I Spake Of Cake

Yesterday
Having made two of them, I then find that the laptop's hamsters had gone on a work-to-rule and refused to recognise that I had connected my camera via phone.  In fact, they were denying that cameras existed, had ever existed or would ever be invented.*
     When I pointed out that hamsters make wonderful chewy snacks for sharks, we began to get some co-operation again.
     Hence, here we have the Norwegian Pear Cake.  Art?

     Extra-large so you can see the texture.  This is gluten-free, which has in the past been rather under-risen; the secret is xantham gum, and also baking it for longer at a lower temperature, so the outside doesn't burn.
     NPC is a well-mannered and docile recipe, unlike the next one: gluten-free Blackberry and Sour Cream Loaf.  Art?

Just look at it, trying to act all innocent

     The thing about this one is that it's batter is so thick it climbs up the paddles of the  mixer, as if trying to escape, so one is continually pushing it back down with a spatula, then trying to get it off the paddles by whizzing them round at top speed, which also risks hurling batter across the kitchen: a spatter of batter.  A tricky customer indeed!

Not quite as bad as this, but definitely getting there

     Now, time to put the motley in the centre of a hedge maze, shortly before we add in a herd of feral, hungry mink!

I Can Hear You Pondering -
 - and yes, I have very acute hearing.  "Why did you bake two cakes?  Surely one would suffice," you were wondering.
     Well, because Darling Daughter came up to see us, which is an occasion enough in and of itself for Conrad to bake a cake, and if we prod that idle sloven Art with the coal tongs -

DD in all her brown-haired beauty

     She gets her looks from me, though luckily not her sense of balance nor dextrousness.
     Nor did she come alone, for Lo!  There was Degsy with a 79-piece platter from Yo! Sushi, an impressive piece of catering.  Once more with the fire tongs -

Impressive, nicht war?

     There was also a pot containing heaped helpings of pickled ginger, which your humble scribe immediately fell upon - when attending Yo! Sushi the free pots of it on my table always end up empty.
     Then we watched "Isle of Dogs" and "The Devil's Doorway" and I had trouble completing my crossword.

Enough domestic tranquillity!  Bring on Things Being Blown Up!
Great Exploding Rocket-Propelled Tanks!!
I know TWO exclamation marks is a little extreme, but so is the next topic up.  I have mentioned in recent posts the less <ahem> successful wartime designs of Perfidious Albion, because not everything that began as a prototype ends up successful, nor being produced in numbers.
     Take, as an example, the Valentine SADE project, which was intended to see if a tank could be made to - er - 'fly'.  Art?

I think this is the only picture extant

     Those big white vertical boxes hold rockets, 26 in total, and the idea** was that, if you could propel a tank into the air, it might be able to project it over annoying battlefield hindrances like minefields or anti-tank ditches.  They used the Valentine chassis because it was obsolete by the time of testing, and one might also add considerably lighter than other Allied tanks; it weighed only 17 tons and the one above has had the turret removed, making it even lighter.
    It still didn't work.  Art?

Not what you're thinking!

     You've got it all backwards.  Despite looking as if they were trying to send this one over the entire battlefield at Mach 5, the jet turbine engine is at the front, and was an experimental method of destroying minefields. I suppose if you were an enemy soldier and you witnessed this howling, shrieking monstrosity emerging from a massive cloud of mud, dust, bushes and insufficiently secured small dwelling places, you'd probably not hang around.

Ooops!  I accidentally clicked Publish earlier, and now a couple of eager beavers have read part of this post already.  Do come back later, chaps, there's still more to come.
     Such as -

I Contend -
That "The Blues Brothers" is not a musical.  It is a comedy with songs, some of which are actually built into the plot, and it is not wise to debate with me on this score,*** since I am skilled in both the ways of poisons and nuclear weapons.

John - hanging tough for Albania

Finally -
I believe that author Ian Banks is responsible for creating a body of science-fiction work in the Space Opera field, which has been mentioned over on the FB Space Opera pages.  I have never read any of his work, so, since it has been recommended over there - and, given the nature of the beast, I'd expect them to be up to speed on stuff - I may pop off to Abebooks and request a few.  After all, I do need the next in the 'Lensman' series.  Art?

Just so we're clear

*  Hamsters can be awkward little swines, if you'll forgive the mixed metaphor.
**  "Delusion" is more accurate
***  Do you see what I did there?