Is Something Of A Mystery For Your Humble Scribe
First of all, Conrad has very little sense of smell, not helped by a deviated septum, and this impacts the taste experience of what he eats - perhaps why he likes aged blue cheese, sauerkraut and tinned fish so much* - which is one way to define "Good Taste".
Let us now change tack completely, in order to be able to add in a click-baity picture (which is also the epitomy of good taste in culture). Art!
For Lo! Your Humble Scribe is now up to episode 5 of "Farscape"'s first season. You can see the main characters above, although one is missing - Pilot. Conrad's not entirely sure of Pilot's backstory, but he/she/it is an immobile part of our discordant band's ship (Moya, an organic construct), usually appearing via three-dimensional broadcast. Art!
Part of the appeal of this series is that the crew don't get along together very well, making Peace, Love and Understanding lofty ambitions rather than reachable goals. When it comes to problem solving D'Argo goes for the disembowelling solution, Aeryn goes for the shooting solution, Zhaan sits down over tea and biscuits, John makes a pop culture reference and looks baffled, while Rygel seeks to either bluff or bribe his way out (and will always welsh on the bribe). Rygel seems to lack a sense of taste, too, as he will eat anything and everything; discerning he is not.
The first season has 22 episodes and all the ones viewed so far have a Commentary track, meaning I'd have to watch them all 44 times or for nearly 40 hours. O the humanity!
Early days: John in his IASA duds
Aaaaaaaaand back to that matter of taste, good or bad. There is, of course, that touchstone of bad taste, "Bad Taste", which, if Art will cease necking the anthracite -
In very Bad Taste
That film's a solid example of how sheer dogged persistence in the face of all imaginable problems paid off. You get P
ANYWAY yes. Where were we? O I remember. Art!
No, not hobbit-holes as you might be primed to think thanks to incurring the name of Peter Jackson. This is actually a mouse-house constructed by wildlife photographer Simon Dell, better known around the internet as "George the Mouse and the Log Pile House". An ever-growing family of wild mice live in these premises, all the better to get cutesy-pie (taste again!) photograph opportunities. Art!
CAUTION! Can cause an overdose of "Awwwww!"
Yes yes yes, all the people who commented on Facebook and Youtube were falling over themselves about how cute these mice were.
Perhaps predictably, Conrad was not amongst these.
No, my first response when I realised what I was looking at was -
WEASELS! WEASELS OF THE WORLD!
DINNER!
For of course the weasel is a noble and virtuous animal who helps the farmer, whereas mice are vermin who destroy crops and spread the Black Death**.
So, one supposes the question has to be asked, can this be considered as being in bad taste?
Late Extra: Log Pile House has new tenant
The Rain In Ukraine Prevents Champagne
For Lo! we are back on the subject of drought and agricultural water shortages in the Crimea, again. Conrad notes that we are in 2021 yet none of the doleful predictions which were being made a couple of years ago about the Ruffians invading Ukraine to get the Crimea's water back have happened. One step too far for Tsar Putin, one feels. Having gotten his hot sweaty hands on Crimea he won't voluntarily give it up, but he must be getting fed up with how much of a money pit it's become.
Well now, he has recently imposed a law on foreign imported champagne, which have to be described as "Sparkling Wine", whereas locally-produced sparkling wines can merrily describe themselves as "Shampanskoye" which as any fule no is what Ruffians call champagne. Hmmm, well, the "Sham-" part is correct, as only French champagnes from Champagne have the right to call themselves such.
Naturally this has the M8s in a tizz, because if you insult champagne, you insult the very soul of France herself, and there is speculation on the other side of the Channel that Tsar Putin is trying to boost the shampanskoye sparkling wine industry of Crimea. This doesn't really fly in the face of reality and the increasingly short supplies of agricultural water there.
In the map above you can see the greenery in Crimea reduced to the southern coastline, where in 2014 the whole peninsula would have been green.
Conrad notes that the Ruffians import 375,000 gallons of French Champagne annually, so I suspect Tsar Putin is trying to sober the population up a little, because there's no way Crimea can produce that kind of quantity. 375,000 milligrams, perhaps.
Oh, and the killing joke? A state of emergency was declared on the peninsula in June because of -
Flooding.
Another Type Of Soaking
As you should surely know by now, Conrad is big on collecting Official Histories of the First Unpleasantness, and checks out various internet sites for same, to see if any are going - or, rather, going at affordable prices. Thus we come to the specialist booksellers Turner & Donovan, who publish a monthly catalogue and whom Conrad has done considerable business with over the years. Art!
Their title page and link, should you be interested. Conrad was reading the VERY LONG description for one volume, which, if Art can bestir himself -
What makes this volume unique is that Major Becke is the person responsible for the maps, since he was one of the staff creating such for the whole set of Military Operations. There are additional photographs he has created and inserted into the volume, along with correspondence with other officers and news clippings. The very long, detailed description had me wondering how much the cost was. Well, a snip if you happen to have £5,000 lying around***!
More Of The Heavens
Yes, we are back to Astronomy Photographer of the Year's shortlist of pictures, although I'm going to miss out the one of star trails over a Chinese city, since it's merely a slight variation on the Paris one. Don't agree with me? Once again, whose blog is it? Art!
Star Watcher, by Yang Sutie
There's a lot of exposition about how the photographer drove back and forth repeatedly, and managed to insert himself on that rockpile, and none at all about what we see here. Which is the Milky Way, our home galaxy. One presumes there is a long exposure at work here to get the car headlight effects and such detail in the galactic lens.
Finally -
Yes yes yes, it is my day off, and no, no, no, you are NOT going to get another fresh post this evening. I may post a collection of links IF I feel like it and IF you are good, and I shall know because my eyes and spies are everywhere. Yes, even in there, and I know what you did.
* Occasionally all at once
** Possibly stretching the truth a little here.
*** If Conrad had this kind of money it would be on my bookshelves tomorrow.
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