Fission Chips With Salt

Ha!  How Hilarious Am I?

Yes, only Your Humble Scribe could find amusement in the not-especially light-hearted topic of nuclear weapons, which are, after all, one of our staples here at BOOJUM!  Also tanks and zombies, one of which will get a nod of acknowledgement from us today.  Firstly, we need to deal with fallout.  Art!

We shamelessly exploit contemporary entertainment

     It's a long way from radiological warfare to Ol' Tolky, too, yet we're going to make the connection.  Art!

     Conrad's not certain what the missing speech balloons would contain, just that this came up under the search term "Cobalt bomb" and thank you Marvel Comics.  Looks like Jack Kirby artwork.

     Okay, pop quiz.  How do you make a multi-megaton thermonuclear warhead even more horrid than it already is?  Why, you add a 'tamper' of cobalt metal around the warhead, a process known - for reasons that escape me - as 'salting'.  Any bomb so modified will cause the cobalt to both vapourise and become a radioactive isotope with a half-life of over 5 years when the warhead detonates.  Art! 

Cobalt

     This is bad.  Normally the "Rule Of Seven" states that 7 hours after detonation, the radiation will have declined by 90%; by 7 x 7 hours, or 49, it will be down by 99%, and by 7 x 7 x 7 (or two weeks) it will be down to 99.99%.  Not so with the jolly old cobalt-salted nuke; those lands outside the Greater Moscow Crater are uninhabitable for a decade, all thanks to that long-lived radioactive fallout.

     This is the up-to-the-minute definition and example of "Salting The Earth", which goes back to antiquity as a ritual and strategy, where the literal-minded beggars used real salt.  Art!

Romans re-designing Carthage

     Carthage was one of the more notorious/infamous/splendid <delete where applicable> examples of a conquered city suffer sowing with salt.  Not only was this a symbolic process of purification of enemy land, it also killed any plant life there present straight off, and prevented any crops from growing for years afterwards.  This means any locals who survived their city's destruction would emigrate, since you can't eat briny dirt.  Art!

     Here we give thanks to "In Deep Geek", who did a short vlog about the Barrow-Wights as they occur in "Lord Of The Rings".  Long, long before the Barrow-Wights existed, there were the Downs, a collection of rolling, treeless hills that became part of Cardolan, one of the successor kingdoms of Arnor.  Art!

"Here was of old the witch-realm of Angmar"

     The people of Cardolan proved to be a hardy lot, despite centuries of unremitting conflict with the Witch-King of Angmar - one of the Nazgûl and the premier of Sauron's servants.  They clung onto their land of the Downs, until the Great Plague practically depopulated them in the Third Age.  By that time there were now tombs and mausoleums and stone circles and obelisks erected on the Downs, as evidence of their prior occupation.  Art!

     Ol' Wi-Ki didn't miss a trick here.  He brought into being 'evil spirits' to inhabit the barrows on the Downs, rendering the whole area unfit for human habitation.  Their existence was a horrid rumour even in the Shire, even after one and a half thousand years, so the wights had quite some staying power.  More than a bucket of sodium chloride, anyway.  Art!

     Their exact state and description is rather open to interpretation, though they do have a physical form, because Frodo chops off his captor's hand, which serves them right as you'll never get a Michelin star for kidnapping guests.

     And yet, and yet - Ol' Wi-Ki might have been better off with a bucket of sodium chloride after all.  His intent was to metaphorically 'salt' the Barrow-Downs and stop any humans settling there.

     Yes, well, the wights are rigidly rooted in the Downs and cannot move outside that area.  After infesting this zone for a millennia and a half, people know to keep well away.  Nor is that all.  Art!

     Ol' Wighty (On The Nighty) took ages to undress and re-dress the three hobbits, and to decorate them with jewellery, and swords and suchlike weapons.

     Did they bother to inform either Ol' Wi-Ki or Sauron that they'd captured four hobbits?

     No, they do not!  One mustn't be too hard on Ol' Wighty, it has been hundreds and hundreds of years since their last guest, so they may have gone a bit potty with the 'My home is your home' practice.  Conrad wouldn't put mental agility high on their list of personal attributes.

     So! there you have the demesne-denying Barrow-Wights.  More persistent than a bucket of salt if not quite as clever.

"The War Illustrated"

Yes, we are still on that montage that tends to take up the middle pages of this magazine, thank you for asking.  Art!

Excuse the seam

     The caption notes this as being "Our armour passes a knocked-out Tiger tank near Rauray" which, of course - obviously! - is utter bunkum.  It's a Panther, that much is obvious.  We cannot see most of the tank so it may have indeed been hit and burned out, or it may merely have broken down or run out of petrol and thus been abandoned.  Note that the hull machine gun is still in place; if the crew were alive and leaving it for whatever reason, they'd be inclined to take this with them for self-defence.  Also note that the British (or Canadian or Polish) tanks don't bother with either camouflage or a look-out as there is almost no risk of an attack from the Luftwaffe.

Conrad's Sekrit Layr With Added Dog-Nest 

The previous dog-nest was an embroidered sheet, which now graces the bed, so Edna has to go slumming it with the following.  Art!

     Don't let that dozing demeanour deceive you, her ears pricked up instantly when I opened a packet of crisps.

     No, I'm not going to pick it up and wear it, I do have *some* standards.  It will go into the wash.

A Hole In The Plot

Thanks to Stephen King for providing so much blog content with his magnum opus "The Stand".  Art!

     These are the hapless laboratory staff at 'Project Blue', victims of the initial outbreak of A-Prime.  Please note that it killed them practically instantly and they had no time to react to alarms or warnings; you don't see any of them in hazmat suits, do you?  Art!

     Yet here is Patient Zero.  He's already infected, and he spreads A-Prime across South Canada from California to West Texas, but it takes him two days to succumb.  How did that happen?  Answers in the Comments, please.  Because, otherwise, this first iteration of A-Prime is so lethal it would never have gotten beyond the labs of Project Blue as everyone died where they stood.  Ironic, that, doncha think?

"City In The Sky"

We have now returned to the outskirts of New Eucla, where the author is trying not to info-dump his audience.

     More questions followed from both sides, with the big news being that Arc One was going to be de-orbited.  This evoked only slight interest from the locals.  Kirwin felt herself getting annoyed that such a dangerous and large-scale project should be treated so lightly.  Didn’t they realise how – which is when she realised that no, the locals didn’t understand just what was involved.

     ‘We want to get out to spy on the Lithoi base,’ explained Ace after tucking away another croc steak.

     ‘Not a chance!’ snorted one of the policemen.  ‘At least not in the dark, without knowing the land.’

     Biting her tongue, Ace avoided replying.  The plod did have a point; their directions from the Doctor were sketchy to say the least, about orienting themselves at the outskirts of the town and heading in that direction for at least a day.

     ‘What’s in your cases?’ asked another policeman, making Kirwin look up from her own crocodile steak.

     ‘Induction rifles, induction pistols, ammunition and a portable FAF missile launcher with three warheads.’

     Ace understood “FAF” immediately.  She had to explain to the Australians.

     ‘It’s “Fire and Forget”.  You point the missile at a target, launch it and then scarper, and the missile finds it’s own way there.’

     Dark looks from those assembled:

     ‘Is it nuclear?’ asked several.

     ‘No.  High explosive squash head,’ said Kirwin sharply, and Ace had to explain that as well.  After which she yawned jaw-crackingly widely and settled down against a handy tree stump to rest – and inevitably fell asleep.

     That's our Ace, genned-up on infernal devices.

Finally -

After the Scunge Bobbler, you need a Sprong© Bibbler in your life!  Art?

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