Chanson D'Armour

HA!
That is going to waylay a few people who were doubtless expecting some witless drivel about that group from the Seventies who actually sang "Chanson D'Amour"*, which is a splendid lesson in paying close attention, and also a sly way of introducing Part 3 of "The Siege of Fray Bentos".  Art!

Hmmm.  This claims to be a photo of F41 -

     But it also looks to be a "Female" tank armed only with machine guns (which have been removed), meaning that it's not Fray.  It is, however, attended by several expired Teutons - you can tell they're not British as they're not wearing puttees.  It will do at a pinch.
     Rather than have he and his crew slither to safety when darkness fell, Captain Richardson decided to tough it out in No Man's Land, because their position gave them a splendid vantage point of imminent Teuton counter-attacks.  However, the artillery of Perfidous Albion could be counted on to concentrate on a lost tank and blow it to bits, in order to deny it to the Hun, so a gallant volunteer snuck back to British lines carrying the message that here was the smallest British strongpoint in the Ypres salient, and could you not blow it up, please?

Somewhat more believable.

     As mentioned already, the Teutons reserved a special dislike for tanks, and they took it out on Fray Bentos that night in an infantry attack, unsuccessfully, as they were driven off by the tank's own Lewis guns.  The next day, the crew of F41 spotted another Teuton counter-attack forming up and sniped them back to cover.  When darkness fell yet another clutch of ill-tempered enemy attempted to sneak up on the tank, which would have been serious as ammunition had almost run out.
     Instead the British front line trenches sent up a volley of flares, since they were taking a paternalistic, protective view of their tank and intended no harm should come to it.  They treated the Teutons to lots of machine gun fire, which chased them back to their own trenches, and kept sending up flares all night, just to make a point.

"It's OUR tank, you dirty curs!"

     Finally, the surviving 6 crew abandoned tank F41, taking their dismounted Lewis guns with them, crawling towards their brace of Victoria Crosses.  The Teutons didn't bother to interfere, probably being right royally fed-up with Fray Bentos by now, and just glad to see the back of it.
     Okay, let's have something less grim.  Art?


Another Photo That Conrad Jibs At
There is no shortage of Apollo-themed articles and photographs on the BBC website, as they continue to sing the song of Apollo 11.  Though they could do with a Conrad present, to avoid silly mistakes ...

Right!

     First off, that's not Apollo 11, since the picture shows the Lunar Rover.  These did not go up with first missions, not until Apollo 15 in fact.  Art?

The "Lunar Roving Vehicle" if we're being formal

     No doubt the real tech geeks could look at the Moon Buggy in the top photo and tell you which mission it came from, not Conrad, he's got a blog to write and can't hang around belabouring Auntie Beeb, see you!

The Haul
If you remember - and reading this blog is the only thing that's going to save your descendants from decommissioning nuclear reactors with their bare teeth - I was rather toooo clever for my own good on Saturday.  I popped along to E. J. Merton's in Didsbury to see if I could pick up a couple of British Divisional Histories of the Great War; the short answer was, no, I couldn't: the books were kept at a separate warehouse and Mr. Merton was off peddling his wares at RAF Duxford, the lucky swine.

"Conrad's palms suddenly became sweaty"

     We did a bit of business over the telephone on Monday, and Mr Merton personally delivered 'em today.  Art?

     That's £8 postage saved, thanks to good customer service.  I do have a cheap and nasty softback A4 format of Volume 2 for the Second Division, which I have so marked about with pen and highlighter than I'd need to pay someone to take it off my hands.  This reprint comes in at £40, which is about as high as I'll go for a single volume.  That's not all, mind you, as it is the two volumes in one, and the cheapest I've seen them going for - individually - is £30 plus £33.
     This now means I've got 20 of the (I think) 39 divisional histories.  Go me!

BOOJUM! Reviews Film
Let us be clear here.  A "Film Review" is a binch** of silly nonsense about contemporary releases, whereas an appreciation is a detailed look at a cult classic, probably in a lot more detail than you ever expected or wanted - that 5,000 word monograph about "Forbidden Planet" is always hanging over your heads!
     So, without more prefatory piffle -
"The Current War": Blimey, could they be any less exact and more vague?  Which one?  I guarantee you that there is a war on somewhere in the world.  There's that one in the Ukraine that Tsar Putin probably wishes would stop rumbling along, plus something going on in Syria, and undeclared stuff in the Persian Gulf - there's just so much choice.
     Wait - it couldn't be a South Canadian mis-spelling and it's really about dried fruit, could it?

Them darned Californicans - they did invent the raisin, after all.

"Spiderman: Far From Home": Is he visiting California?  Hang on - didn't he disintegrate at the end of a recent 'Avengers' thing?  What, he suddenly got better and re-integrated, or they went at his dust with a lot of glue?  Colour me confused, and don't even bring that horribly confusing 'Spiderverse' thing into it. 

Is that the London Eye?  GET OFF IT!  Blinking South Canadian vandal ...

     I think I shall have to consult Nathan, an office colleague who has extraordinary good taste in film and television (that is, rather similar to mine) about this wretched farrago.
"The Keeper":  NO!  How many times do I have to tell you that Your Humble Scribe is not remotely interested in the ballfoot game, even if played by a load of ladies jiggling all over the pitch.  I am emphatically NOT going to watch even a trailer for a film about a goalkeeper.  NOT!
     Or - hang on, could it be about a hoarder of <thinks> rare military history books?  That would get my thumbs up!

Ought to score 9.5 at IMDB in my opinion

*  Can't remember who it was, don't care, not going to look it up, feel free if you want to waste your precious time.
**  Portmanteu blog-speak.  A combination of "Bit" and "Pinch" and "Bunch"