Falling Skies

No!  Not The Television Series

Conrad knows whereof he speaks, since he watched the first two seasons, and is slightly horrified to discover that it began in 2011 before finishing in 2015 after five seasons.  So it's been out of commission for over a decade.  Erk.  Art!

     Just to recap, it was about, an Earth over-run by an alien invasion, where 90% of the population had been wiped out with the destruction of major cities and towns.  Hmmm.  Bit careless, that, because those hapless aliens have left 900 million Hom. Sap. alive and thirsting for vengeance.  That's an awful lot of ticked-off people, and in South Canada there would probably be enough guns for everyone to have 10 of them.  Not sure about the ammunition for them.  And by the time 30 years have passed there would be well over a billion hostile humans, probably close to 1.5 billion.  Art!

"I brought you the head of Alfredo Garcia.
     AN ALIEN! I meant an alien. The head of an alien.  Sorry."

     Interesting to see Noah Wyle being a hard-bottom, given that he was best known for playing a doctor in some medical soap that I can't remember and cannot be bothered to find out about.  Sue me, I don't care, I'm horrid that way.

     ANYWAY of course - obviously! - that's nothing to do with what this Intro is about, because when do we ever create content in a sane and sensible orderly fashion?  Yes, there was that time in 2017, but it was purely accidental.

     What am I talking about?  Why, nothing less than Near Earth Objects, those visitors from inner space that whiz by Planet Earth with worrying regularity.  Art!

     That shows the relative orbit of the Moon and asteroid 2023 DZ2, which you may not have been aware was traversing cis-lunar space tonight, approaching to just over 100,000 miles from your our fair home.  It was a late discovery, only being picked up at the end of February.  It's dimensions are a bit of a guesstimate at present, being about 65 yards in diameter and weighing circa 200 tons.  Art!

KILLER SPACE POTATO!

     Ha!  You should have seen your face!  Only joking.  This particular 200-ton puppy orbits the Sun every 3 and-a-bit years, so it's due back in 2016.  Ooo-err Matron!  Except not.  Having been tracked for weeks now, it's projected orbit can now be predicted with a very high degree of accuracy and there's absolutely no chance of it hitting Earth.  Whilst this might disappoint the Doomsday preppers amongst us, the rest will be quite happy.  Even if it did hit the atmosphere it would mostly burn up and disintegrate into small pieces.

    But wait!  There's more.  You see, back in January of this year, another Near Earth Object made a very close pass to Earth: 2023 BU.  Art!

     That's just over 2,000 miles in proper measurements.  Nobody is willing to put a mass to the tumbling twod, and estimates of it's size range from 3 to 8 yards in diameter, so Your Humble Scribe can guesstimate  between 9 and 17 tons.  This is very small fry as Giant Space Rocks go and it would never reach ground level even if it did hit fair and square.

     Before you start fretting, the Planet Killer asteroids are all known and tracked and there's no danger from them.  Where there is a dearth of information is about  those in the 150 yard diameter range, which are difficult to track and which would destroy any city they hit.  Conrad doing his back-of-a-fag-packet calculations reckons one of these would mass about 24,000 tons.  Art!

Well, Richard, you did say you wanted to see the bright lights tonight.

     And with that shocking display of bad taste, we shall move on.

More Coffee-Grounds From Sherlock Holmes

Metaphorical ones, I hasten to add.  Now that I've finished reading the short story collection, there are a few words I made note of whilst reading (yes I am a very sad man).

"PLETHORIC": 'Excessively full of bodily fluid, especially blood.'  Hmmm the word is used in describing a blackmailer, whom seems to have an especially florid complexion, which is greatly improved when he is shot dead.  Art!

"SCORBUTIC": Sounds like an orc character from LOTR, doesn't it?  A good mate of Gorbag, perhaps, with a giant scar across his scalp that's only held together with metal staples.

     Sadly not.  "Of or having scurvy".  Well well, someone should have been eating their lemons, shouldn't they?  Art!

"ERISIPELAS": Hmmm, one of the Woodland Elves from LOTR?  It's not in my Collin's Concise.  Ah!  Because Ol' Coney mis-spelled it.  It should be ERYSIPELAS, and it's a rather nasty skin infection that results in fever and purple lesions.  Yuck.  No, Art, don't bother.

Erysipelas at centre

Death Of A Trope (Well, Possibly)

One of the persistent questions on Quora is "Are the Russians keeping back all their good kit in order to suddenly overwhelm Ukraine with it?"

     The short answer is 'No'.  The slightly longer answer involves pictures of T-54/55 tanks being taken out of storage and sent to Ukraine.  Art!

     That number in their title is when they went into service.  So, Russia Mighty Russia is now sending tanks that are over 70 years old to Ukraine.  We can do one better than that, however.  Art!

     This is one of a batch of 11 KS-19 heavy anti-aircraft guns that the Ukes captured in Donetsk, which first went into service in 1949, and thus of even older vintage than those T-54/55s.

     Shortly to be deployed by Russia south of the Dnepro River in defensive positions - Art!

     Apparently even the pro-Kremlin military bloggers are aghast at what Russia Mighty Russia is reduced to.  Just wait until tomorrow when we'll do an item about the Ruffian economy.

"The Sea Of Sand"

Things are hotting up at Mersa Martuba, because the bio-vores attacking the small garrison have learned from their previous mistakes.  They're aliens, not stupid.

Running out of ammunition as the belt finished, Davey began to open another box.  Tam began to fire his gun, short bursts aimed at a particular target, and he kept firing until he hit the target.  Bio-vores made bigger targets than humans, but they were stronger, too.  Each needed several bullets to kill them, nor was that all.

          ‘They’ve got armour on,’ realised Tam, seeing another bio-vore get up, only injured from what ought to have been a killing series of hits.

          ‘Good! Because this belt is armour-piercing!’ snarled Davey, in the grip of a furious temper.

          A single loud popping sound erupted from behind the bio-vore tank, like a giant hiccough.  Davey recognised it as a mortar and ducked flat, or as flat as he could.  Another loud popping sound struck his ears, and he felt a stinging pain in his left bicep, and another behind his left ear.  What sounded like bees went whizzing into the ground, and the sandbags, accompanied by pinging and rattling.

          ‘We’re being shelled,’ he called to Tam, who didn’t reply.  The pain in his bicep made him look to see the damage: a  long, slender splinter of glass fully four inches long projected from the muscle, blood staining the worn khaki around the wound.  Almost afraid to look, Davey realised the big shrapnel spike penetrated to the other side, poking out for an inch.

          ‘Tam!’ he hissed, feeling a wave of nausea.  ‘Tam – I’m hit!’

     Uh-oh, things not looking too good here for the humans.