Like A Deuce

This Is A Tangent
And it does come from some of the lyrics to "Blinded By The Light", which we will be getting around to, don't you worry.
     The "Deuce" is referred to as being "revved", which Conrad has interpreted as thus being that iconic South Canadian truck the GMC 21/2 ton.  Art!

Presto

     These things were one of the reasons the Allies so consistently out-performed the Teutons; to move your logistics you need vehicles, and the South Canadians produced nearly 800,000 of these beasts.  Significantly, 200,000 were sent to the Sinisters during wartime, putting the Red Army on wheels and shortening the war on the Eastern Front by between eight to twelve months.
     Here's another aside.  I recall the tale of an South Canadian war correspondent on the Eastern Front, with an accompanying South Canadian colonel, who were in a column of 2 1/2 tonners full of Ruffian soldiers.  One of these soldiers was loudly boasting how good Sinister machinery was, and proudly lifted the bonnet of his own truck to demonstrate, revealing the "Studebaker" marque.  The correspondent wisely advised the colonel to let the matter drop.

The Studebaker version

     Gaze upon my werks, ye Teuton generals.  The Wehrmacht, which Goebbels had played up as a mighty mechanised juggernaut, was only 20% mechanised at best.  Rather than a gigantic amount of homogenous transport a la Detroit, theirs was cobbled together from the whole of occupied Europe, which meant an absolute nightmare for maintenance and spare parts.
     Just wait; I bet Bruce is on record as saying BBTL's "Deuce" is the playing card.
     Well, it's gotten us this far.  Motley!  I have replaced the paint in these paintballs with nitro-glycerine.  Let's see what happens, hmmmmm?

Yeah, probably this

Back To Our Little Musical Critique
O I do so enjoy these!  The artists in question, probably not so much.  Why, Bruce is looking a bit nervous and hiding behind a cushion.  Stand up and take it like a man, Bruce!

Madman drummers bummers

Ah, I see - we are being inclusive here, are we?

Indians in the summer with a teenage diplomat

Diplomats have a long career trajectory and are never teenagers.  Minus one point.

In the dumps with the mumps as the adolescent pumps

Hugely unlikely thanks to MMR vaccination.

His way into his hat

I'm not sure about this.  It sounds kind of dirty.

With a boulder on my shoulder, feelin' kinda older

O poetic, hmmm?  A boulder rather than a chip.  And everybody ages.

I tripped the merry-go-round

IS THIS A DRUGS REFERENCE!!

With this very unpleasin', sneezin' and wheezin'

How prescient.  And apt at this time.

The calliope crashed to the ground

Will this seriously impact it's resale value?

The calliope crashed to the ground!

WE HEARD YOU THE FIRST TIME

     
      Like me, you are - O thanks, Art.

A calliope

     It is an instrument powered by steam, and next to a cannon, was probably the loudest thing people had heard before electric amps. So, if it crashed to the ground there's a good chance clouds of scalding steam would be emitted, putting passers-by at risk.  Thank you for bringing this serious safety hazard to attention, Bruce.  See, that wasn't too bad, was it?  You can even put the cushion down.

Top 50 Sci-Fi Television Shows #18: "Orphan Black"
Your Humble Scribe has heard of this in a vague sense, something about clowns?

O - clones.  Sorry.

     It sounds frightfully worthy, dealing with the ethical and moral and social issues that come with cloning people <yawns> which also sounds rather dull and bland and issue-of-the-month.  Long gone now, it did give an awesome acting platform for Tatyana Maslany, who played umpteen clones, and she won lots of awards.  They mix in conspiracy plots as well, with an Evil Corporation behind it all.  Isn't it always*?
     I dunno.  "Wynona Earp" doesn't take itself seriously, which I like.  Plus, how many explosions does OB possess, hmmmm?  Conrad has read the synopsis and wasn't remotely blown away, nor even nudged a bit.

O dear - I upset Tatyana

    
Erk!
Bear with me for a little trip through my mind.  You - ah - might want to imitate Brucie and hide behind a cushion -
     Okay, I was looking at Marketa's list of idiomatic Czech words not found in the phrase books, and the next one was -
     "Baracnik"
     This means a person who has never lived anywhere but a house, which I would think is most of us?  Tent-living communities not being especially common in Western Europe.

I have no idea, except that it's in Czech

     Of course, in Conrad's head that word is suspiciously similar to "Bereznik".
     The Republic of Bereznik consists of Eastern Germany, Czechoslovakia**, Ukraine and Poland and was hammered together after yet another European war (these things happen every so often when people run out of interesting things to do).  It is rigidly Communist, frothingly anti-Western and wants nothing more than to see South Canada wiped out.  Whilst this might sound like Tsar Putin's version of Ruffia, it's actually from the pages of TV21 comic and won't actually happen for another 44 years.  Art?

Some of their kit

     The worrying thing is, there really IS a Bereznik, since it came up when we were looking for suitable illustrations, and wouldn't you know it, the place is in Ruffia.  Art?

In the far North

     Let's just hope it's far enough ...

     O and you can put that cushion down now.


*  And the lead bad guy is probably British.
**  Forgive me, Marketa!