I Like When I'm Right

Which Is All The Time, Of Course
Except for that occasion when it was the black wire, not the green one, and the nuke destroyed Hampton Parva - but enough of that.

Art!

     If you have the memory of a geriatric goldfish then you ought still to recall Conrad's assertions yesteryon about the nuclear missiles that hit Glendale in "Daybreak".  One, that their quality was rather low, and Two, that they were exceedingly numerous.
     That second assertion eliminates the Norks and Iranians as the culprits, leaving us with either the Ruffians or the Populous Dictatorship.  The Ruffians, back when they were the Sinisters, experienced the equivalent of a medium-sized nuclear assault ("Operation Barbarossa"), and they would not risk having a South Canadian response that makes that look a happy picnic.
     So - we are looking at you, Populous Dictatorship.  Art?

Behold!

     Chinese.  VINDICATED!!  Plus, there was a red star on one of the un-exploded conventional missiles.
     Now we know who the culprits were.  Since this is the end of Season One, we're not going to find out the "Why" anytime soon, nor if what happened to Glendale (and, by extension, South Canada as a whole) happened to the rest of the world.  It's possible that there are answers in the comic book the series is derived from; I still have a pile of unread comic books to get through, ta very much, so NO! I am not going to buy it.

Much bleaker than the television series

     The motley can't be here today - something about food-poisoning ...

Our Last Bit Of Culture For A While
Yeah, we can't risk alienating you lot with too much haute <thinks> roman.  And so to the last 10 Novels That Shaped Our World (as long as you read English) in the BBC's selected list.  Bring it on under the title "Rulebreakers":

Rule Breakers

A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole

Bartleby, the Scrivener – Herman Melville

Habibi – Craig Thompson

How to be Both – Ali Smith

Orlando – Virginia Woolf

Nights at the Circus – Angela Carter

Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell

Psmith, Journalist – P. G. Wodehouse

The Moor’s Last Sigh – Salman Rushdie

Zami: A New Spelling of My Name – Audre Lorde

     Conrad is not entirely sure why these are Breakers of Rules.  I have read Nineteen Eighty-Four, and a jolly depressing tome it is, too.  "Imagine a jackboot stamping on a human face, forever" is about as dismal an ending as you can ask for.  And, can you imagine it - The Allotment of Eden reduced to a miserable status as "Airstrip One".

Except the opposite is now true, isn't it?

     Your Humble Scribe is also pretty sure he's read "Psmith, Journalist" and, if not, then at least Plum has a presence in this list; not sure that he was a rule breaker, though he did do that monumentally ill-advised series of broadcasts from Occupied Europe.
     Herman Melville?  No thank you, I gave up on the enormously boring "Moby Dick" after about a hundred pages of nothing happening.  One for ennui fans.

     I shall pause at this half-way point as I've got to go do the weekly shop, which will take about an hour to perform and which I regard as a necessary chore that is most definitely NOT a leisure activity, and then it'll be time for Edna's Longer Walk.

     Back again!  Shopping done and put away.

About Edna's Longer Walk -
I had planned on taking her on the Pennine Trail track, which loops around to the south of Tandle Hill Park, and which ends in open fields, that sometimes have cattle present; if not, the plan was to let her off her lead and let her run around.
     We didn't get that far; the small footbridge near the fields was, as usual, over-run by the brook that's supposed to run beneath it, which had resulted in yards of mud having been created.  Sadly no pictures for you but Wiki is our friend -

Like this, except darker and muddier

     Conrad is not sure who - or what - made the muddy tracks, as you never, ever meet anyone on this trail.  Given that it was also dusk, and half a mile from the nearest person, a rather eerie place to be when your only company are startled birds that your presence has alerted (at least, you hope it's your presence and there isn't an unseen Something paralleling your course amongst the trees ...).  Conrad, massive coward that he is, was rather glad not to have to plod back along the track in the dark: you never know what you might step in.  Or on*.

On A Lighter Note -
But only by comparison.  I am referring - obviously! - to some passing comments that Jim and Al make on their podcast "We Have Ways -" which, for September, focussed on "Operation Market Garden" and the battle for Arnhem Bridge.  Al makes the point, possibly contained within Robert Kershaw's "It Never Snows In September"**, that the Teutons were expecting airborne troops as lightly-armed as their own Fallschirmjagers.  Art?
               

     Sadly not, soldaten.  General Browning had insisted that 1st Airborne go into action as a fully-equipped infantry division, so they had heavy machine-guns, mortars, jeeps, anti-tank guns and pack artillery.  Rather an unpleasant surprise for those Teutons assembled for the counter-attacks!

Finally -
Edna is doing her "Desperately Despondent Dog" act again, which means she thinks it's time her human got off it's overstuffed posterior and slung some food in front of her, which precedes at least half an hour of her expecting her human to chase her and her squeezy ball.  You see?  You see the things I have to put up with as Dogsitting Dad?
     This item is aimed squarely at those enjoying themselves on the briny deeps.  Thank you and goodnight.

     Edna?  Tea time!





*  A plot point in Lovecraft's "The Rats In The Walls", I believe
**  Arnhem from the Teuton perspective