Portable Bicycle Chain Cleaner!

You Know It Makes Nonsense

Conrad is minded of that Monty Python sketch about Bicycle Repair Man, where everyone, and I mean absolutely everyone, is a Superman/woman/boy/girl.  Art!

     Yes yes yes, there is a tranche of comics where this is held to be true, I've even got a trade paperback in the Comic Mountain somewhere <hopes this diverts from his inability to remember the title> BUT this was an unheard of skit at the time (1969).  So - what happens when a Superman is out riding his bike and it breaks?  Art!

     Why, one Superman sheds his boring everyday external appearance and becomes BICYCLE REPAIR MAN!  

     I really need to dig out that TPB.  Better go overhaul some of the Comic Mountain.

     ANYWAY back on track.  As some of you ought to recall, Conrad has been somewhat baffled by the appearance of Sundry Mysterious Devices on the pages of "The Daily Beast" or over on Quora, and one blue plastic item with a vaguely seedy appearance was especially quizzical.  Art!

     This, ladies and gentlemen and those unsure, is a 'Portable Bicycle Chain Cleaner", since the print is rather too fine to read easily.  An item that you never knew you needed.  First of all you'd need to disconnect the chain in order to be able to run it through this device, because you can't cycle* a closed loop through this system.  Don't sneer, either, bicycle chains are lubricated and collect all kinds of disgusting mucilage when used outdoors.

     So now we know, and hence this evening's title.  Plus, proof that we can be concise if we have to be.  

An Image Too Good To Miss

As you should surely know by now, Conrad has been following the slow implosion of the Ruffian economy for many months, and it never fails to predictably get worse over time.  I recently made a post where the exchange rate was ₽86 to the dollar.  Earlier this week I posted on Quora, by which time it was ₽90 to the dollar.  It apparently reached ₽94 to the dollar before the weekend, at which point the Ruffian Central Bank blinked, and started to burn foreign exchange reserves to restore (!) it to ₽92 to the dollar.  Art!

     Now, if I were to say "Elvira" to you, doubtless you'd imagine that Gothic chick with the eye-popping cleavage and a lot more wit than you'd credit her with.  WRONG!  I refer to Elvira Nabiullina, Chair of the Ruffian Central Bank.  Art!

No cleavage, lots of brains

     She has the thankless task of trying to prop up the Ruffian economy and has already attempted to tender her resignation - which Bloaty Gas Tout refused to accept.  If she allowed the expenditure of reserves on keeping the ruble on crutches rather than in a coffin, then things are truly desperate, as the Central Bank stopped doing this a year ago.  It's too expensive and they have a deficit to fund, after all.

     Go on, Dimya, tell us again -

     <insert swear here>, if this is 'According to plan' I'd hate to see it when it all goes pear-shaped.

DRILLER KILLER!

No, we are not talking about the notorious 'video nasty' from the Eighties - heck, nobody had heard of it until it got banned and then every deviant in the UK wanted a copy  - but, rather, about that list of 12 Deadly Devices, power tools around the home.  Art!

The Circular Saw

      No, it's not a drill.  Sue me.  Also, psych!  

    The reason these things are dangerous is pretty obvious, nicht wahr?  You have an extremely sharp cutting blade rotating at several hundred r.p.m. which will cut inch-thick oak planking with 0% difficulty, so your delicate squishy meatbag self isn't going to present much resistance.  As with chainsaws, there is the risk of 'kickback' with circular saws, when the cut but still-attached wood pinches on the blades by flexing downwards and the whole thing comes flying backwards.  Usually at an angle towards the arm being used to hold the wood steady. Art!

     I'm only posting this here as this chap got off lightly; he could have potentially lost his whole hand.  Remember - THE PINCH IS A GRINCH!**

"City In The Sky"

Conrad, in a vignette, has cunningly introduced the alien Lithoi and the Nullarbor Plain dingoes, who have the IQ of a five year-old Hom. Sap.

     Then the Not-Good had arrived, with their unbelievably foul smell, a  smell so evil it set them apart from every other living creature.  Nor was that all.  No.  The Not-Good killed on a vast scale, worse than the Good at their worst – which is when the dingo term “Man” became “Good”, because this new arrival was so much worse.  From that point onwards, it became a point of principle for the dingoes to kill the Not-Good if they could manage it, at least without excessive loss.

     Still, no hunting down of the nearby enemy.

     Not for now, anyway.

     Mis-treatment of the dingoes is going to come back and literally bite the Lithoi on the bottom, mark my words.

     I'm going to add another extract in here, as there's an abrupt shift from the above 'Interposit' and if you don't like it - whose blog is it, again?

CHAPTER FOUR: Chance Meeting

      The Doctor had decided to try and find out a little about the Great Northern War first.  His memories of it were vague.  The subject and period aroused considerable sorrow in him and he’d never been compelled to investigate closely, nor to recall what he’d found.

     It began in Asia, and spread from there.  Very well, avoid the trouble spots.  He led Ace into the TARDIS and stood, thinking, holding one finger alongside his cheek.  As a precaution he led her to a storage room in the lower levels, where a collection of space-suits stood, held erect by racks and pinions.  A holographic projection itemised the suits, then a help menu for donning, sealing and working in them.

     ‘You need to get practice in several of these.  The Ares first, and then choose for yourself after that.’

     ‘Cool!  Are we going into space?’

     ‘Perhaps.  So, a good couple of hours practice.’

     When I say 'Great Northern War' I am not referring to the war between Sweden and Russia, back in the day when Sweden was an aggressive imperialistic land-grabber of a nation.  Just so we're clear.

Aerial Serendipity

As you should surely know, Conrad had up a picture of the 'Fireflash' airliner from "Thunderbirds" yesteryon, because whilst it may look cool, it actually runs 'hot', which is to say radioactive, and everyone on board will die from radiation effects if they're not disembarked within ninety minutes.  Art!

     Here's what I stumbled across yesteryon - 'Haze Gray Art' on Youtube - an animation of Fireflash as it taxis and takes off.  Art!

     Quite cannily and coyly, HGA doesn't use the name 'Fireflash', instead calling it a 'Mach 6 Nuclear Powered 300 Seat Jetliner', and they refrain from using any Gerry Anderson music.  The clip is over a year old so it looks as if it's flown in under the radar of the corporate lawyers.

    You can't see it in the clip above, but the distant trees at the end of the runway are threshing about in the backwash as FF M6NP3SJ accelerates, which is a really cool subtle touch.  Art!

     I'm not sure if you can make the conversion out here, but the wheels used for taxiing have now retracted into their in-flight storage pods.  Inevitably some people in the Comments have to bang on about how aerodynamically inefficient this process is -

     Yeah, I bet you don't get invited to many parties.  Art!

     This is the zoomed-in view as M6NP3SJ gets beyond camera range, in what skywatchers will recognise as absolutely typical footage from air shows and Apollo launches.  9/10 for realism.  They even manage a couple of camera illumination glitches.  Art!

     Not a lot going on.  Until -

     - M6NP3SJ suddenly shoots into view from below.  It certainly looks as if it could manage London to Paris in 4 minutes 28 seconds.

Finally -

I'm back reading "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell" after a long hiatus.  My opinion has not changed; yes, it's entertaining, but it could have done with a good long hard edit.  Generally you only get this phenomenon with established authors who churn out inch-thick novels on an annual basis - whoever wrote "The Passage" I'm looking at you.  Enid Blyton never needed a one-million word count to complete any of her masterpieces!***

*  Do you see wh - O you do.

**  If the HSE or OSHA come a-knocking I want royalties.

***  Or should that be 'mistresspieces'?