I Can Predict How Badly You Would Mis-Guess
For one thing, those very sad people - and yes, Conrad is a card-carrying member of that clan - who religiously read ALL the end credits for television programs or films, would be well aware of the name LES BOWIE. Art!
Les did the special effects for the television series and this film, too, trying to gat a tenner out of a tanner. Frankly, those poster copy-writers over-egg the pudding, the 'alien monsters' aren't that great, what are good are the 'ice-zombies' they create from living people who they then co
ANYWAY suffice it to say that Les had a long and fruitful career in special effects from the Forties up until he hopped off this mortal coil at the end of the Seventies. In fact he has enough background to sustain a whole Intro all by himself - not for today, however. Art!
The Canuckistanian himself
As for original South Canadians, there is always JIM BOWIE, who happened to be at The Alamo with Davy Crockett, and whom was reportedly laid up in bed feeling rather poorly when the Mexicans stormed the fort. They were polite enough to insist that he not get up before they inflicted a whole lot of bayonets upon him. Art!
You'd need a bayonet mounted on a rifle to out-reach this formidable pig-sticker, nicht wahr?
Then, finally, we reach DAVID BOWIE. During the early and into the mid-Seventies he was always flirting with androgeny (and make-up laid on with a trowel), which is where one particular song comes from. Art!
The narrator is informing 'John' that there's no need to worry about his involvement with a girl on the dancefloor because - you may be ahead of me here - they are only dancing. Honest, John.
WHICH IS WHERE WE REALLY BEGIN!
You see, this Intro is in fact about another of those inaugural South Canadian nuclear weapons, this one being a battlefield tactical rocket called -
 |
| HONEST JOHN |
Please note that this isn't a missile, because it lacks any kind of internal guidance or control mechanism; no gyroscopes, or inertial systems, or terrain radar. You can imagine it as a giant firework with a 20Kt nuclear warhead.
The rocket design itself came out of a requirement for an artillery rocket able to deliver a 1,500 lb payload out to 20,000 yards. The whole design and testing phase was rushed through, which you might expect to cause problems, yet no. Partly because HJ was a relatively simple rocket, there wasn't a lot to go wrong, even if accuracy left a little to be desired. Art!
No, they're not exploding upon launch. They are spin-stabilised in flight and here you see the verniers imparting said spin.
The original model was upgraded, and soldiered on - do you see wha - O you do - until the Eighties, for that elegant simplicity once more; there was little to go wrong with an HJ.
And the name? Allegedly there were doubts from the higher echelons of the Army that such a rocket could be designed, tested, approved and put into mass production as quickly as Douglas (the makers) claimed. Those working on the project took the motto of a Texan car salesman they had seen, and dubbed the rocket "Honest John" in homage. Art!
IGNORE! IGNORE!
Like all nuclear weapons, this one came with a Minimum Safe Distance: three miles. Any less than that and you risked being irradiated, burnt, blasted and covered in fall-out, especially with the less-than-accurate M31 initial variants.
Okay, I think that's enough virtuous veracity with velociraptor vehicles, time to move on.
Beware The Chair!
Yes, we have still to finish the tale of OP and his trusty folding chair, that fixture at family events, where, if you remember, the family are nearly all low-level bonkers.
The trigger event was OP's nephew stealing his phone, hiding in a bathroom with it and then smacking the living daylights out of it rather than hand it over when the locked door was forced open. Art!
OP's cousin ponied up the $300 for repairs. His wife, on the other hand, blamed OP for everything, because he so obviously forced nephew to steal, use and destroy the phone by using his awesome - chaos powers? I dunno, she was pretty nuts. And with a marked hatred of OP's folding chair. O boy did she hate that chair. It was obviously looking to run off with her husband.
The rest of the family then decided to prank Woeful Wifey at her own home. They moved all the chairs out of her house and replaced them with folding ones, expecting her to blow a rage-gasket and throw a fit in front of all the busily-recording phones. Art!
Welp no. She went insane with rage, trying to get to the kitchen knives so she could stab her husband and anyone else too slow to avoid her. When she was prevented from stabbing holes in people, she got pepper spray from her purse and sprayed everyone.
OP is feeling a bit guilty at this point. I mean - folding chairs, the devil's playthings, right?
Insane wife of cousin is arrested and jailed, everyone has to get treated for being sprayed, cousin files for divorce, wife pleads guilty to assault and does more jail time, has a restraining order taken out against her and has to go live with her sister. Whom is as big a nutjob as herself. Art!
CAUTION! Can cause psychopathic rage
Badly-behaved nephew is now much better behaved thanks to Mental Mom being off the scene. Mental Mom's furniture of choice in the home, chintzy Victorian stuff, was all binned by the dad as it was considerably less comfortable than folding chairs.
That, to date, is the end of The Chair Saga. Last update was seven months ago. With a family this demented, you can never say never.
"City In The Sky"
Life on the Australian coast, in the twilight of human civilisation.
‘Since Alex is completely new to Earth, would you mind providing him
with an escort? He’s completely unused
to your lifestyle and I guarantee he’ll have lots of questions. You would?
Thank you so much!’
Which, once again, constituted his deviousness in action, requesting an
escort when the Euclans would have insisted on allocating one anyway, getting
them on-side without realising.
‘I would also like to offer one person in your community the chance to
go Upstairs and experience life aboard Arcology One, with Ace as a guide for
them. They can help to sort out your,
ah, Death-Sat problem when they’re up
there.’
Don perked up at this, and Ace nearly missed the bit with her as a guide
–
‘What?’ she said, before the Doctor carried on.
‘They’ll need to be young, around twenty years old, and in sound health,
no communicable diseases, good hearing - ’ during which recitation Don’s face
fell again. He was then struck by an
idea, one that worried him, to judge by the frown that turned his forehead into
a corduroy pattern.
‘Hang on, hang on. Just how did
you get down here? and how are you going
to go back to – whatever you called it.
The Arkoloidy.’ The threat of
lightning-baiting electrical equipment hung in the air, and there might have
been a longer argument if Terry, the spanner-wielding youngster of the trio,
hadn’t burst into the office without warning or knocking.
With a touch of time-travel and alien invasion thrown in free of charge.
The Kraken Breaks
Ha! Do you se - O you do. By 'Kraken' I refer to that chuntering bafune Sidney "Release The Kraken" Powell, ex-attorney to Donald Trump, and one of the 18 other co-defendants in the RICO case in Georgia that is proceeding apace. Art!
Ooops. They missed this one when Photoshopping.
You may not know it, but, written into the South Canadian Constitution is the right to "a speedy trial", because the clever chaps who drew it up were aware of the possibilities for abuse in the trial system, by delaying things.
Sid, as well as Mister Cheseboro and Jenna Ellis, have all opted for this speedy-trial approach to justice, the first two having already been sentenced. Their sentences were slightly more than a slap on the wrist, but only slightly. A small fine, misdemeanour charges - not the far more serious felony ones - and suspended sentencing. Clearly they have done a deal to avoid jail time. Ellis will do the same if she's sensible. Art!
Jenna, with Sid looking over her shoulder
One reason for such a rapid plea is lack of funds; South Canadian attorneys are very expensive, and this trial is going to last for months.
D J Tango, on the other hand, wanted this trial to be postponed as long as possible and then to be dragged out as long as possible, because something may come up that gets him off the hook. Hugely unlikely, frankly. What he and his attorneys are now discovering is that people are getting in plea deals ahead of his trial, so they will be bearing witness against him. Sid doing a deal was quite a shock to the defence, as they expected her to die on her sword for Donald, who is now reduced to claiming that he never met her, doesn't know her and never employed her. Art!
Hmmmmm, Donald, it's kind of hard to fire a person if you never employed them in the first place, doncha think?
Ooops.
Years In The Reeling
Conrad came across a couple of vintage Fifties films dealing with the Matador and Snark nuclear missiles, not in great shape as the sound on the latter was very faint, and neither were exactly crisply defined - being seventy years old will do that. They were both free, however, which goes a long way in their favour, and both were rescued and renovated celluloid stock from Periscope Films. Art!
They have their own Youtube channel with very varied historical films that have been played, scanned and rendered into digital media for preservation and future use. To us, the public, they are free; to commercial entities such as the BBC or National Geographic, they are a stock source.
I may put up a transcript of a major film assessment and renovation project they added last year.
Finally -
I've prattled on far too long so it's time to call it a day.
A DAY.
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