Din Această Urzică, Pericol -

Which You Pikers Ought To Immediately Recognise As Romanian For -

"From this nettle, Danger -"

The reason it's in Taupe and bold is because it's a quote from the Barf Of Avon, Willy Shakingshaft, and his play 'Henry IV'.  The second part is "We pluck this flower, Safety".

     What Bill means, taking a long time to get there - perhaps he had Word Count targets of his own back in the sixteenth century? - is that sometimes the location with the least likelihood of danger is situated right next to a very dangerous site indeed.  Art!

     This is the location of one of the Sinister's finest moments, the battle of Stalingrad.  Of course, being Sinisters they couldn't allow the city to remain with that name after 'The Little Sod With The Moustache' fell from grace, and it's now Volgograd.  Expect the Bunker Midget Grandad to change it back any day now, since th

    ANYWAY ANYWAY General Chuikov had the distinctly horrid task of defending the enormous pile of ruins on the west bank of the Volga from being entirely over-run by the Teutons.  Art!

     As you can see here, his HQ was improvised and lacked any modern amenities.  It was also dug in dangerously close to oil tanks that had not been drained of their contents, which Luftwaffe bombing set alight, hence the dense clouds of smoke you can see in the first picture above.

     This proved to be a blessing in disguise; the 62nd Army HQ was actually protected from observation by the columns of smoke, and the Teutons didn't think anyone was daft enough to hang around hundreds of tons of burning fuel.  Art!

     Chuikov also ordered his troops to get as close as possible to Teuton positions.  This might sound counter-intuitive but Nettle-Danger-Flower-Safety, remember?  Yes, the Teutons might hurl hand-grenades or empty shell cases full of excrement, and incautious exposure meant getting shot, but being so close meant the Teutons dared not use artillery or bombs or risk hitting their own lines.
     There is an excellent illustration of this Nettle-Danger-Flower-Safety principle, and I am delighted to have found the relevant clip on Youtube.  Art!

     From "We Were Soldiers" and again this is the way to go if you don't have an air or artillery advantage.

     What brought on this reflective Intro?  A bit of speculation whilst walking Edna, the 'Thinking Time' as it gets dubbed, quite accurately, since there are no other distractions present, bar the odd suicidal pigeon or learner driver grinding their gears into iron filings.

     You see, the recent 'Operation Spiderweb' as conducted by the Ukrainian SBU (their Intelligence Service), used bases they had established inside Mordorvia.  This had the advantage of hiding in plain sight, because who expects your enemy to turn up and squat on your doorstep? and to assemble lethal technology whilst they're about it?  Art!

     Even more hideously embarrassing, one of the SBU cells set up within spitting distance of an FSB (Ruffian Intelligence Services) provincial headquarters, on the Nettle-Danger-Flower-Safety principle.  We are not informed which office this was, but you can bet your last Notional Economic Monetary Unit that the office manager has been demoted and volunteered for front line service in Donetsk.

     Then we have the even more recent Israeli strike on Iran.  Like the Ukrainians, this one was a long time in gestation, possibly for years.  It, too, involved Mossad (Israeli Intelligence Services) building a drone factory inside Iran, once again exploiting the Nettle-Danger-Flower-Safety principle.  Given that Israel and Iran do not have a common land border, it was probably a lot easier for Mossad to set this up in the absence of any suspicion about what it might have been planning.  Art!

     If you would like a fictional example of NDFS, look no further than "The Zone: Overkill", which involves a desperate NATO relief and reinforcement convoy being sent to the besieged city of Hamburg.  Art!

     Once there, the strike force personnel are processed in an underground sewer station by a British diplomat who is, to be polite, off his effing rocker.  He is happy to live in the reeking depths because, as he informs them, if the Sinisters start using Sarin or other gas agents, he can use the sewer fumes to generate an overpressure and keep the gasses out.

     Yeah right.  I think the Nettle is better than the Safety here.

     I was thinking of including 'Arctic Heat' here but will delay it for reasons of suspense.

"The War Illustrated Edition 209 22nd June 1945"

So we have reached the end of 1942, in this retrospective montage, where the fortunes of the Allies have taken a marked turn for the worse - 'The end of the beginning' as Winnie put it.  Art!

     A campaign that is virtually unknown here in the UK, this was the Ockers and Polite Australians taking on the Imperial Japanese Army and beating the tripes out of it.  The terrain, disease and climate were awful, as bad as Burma, which is saying something, quite without having a fanatical enemy wanting to introduce an 18" sword bayonet into your vitals.  The significance of this victory is that it put an end to any Japanese hopes of advancing on Australia itself.  Conrad has a film of the same name knocking around in his DVD collection.  

Give It A Bit Of Ginger

How very apt!  For whom appears in "Biggles Hunts Big Game" but Air Constable Hebblethwaite, who hails from Yorkshire but we shan't hold this against him.  Thanks to his hair colour - you may be ahead of me here - he is universally known as 'Ginger'.  In BHBG the shoe is on the other foot and Ginger is stalked and nearly killed by a Cape Buffalo, wh

     ANYWAY Art!

     This is the Ginger Pudding I made, which is what the Cape Buffalo would have made of A.C. Hebblethwaite if it had caught him a little on the small side.  Nor is it all that gingery, so I have another one steaming as we speak, with ground ginger, as before, and also ginger puree and a smattering of crystalised ginger.  The steaming process takes hours so I won't be putting it to bed until late this evening.

How To Make Armageddon Dull

You ought to be aware that Conrad has been, via 'The Sky At Night', updating you on how potential Near Earth Objects that might, perhaps, impact Earth, are detected, assessed and projected.  Art!

     Here we meet Professor Hugh Lewis, the UK's man at the 'Space Mission Advisory Group', better known by the acronym 'Samepage'.  These are the people who deal with the astronomical data that might inform of an impact, and how to either prevent it, or mitigate the consequences if impact is unavoidable.  Art!

     Hugh explained that many nations lack any ability to deal with such an impact, and therefore have to rely on those that do, which is expensive.

     Then there is the  bi-annual 'Planetary Defence Committee', which invokes images of Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith.  Not so.  It's a planning exercise where they simulate a potential NEO impactor and have various people act the part of politicians, journalists or scientists, who then have to act as if their matrix game was real.

     Conrad has referred back to TSAN because I checked out the SPAG and it's a terminally dull sea of text.  Very worthy and all that, just - snoozefesty.

Finally -

Today will be another working Monday whilst also dogsitting, O joy unabated.

I will also tell you more about the Ginger Pudding.  I bet you can hardly wait.