Bear With Me On This One
Back in the First Unpleasantness, those dirty curs the Teutons would send U-boats through the Channel in order to get out into the Atlantic and sink Allied shipping. It was risky, since the World's Mightiest Navy - that is, the Royal Navy* - maintained all sorts of armed patrols on the sea and by airship above it, to prevent just this from happening. The alternative was to sail around the north of Scotland and Ireland, which was tremendously longer and almost as dangerous, given the sea and weather and how unseaworthy U-boats were.
Well, the unsporting Hun spoiled things by signing the Armistice in 1918, leaving only one tower built. O what to do with it?
Use it as a lighthouse! is the obvious response (or is it just me?). Art
So the completed tower was towed out to Nab Rock, off the Isle of Wight and out in the Solent, and the base was flooded to allow it to sink atop the rock and thus replace the aged lightship that had been there before. There was a bit of a list to the whole structure, which was slight yet noticeable. Art?
Towers under construction
Being lightish since 1920
You know, that would make a good setting for a 'Doctor Who' dramamentary, perhaps about the Sea Devils' return, although given modern sensibilities they'd have to be called the Sea Not-Angels or somesuch -
Anyway, it was given an extensive overhaul in 2013, being reduced in height and given a protective concrete cladding, in order that maintenance and repair helicopters can land safely on the roof helipad. It's not had a crew since 1983, as a result of lighthouse automation. I was minded of it when writing about the Saint John's Point lifehouse and how the locals don't want it's light being replaced with a modern LED version. Well, nobody's going to protest the Nab Rock being whanged around like billy-oh, are they, thanks to it being in the middle of the Channel? We have covered it earlier in BOOJUM!'s history, years ago, so I bet you've forgotten all about it and you're welcome.
Motley! Dig out a copy of that film "Day of the Triffids", for I feel the urge to see yet more lighthouse shenanigans!
The Nab Tower today
O Schadenfreude, Thy Name Is Conrad
As you should surely know by now, Your Humble Scribe likes nothing more than to savour a nice pudding of misery at other's expense, especially if it concerns the ballfoot game, since he 1) knows nothing about it, and 2) doesn't feel affection for any of the teams that play in the Permian Lager or the Campion Chip (spelling?)
Thus it brings a smile to my face and a laugh to my heart when the BBC foolishly allows a Have Your Say on a ballfoot game. Art?
In case your rheumy eyes cannot read that the response is "So dire they finished seventh two seasons running, now give Mummy her laptop back you little scamp and off to bed." The implication is, rather than being a grown adult with a responsible world-view and the ability to express same, they are in fact a seven-year old yet to develop an intellect. Quite crushing and amusing at the same time, and nary a swear word in sight. Conrad approves.
Don't ask me which teams they were, I've got no idea and care less than that.
"Jeeves In The Offing"
Conrad won't insult your intelligence by bothering to list the author. I have come across several peculiar expressions over the past couple of days - I've finished it, by the way - and made notes. This way, you don't need to slow down in puzzlement should you ever come across these yourself, and you're welcome.
"Espieglerie": neither a lorgnette nor decolletage, as Your Humble Scribe suspected. No, it means "vivacity", "liveliness", or, as Bertie Wooster would say of Bobbie Wickham, "a destructive force of nature".
 |
| A lorgnette (You are NOT getting any cleaveage-revealing shots of decolletage) |
CAUTION! Not to be taken above a milligram dose. No mugs to be used.
"Parasang": This is a unit of measurement from the ancient world, specifically Persia, where it was the distance a person could walk in a day. This seems like a really silly measurement. What if you were walking uphill against the wind in a rainstorm? What if you had really long legs? Or short legs? Or no legs? (discrimination against snails!) What if you were carrying a horse? (to give it a rest, before you ask).
I have more, which we'll go into at a later date. I promise.
Gadzooks!
Remember the crowing I did about coming across links to a Canadian online resource, which listed digitised records of the Royal Canadian Air Force in the Second Unpleasantness? And that they were FREE? Well, with a bit of judicious backtracking through the URL, what did Conrad find? Art!
There are hundreds of these digitised files there, totalling 1,353 reels of photos - no idea what any of them are about. Sheesh! The amount of stuff here is jaw-dropping. It would take a couple of days just to index them**.
Finally -
By divers means, Your Humble Scribe has been watching Season 2 of "The Boys", and has just finished Episode 4, "Nothing Like It In The World".
However ... SPOILERS AHEAD
NO REALLY SPOILERS
FINE IF YOU DON'T BELIEVE ME CARRY RIGHT ON
- back in Episode 3, "Over The Hill", we see Stormfront merrily massacre 59 people and injure hundreds more, all of which is blamed on the super-terrorist she was chasing.
Excuse me? Plot hole? None of the survivors or injured noticed that it was Stormfront doing the murdering? There was also a major clue in there about what she's really like, which you don't discover until Episode 4.
Now, I have - of course! (obviously) - read the whole comic book series, but the television series diverges sufficiently that this is no guide at all to what's going to happen next. Which is a good thing, unpredictability, chaos, all that jazz.
And with that we are O so very done!
* Of course - obviously!
** To you - an hideous torture. To Conrad - fun fun fun!
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