The Word Is Absurd

In Fact, Where Does "Absurd" Come From?
Since I am back in my mancave, let me consult my Collins Concise -
     A bit of background here.  Before I started working with my still-anonymous employer as of July 2017, I was temping for a month with Tameside Children's Services, which was fascinating if also unremittingly grim.  Towards the end of my time there, they were binning whole sets of dictionaries and thesauri, so I asked if I could liberate a dictionary?  The answer was a resounding "Yes", because otherwise it was going in a skip*.  Hence my dictionary.  Art?

A good two-and-a-half inches thick

     Anyway, "Absurd".  Ah, as I thought.  From Old French via Latin - "Ab-" as an intensifier, and "Surdus" which means "dull sounding".
     What I meant to say was that I've gone back to my whacking big book of puzzles, and am slowly trawling through the "Word Power" section, where they had some ridiculous anagrams based on photographs that were wildly ambiguous.  That's the absurd bit.  What I would like to concentrate on is the Jigsquare puzzle, which I smashed.  Art?

No apologies for it being sideways; this means you can see the whole thing

     You can see my successful solution in that grid there.  You have to create eight four-letter words, and have a clue to each of them.  "Ice Arena", for example, was "RINK" and you can use the jigsquare pieces to see where it ought to fit.
     I see Blogger's iniquitous spell-checker doesn't like "jigsquare", which means I'm going to use it as often as possible**.
     Right, motley, time to put the kettle on and get ready to noodle out!

We Revisit Bricks
A moment's silence, please, for Den of Geek's long article on 16 really difficult (and expensive!) Lego builds, because we now come to the next to last one.  Art?

This is the Grand Carousel

     This kit comes in at 3,263 pieces and has an electric motor that spins the carousel around whilst also playing music, so you too can experience all the tat of a fairground in your living room, without having to worry about the weather.
     You might want to sit down now, because I've looked up what kind of price you'd pay for this, and the most expensive one on e-bay is <waitforitwaitforit> £3,058.50.  Blimey.  At that price you could by the real thing.  But you'd have trouble fitting it into your lounge.
     Tomorrow we see the final kit in this series - the Death Star!
When Animals Attack
Ha!  Gotcha.  In reality this ought to be titled "When Animals Come To Sleep In A Despondent And Disgusted Pose On Your Man-Cave Floor".  For yes, we are talking about Edna the Entitled here.  Art?

      There she is, the very picture of neglected misery, thanks to us Wicked Neglectful Humans not playing with her and her i) squeaky toy or ii)  her ball, because we are wicked, and neglectful, and also human***.  "When Animals Guilt-Attack" is more apt.
The 50 Best Sci-Fi Shows Of All Time
And now we hit Number 47.  The people who created this feature are from "Rolling Stone", which I understand to be a South Canadian magazine of some sort.  Probably to do with music and popular culture. 
     Anyway, if Art can put down his bowl of coal -

I say, Art, jolly well done!

     There you have the Tracy brothers, and all the Thunderbirds, and Lady Penelope <swoons a little> and Parker and the pink Rolls Royce that bristled with very unladylike weapons, and of course EXPLOSIONS! which is probably what Conrad remembers best about this programe, lots and lots of huge EXPLOSIONS - 
     <pauses so his pulse can settle down>
     Okay, this was a very moral program, our resident futurologist Gerry Anderson having a rather benevolent view of the future: the Tracy family operated to save lives, and avoided the use of deadly force unless forced into it as a last resort.  International Rescue were a highly-secret organisation that carried out rescue operations beyond the capability of conventional emergency services, with the capacity to operate in space, on land or under the oceans.  Given that their technology was so far ahead of anything else on the planet, Jeff Tracy was understandably paranoid about anyone being able to copy it.  The Bereznik Republic, which is what Ruffia morphs into, apparently, would do ANYTHING to lay their hands on IR's kit.  As would that bottomhole The Hood, because then he could sell it for top dollar.
     You see?  You see how difficult it can be, saving the world a bit at a time?

Hiram Hackenbacker III - the genius behind the kit

     We shall ignore the most recent film.

"The Battle Of Britain" By James Holland
Finished this last night, and an epic read it was.  Ol' Jim took a broad view on a deep subject, dealing not merely with the aerial combat over This Sceptred Isle, but the naval war as well, and politics in the corridors of power, too.  He also has plenty of mention for Bomber Command, who usually get short shrift when the BoB is discussed, which is very unfair.  Art?
        

     That's an Armstrong Whitley and a Blenheim bomber, which were what the RAF were using in the summer and autumn of 1940.  They bombed Berlin, which infuriated the living daylights out of Herr Schickelgruber, and also Goering, who had promised that no enemy bombers would ever dare to bomb Berlin.  They were continually making sneak hit-and-run attacks on the Teuton airstrips across the Channel, not doing a lot of damage but ensuring that Teuton pilots got as little sleep as possible.  They also bombed the "invasion" barges that had been collected for the imminent "invasion" of Perfidious Albion and sank 10% of them.  Which is rather a lot for a fleet that hadn't even put to sea.

They also flew these puppies: Handley-Page Hampdens

     These last look a bit narrow; I don't think I'd ever fit in one of these.
     Anyway, it's an impressive work, and I'll be illustrating that with some commentary on it.  Probably tomorrow.

And with that, we are done!

*  A "Dumpster" for our South Canadian cousins.
**  Heh.
***  Stretching a point with me, but whatever.