The Light Fantastic

No!  Nothing To Do With Procol Harum

You know what I'm talking about, the lyrics to "A Whiter Shade Of Pale", which make absolutely no sense, and did J.C. Bach get a credit in the composition?  "We skipped the light fantastic" as Gary Brooker warbled, and then goes on to relate how they did gymnastics, too.  Athletic lot, aren't they?  Art!

     Conrad thinks PH hit their creative peak with "A Salty Dog", which

     ANYWAY enough of wibbling about songs over fifty years old.  No, what I wanted to introduce today is a military organisation that was established to exert British dominance over the deserts of North Africa, in Libya and Egypt, who tooled about in armed motor vehicles bristling with machine guns.  I can tell what you're thinking.  Art!

     WRONG!

     You're thinking of the SAS and/or the LRDG of the Second Unpleasantness.  Well, long before them, in 1916, there were established the Light Car Patrols.  These were mostly Model T Fords, stripped down and with a condenser to collect any boil-off from the radiator, with pintle-mounted Lewis guns and tripod-mounted Vickers guns.  Art!

     They do look a bit flimsy, which is deceptive, as they were robust and reliable vehicles able to mount patrols over hundreds of miles in the desert.  The Light Car Patrols were so-named because they took over the role of more traditional armoured cars.  These were found to be too heavy for the desert terrain, whereas the LCPs could manage it with ease.  Art!

    This particular beast is a Rolls-Royce armoured car, which tipped the scales at a weighty 4 ½ tons thanks to the car chassis and all the armour on top.  The LCP's Model T Fords came in at about ½ ton, before you added in their crew, weapons, ammunition, water and spare parts.  Even if this doubled their weight it was still a fraction of an armoured car's bulk.  Art!

     

    This map shows the territory where the LCPs operated, deep into the desert to prevent the Senussi raiders from being able to infiltrate into Egypt and threaten Cairo, the Nile Delta and the Suez Canal.  They effectively cut off the raiders and helped drive them back into Libya, thanks to a combination of mobility, endurance and firepower.  The Senussi, used to the traditional motive power of horse and camel, had been out-manoeuvred by what was fairly new technology at the time.

     The LCPs also fought in Palestine.  Here they had a reduced brief, as the terrain was less desert-y and more cultivated, with towns and villages, not to mention wadis, that restricted movement.  Art!

   Thanks to bodged staff work resulting in a British retreat from the First Battle Of Gaza, General Royston asked the 7th Light Car Patrol if they could act as a rear-guard whilst his 3rd Light Horse Brigade broke contact with the pursuing Turks.  The polite and helpful officer in charge of the LCP jumped at the chance, and his five machine gun-armed cars held up a Turkish force of several thousand, forcing them to formally deploy to assault the ridgelines held by the LCP.  Of course - obviously! - by the time said ridgeline was attained, the LCP had fallen back to another one.  Art!

     Okay, I think that's enough motors and machine guns.  Next!

No, Vulnavia, Warsaw Is Not Alight

You may not know this - indeed I did not - but November 11th is celebrated in Poland as their Independence Day.  Art!

     This sea of flares is from a nationalist, far-right march that we at BOOJUM! cannot possibly condone and I include it here because at first sight it does look as if downtown Warsaw is ablaze.  Only metaphorically.  The rather unpleasant right-wing government there has now been voted out of office, which is another cause for celebration as CAUTION POLITICS IMMINENT ABORT ABORT ABORT

     Venturing dangerously close to Politics, Poland has been one of the staunchest possible supporters of Ukraine, because they know what it's like to live under the boot of the Sinisters and they don't want a repeat of it.  In reality the Ruffians would stand about the same chance as a nitro-cellulose dog in Hades, were the Polish army to be pointed at them.  Art!

  This is a commemorative wreath being laid at the tomb of Marshal Joszef Pilsudski, father of modern Poland.  Traditionally the Poles have been at daggers drawn with both Germany and Russia; today they only have to worry about their eastern neighbour.  Art!

    

Still A Bit Militarily-Oriented

We have been focussing on hex-and-counter wargames of late, haven't we?  And the trend continues.  I would argue that resolving a crisis in this way involves nothing more than paper, card and perhaps plastics or resin because you always need dice in these games.  Art!

     There's a fair bit to unpack from this single image.  The cover picture is, I believe, from a photograph of South African troops marching elsewhere on the Western Front in the First Unpleasantness.  "The Great War" is how those at the time and for years afterwards described what we now know as "The First World War", with 'Great' having the sense of 'Awful' or 'Terrible'.  Also, the box title is a misnomer, because this game covers the Middle East as well.  Art!

     Here you see the three maps.  They're about six feet by three feet.  Yes, I could base them on bits of hardboard, except - where would Edna lie?

     This is the rules and scenarios pamphlets, and the enormous number of units involved.  I have mounted a lot on A4 sheets, which still leaves an equally large number in ziplock bags.  Conrad suspects that playing this monster will require more time than it actually took in real life.  You know those people who retire from a job and die three weeks later because their empty hollow lives have no spark anymore?  Yeah not Conrad.

"City In The Sky"

In Conrad's 'Doctor Who' fan-fiction, Ace and Terry are on the back foot aboard Arc One, thanks to some officious and interfering Wardens.

‘I can have ten Wardens here in twenty seconds to wrestle it off you,’ interrupted Barclay, to an annoyed roll of the eyes from the other five.

     ‘He told me it’s an infection risk!’ snapped Ace, only to be drowned out by Barclay snapping into his Tab, calling for reinforcements.  For a moment the young woman set her jaw, about to refuse the request, until a pair of Wardens appeared at the common room’s entrance and made directly for her.  Then she shrugged and tossed the transciever to Abramovitch, the nearest sitter.

     ‘Try if you like.  He warned me not to call him and said he’d be the one doing the calling.’

     Christos looked the radio over.  Simply designed, nothing too advanced.  He tried the green button and got static.  Tuning the dial didn’t help at all, all he got was static.

     ‘He’ll have his radio turned off,’ warned Terry.  ‘Or the death-sats would blow him up.’

     Unbidden, Christos rolled his eyes.

     ‘Hopeless,’ he muttered.

     ‘Nothing’s hopeless,’ retorted Ace. 

     Barclay looked between the two of them.

     ‘Maybe not.  I don’t know whether to be impressed that you came back, implying that your companion believes Arc One to be safe, which gives us hope.  Or whether he believes Downstairs to be so dangerous that he can’t have you hanging around.  That would be hopeless.’

     Hmmm so he's not just a one-dimensional character.  Give that author a brownie point!

You What?

It is a dismal soggy boggy foggy day, yet I can hear the reports of fireworks this was me being poetic, I meant that there's lot of bangers going off outside in the distance.  Who are these idiots and what are they doing?  I think I need to go sort out the tumble-drier.  Which probably crops up on Twitter as MyRock'n'RollLifestyle.

Finally -

Better get this posted, tomorrow is the 13th after all. 

Smooches!