Are You RANDY?

First Of All - 

WASH OUT YOUR FILTHY MINDS!  Although this does apply principally to any readers here in the Allotment Of Eden, because those who are unfortunate to live beyond these hallowed shores may not know what I'm talking about.  Art!

Mr "Werebear" Quaid

     Nope, that's not what I mean, either.  But because I am mellowed by a bellyful of Earl Grey tea (which is only ever served hot so why specify same?) and toast, I shall omit the usual Tazer for transgression. Let me define 'randy' as a British vulgarism: to be ready for bedroom hanky-panky, rumpy-pumpy or chicken-licken*.

     ANYWAY there I was watching Episode #1 of "The Offer" and they had an office exterior with large metal lettering spelling out - Art?

     It's a portmanteau name derived from the acronym from "Research ANd Development".  So you can see where today's title comes from.  From research you derive prototypes, and development of these irons out problems and allows serial production.  Development is a crucial part of the process, except that it takes time, often lots of time, and commercial organisations hate hate hate to spend time not making money.  

     How much worse if the research imperative is being driven by political decisions and politicians <hack spit> themselves, rather than anything rational.

     And here we come to the meat of the matter: "Why The Allies Won" by Professor Richard Overy, which I've just finished reading.  Art!

     The Prof makes a very good point about how the Teutons were pressing ahead by late war with technology at the cutting edge - he and others have put this across as trying to reach the Fifties in the Forties.  The Allies, for the most part, were content to utilise technology of the Thirties apart from notable exceptions - 'Tube Metals' as the Manhattan Project became known, and the proximity fuse.

     Does this matter, and how does it relate to R and D?  Yes it does, and here's why.  The Wehraboos all clutch themselves with disgusting glee when they bang on about the Me262 jet, or the V1 and V2 missiles.  However, the thing about all this technology is that it was new and untried.  Normally the development process involves lots of trouble-shooting and experimentation, fixing teething-troubles and moving forward.  Slowly.  Art!

Me262

     The Me262's Jumo engines are a case in point.  They were cutting edge, state of the art, and had a life of as little as 10 hours.  The long developmental process that would have led to new materials for the turbine blades had to be neglected because Herr Schickelgruber wanted them NOW even if troubled, rather than a perfected version that would have been combat-ready by 1947.  I think you can see the flaw there.  The whole Me262 fighter program was of very limited use, since it was only effective in the hands of a very skilled pilot, a rara avis in the Luftwaffe by the time it began operations.  The undercarriage had a tendency to collapse suddenly - what you get for cutting R & D corners - and the Allies knew exactly which airfields it operated from because it needed inordinately long runways.  Not only that, it was a dog in the air when taking off or landing, which canny Allied pilots discovered and made use of.  Art!

Also great at setting airfields alight

     I think we'll come back to this subject, it has legs, and it's always amusing in a malicious way to torment the Wehraboos**.

A Little Nostalgia

As you should surely know by now, Conrad likes to occasionally pitch in a painting by the South Canadian artist Charles Marion Russell, because he painted thousands of canvases and they portray an Old/Wild West that had largely vanished by the time he depicted it.  Here's one:

"When Law Dulls The Edge Of Chance" (1915)

     You can read the background here without hesitation.  Those chaps on horseback in the red uniforms are the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and they appear to have apprehended a pair of scunners who seem to be horse thieves to judge by the number they possess for a mere pair of riders.  "The Mounties always get their man" was their catchphrase, because they used to catch villains.

Back To "The Sea Of Sand"

Okay, okay, since this extract concerns the war in North Africa, I shall forego sticking in an item about "The War Illustrated" because that was full of stuff from North Africa, too, and you can have too much of a good thing, quite as much as too much of a bad thing.

‘Sarah, we need to move,’ he cautioned, stooping to grasp her, painfully, by the elbow.  ‘Quickly now!’ and he exerted a considerable degree of the strength that normally lay dormant.  Sarah found herself jerked upright and waltzed off on one leg away from the now far distant TARDIS.  Looking backwards, the Doctor hissed a curse in no human language and threw her prone, following the action himself.

Sarah cradled her head in her arms, finding that she could look backwards through the gap.  She saw the aeroplane swoop down on the TARDIS, and the flash of twin machine-guns set above the aircraft’s nose.  A storm of dust and rock rose up about the time machine, with glowing tracers ricocheting away in all directions.  Finally, with grand and awful deliberation, a bomb detached itself from the aircraft’s belly.  It fell with uncanny precision upon the dark blue police-box, resulting in a huge explosion that only cleared after a whole minute.

By then, the aircraft had gone.  So had the TARDIS!  While Sarah could see the attacking fighter diminishing slowly into the distance, of the time-travel machine there was no trace.

Next to her, the Doctor sat up and stared, aghast, at the crater where the TARDIS had stood.  He clapped a hand to his forehead, nearly dislodging his hat.

‘Oh no!’ he gasped.

     "Oh no!" has a worrying ring to it, doncha think?

Finally -

Up to Page 1362 of "Reclaiming History" and Ol' Vinnie is now going after a double target; District Attorney Jim Garrison and Olly Stone's "JFK", which he alleges is a tissue of lies from beginning to end.  Indeed, one of the advisers who worked for the original Warren Commission commented that Olly managed to get the assassinated president correct, but nothing else.  I get the feeling that Vinnie is going to enjoy tearing several new ones for Olly, and he's already several pages into a destructive analysis of Garrison's attempt to blame and frame a completely innocent man for the assassination.  I shall keep a tally of the errors.  Maybe need to purchase a new notebook.

Further to Finally, our traffic is still pretty dismal, so this is possibly the last BOOJUM! ever, as Your Humble Scribe has, as ever, a Book Mountain to tackle, not to mention "Judge Dredd: The Megazine" which I've only ever read once, upon purchase in 1991.  So they come across as completely new, which is nice.  I have also allowed Darling Daughter to borrow "The Thing From Another World" with cautions about greasy fingerprints.  Art!

One of the best

* We're not judging anyone here.  Whatever floats your boat.

**  "Wehraboos": a species of nerd who worship Teuton technology.