 600 rounds per minute, or 10 rounds per second.  This resulted in a controllable gun.  The Wehraboos all froth with pride that the Teuton MG42 had a cyclic rate of 1,200 rounds per minute - twice as fast as similar Allied weapons.

The article in question

     Yes indeed.  Which mean that it used up it's ammunition twice as fast, didn't it?  There is a thesis to be written on the logistical  burden placed upon the Wehrmacht, simply due to that higher rate of fire.
     Anyway, there is a similar frothing adulator to be found that corresponds to the Wehraboo, except they adulate frothily about the Red Army of the Sinister Union, or just anything Ruffian.
     I have decided to call these "Krasnaboos" after the Ruffian for "Red" - "Krasnaya".
     Right, better get that nose-grindstone interface action going again!

Quiver in fear, lesser mortals, at that behemoth, the Odessa Tractor Tank!

     Pausing only long enough to make the motley drink a bottle of red fountain pen ink, let us proceed on today's journey of - hmmm - I wonder what it is, exactly? - well, let's start it, anyway.

Those 100 Stolen Atom Bombs ...

If you remember, Conrad was very curious about an abortive series of thrillers outlined by Michael Newton in his work "Armed and Dangerous", where the author proposed that the series' villain had stolen 100 atom bombs, to be retrieved one per book for 100 books.
  Art?

An early iteration of an atom bomb

     You'd obviously need a lot of storage space for 100 of those rascals.  Anyway, Mike informed us that the 'stolen atom bomb' plot was resolved within 3 books, the original author got fired after 10 and the series ended on 13 books.
     Nowhere did he give a clue about who the author was, nor the book titles.  I have diligently tried Googling for a clue, to no avail.  Inspiration striking me yesterday, I had a look at Abebooks, again to no avail - although I did come across a  swivel-eyed conspiranoid loonwaffle who'd self-published a book that seemed to join all contemporary conspiracy theories into a single giant conspira-pudding.  I wouldn't pay to read it, but it would make great lining for a cat's litter tray.
     Hmmm.  Sir, I do not think your cat approves, though I salute your diligence and thoughtfulness.

More Of Space Opera

If you are familiar with that splendid televisual entertainment known as "The Expanse", then you may be familiar with the novels from which it derives.  The television series is frequently touted by folk as being "hard" sci-fi, that is to say fi which is definitely feasible and accurate about it's sci.  There are no atomic blasters, anti-gravity shields, matter transporters or Faster Than Light drives.
     I know, I know, what would E.E. Smith think about it!  All of the - excuse me?

"It's 'E. E. DOC Smith', sonny, and don't you fergit it!"

     Oh.  I beg your pardon, Doctor Smith.  Is that better?
     Where was I?
     Ah, yes.  Well, the writer of "The Expanse" explicitly denies that it has any pretence of being hard sci fi and is in fact their attempt at space opera.  So now you know.  You can't deny it does cover a lot of space and there are battles on a large scale between the UN and Martian space navies, after all.

At no point does this ever happen

Finally -

This an example of what one might call the triumph of acquisitiveness over sense.  A picture will clarify the situation.  Let me just cattle-prod our Neanderthal in charge of photography - Art!

Extra-large for clarity

     This is We! magazine, being given away free at the Gobes Festival the other week.  "Free" being one of Conrad's favouritest words, he slipped one into his bag.
     To no purpose, I'm afraid.  The whole thing is in Hungarian - see that "Brexit is coming" headline?  About the only English in it.  Nor is Magyar an easy language to translate, since it has no relation to any other European languages, and only a passing one with Finnish.
     Still, it was Free.

And on that note I think it's time to close the shutters and spread some butters.
     (On toast, since you asked)