This Is Going To Take A While -
So bear with me. Firstly, you are not imagining things. At least one would hope not, given that it's 10:13 in the morning and it's a bit too soon to be going at the sherry just yet. Doubtless you are either pinching yourself or are having discomodious thoughts about Conrad being at the sherry himself*. Not so. Your Humble Scribe is a-swill with tea and porridge, and that's it.
O - and plutonium. But let's not get into that ....
Where were we? O yes. Doubtless you are suffering a bit of discordance, trying to picture the sternly Puritan Oliver Cromwell in a feathered hat, laughing gaily as he trips the light fantastic o'er the dance floor, sneaking sly glances at the ladies stockings -
WRONG! WRONGWRONGWRONG! <chokes a bit> wrong. Art?
For this is the Cromwell I refer to. The tank.
Interestingly, as an aside, the Irish army tended in the past to buy British tanks that were going out of service in the UK, because 1) they were thus cheap and 2) who on earth is going to invade Eire? I mean it's an island so you either mount an extensive and expensive amphibious invasion or do it by air, which is even more expensive, and then you have to spend a decade waging guerilla warfare, at the end of which you can proudly proclaim to have conquered a peat bog - and no, Conrad is pretty certain the UK was not silly enough to consider invading from Ulster. Anyway, the Irish army did buy several Churchill and Comet tanks. Would they have ever considered purchasing any <drum roll> Cromwells?
Another aside - way back in the days of the Sinister Union, they had a satirical magazine entitled "Krokodil", which as you may guess was the Ruffian for "Crocodile", and Conrad even managed to buy a couple of issues, as very few news outlets in Gomorrah-in-the-Irwell were retailing copies.
The frankly terrifying Churchill Crocodile
No, sorry, forgive me, Shelli - a crocodile. Intrepid chap, that.
Where were we? O yes, the "We Have Ways -" podcast, where Jim and Al were visiting 'Track and Wheel", whose business lies in restoring and running old British army kit from the Second Unpleasantness.
"That's a Cavalier," explained Tobin, whose business it is. Art?
You may be forgiven for mistaking this particular AFV for the Cromwell, when it is in fact the almost identical Cavalier A24, not the A27M. Quite a different beast to the Centaur A27L - Art?
As Al pointed out, this was the only tank operated by the Royal Navy, if you define the RN rather broadly. It was used as a Close Support tank by the Royal Marine Commandos from D-Day onwards, mounting a 3.8" howitzer rather than a 75 mm gun, and it was powered by a Liberty engine instead of the Cromwell's Meteor.Wildly different!
There we are. It took a while, but we got there.
That "G" Word
I never did reveal what bizarre word beginning with the seventh letter of the alphabet came drifting up from the turbid depths of my mind, did I?
Was it "Gaugamela", the epic battle that Alexander Meglos fought and won in 331 BC?
Nope.
Was it "Guatemala", the most populous of Central American nations, whose name means "Many trees"?
Nope.
Okay, okay, I can see your patience wearing thin as I recite what it's not. The word was "Galindranome" and of course it's complete nonsense and doesn't exist in the real world**. However ... if we omit a couple of letters and I actually meant "Galindrome" then -
You get this. Trust me, try it yourselves.
"Potrzebie"
There are two groups of people who will recognise this word: South Canadians and Poles. The latter because it's Polish, the former because it crops up in the backrounds of "Mad" magazine. Or - is it a comic? Your views may vary***.
It means "A need", and was spotted by the magazine's editor, being on an advisory note contained in an aspirin bottle that featured lots of foreign languages. Art?
Conrad is also rather relieved to find it's an actual word and not the suspicious product of his fervid imagination, because - you know, Galindranome.
Quickly, Vulnavia! Flood the Anti-Locomotive ditch with the lava effluent, for I hear the sinister sound of steam engines a-circling!
KEEP YOUR DISTANCE! WE HAVE MISSILES!
Finally -
Well, all we need is a short article to round things off and then I might be virtuous and take the dog for a swim, it being that kind of day. The lights have been on all day long, it being so dank and dark. That is, providing Edna wants to go walkies; if it's really belting down she sits and stares at you when the back door is opened, with that "Yes, foolish human?" expression.
Let's spoof a horror trope!
The setting: an abandoned lunatic asylum, long derelict, is being demolished by a gang of workmen. It is getting dark and they are trying to scare each other.
FIRST WORKMAN: - and her ghost can be seen walking up and down that corridor.
SECOND WORKMAN: She'll be hard put to haunt it now,we pulled it all down yesterday.
THIRD WORKMAN: What about the madman they bricked-up in the cellar?
FOURTH WORKMAN: No, he bricked himself in.
FIRST WORKMAN: That makes no sense.
FOURTH WORKMAN: Mad, you see.
FIRST WORKMAN <makes wobbly noise>: They're coming to get you, Barbara!
SECOND WORKMAN: Streisand or Hershey?
FOURTH WORKMAN: and by the time he'd changed his mind, the mortar had set.
<night descends>
SECOND WORKMAN <flicks a wall-mounted switch and their generator-powered lights cut in>: Fiat lux!
FIRST WORKMAN: Eh? We're on about cars now?
And with that we are done done done!
A fixer-upper
* As if! Sherry, as is well known, is loathsome to the taste buds. I once flavoured a milkshake with sherry. It was vile.
** REALITY IS BORING
*** And are wrong.
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