If I Were To Say "Crown Of Thorns"

You Would Probably Throw Your Hands Up In Horror

"Conrad!  That's bordering on religious iconography, that is - and you avoid Religion, it's in the Charter."

     Here an aside <narrows eyes in sinister fashion*> yes already.  You should remember that wild and strange post-apocalyptic novel collaboration between Roger Zelazny, arch-fantasist, and Philip K. Dick, arch-drugs hoover entitled "Deus Irae" which is Latin for "God of Wrath".  Both authors worked on it, on and off, for several years, and the fun part for any reader is trying to discover who created what.  Art!

     There is another cover I like, but it has a robot with boobs, so it's never going to appear here.

     ANYWAY the antagonist of the piece, one Carlton Lufteufel, suffers extensive shrapnel injuries to his head, in a pattern that mirrors that of the injuries suffered by Jesus, what you might call Carleton's stigmata.  Did I mention that religious themes permeate the novel?  

     Where were we?  O yes.

     Again, if I were to mention 'Barriers' you would be quite entitled to assume I was talking about that BBC themed exhibition, although you would be WRONG.

     No, pilgrims, both Crown of Thorns and Barriers come together in one of the largest living organisms on the planet, visible from space.  NO!  Not Dwayne Johnson.  The Great Barrier Reef.  Art!

     In a world of war and wickedness, there is actually a bit of good news: the Great Barrier Reef has recovered so extensively that it's coral cover is now at a 36-year peak.  This is over the northern and central portions.  Bonzer!

     There are qualifications, mind you.  Global warming - which has given us here in the Allotment Of Eden a decent summer at last - also affects the GBR, making it more vulnerable to what they call 'bleaching events' where - do I have to draw a map?  Higher ocean temperatures also means more of these buggers - Art!

     The Crown Of Thorns starfish, a whopping beast up to a foot across and with as many as 21 arms.  There's a joke in there somewhere.  That white patch of coral above is where this unlovely creature has eaten all the coral polyps, since they dine exclusively upon coral, the dirty curs.  They are a major source of coral destruction.

     "Ah, we are so relieved," I hear you chunter.  "But - what are the Ockers doing to cope with these ambulatory pin-cushions?"

     I thought you'd never ask.  Art!

     These are underwater drones, if you will.  They can operate over areas with a duration simply not possible for Hom. Sap. day or night, regardless what the ocean's surface state is and they don't need to stop for food or drink.  That long extensible arm?  It injects the COT with lethal poison, heh-heh!

     Then we have a more natural resource, the Triton's Trumpet.  Art!

With puny human for scale

   These things are huge, and they have a taste for the COT, which is rare as the COT is full of saponins, which taste disgusting.  Seriously, nearly all fish that bite a COT spit it out afterwards.  Art!

     I know, I know it looks vaguely rude.  Believe me, that's the TT sawing the COT into bits with it's saw-toothed tongue, known as a 'radula' in snails, and if Art will co-operate - 

     'Food source' in this case is the hapless COT.
     This didactic post has been created and published by BOOJUM! for everyone's benefit, and you're welcome.

One Hundred And Eight-Year Old Handwriting

Yeah, truly.  Allow me to bore you with how the British Army operated in the First Unpleasantness when it came to keeping a journal of events.  Each infantry battalion, nominally 1,000 men strong but more usually 800 or so, would appoint a Battalion Intelligence Officer.  It was their responsibility to keep up with military intelligence, and also to keep their battalion's daily War Diary input.  Art!

     As you can see, this was done by writing longhand; Conrad is unsure if this was pencil, chinagraph or fountain pen.  The amount of information present was entirely down to the BIO, who might be diligent or deficient, but whom had to stick to the convention of writing place-names in CAPITALS.  If you read on in detail you will see that only officers are named when it comes to casualties, probably because there simply wasn't room for the 'OR' (Other Ranks) names.  When there are 273 of them after an action you can understand why.

     

     These typewritten notes probably make up no more that 25% of the whole, and would have been typed up from hand-written notes made at the time, implying that there was spare time to be had.

     "But Conrad, surely you have the world's most boring hobby?" I hear you quibble.

     Not so.  These documents are what historians call a 'primary source', meaning that they haven't been filtered by anyone, or 'interpreted' or 'collated' or any other euphemism for 'has been mucked about with'.  They are the raw data that can be interpreted as one wishes BECAUSE you have the original data to back you up.

Whilst On The Matter Of Conflict -

Back to "The War Illustrated" which is set in the Second Unpleasantness. Art!

     Very true.  The Teutons would scoff at British tanks and infantry "Tommy is no soldier!" but when it came to artillery they went very pale and quiet, and respectfully deemed the Royal Artillery the most professional arm of the British army.  Conrad not going to argue.  From the top we see a Sexton self-propelled gun - an artillery piece put on a tank chassis so it can travel cross-country and keep up with the armour.  To starboard is a 25 pounder and the blurb has it taking on an 88mm battery, which would be bad news for the 88, as it had a very flat trajectory whereas the 25 pounder could loft shells in a parabola and thus hide behind cover.  Below that you have a 5.5", instantly recognisable by the 'horns', and capable of putting a 100 pound shell amongst the pigeons.  The gun at bottom is not British, and the caption has it that it was a captured Italian gun being used against previous management.  It has the lines of a 9.2" howitzer to Conrad.  Art!

Meanwhile, Back In 1941

Sorry, we still have tons of this left.  If you feel like skipping over it DO NOT DARE OR THERE WILL BE CONSEQUENCES as yes, I do know where you live.

More relieved than he cared to acknowledge, the Doctor slumped backwards in the gunner’s tiny seat, exhaling hugely.

After a few seconds a rapping could be heard on the tank’s armour.

‘Hello?  Doctor?’ came Sarah’s plaintive voice.  ‘Are you alright?’

The Doctor popped up out of the turret like a jack-in-the-box, startling the young woman.

‘Never better!’ he grinned at her.  ‘Don’t cut yourself on the remnants of our alien caller.’

The upper surfaces of the tank were indeed liberally covered with shards of black glass, which crunched like crisps underfoot.

Captains Dobie and Jolyon crunched around the mud hut, surprised and pleased that the Doctor had survived.

‘Damn plucky, that, Mister Smith,’ blustered Captain Dobie, kicking the tracks of the third machine.  ‘What the hell – oh, beg your pardon, Miss Smith – er, what on earth is this thing?  Some Italian infernal engine?’

‘ “On Earth” isn’t the right phrase, Captain,’ remarked the Doctor, drily.

‘It isn’t Italian!’ interrupted Sarah with some heat.  ‘It killed fifteen or sixteen of the prisoners.’

Poking around in the shattered track section, Captain Jolyon whipped his finger back, swore briefly and sucked it.

‘Cut my finger,’ he muttered.  ‘Damn thing’s sharp as a razor.’

‘Fused silicon dioxide, Captain,’ explained the Doctor.  ‘Glass, in other words.  Must be making use of local resources,’ he continued in an undertone.

     Everyone's favourite Gallifreyan has survived, hooray!  Now watch him work out what has happened and why. 

     I think that's enough martial strife and conflict.  What now?

'Barriers'

Let us finish up with another entry from the BBC's photographic exhibition on the theme of 'Barriers'.  Art!

Courtesy Tony McDonald

     Hmmmmm okay this is Hadrian's Wall so still a martial theme <sighs>.  It seems this stretch is the only bit you can walk upon.  

* Possibly also due to sunlight