No! This Has Nothing To Do With The Clash
- and their seminal hit "Should I Stay Or Should I Go", where they portray someone who is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't, you know -Art!
You know, he's going to get a literal spanking if he hangs around, but if he dodges the issue by getting out of Bodge then he's going to get an even bigger spanking when Whomever catches up with him. The horns of a dilemma.
ANYWAY that's what this Intro's not about. Instead I want to dedicate it to the theme of doppelgangers in fact and fiction, also dealing with drugs, alternate realities and nosophobia. I shall try to keep it free from Politics but you never know what my mind will come up with. Art!
The butt of a thousand memes
This is, indeed, Bloaty Gas Tout himself. He is so terrified of catching a disease that, during Covid, anyone who needed to meet him had to undergo two weeks of isolation beforehand. Here we see him at a meeting, keeping considerable distance between his precious person and the plebs who serve him. Rumour has it that he takes steroids by the bucketful, which explains the 'Puffy' part of Puffy Petrol Pimp, and which also render him vulnerable to infection. This isn't the sole mention of drugs in this Intro, read on for more. Art!
This is definitely not the same person! It is known that the Fun-Sized Foot Fiddler has at least one double, who was last trotted out in Mariupol, also during night-time. This is either because Tsar Poutine shrivels up in sunlight like a salted slug, or because the darkness helps to hide his real identity from the cameras. An even bet as to which is correct. Art!
These two pictures were broadcast live at the same time, with the Kremlin Gremlin being seen at a parade in Moscow - in daylight, so that's got to be the double - and greeting the PM of Qatar simultaneously. Under artificial lighting, you'll notice.
This use of a body double reminded me of one of Philip Kendred Dick's best novels, "Now Wait For Last Year", which positively fizzes with ideas and imagination. Art!
Terrific Chris Foss artwork - that has 0% to do with the novel
PKD here introduces the hell-drug JJ180, conceived as a weapon by the Reegs, an alien race that Earth is at war with. It is addictive with a single dose, and the withdrawal symptoms cause a complete mental breakdown. There is no cure.
Dr Eric Sweetscent, organ transplant specialist, is dosed with the drug by the 'Starmen, Earth's supposed 'allies' from Lilistar. In fact they are the bullying top dog in the relationship and dosed Eric to blackmail him into spying on his latest patient - Gino Molinari. Who happens to be the UN Secretary General, de facto leader of Earth. Art!
Eric's wife and a Reeg. Plus the Luftwaffe, for some reason
The thing about JJ180 is that it propels most people into the past. Yes, time travel via chemicals. Eric is one of the vanishingly few who get moved into the future, where he encounters alternate realities in which Earth has allied with the Reegs and has won the war against the 'Starmen.
'Yes yes yes, but what about doppelgangers?' I hear you quibble. SILENCE! BE PATIENT!
Gino Molinari has also taken JJ180 (whether voluntarily or not is not explained) but he is, uniquely, able to travel sideways in time, into alternate realities. This is the apparent explanation of why there is a bullet-riddled corpse of Molinari being kept in cold storage, for murky future use. Then, too, this would explain away how Molinari manages to survive assassination attempts; there is always an alternate waiting in the wings. That supposed android copy of him? Actually the real thing hiding in plain sight. Art!
Terry Nation's estate will sue you, mate
I bet The Pest In The Bullet-proof Vest is even now chivvying-on Ruffian scientists to come up with their knock-off version of JJ180. Wouldn't it be amusing if he necked a dose and ended up stuck in 1937's Sinister Union! Whilst the purges were in full swing. Ho ho ho. Makes me smile just thinking about it.
A Moment's Silence, Please
Conrad notes with some sadness the passing of Alan Arkin, South Canadian actor across many decades. He was never actually a star, per se, but was always watchable across very different films. Art!
Yossarian in "Catch 22" "The Russians Are Coming!" for which he learned Russian "It wasn't too much with the ethnic slurs, was it?" "I'll give it a shot -"
"NO! NO! DON'T SHOOT ANYONE!"
O and he won an Oscar. Finally.
Vindicated!
I posted today in our afternoon blog about how "The Daily Beast", for once, didn't have anything about the British Royal Family present. How strange it is that South Canadians cannot get enough of our monarchy. You know, being a republic and all that.
I should have waited, because I logged onto their webpage to see if the strange torture devices were back, and caught this - Art!
South Canadians mis-spell 'Rumoured' AGAIN
No, I didn't click on it. I am more of a republican than those South Canadians.
Speaking Of Strange Torture Devices...
This advert keeps cropping up on Quora. Art!
No, I didn't click on this, either. It looks moderately rude. Perhaps a pump of some sort, as there seems to be a motor with gears under the blue plastic casing? Pool circulation and filtration device? Any answers in the Comments, please.
"City In The Sky"
More of the on-going theatre-level nuclear war playing out 'Downstairs' in the Middle East.
‘Hmm.
Probably carrying air-launched cruise missiles,’ he surmised, chewing
the leg of his glasses. ‘How’re the
incoming missiles?’
Davy felt a touch of shock when the
trajectory played out onscreen.
‘Not too good. Three destroyed completely in mid-air.
Another has been affected – it looks to impact in
Kouroush groaned aloud. Davy tried to send on a Jordanian channel, to
sound a warning, but had no luck amidst the frantic Arabic chatter.
‘Is there any chance either might be a
simple explosive warhead?’ asked Abramowitz.
‘Maybe,’ said the Iranian. ‘Or they may be full of a nerve-agent. The Israelis will assume the worst, that they are nuclear warheads, and –
being fired from Natanz, the odds are good that they are nuclear missiles. With a very big yield.’
Any speculation was resolved dramatically
less than a minute later. The damaged
Iranian missile continued to yaw, losing altitude rapidly and coming to earth
in eastern
Screen Seventeen flashed red, the crimson
glare lighting up everyone’s faces in the stilled room, giving them the aspect
of devils. Three words in black occupied
the screen’s centre: NUCLEAR DETONATION
DETECTED. After that, the screen re-set
and displayed latitude and longitude for the detonation point. Davy coolly input these into the geography
database, and brought up a rocky, barren land devoid of towns or roads. Unfortunately not totally devoid of life; a
few small villages were scattered on these arid desert plains.
Yes, war has a way of going pear-shaped at the slightest chance.
Hmmmm
Today being the First Of July, Conrad considered that perhaps Blogger's traffic tracking algorithm had re-set from June to less ridiculous levels. Art!
Finally -
It started raining the moment Edna and I set out this afternoon. Dog Buns! However, it stopped after a few minutes and one upside was - no other dog walkers around.
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