A Dismal Demographic

And Colourful Cartographic

We need not bother with the lonnnnng preamble of yesteryon's Intro, because I'm going to head into this one with the bold assumption that you recall what I'm gabbling on about.  Which is that map of Judge Dredd's world as of the 22nd Century, where, it is fair to say, Hom. Sap. have not been treating Mother Nature with the care she deserves.  Art!

Hershey proves she's not made out of chocolate

     To be fair, they did have other, more immediate concerns than the EPA.  A little background is in order here.  You see, thanks to various supernatural shenanigans, the Big Meg had a rather large body count during the events of 'Necropolis', which I'm not going to detail or we'd be here till the weekend.  I believe the total number of dead was 60 million, who were buried in giant pits out in the Cursed Earth.  

     Then along comes the rapscallion Sabbat, who is of questionable morals and intent.  He reanimates all the dead across the planet, leading to the story called "Judgement Day", in order to take over Planet Earth.  Whatever happened to getting along with people and co-operation, hmmm?  This is where our other map comes in.  Art!

     The global death toll for JD is three billion people, which is rather a lot.  Conrad's unsure if the creators ever give a total for the pre-JD world population, which is likely to be less than our current world thanks to the environmental restrictions you can see above.  Five mega-cities are deliberately nuked by the surviving mega-cities in attempts to keep the zombie hordes at bay; yesterday's map detailed Mega-City Two, Brasilia and South-Am City, and above you can see Djakarta and Sino-City One were also victims of this gambit.  Ooopsie.  Art!

     If you have sharp eyes and equally sharp wits, you'll have noticed that East-Meg One is now a giant glass crater - but it's not a victim of Judgement Day.  This fate goes back to the brief Apocalypse War, when EM1 made a big for global domination, first by nuking half of the Big Meg into radioactive vapour, then by invading.  They were hoist by their own petard when a suicide squad led by Ol' Stony Face launched one of their own Total Annihilation Devices at them, from inside their own defensive shield.  Ooopsie.

     You ought to have noticed that the British Isles have survived, partially intact, into the 22nd Century, possibly because of prevailing offshore winds, although the writers wanting to set specific stories in the three different environments is more likely.  Art!

     Although plagued by all the ills of a modern mega-city, Brit Cit judges are not armed as their South Canadian counterparts, because - I mean, that just wouldn't be British, would it?  Plus, if you want a little local colour and to mock stereotypes, simply wheel in a story from Cal Hab - what remains of inhabitable Caledonia - or Emerald City - what remains of habitable Hibernia and nothing to do with Oz - and satirise away.

     Conrad would like to point out that all those green areas are not verdant pasturelands; they are radioactive wastelands, and the green is that of glowing fallout-contaminated land.  There aren't any readily available depictions of these areas unless one goes into individual comics, so this will have to stand.  Art!

     This is the South Canadian 'Cursed Earth' radlands, which stretches from the west to the east coast, and they can stand in for other such places.  The red-shaded areas are, according to the legend on yesteryon's map, positively hotching with mutagenic agents and are to be avoided at all costs lest you want your offspring to have three heads and tentacles.  Up to the point where I stopped reading '2000AD' there hadn't been any stories set in these areas, so if you an imagination and Word, you could try selling a story to Revolution publications.  Art!

Hondo Cit Judge

     Apart from this pretty spiffy artwork (artist unknown at present) that's it for this map chat, chaps.

Conrad The Curious Culinarist

If that's not already a word, I want royalties when it gets into the next edition of "Collins Concise Dictionary'.  Okay, I was reading one of <deep breath> 'War Witch Will Hold This Territory' on Twitter <suffer ignominously Elong Tusk!> when she mentioned 'tomato pie'.

     SSSCCCCCRRRRCCCHHHHHH

     You what?  Conrad had never heard of it before.

     Turns out it's a recipe from the south of South Canada.  A savoury pie, with the tomato filling held together with mayonnaise and cheese.  

     I have found a recipe, will be making notes and tonight is the Weekly Shop.  I will let you know.

Man Of Stele

No!  That is not a spelling mistake, although it is a bit punny, following on from our "Man Of Steal" title of yesteryon.  No, 'Stele' is a proper word, and it just happened to float up to the top of my mind this morning, apropos of nothing in particular.  Just the way a mind works, I suppose.  Art!

     Let me guess, this word has Greek roots?  I shall consult the CCD.  "An upright stone slab or column, decorated with figures or inscriptions, common in prehistoric times."

     And yes, it is from the Greek, 'Stele'.  No information as to what the Greek word means.  "A big stone"?

I Am Currently Working On A Thing

Because only South Canadians would use the pretentious word 'Project', although you could argue this Thing is about 'Projecting', in the strategic military sense of the word.  You see, a few Ruffian bottomholes have been ranting on television, when they ought to be home in bed, trying to sober up.  Art!

     This quarter-wit is Gurulyov, whose face seems to be sliding off his skull.  Take that phrase appearing on-screen: "Americans are now very concerned that the Ruffians are going to attack Alaska."

     Well, you know Conrad, ever up to carry out a ridiculously detailed examination of the ridiculous, and I am currently at the note-making stage on dealing with this asinine assertion.  There may be a bit of history involved.  For reference's sake, let me prod Art into semi-consciousness after his bowls of coals -

Alaska the biggest South Canadian state

 

Behold!  A New Friend!

Conrad continues to plough his lonely furrow, promulgating the truth that sharks are our friends.  Probably not good as domestic pets, mind.  Art!

     Say hello to a newly-discovered species of 'Ghost Shark', so-named because they lurk in the abyssal deeps of the ocean and are thus stumbled across only very rarely.  This one has been christened the "Australian Narrow-Nosed Spookfish" because - you may be ahead of me here - of it's very long, thin nose.  They inhabit the briny deeps at a depth of over one and a half miles, which you'll agree makes it unlikely to scoop one up in a shrimping net when you go out all marine-biologing.  Would make a nice background element when they finally produce "The Kraken Wakes" as a miniseries.

More Obsessive Detailing

Your Humble Scribe is still sorting out counters from "The Great War In Europe" and is now dealing with the Teuton counters, and O my there are a lot of 'em.  Art!

Before

An hour later .....

     It did give me the chance to listen to another of 'Anders Puck Nielsen''s excellent and succint vlogs on how the Special Idiotic Operation is going.  Swings and roundabouts.

Finally -

For some reason there was a lot of chatter on Twitter about sausages yesteryon.  I personally have 4 Posh Dogs in the fridge waiting to go, in case you want to know about the Sekrit Layr's Sausage Situation.