EXCITING JOB OPPORTUNITY!

Forgive Conrad For Being A Cynical Old Beggar

Don't forget, if you don't feel Forgive, I still have the Remote Nuclear Detonator and know where you live.  Your Humble Scribe still remembers applying for jobs way back when, when dinosaurs stalked the Earth and you had to write letters with a pen and send a piece of paper out with a 'stamp' upon it, and turn up in a suit and tie for a job interview, which apparel Conrad laughingly dismisses as a 'monkey suit' as he detests such formal clothing and didn't learn to tie a tie until he was 37.  Art!

"How can I tie a tie or write a letter with such TINY ARMS!"

     Your Humble Scribe is due to be made redundant (yes AGAIN!) in August, so will be trawling the waters of the job market at some point after that.  Not immediately, I plan to spend several months getting up late and drinking tea for England -

      - hearken yea - whilst playing random I-pod tunes what do we have here but "Swan Lake", which was traditionally played in the Sinister Union when one of their disgustrous dinosaur despots died.  Fingers crossed that this synchronises with the Bloaty Gas Tout!  Art?

     Let it be noted that a nation capable of Tchaikovsky cannot be all bad.

     Where were we?  O yes, job-hunting.  Conrad, being old, cynical and wise, is not at all enthused by the various websites that set out their wares in order to entrap likely candidates.  Ones that seem to allege that office life is One Giant Party are to be avoided at all costs, because they are lying.  Conrad also notes that there are few recruitment pictures of his ilk, that is, people over the tender age of sixty.  Once you hit 21,900 orbits of the sun - game over, baby, game over.  Art!

Conrad in a better mood than usual

     Hmmmmm.  You'd jump at the opportunity to employ this bloke, wouldn't you?  Imagine him on the Reception desk.  99% of visitors with a complaint leave without bothering to lay it.

     ANYWAY precious little of this has to do with "Thunderbirds", which is what I wanted to vent about today.  You see, Thunderbird 5 is the hidden asset of International Rescue, located in a geostationary orbit 22,500 miles above the Earth, able to eavesdrop on global communications 24/7.  Art!

     Conrad not sure why the logo on the side, because who else is going to turn up at this location - Eamon Holmes?

     Okay, imagine that John Tracy, who is the default crew member for TB5, decides that he needs a protracted leave Downside, due to Covid, or an appendectomy, or the need to woo his ardent swain Elena in Helsinki.  Art!

     Yes, fellow-astronaut Alan can deputise for a short while, but Thunderbird 3 needs it's pilot, so that's a short-term solution.  Hence our hilarious title today.

     Are you a lone wolf?

     Can you operate unsupervised?

     Do you have positive listening skills?

     How much astronaut training have you had?

     Any objections to joining a deliberately anonymous paramilitary organisation with no oversight or legal restrictions?

     SAY HELLO TO <several levels of interactive blocking> INTERNATIONAL RESCUE!

     One can imagine Jeff Tracy facepalming a facepalm.  Don't worry, Jeff, I'm sure Brains will manage a work-around!

     Conrad would apply but Question #4 would probably deny me.  You can't help  but admit that it's a wonderful job.

The Origin Of Cats

Conrad has pointed out that modern domesticated dogs are the descendants of wolves, which is understandably hard to wrap your head around when you look at Edna Wunderhund.  Art!

     So what of cats?  Conrad cannot really imagine tribesmen of pre-antiquity managing to tame and domesticate the Sabre-Toothed Tiger, so - whither cats?

     It seems that feral cats lived alongside Hom. Sap. for many a year, until some of them decided that these funny-shaped cats were worth associating with, in order to get FREE FOOD!

     The jury is still out on whom is the boss of whom.  If you want an answer, come back in about another two hundred thousand years*.

Another Bridge

Ha!  You can hold forth against the photographs that Conrad puts up here, just you wait, we've got yet another photographic exhibition to come thanks to the BBC.  Meanwhile - Art?

    Yes indeed, somebody's architect was doing illegal substances in the design phase! and no mistake.  This spectacular exhibit is the Golden Bridge of Da Nang, which is supposed to represent a golden thread being held aloft by a pair of hands and is exactly the kind of structure you'd expect to see in Vietnam.  Art!

With puny humans for scale

Hey Bring On The Long-Term Fan-Fic!

Heck, if you insist, what choice does an author have?  Go on.  Remember that this is set in June 1940, when the Second World 'Special' Military Operation was on-going.  The Doctor and Sarah Jane are about to have a little bother in the Libya of 1941.

He began to run again, wearily, being forced to the south by the pursuing demon, further into the desert sands and away from the campsite and help.  The adrenaline surge that allowed him to outpace it earlier was a distant memory.

Yes, when the dune nearby the one he sat upon to watch the excavation quivered, rumbled and suddenly burst open to reveal the demon, he’d jumped upright in fear, dropping his cigarette and running headlong into the night.

The stitch came back again, worse than before, slowing him to a painful shuffle.  His bare feet burned, his throat spasmed.  Once more he bent forward, seeing the gritty sand up close.  His mouth felt dry as a stone, his tongue like a towel.

Foolish man, he said, to the wind and sand.  To take the lire and cigarettes and be happy with them.  No living thing heard his despairing words; in this the most silent of regions there were no creatures to hear him.

Once again the soft soughing of the Demon caught his ear, and Al-Hassan managed to stagger on for a few paces, until his ankle gave way.  He pitched to the sands, sprawling, feeling the cold grains dash against his face.  The hissing grew louder very quickly, as the pursuing monster slid down the dune face towards him.

Ibn Al-Hassan’s upthrown arm and hopeless wail of despair failed to stop the monster.  He died there, on the desert sands, and nobody ever knew.

     Apologies if you were expecting BOOJUM!'s usual frothy nonsense.  This is not as dark or sinister as "Tormentor" but it's no fairy-tale with happy skipping bunnies either.

Finally -

Your Humble Scribe is now at page 1010 of "Reclaiming History", Ol' Vinnie's attempt to destroy the Kennedy conspiracy industry with a book the size and weight of a breeze-block, and if Art can -

     Conrad has reached the point where Ol' Vinnie takes on one Mark Lane, the Conspiranoid In Charge, whom basically kicked off the whole Kennedy Konspiracy Kottage <thinks> Krew.  This is interesting because Lane used a whole array of dishonest techniques and manipulations that Your Humble Scribe is familiar with thanks to the Truther conspiracy of 2001 - you know, when the Twin Towers came down.  Ol' Vinnie doesn't mention Nine-Eleven once in the body of his text so far, which might mean he was completely innocent of them and their dishonest panderings.  The similarities are remarkable, however.

*  Probably still  "Cat"