How Weir Is That?

I'm Warning You - This Tazer Is Charged
And that's not a spelling mistake.  You ought to know by now that Conrad is sufficiently a spelling and grammar Nazi to at least avoid making errors in his own compositions - despite what Blogger's somewhat, shall we say "idiosyncratic" spellchecker throws up as incorrect.
     No, I put that word "Weir" because that's what I intended talking about: weirs.  And this became a topic because Your Humble Scribe came across another interesting Youtube channel - "Practical Engineering".  As you ought to know, Conrad does have an interest in civil engineering, in his own rather dilettantish way.  Art?

The weir on the River Irwell in Salford

     If Conrad was driving home from his job at Connexions, I would get a glimpse of the weir above for about a second, and would always wonder exactly what it was there for; it stops any traffic from using the river in both directions, right?
     Well, Our Host on Practical Engineering stated that it's a water control issue, upstream.  The weir backs water up, giving a deeper river upstream and thus potentially making it navigable; without a weir it might well be too shallow for boats to use.  Art?

     And there's that word "Flume" again - hey, you want to talk about getting bitten by the Coincidence Hydra AGAIN?  - Art!

     From one I did earlier this afternoon.  Sheesh!  It's getting so a chap cannot sit down comfortably thanks to teeth fastened firmly in one's nethers.
     Okay, from weird back to weirs.  PE put up a picture of their weir with transparent walls, so you could see the amount of water backed up and flowing over the weir itself.  Next our host demonstrated how to increase the flow across the weir - what is classed as the "rating curve" - by changing how much weir there is.  Art?

     A flatter rating curve means the weir can cope with a wider range of water levels, which is what you want, especially in This Sceptred And Frequently Sodden Isle.  There are variations on this approach, with the apty-named "Piano-key Weir", which, if Art will put down his bowl of coal -

     Classy, hmmm?
     So there we are, all of us are now better-informed than we were five minutes ago.
     Motley, fancy a paddle?  Not, of course, in our local flooded quarry as that would be unsafe*.

BOOJUM! Atypically Tackles A Current Affair
Normally we steer clear of Politics, Religion or Current Affairs, except when we can annoy Tsar Putin, who seems to confuse the first two with his person.
     Anyway, Conrad came up with a name for the swivel-eyed loonwaffles who have been burning down mobile phone masts and issuing death threats to the electrical engineers who service them: they are now the "Five Gees".  Art?

CAUTION!  Conspiranoid mindset can affect ability to use proper case

     Yes, in addition to being raving drivel, they appear to be mixing upper and lower case WHICH IS CRIME ENOUGH IN CONRAD'S EYES - I did mention that spelling and grammar Nazi thing, didn't I?
     "Why 'Five Gees' O elderly scribe?" I hear you question.  "Is this some in-joke about 'The Expanse'?**"
     Not at all, good call though.  No, it is because I have dubbed them "Grotesquely Gullible Garbage-Guzzling Gits" - five G's, which I have highlighted in case that was too subtle for you.  The 'Garbage-guzzling' refers to their mental consumption of woo.  You can picture the scene, can't you?

CLEMENT <On Facebook>: Get this, I was cruising the dark web because we'll need guns when civilisation collapses, and I came across a file that says any cure for Covid-19 will actually be full of nanobots.
FELICITY: OMG!!! what I want to know is what happened to the other 18 viruses
(Felicity is not very bright and has never learned to punctuate properly)
CLEMENT: And that's how They will not only know exactly where you are at all times, They'll know what you're doing.
FELICITY: were all goin to be robert drones
CLEMENT: Whose drones?
FELICITY: Sos meant robot drones OMG life will not be wort living
CLEMENT: Not unless you have a gun and a securely-fastened tinfoil hat.
FELICITY: woud a bike helmet painted with silver paint do insted???
BEATRICE: I think it's too late for you, Felicity.  
FELICITY:  OMG!!! wat can I do
BEATRICE: The only cure is to flush your system out with liquid plutonium and bath salts, whilst standing neck-deep in hydrocyanic acid.
FELICITY <Long pause before she replies>: I been checked the kithching cupboards and I have btah salts and balsamic vinegar will they do???

Sadly not

     Conrad awaits the day some of these 5Gees blow up a mobile phone mast, which falls upon them and kills them dead, at which their co-conspirators will all point and say "See!  We told you so!  5G is lethal!"

Back To That List Of Retro Monsters
Because I deliberately skipped over one of the titans of the genre, to wit: "The Invaders", which, if Art can put down his plutonium and bath salts -

     Conrad absolutely loved the television series, which was first broadcast way back when he was much smaller, and which he got to see again when it was repeated in the Nineties.  The central premise is that Earth has been infiltrated by aliens, who are plotting to get rid of us so they can flee their homeworld and settle here.  Hom. Sap. doesn't have a say in the matter.  David Vincent, an architect, takes a wrong turning one night whilst travelling alone in the backwoods of South Canada, and comes face-to-face with a flying saucer as it lands.

Bad guy with gun

     Dave has trouble persuading anyone of the truth about what he's seen, unsurprisingly - after all, would you believe him.  The invaders are also paranoid about their secret getting out; when they die, their bodies vapourise, leaving no evidence they were ever there.  Over time Dave does convince people he meets along the way, and in the second season he has some helpers.  It's always an uphill struggle, mind you, especially since you don't know who you can trust ...
      You can spot some of the Invaders as they cannot bend their little finger, a consequence of donning human disguise.  They don't bleed if injured and don't manifest any emotions, rather like the taxman -

Frankly, chaps, you should be moving in the other direction, at speed.

     And with that we are done done done!


*  You might not get a paddle out of the Irwell by now, as they've been removing weirs from it over the past 7 years or so.  Just so you know.
**  They routinely use "#G" to denote acceleration.