It Went Up A Bomb

British Idiom
Can be confusing, nicht wahr?  For, if you are a South Canadian, any association with bombs is taken to be negative.  "It bombed", for example, means that "it", whatever "it" may be, was dismally unsuccessful - like "Cats".
     Whereas here in This Sceptred Isle, "It went down a bomb" means "It was tremendously successful", which I admit is a peculiar way of looking at things, because generally if a bomb lands in your vicinity, it is not going to go well for you.
     Here an aside.  Remember The Blitz?

Badly-behaved Teuton Tourists!

     This was the Teuton's follow-up to not winning the Battle of Britain; they bombed the merry heck out of Perfidious Albion.  Inevitably, a certain number of the bombs they dropped were duds, which failed to detonate, after having usually penetrating to a considerable depth.  Bombs being pointy and heavy, you see.
     Can you see where this is going?
     Fast forward eighty years later, when construction work is going on in the city of Babylon Major ("London" for the formally inclined).  What do the diggers discover whilst laying foundations?  No!  Not a giant vat of magic ice-cream.  A bomb.  They found a bomb.  Thus lots of people get hustled to safety and kept away.


     Note the Loggie at upper starboard.  He's from the Royal Logistics Corps, Explosive Ordnance branch, and it's their remit to deal with dangerous explodey things.  Conrad wishes them well of it, as this bomb is going to be potentially perilous to tackle.  Explosives can decompose into desperately unstable derivatives over time, and this thing's had plenty of time.
     Anyway, that's purely by way of an illustration.  What I really wanted to go on about was something completely different.  Back to Project Orion!  Art?

On wings of fire.  Literally.

     You can see the salient features of this vessel.  Up front is the payload and crew, and at rear, the pusher plate that collects energy from a nuclear warhead detonated a precise distance behind.  Yesterday we dealt with the launch of such a spaceship, this being done by having the first bomb at the bottom of a shaft.  The fallout residue would probably be quite low, as the bomb would create a camouflet, rather than a crater, thus limiting the amount of debris.

An example of same.

     Problems arise with the second detonation, which will be at height, this varying with how large the warhead and how massive the spaceship.  If over, say, a mile high, then you're going to get transient electro-magnetic pulse issues, meaning that you'll destroy everything electronic beneath you in a very large footprint.  So, hello Utah; you need somewhere remote to launch your Orion ship, especially as you don't want nearby curious civilians to be looking at the shuttle when it detonates it's next nuclear round.  You'd better also post launch schedules in advance, the better to warn people not to look at the heavens if they hear the world's biggest drum being hit.

Perfect!

     Then there's the problem of the neighbours.  Not literal neighbours.  Just that the Ruffians and the Populous Dictatorship would both vehemently protest at Orion shuttles being launched, since these things will be carrying a "fuel" that could be used to atom-bomb from orbit.  Tsar Putin would put himself in the South Canadian's shoes and expect them to drop a hundred and twenty fusion warheads all over his dominion, because that's how Dimya thinks.
     Which is getting worryingly close to Politics, so we shall end here.
     Motley!  Let's play Bomb Disposal Squad.  You can be the technician and I'll set up the Diarrhoea Detonation Device.

Again, This Will All Make Sense On Facebook -
Here we have a lady called - Tina.

That is all.

Hermes Hating
That is, the Greek god of transportation, not the parcel delivery service. 
     This morning did not start well.  I had over-compensated with my alarm clock and it went off at 05:33.  I groaned, turned the lights on and promptly fell asleep again.  So much for getting up and out of The Mansion five minutes earlier.
     Then my laptop had frozen, which requires restarting it and patiently establishing an internet connection and equally patiently waiting for the webpages to load again.  Only then could I repost yesterday's little instalment of wonder*.

A Boojum tree.  Well I never.

     Thus it was that I reached the main road at 06:18 and decided to head uphill to the bus stop outside the Pleasant Inn.
     "I should be alright," I boldly stated.  "The 409 is always a few minutes late."
     Not today it wasn't.  No, it was right on time and Your Humble Scribe saw it go sailing past whilst he was still on the other side of the road.  Then I had to endure a 20 minute wait until the next one turned up.  Because, yes, it was a couple of minutes late.
     Bah!

Sounds Unlikely
"Concertina", Vulnavia, was a Cryptic Crossword solution this morning, which naturally had Your Humble Scribe pondering on what, exactly, a concertina is.  Art?

Think "Baby accordion"

     You pump the bellows and press those buttons to create music.  Invented by Mister Wheatstone of This Sceptred Isle in 1829.  The name itself comes from "Concert" and the diminutive ending "-ina".  If you've ever seen "Prometheus" then you'll have seen Idris Elba's character playing one.
     Oh - the Teutons claim to have 'independently' invented the concertina in 1834, when everyone knows they simply stole OUR idea, the curs.  I bet this is behind their reasons for being jealous of the British Empire; a place in the sun and baby accordions**.

This Will All Make Sense On Facebook -
Allow me to introduce one of the most disgusting utensils ever invented in the history of humanity.  Art?

Behold.

     The Spittoon <goes away feeling ill>.


Finally -
Whilst poking around in my Gigantic Collection Of Military History Books, I came across Sydney Jary's "18 Platoon", which I have been meaning to locate and re-read.  It is definitely a classic, and once I've read it again I think I'll begin from scratch and annotate it, because - Anorak.
     I then wondered what it was going for on Abebooks, having a vague recollection that I got it at a far lower price than most vendors were asking and HOLY HECK HOW MUCH!?!?

Mine is in better condition

     The cheapest one on Abebooks is down for £183.81 PLUS £57 for posting, which is an unbelievable rip-off since it's a small, light hardback that ought to come in for well under a tenner.  Someone is chancing it there, matey.  The highest price is £255 PLUS £15 posting, for which someone can go get stuffed.
     Conrad is definitely hanging on to his volume!
 *  BOOJUM! of course. 
**  This is my thesis.  You may disagree, in which case THE EXIT DOOR IS THAT WAY!