The Zombie Apocalypse Is Here

Not The Real Thing, Obviously! 

Or it would be a lot noisier out on the streets as people ignored the lockdown in order to flee the rampaging undead hordes, with the odd person waving a placard that said "Zombie HOXE! Guverment is lyeing to you!!" because spelling and grammar are not at the forefront of conspiranoid loonwaffle skillsets.

Zombies!  Or ballfoot game hooligans*.

     No, what I refer to is one of the bagful of books I purchased in Cheadle a couple of weeks ago, and if Art can pause his sucking out the innards of that nuclear fuel rod -

     At only £1.00 it would have been rude not to buy it, so I did.  It's what you might call an "Epistolatory" novel, in that it consists of the journals, blogs, diaries, e-mails and official reports instead of a third-person narrative.  What's more, it boasts nineteen authors who all write separate vignettes about the progress of the apocalypse as it begins, starting small and escalating.  There is no list of chapter titles at the novel's beginning, perhaps to avoid nudging you out of the sense of place (genius locii, I belive it's called); instead it comes at the very end on the last page.  Much to my surprise, there's Christopher Fowler, author of the "Bryant and May" detective novels.  Art?

     I hate to put you out, Art, but can we possibly have a portrait of the author himself?  If it's not too much trouble.

Spiffing

     This semi-index at the back notes which pages each of the nineteen author's contribution begins at, which would be helpful if the pages actually had, y'know, numbers on them.  Art?

Evidence of the lack.

     Alas and alack.  Your Humble Scribe is now half-way through the book, at which point I decided it might have been a good idea to have marked the pages with their correct numbers.  O well.
     Motley!  we're going to play a game of blindfold tig, with you being given a nice sharp cutlass, and the other players will be zombies.  Let the fun commence!

"So, There I Was, Just Minding My Own Business ..."

Wildlife photographers here in Perfidious Albion don't have to worry about some of the more exotic threats to life and limb that exist elsewhere.  There aren't any lethal creepy-crawlies here, and only one person I've ever met has ever seen a snake; you aren't likely to get savagely mauled by a badger (cute British version not the homicidal psychopathic South Canadian bag of teeth and talons), and indeed most wildlife will run the instant it gets the chance.

What idiot decided that the creature to starboard would also be called a "Badger"?

     Not so, of course, in South Canada, especially in the remoter parts of that enormous country, which happens to be quite a lot of it.  There are tarantulas, and endless snakes, and bobcats and wolves - and bears.

     There are rules about how to behave with bears.  Don't startle them, don't get close to their kills, don't threaten their cubs.  They will then generally avoid you.

     Generally.  Art?

"O hai"

     Bear just stood there looking at the river, the birds wheeling around, fish splashing in the water, taking in the ambience.  It then sat down and looked all around for a few minutes, then ambled off again once the scenery had begun to pall.

"Ize just takun the wayte off"

     Perhaps it was the hippyest of all hippy bears, more laidback than all three of the Hair Bear Bunch put together.  Certainly not what you expect to see every day.

**

The Rock, The Rock, How It Doth Interlock

For Lo! we are back on the Eddystone Lighthouse again, being at the point where the second lighthouse has gone up in flames in 1755.  The Eddystone Rocks were far too dangerous to leave unlit, so a Mister Smeaton was charged with building a lighthouse on the rocks.  No hasty or improvised job this; he took inspiration from nature, having the lighthouse resemble the trunk of a tree, thickest at the base, tapering to the top, and making extensive use of concrete that would set underwater.  Art!

     Here you can see cross-sections through the tower at different heights, showing how the granite and limestone blocks dovetailed into each other to create an immensely strong structure horizontally and with dowels to stabilise it vertically.  The quality of the work was so high that it lasted for almost 120 years and was only superceded because wave action had eroded the rock at it's base, making it rock slightly when large waves hit.  Which must have amused the keepers within no end.

     Smeaton's Tower, as it became known, was honourably retired by 1877, being mostly dismantled and rebuilt ashore, where it has become a tourist attraction. 

     "Mostly", since the base proved to be too robustly constructed to dismantle, and it's still out there on the Eddystone Rocks.  That, Vulnavia, is what they call a quality build.

The World's Most Expensive And Dangerous Alarm Clock

It is a truism that life in the military consists of long periods of utter tedium, interspersed with moments of sheer terror, that latter being what us folks safely ensconced in civvy street like to read about.  During the tedium part, however, soldiers alleviate the boredom by being mildly horrid to each other, to the great amusement of anyone who's not the butt of the joke in question.

     Take this chap, for example.  Art?

    He has unwisely chosen to fall asleep in front of his comrades, who, as you can see, are preparing to fire their monstrous bit of kit.  Do they warn him or waken him?  They do not!  See below -

     A very rude awakening

     And of course everyone else is laughing at him.  He got up and jogged around a little after his alarm call, and took it in good stead.  But beware, chaps, because he now has reason to get a little revenge ...     

And with that,we are done!

*  Take your pick.

**  Note that these perverts HAVE NO PANTS OR UNDERWEAR!