We'll See How This Watery Theme Goes

On Sunday We Were Haranguing You With Words About Water

Tonight (for it is the night before the 21st October) I am typing up the blog whilst listening to "Tales From Topographic Oceans", which is probably the zenith or nadir of Seventies Prog Rock courtesy of Yes, depending on your perspective.  Plus, I was getting an overview of the Sayano Shushenskaya Dam disaster, which is rather too long and complicated to be gone into here.  Maybe at a later date.  Art?

No laughing matter

     Okay, let us now return to annoying Frank and the Count, because Your Relentlessly Logical Pedant wishes to further analyse another line from that standard "Fly Me To The Moon", to wit:

"And let me see what spring is like

On Jupiter and Mars"

     NO!  This would be outrageously dangerous, not least because we currently have no way to safely carry human crew or passengers to either of these destinations, so you'd have to wing it*.  Besides, Jupiter's seasons are almost indistinguishable from each other because it has such a small 'axial tilt', which is both what causes the planet's seasons and an awesome name for a band.   Art?

"Hello Shea Park! - are you ready to rock?"

     Conrad can tell you what spring, or any other season for that matter, on Mars would be like: very cold and severely lacking in atmosphere (1% that of Earth's) and what there is is unbreathable carbon dioxide.  If you're lucky it might not fall below -1000C.  Art?

Red hot it's not

     Returning to that theme of water, Mars might be dry as dust today, yet there is a whole lot of evidence that in the remote past (and we're talking millions of years here) it was so wet that citizens of Perfidious Albion would have felt right at home.

     Motley!  Remember that scammy Dutch project a few years back that was going to fund people's travel and life on Mars thanks to teh interwebz?  Well, you're going to be just such a pioneer!  We've got a rocket and buckets of food and water -

MOT1's skilled technical team add the finishing touches

Meanwhile, Back In Andersonland -

Conrad read a post by Christopher Fowler yesteryon about buildings that resemble designs from Thunderbirds - the author of the "Bryant And May" series of murder-mysteries, you uncultured bafoons - and remembered a Youtube clip about a Self-Propelled Gun that was clearly designed by people who grew up with and were influenced by Thunderbirds.  Gerry Anderson's long reach as a futurologist remains.  Art?

The Beast banging away

     This is the 'Archer' self-propelled gun, doing what it was designed to do.  I think we need a picture of what it looks like in travelling-mode, before it swings into action.  Art, source me a picture.

      Looks pretty innocuous, doesn't it?  You may notice that it's wheeled, which is a lot more common amongst SPGs than it used to be, given the increased cross-country performance of wheeled military vehicles (which are also a lot cheaper than tracked ones).

Before

     Here the beast has come to a standstill.  Take careful note of where everything sits, as there will be a test later.

     The gun-barrel emerges from it's cradle, and the hydraulic spade lowers at rear, to give a more secure and stable firing platform.

     The gun-barrel (my fingers keep writing 'gin-barrel'!) now extends fully and someone somewhere is about to have a bad hair day.  Given that Sweden has a couple of dozen of these things, those roguish Norse and Finns had better watch out.

     Having dropped a ton of ordnance on the opposition, the gun-barrel now retracts and lowers into the cradle, which you can see open here.  Once affixed, it won't get jolted around or acquire gunk in the muzzle.  After a whole 30 seconds the Archer is ready to drive off.  And for those at the receiving end ...

"YOU ARE IN A NO-PARKING ZONE.  MOVE ON IMMEDIATELY.
YOU HAVE FOURTEEN SECONDS TO COMPLY."

"FOURTEEN - THIRTEEN - THREETWOONE -**"

     TFTO is still going strong in the background, if you were interested.

"The Parable Of The Talents" By Octavia Butler

Having bought this ages ago, Your Humble Scribe has now made an effort to read it, and read it most sternly, not letting up for an hour at a time.  Art?

     Conrad is somewhat surprised neither this, nor the prequel, haven't been turned into a film or television series.  It covers issues of race, gender, religion, demagogues, poverty, ecological damage, drugs and other meaty concepts, all things that one presumes issue-driven producers would love, except it's done in an intelligent and adult way rather than beating one over the head with polemics.  Then again, given that it was written 22 years ago and yet positively mirrors current society, perhaps a little too politically-charged.
     

You may well smile, madam; Conrad does not praise lightly

     Sadly there will be no third volume as Oct died back in 2006, though there are notes and outlines for it, so some brave soul may take it upon themselves.

     As she did with "Parable of the Sower", Oct  introduces another exceptionally horrid product of 2035: the slave-collar.  This is an electronic system that allows the person with a control belt to torture their slaves, indefinitely, without killing them (usually), at the touch of a switch.  Brrrr!

Brickman

Sounds like a rather bargain-basement superhero, right?  "He can turn himself into bricks to fight crime!" (and also carry out minor housing repairs).

      Sorry, no.  We are talking about a licenced Lego construction practitioner here, one Ryan McNaught, whom is a member of a very small brotherhood of 13 other people officially licensed to Build Big Things With Lego.   Art?

     This is a model of the Colosseum, in two halves.  Closer to us, the observer, is the Colosseum as it stands today, rather broken-down and forlorn.  The other, more distant half, is the building in it's heyday, complete with spectators and gladiators (and a wild bear coming out of a trapdoor if you look closely enough).  Because I know you like to hear the statistical side of things (or is that just me?), this beast contains 200,000 bricks.  Art?

From the other perspective

     No information about how long it took to put together, but Conrad confidently calculates at least three, possibly four, hours.

     And with that, we are exceedingly done!

*  Do you - O you do.

**  Alex Murphy is probably frowning at this.  No, Alex - it's made by BAE Systems, not OCP!