Done To A Turn

Just Because You Can -

Doesn't mean you should.  Jumping off the roof holding an unfurled golfing umbrella, to see if it works as a parachute, is entirely possible.  One could not call it wise, by any stretch of the imagination.  You can also walk into the roughest pub in Dublin and announce you're collecting on behalf of the Oliver Cromwell Fan Club, in which case you will probably wake up in the Intensive Care Unit.

     Thus we come to a topic covered by the ever-intrepid Tom Scott: the South Canadian Rotary Jail.  Up until a couple of weeks ago Your Humble Scribe hadn't ever heard of this institution.  Art!

     The whole thing was dreamt up by the unholy pairing of an architect and an iron foundry owner, which is never an ideal combination.  Mister Brown's idea was to have a jail where individual cells would be shaped like slices of a pie, with a single door for ingress and egress.  The cells would be entirely separate from the bars, rotating within them and around a central axis that also acted as a plumbing fixture, which was unparalleled luxury at the time.  Art!

     Thus only one guard was needed on duty at any time, which saved money.  Saving money was good, as this was a ridiculously over-engineered solution to a problem nobody had asked about.  Art!

     Rotated by hand-crank WASH OUT YOUR FILTHY MINDS! thanks to being on a bed of ball-bearings I SAID WASH OUT YOUR FILTHY MINDS! 

     Of course - obviously! - there were problems, which immediately came to light once prisoners were placed in this type of prison.  Nothing like the cold hard light of day, is there?  As the custodian of the prison above pointed out, the prisoners put into these cells were often there thanks to public inebriation, and would often slump against the bars.  If a finger, or hand, or entire arm, happened to be projecting through the bars when the jail was rotated, said prisoner got a traumatic amputation.  Bit harsh for being on a booze bender.  Art!

     There were other serious safety concerns.  What if a fire broke out?  The guard would have to patiently stand there cranking the handle to release the prisoners one by one, probably feeling as if he was working the world's largest rotisserie.  Predictably, they were not a success and needed remedial work to allow access to and from every cell.  Mind you, they do allow Conrad to make a tasteless joke about "Getting legless".  Art!

Our Trawl Through The Soft White Underbelly Continues
Thanks to Geography King for a grim yet edifying whistle-stop tour of South Canadian regions stricken by poverty, drugs, violence and gangs.  We covered the biggest ghetto in the nation, Detroit, and are now on to the most dangerous one.  Art!

     Chicago, and you're welcome to it.  For the stats, that's one person shot dead every 2.7 days.  According to GK nearly all the violence is gang-related, so in theory he could drive throught the 'hood and not get shot, but he'd rather not put it to the test.

     GK also makes the point that a lot of Chicago is made up of nice, pleasant neighbourhoods (unlike Detroit) but where it's bad, it's verrrry bad indeed.

More On The Theme Of "Empty Spaces"

Thanks to the BBC for removing some of the burden of being endlessly creative.  Art!

Courtesy Glynn Moffitt

     This is a pier at Southend-on-sea, and you're looking at a set of empty seats, empty by virtue of not having anyone sitting on them.  Conrad not sure if the photographer used a filter here or not, as it's more orange than a Michael Bay film.

"The Sea Of Sand"

We left the bio-vore Sorbusa musing on what the Doctor had challenged him about.

Thedoctor seemed to have ideas for alternatives.  A single alien.  How could a single alien know what the whole Technician society of five thousand years ago did not know?  Or, for that matter, what the bizarre current society knew?

     Sorbusa felt as if his old view of the world had been shattered, broken into a thousand pieces.  He held those thousand pieces in a mental limbo; he could remake them into any picture he cared to, to explain how and where he found himself.

     "Oof!" exclaimed the Doctor, landing indelicately in the underground cell.  "You know, I think I rather rattled old Excellency Lord Sur, talking about alternatives."

     Sorbusa looked over at his fellow prisoner, indicating the bottles in a corner.  Politely, the Doctor refused.

     "We already presumed the guards can listen in to our conversation, Thedoctor."

     "I meant that his guests looked as if they'd been hurried to the meeting to gloat over me.  He didn't like the course our conversation was taking."

     What had the subject been?  Oh yes, hibernation for a fifth of the population.  A willing surrender of liberty.  Allowing the technicians to dominate the bio-vore culture, or what remained of it.  And then the evolution of the aristocracy, the Warrior culture.

     The Doctor is plotting on the fly here.  Sur had better expect trouble, because when our favourite Gallifreyan gets up to mischief ...

Ninjagogo!

One plus to having The Mansion to myself is access to the Ninja air-fryer that Wonder Wifey and Degsy normally use.  It's surprisingly easy to use, and we have a load of full-size potatoes not doing anything, so - Art!

     The recipe book recommended using 450 grams of potatoes, which Conrad diligently peeled and chipped, chucking them in for 25 minutes.  It's important to juggle the food being cooked, so it gets done evenly.  And Hay Pesto!  Art?

     A plateful of chunky chips, and no, I did not have any trouble polishing the lot off.  No, Edna did not get any, although I allowed her to lick the plate.

Korean Stir-Fry Chicken

The recipe is for beef, which I didn't have.  I did have chicken, so that's what got used.  Art!

     It was something of a disappointment, being quite bland.  When I reheat the leftovers I shall add mirin or fish sauce to add some flavour.  It did ensure I used up all the beansprouts and spinach before they went off, so a lose-win in that sense.

     Dog Buns!  I've made myself hungry now.

"The War Illustrated"

By the time Issue 165 came out, the Teutons were indubitably losing the war - this is as of October 1943.  They have already lost the battle of Kursk, Italy has chucked in the towel and the Battle Of The Atlantic has been won by the Allies.  It's not turning out terribly well for Herr Schicklegruber!  Art!

     You will find the Wehraboos banging on about the Me 262 and Tiger tanks; let me introduce you to a vehicle far more important than both of those put together, the DUKW.  This was an amphibious 3-ton truck that could alter it's tyre-pressure centrally in order to cope with moving from road to beach and vice-versa, and they were used by the thousand.  Using DUKWs meant you didn't need to capture a harbour or port; you could simply offload supplies from ships into them and have them run ashore and well inland.  Logistics, you see; the backbone of any army*.

     You might recognise some of these names, even if they use the Russian spelling convention.  September 1943 on the Eastern Front.

     

*  Except the Russians.