Vat69nik

This One Will Take A Bit Of Explaining

They often do, don't they?  Your Humble Scribe is broadening his literary horizons with that classic from 2,000 years ago, "The Aeneid", and also expanding his knowledge of arcane South Canadian argot by getting even further into "The Big Sleep".  

     What do they have in common?  Well, for one thing, their respective audiences would have been quite at home with all the contemporary references therein.  Conrad, on the other hand, is a tad lost and has needed recourse to Google.  Art!

     Bear in mind that the novel came out in 1939, and the film above in 1946, with the whole of the Second Unpleasantness in between, with all the background baggage that added.

     "Yes, but - Vat 69 and 'Nik'? whoever he might be?" I hear you query.

     PATIENCE!

     What is the 'Mann Act'?  Because Ol' Ray mentions it in the text.  People at the time would have known what it was.  Not I.  So: it was previously known as the "White Slave Traffic Act" and was intended to outlaw the transportation of women for - gasp! - 'immorality'.  Which was a bit vague.  Art!

     These, gentle reader, are 'automatic elevators', which get several mentions in the text.  Why, I pondered, did they get the description 'automatic'?

     Because up until the end of the nineteenth century an elevator - more prosaically know in This Sceptred Isle as a 'lift' - required an operator to move between floors.  With an automatic all you needed to do was get in and press a button.  Less romantic, perhaps, but of more utility.

     'Ether and laudanum'.  Conrad could tell thanks to context that this is a combination of rather naughty substances, and whilst an audience in 1939 (or 1946) might understand what they were, Google in 2024 is your friend.  Art!

          Laudanum is opium in a high-proof alcohol base, and ether is an anaesthetic which gins you up before you pass out.  Knocking back a thimble glass of it would probably put you on your back.  Art!

     This is where things start to draw together, because 'Vat 69' is high-proof alcohol, being a blended scotch.  Conrad was somewhat surprised to discover that it's still around, which is explicable as I'm not fond of scotch at all, don't buy it and don't inspect bottles of it during the weekly shop.  Art!

     Your grandchildren might need to be informed about what a 'Vatnik' is.  In case you've been living in a submarine environment at the bottom of the Challenger Deep, you may not have noticed that there is a breed of Ruffian who stoutly supports their country in ultra-jingoistic fashion, despite (or because of) their lack of intellectual firepower.  Art!

Vatty looking a bit hammered

     Evil, cruel and malicious Westerners - like Conrad - take great delight in mocking the vatniks and causing them to weep copiously, leading to memes about 'Vatnik tears'.  Art!

     'Vatnik Soup' is the Twitter trope title created by an evil, cruel and malicious Finn called Pekka Kallioniemi, whom counters vatnik disinformation and is heartily hated by them as a result.  You may not be able to resolve details on the label, which declares it to be "American Pale Ale", rather than a salty broth.  What a relief.

     Conrad, being matter-of-fact about these things, immediately asked what proof it was, because that's a cold, hard, empirical fact, rather than any nonsense about taste or flavour or guff like that.

     Well, I suppose I'd better bring in a bit of Virgil since his work got mentioned in the Intro's intro.  Art!

     I've just finished Book Seven, where Aeneas and his Trojan exiles end up on the shores of Italy, at the mouth of the Tiber, called the 'Thybris' here.  Juno, who cannot stop meddling in human affairs and trying to put Aeneas down, has brought about a meeting of Roman tribes to wage war on the Trojans, and we get a brief description of various leaders and the tribes and cities they come from.  Art!

     This is Aventinus, whom readers back then would have recognised as the son of Hercules and the priestess Rhea.  He rode to war in a chariot, wearing a whole lion-skin, leading soldiery armed with javelins, 'fearsome pikes' and the Sabine throwing-spear, which Virgil describes as having a 'round tapering point'.  If it tapers to be round, that's not going to do a lot of damage when it hits, is it?  Art!

Deadly sharp throwing sticks

     Again, I bet contemporaries knew exactly what Ol' Virg was on about.  Conrad remains rather baffled.

     I think that's enough sharp pointy things for one Intro.  Next!

Conrad Guesses Again

Yes, another spaceship brought to you from the "Interstellar Research Centre", this one under the title 'Icarus - UDD'.  No expository blurb about this one, again, though there is a diagram breaking down the construction and engine design.  Art!

     Guessing here again, that there's a ballistic shield protecting the payload at the bow, with tanks of reagents and an engine with engine bells to stern.  Art!

     This isn't one of the enormous previous designs, being less than 200 m long and 150 m at the widest point.  They mention "D to UDD conversion" which might mean "Deuterium" as we are talking nuclear fusion here and you tend to need one of the isotopes of hydrogen to manage that particular process.  

     I found a webpage for Robert McSwinney, who is one of the Project Icarus people, with a clutch of degrees and master's qualifications.  He still doesn't define 'UDD' but does mention that "D" is plentiful, non-toxic and far, far cheaper to produce than He³ (the isotope of Helium you need for nuclear fusion).

     Aha!  Thanks to "Atomic Rockets" - an absolutely outstanding resource for the science in sci-fi - we now know that "UDD" means "Ultra-Dense Deuterium".  This is ONE MILLION times more dense than normal deuterium and you can classify it as possibly-to-be-Obtainium.  Art!

Potential UDD reactor

"City In The Sky"

Arcology One is now in the most dangerous phase of it's descent, coming down directly over the Lithoi's base-ship - and it's annihilating thermal cannon.

Once it landed, gravity would take over and cause the fusion plant in the smaller part of the dumbell to fall to earth as well, braked by that same parachute.  Doubtless there’d be extensive structural damage, rendering the sphere incapable of sustaining life – which is where Alex caught his logic failure, because once down on Planet Earth, Arc One didn’t need to sustain life.

     The Captain, having a background that dealt in weapons and warfare, studied Arc One as it came down with a slowness that made her curl her toes in dread.  The Lithoi still had their beam weapon and an estimated twenty minutes to bring it into action.  The sphere’s additional layer of what must be heat-shield might fend the beam off, but that parachute was frighteningly vulnerable!

 

CHAPTER TWENTY NINE:Rain Rain Rain

      The sphere had suffered it’s first casualties of the descent when two Lexan window panels had shattered, sending hard-edged plastic pinging around the interior.  Nothing lethal, just a score of shocked crew with gashes and gouges.  There had been a brief, violent tempest as air in the sphere equalised with the atmosphere outside, creating a blast of condensation; fortune favoured them, since the outside pressure was relatively high and the worst effect was sore eardrums.  Davy shut his eyes and gave thanks to any deity watching over them: if those panels had blown whilst they were in the upper atmosphere, they’d all be dead from hypoxia!

     Brace for impact.

Meanwhile, In South Canada .....

I believe the debate between an old man and an even older man is underway, none of which is going to be available for us in This Sceptred Isle to view until the small hours of Friday morning, by which time Conrad will be copping zeds and catching up on his badly-needed beauty sleep.

     "The Daily Beast" has a sly idea to keep people's interest.  Art!

     "Tapper" and "Bash".  Did they search out these presenters deliberately?  Enquiring minds want to know!

Whilst Skirting That Event

I am now going to post another update on the share value of Trump Media And Technology Group, which has only a single medium that's not up to much technologically.  Art!

     'Tain't looking good for the Flabby Farting Felon.

Finally -

By the times these lines greet your sight, it out to be Saturday, when Conrad is due to rendezvous with Darling Daughter for a somewhat delayed Father's Day meet-up.  There is said to be a library and museum in the mix.  I shall report back.