If You'll Excuse My Strangulated Impression
From back in the Eighties, when Arnie was delivering one-liners and mayhem, rather than political statements. It's from "Predator", if you aren't aware and if you aren't THE EXIT DOOR IS THAT WAY!
For the confused, "Da choppah" is a helicopter, and Dutch was making an earnest entreaty for his surviving compatriot to get out of Dodge-strongly-flavoured-with-Hell, whilst they still could. Art!
Muzzle-flash as done in the Eighties
There may be some confusion amongst those who have only seen clips of this particular scene, because Billy is one of the last four survivors, and he decides that guns are for cissies, he's going to go toe-to-toe with the Predator armed only with a knife, except the knife is about two feet long, so it might also be seen as a chopper. Art!
Now, call me a pedantic hair-splitter, because we never see what happens to Billy, only hearing a very loud scream from him. It's conceivable that he fell off the tree-trunk bridge to his death below - or did hit fall into the river and have his fall cushioned by water? Even if he had to fend off hungry alligators. "Dark Horse" probably did a one-shot on this very topic back in the Nineties, when they we
ANYWAY now that we've got people's attention, I would also like to put forward a track by Echo and the Bunnymen, to wit: "The Cutter". "Spare us the cutter" croons Ian McCulloch, being wary of describing exactly what this sinister edged instrument is: a razor? breadknife? piece of broken glass? Sweeney Todd? Who knows, and I bet neither did he. Art!
Nor can we mention "Choppers" without acknowledging that anti-hero from "2000AD", the self-styled-and-named 'Chopper' (real name Marlon Shakespeare), who went from a wall-scrawling graffiti artist - very much a hugely criminal no-no in the Big Meg - to a hoverboard champion. Art!
Probably also an illegal undertaking in Mega-City One. Face it, everything except breathing is illegal in the Big Meg, so this probably is, too.
Then we have an Antipodean entry, because the Ockers are always worth checking out for what they get up to on their island continent. Art!
Sadly - or otherwise - it's not about a team of Oz lumberjacks who travel by helicopter to distant forested parts of the hinterland to do - er - emergency logging and tree-felling? Rather, it's about an emergency rescue helicopter on a beach. MY idea was far more interesting!
ANYWAY as you may have guessed, none of this is to do with the real meat of the matter, which does concern choppers, except more along the lines of lumberjacks rather than helicopters. Art!
Yes <sighs heavily> it was clickbait, the machines they depict were pretty universally commercially-made timber cutting devices, but that's not to say they're not dangerous. One can imagine drunken idiots thinking 'O after 27 bottles of beer and a whisky chaser I'm all set up for an afternoon of wood chopping!'
Then they wake up in hospital minus a limb or two. Art!
This is a "Screw wood splitter" and operates by virtue of the tapered screw head rotating at very high speed, so it drills into and splits the wood apart. Note our brave operator not even bothering with gloves, nor are there any means of remotely shoving the wood, it's all done by hand. Heaven forfend one loses ones balance or mis-steps on a large lump of wood. Which accident would be mitigated by virtue of the screw head not being an edged blade, You'll appreciate this point when you see more of the other choppers being used. Art!
This one looks more bodged-together than a manufactured variant. Once again, entirely zero safety features; no guides or screens or grips, just raw hand-power, protected by an entirely inadequate pair of gloves. Remember what I said about edged blades? This one looks like it would, at most, only remove a couple of fingers or split a hand in two whilst impaling it (thanks to the metal mass at the end of that lever), so - safe enough for Ruffia, which is where this clip comes from.
Okay, having gone on at great length about what the Intro's not about, and then only scratching) no pun intended the surface, I feel it's time to move on. Don't worry, there are another 17 wood choppers in this vlog entry, and a second one with another 17 again. Chop chop!
"The War Illustrated Edition 196 22nd December 1944"
Before you ask, no, there aren't any heartfelt Christmas pictures in this edition because it's dealing with stuff from the 8th of December onwards. Art!
The photograph to port is a quite remarkable one, showing the 'tail' from a Teuton V2 in flight, as taken from a recon Lightning of the South Canadian Air Force in the 4 second window the pilot had. The V2 was supersonic and couldn't be intercepted in flight, which led to Herr Schickelgruber tweaking his moustache ends in malicious glee, which led to the Brylcreem Boys coming up with a solution: bomb the living daylights out of any identified V2 sites. This is what you see at starboard, with the Before and After Brylcreem. Buildings on the hard stand have been obliterated, and all those craters will need filling-in before any more V2s can be trundled around from storage to the firing platform.
More High Jinks On The Asiago
Conrad is delighted to have found a short silent clip from the Imperial War Museum with a series of clips from British troops serving Perfidious Albion in Italy. No location is given but Your Humble Scribe strongly suspects the Asiago plateau, thanks to the sheer elevation, the forests and (a bit of a giveaway) the impenetrable rocky terrain. Art!
Quite a vantage, I'm sure you'll agree. This is probably later in 1918, as there's no snow on the ground. The trees haven't shed their leaves as they're all evergreen pines. The vista is a bit murky and vague, thanks to early camera technology, and OF COURSE it was silent, the talkies hadn't arrived yet. I'll leave you with this one still as there is more to come. O yes indeed.
The Numbers Do Lie!
False but flattering, Blogger's Traffic stats have once again done the opposite of falling off a cliff - they have climbed aboard that rocket headed for the stratosphere. Art!
Hazegrayart illustrates the metaphor
Allow me to make my point. Art again!
A daily total that approaches that of a complete month? And a popular month at that? I dunno, perhaps Budanov is getting his technical wonks to puff up my stats in recognition of how awesome BOOJUM! is. Otherwise it's aliens.
A Functional One
Yesteryon we featured a defunct square baler, so now it's time to show you what a funct one is when in action, rather than inaction. Art!
Square baler doing just what it says on the tin: making cubes of hay, all the better to stack them or store without wasting space. Art!
They get towed by tractors, just so we're clear. The world is obviously not ready for a self-propelled square baler. Unless you have a brilliant idea and the compulsion to build a better mousetrap, as the saying goes.
Finally -
Since yesteryon was Monday and payday, more especially the latter, I pushed the boat out and purchased 4 paperbacks; one detective mystery, two post-apocalypse sci-fi; one military history. I did have a look at the latest over on Turner and Donovan's website but declined to spend £245 on a single hardback, although that may just be me. Toodle pip!
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