O Frabjous Dey

Stick With Me For This One

For, as is quite common with Intros, this one meanders a tad.  Nor is that title a typo - you are only alive at this moment because my Remote Nuclear Detonator is getting it's fifty-thousand victim service - as we shall see shortly.  Or maybe longly. It depends how voluble I feel.

The Jabberwocky gets scragged.  Not a very frabjous day for it.

     You ought to know that there is that line in Carroll's "Jabberwocky" when an elderly lunatic enthuses about the extinction of said creature, "Oh Frabjous day!  Callooh!  Callay!"  This seems to mark 'frabjous' as having the same meaning as 'A red letter day', if in slightly more succinct form.

     Now, I have been educating you of late about the artwork gracing the early to mid-term albums of Blue Oyster Cult, while they were still creatively hot.  What does this have to do with Mister Dodgson and his nonsense verse?  Art!

CAUTION! Does note make a good domestic pet

     Conrad was always impressed by this picture, which turns out to be a detail from another artwork that had nothing to do with BOC.  Art!

     "Behemoth's World" is the title of this artwork, and it was painted by the prolific British artist Richard Clifton-Dey, from whence today's intercostal pain caused by the hilarity comes from.  Richard painted covers for innumerable sci-fi paperbacks back in the Seventies, lots of which Your Humble Scribe recognised.   Art!

     Let us see the original artwork, unsullied by any intrusive texts.  Art!

     I have no idea, before you crowd around and ask questions.  Hang on - okay, that character above is 'Scully', who grew up in an orbital environment, which explains why he is so etiolated and why he needs an exo-skeleton to survive.  You can't deny it's an intriguing picture, one which would pique the interest of casual browsers, and yet the publishers 95% probably didn't credit Richard, because that's how they behaved in those days.  The dirty curs.  Let's have another.  Art!

     This is one of Asimov's 'juveniles', written under a pseudonym: Paul French.  He adopted this as the novels were going to be adapted into a television series, which he suspected would be dire, and he didn't want his real name associated with them.  One last one!

     I actually owned this edition, which had some rather macabre short stories within, and once again I bet they never credited Richard.  Let us in recompense have the full, unexpurgated version.  Art!

     As you can see, details are less pronounced near the top of the picture, since that's where the publishers stick both title and author.  You can't always be certain they'll actually do this, nor be sensible about font sizes, as you can see in ASIHT.
     Right!  I think we've gotten enough out of a tangent that sprang from a tangent, let's throw Art some coal and get back to BOOJUM!  Motley, break out the porcupines and chainsaws, we're going to practice juggling - right after I finish this bucket of gin.

Point, Click And Laugh

I am sure you are all well aware of those repellent Indian call centres that try to scam the elderly and technically-unaware.  As we have mentioned on a few past occasions, there are some keyboard warriors out there who endeavour to turn the tables on these repulsive people and organisations, at the very least outing them and destroying their anonymity, and at times deleting tens of thousands of the scammer's files.  Art!

Enter - PIEROGI!

     This chap is quite infamous on teh Interwebz for trolling or emasculating scam call centres.  He uses a voice-altering microphone so he sounds both elderly and female, which are big tick marks in the scammer's mind.  However, he is also an internet and computer whiz, far more adept with IT than the script-following scammers.  The most recent of his Youtube uploads showed his dark satanic skill at back-tracking a scam caller to their location in Kolkata, indeed to their precise address, then in asking if they wanted to chat with him.  Art!

     Wicked Pierogi is actually able to speak and understand Hindi, which is why we have this translation of what the unfortunate scammer, his colleagues and his boss were saying.  Pierogi also promised to send their details to the Lucknow cyber-police, since the scammers were incautious enough to let slip that's where they were.

     O those files that get deleted?  These will have been obtained via the dark web from criminal gangs, and to get that list back, or a new one - they will have to pay.  It's also deliciously hilarious to hear a scammer, who has spent ninety minutes on the phone with whom he thinks is a feeble-minded old woman, eventually realising he's been scammed himself and that no gift cards or wire transfers or simple cash are coming.   They get so angry!

There's a story there

     Go and check out his Youtube Channel, ScammerPayback, which does exactly what it says on the tin.

"Seashaken Houses" By Tom Nancollas

As you ought to know by now, Your Humble Scribe has a modest interest in marine lighthouses, as opposed to the ones that sit politely and safely ashore.  We have covered them sporadically, and Conrad is now beginning Tom's more experience-based work, which is definitely not simply an engineering treatise.  One would hope not, as such would be exceedingly dull.  He anticipates a journey around This Sceptred Isle visiting seven totemic lighthouses, beginning, of course - obviously! - with the Eddystone.  Art!

Eddystone as is

Finally -

That volcano in Iceland?  Since it erupted in March it has become a popular tourist attraction, with music videos and weddings being recorded against it's pyroclastic posturings.  All this may have rendered people a tad complacent, as in the case of a Youtuber called Joey Helms, whose surname proved to be utterly false.  Joey, you see, was flying a camera-drone over the volcano, when he swung the helm about and headed into the erupting geyser of magma at the very heart of Fagradalfjall.  Art!

FAIL

     One hopes it wasn't his very bestest drone, as there are now only vapours remaining.  Iceland - for a nation with a name like that, it has some very, very hot spots.

     And with that I think we are done <checks> Yes we are!