Articulated

It Was A Crossword Answer
"Hinged; segmented (11)", and yet it also applies to human communication; if you can get across your ideas and concepts in a comprehensive, understandable way, then you are deemed to be "Articulate".
     Which is kind of where this part of the blog begins, because, as ever, Your Humble Scribe's mind has been flitting from one subject to another, where one thing inevitably leads on to the next in the series.  You see?  Articulated, like a scorpion's tail, or a medieval mace, or an armoured gauntlet -

                                                Is there a theme here?

     For another example of "Articulated", allow me to parade before your perceptive glazzies - this.  Art?

Behold!

     As you can see, this is Lego Technic, rather than their more normal brick construction, and if my memory serves, this construction stuff used to be sold under the banner "Fisher Technic".  As things go, a mere 2,793 pieces is pretty lightweight compared to some of the monster bespoke projects we've covered of late.  Still here is an articulated articulated, and there's not many occasions where you'll read that as a legitimate phrase.

A somewhat simpler project

     The day started with me recalling a wonderfully bizarre comic strip that used to grace the pages of "Sounds" weekly music paper.  It had absolutely nothing to do with music, and was called "The Stars My Degradation".  Art*?

I'm not going to enlarge it as there are very probably rude words

     This was actually the young Alan Moore at work, beneath the pseudonym "Curt Vile" (which is how Kurt Weill is pronounced - and no, we're not tangenting about stage composers of the Thirties), and he's a pretty fair penman in his own right.
     You may not be able to read the title sidebar, which is a little declaration by the series hero Dempster Dingbunger, to wit:

"Dempster Dingbunger is my name, 

Sputwang is my nation.

The depths of space gob in my face-

The stars my degradation"

     The thing is, this will only really make sense if you are aware of one of scj-fi's most iconic and classic novels, which was originally published under the title "Tiger!  Tiger!", and then later as "The Stars My Destination".  One of sci-fi's most famously unfilmed novels, and the work of one Alfred Bester.  Art?

From the graphic novel

     The plot is much too complicated to go into here.  Go out and buy it, or enslave it on your Kindle (or however those devil boxes work).  Gully Foyle is one of the great anti-heroes, and Conrad has adopted and adapted his battle cry "Vorga! I kill you deadly!" for various software issues at work.  It scares people, without having to be explained.
     I suppose you can see the joints in this articulation?  For Conrad moved on from TSMD, and onto Bester's other classic, "The Demolished Man", which I have read, but ages ago.  I might have to see what it's going for on Abebooks.  Art?

The demolishing

     This is a kind of we-know-who-dunnit but can the other characters discover the truth?  Bester posits a world where telepathy is widespread, meaning criminals have to try very hard and be very clever to get away with even the smallest act of naughty.  And the central character intends to commit murder ...

<sigh>  Time for Art's regular Tazering, I'm afraid

     Critics at the time observed that TDM was as much a psychological thriller as it was a sci-fi one, addressing Freudian issues in the same way that - another articulation here - C.S. Lewis' "The Last Battle" addressed this issues of Christianity.
     Presto!  Another leap to find a precis of TLB, which, when you stop to analyse it, really does deal with some rather deep Christian issues - which we're not going into.  Art?

Yeah, but they said the same about the one before ...

     You see, Art, you can do it when freshly smoking from a severe Tazering, can't you!  And we shall be coming back to Narnia, O yes I say Shelli Le Fay.
     I say, I have gone on rather, haven't I?  Not a bad article so far for an item that began with only four words.  Well, I say "Not a bad" but your views may vary**.

Crosswords, And Music, And THE COINCIDENCE HYDRA AGAIN
Okay, so the answer was one of those tricky ones that combine a partial anagram, coming out as "ADAGIO", which Conrad is familiar with thanks to that splendid baroque composition "Adagio in G Minor", attributed to Albinoni.  Art?

Tomaso A.

     Boy, he certainly cultivated a veritable forest of hair, didn't he?  Must keep him warm in winter.
     Anyway, Your Humble Scribe, being curious/nosy/inquisitive <delete least flattering> wanted to know what an Adagio was, and thanks to Wiki we now know:
 

Adagio – slowly with great expression^[8] (66–76 bpm)

     Incidentally, the very same list also includes "Lento" which is the Italian for "Slow" and which was a crossword answer I didn't get.
     But what's this in the "They also serve" bit of Google, over to starboard?
     "Adagio Fine China", a chinaware shop on Milnrow Road, in Shaw - the next town over from Royton, practically my next-door neighbour.

Some shops in Shaw

     What are the chances of that happening, hmmm?  Excuse me whilst I go get a fork to pry Mister Hydra's teeth out of my nethers.

Finally -
How many times have you sat back and thought to yourself, "Why is taking over the world such a complex and time-consuming operation?" to yourself "What the world really, really needs is an iconic science-fiction spaceship, rendered on a very large scale, in straw."
     One would hope the reply came back as "Never".  However, we (the editorial "we") do reside in the splendidly sensible and matter-of-fact Allotment of Eden.  Other countries are less - sanguine?
     For this to make sense I shall have to deliver some background (more articulation), about "Space Battleship Yamoto".  Art? O stop whining and put some salve on!

Anime version

     Remember, the "Yamoto" is not to be confused with the base and wicked "Yamamoto", oh no, not at all.  Art?

Live action version
(Which I've seen and could not make any sense of)

     Big in Japan.  Okay, Exhibit One:

Words are superfluous

     You can see a puny human included for scale.
     Seriously, WoE?

     Having hopefully befuddled and entertained you in equal amounts, and not posting half of what I'd intended to - we are out of here!


*  Although, allegedly, back in the late Fifties, Thomas Pynchon applied to the Ford Fellowship Foundation for a grant to turn TDM into an opera.  This sounds so bizarre it must be true.
**  They don't matter, but are graciously allowed to vary.