Going Potty

Or, Smashing!
Not in a good way, either.  During the events of yesterday, which resulted in the temperature within The Mansion falling to that of a clinical research laboratory's super deep-freeze locker, a crash was heard from the kitchen.  My favourite large (favourite because large) teapot lay in shards on the ground, with the funereal shroud of a soggy cosy <sad face>.  I was too distraught to take a picture, so maybe there's one in the archives.  Art?

A moment's silence, please

     We strongly suspect that the cat is responsible for this wanton act of mindless destruction, having been up to no good on the worktop - probably having a nosey at the drip tray under the Foreman grill - and having pushed the pot to it's doom.
     I realise I'm making a lot of this incident, which is because I get through a whole lot of tea, brewed via a teapot.*
     Having literally dusted off my second-favourite teapot, and having brewed a pot of tea with it, we once again heard the sound of breaking glass.**  Yes, the second pot had perished.  This time it's swan dive had been accompanied by a large hardback cooking book that had been propped up behind the pot.  I suspect this had slid out of place, hitting the pot and propelling it to a brittle death.
     Sorry, no pictures of that dead teapot, either. 

Have a picture of Comet Kohoutek instead

     After returning to work, I explained my tale of woe to Ania, our might team leader, who by coincidence had a friend with two surplus teapots that would have otherwise gone to a charity shop.
      Splendid!  Serendipity!  She showed me a picture of both teapots and I chose the larger of the two, before texting her friend.
     Conrad was sitting picturing his brand new pot brewing up a pint of Lady Grey tea, none of that milk and sugar nonsense here, when Ania came back.  Her friend had replied to the original text.
     "She was packing it away," explained Ania, " - when she accidentally broke it ..."
     AAAAGH!***
    
The Sheer Pulse-Pounding Excitement Of Simply Getting To Work
This is no mean feat considering we are talking about First Bus, quite apart from the weather.  Luckily your humble scribe, being an alien from an ice-world, already has veins filled with liquid nitrogen and Freon, so the icy conditions feel quite homely.  That wind is still rather excessive, though.

Home!

     Which is not what I wanted to talk about.  Instead, let us focus on LITHIUM-WAFER BATTERY DESI - hmmm, perhaps not.  Sounds dull.  Instead let us focus on BUS WAIT RATE! which is a whole lot more interesting.
     'Bus Wait Rate' is an utterly objective phenomenon and not the fevered imagining of my tortuous mind (which is in fact what you're reading now).  It refers to the unarguable fact that, as you wait on one side of the road for your bus, many more will pass on the opposite side.  This morning the ratio was 4:1.

First Bus spokesdemon says:  "And?"

     If only there was a method to make money from this!


Back To Banging On
 - about the 3.7" anti-aircraft gun.  Shelford and Bidwell mention the reasons for not using this weapon in a ground role against tanks, which you are about to learn.
     For a start, they argue that you would need two regiments of guns, at least 48 of them, and the crews would need extensive re-training - shooting a tank not the same as potting aircraft.  This means a significant weakening of anti-aircraft defences behind the lines, meaning a diversion of RAF resources to compensate. 

 - like moustache wax

     Then, too, the guns were designed with lots of complicated electrical and electronic gear, which would have to be removed, and anti-tank sights installed.  The 3.7" was also a big beast, weighing in at ten tons, so you needed an equally beefy tractor to pull it.

Avenge our moustache waxes!

  And, because it hadn't been designed to be fired horizontally, the recoil mechanism would fail with monotonous regularity.  Only to be expected; after all, you wouldn't go racing in a farm tractor, would you?  Same principle.

Er - then again -

Conrad Is Unsure
The crossword clue was "A race between two poles and a tank (7)", which I think comes out as "SARACEN".  The two poles are the South and North poles respectively, abbreviated to S and N.  Then you have "A RACE".
     However!  The Alvis Saracen is most emphatically not a tank.  NOT.  NOT!  Art?

Alvis Saracen

     Do you see any tracks there?  A big gun in a turret capable of accommodating the commander, gunner and loader?  Inches-thick armour?  The Saracen is an armoured personnel carrier, not a tank.
     Of course, if the answer turns out not to be "SARACEN" then I shall look foolish.
     But I thought I ought to make the point.^






*  And loose-leaf tea, of course.  None of that bagged nonsense here.
**  David Bowie reference there.
***  Coincidence Hydra moment.
^  Pedantic, cold-blooded and alien.  My best features.

A Tidy Atomic Pile

Dammit!
That's not what I meant to put.  Sorry; I've been using the prefix "Atomic" recently - Atomic Snail, Atomic Weasel and Atomic Shark* - which sort of went hand-in-hand when that word "Pile" came up.
     Here an aside.  Nowadays we call them 'nuclear reactors', yet they were originally known as 'atomic piles' for a reason.  Art?

Thus

     As you may be able to see, this is literally a pile of graphite and uranium bricks, which created a self-sustaining chain reaction.  By design it only put out enough power to heat a cup of tea, so there was no worry about it going critical and destroying the city of Chicago, or even the University thereof - an important point since it was built under the football stand of said university.  Why there?  You got me.  Health and Safety not an issue back in the day, I guess.
     Back on track!  What I meant to say was merely "A Tidy Pile", because I was wondering where my DVD of "Undermind" had gotten to and yes, the two things are connected. Art?

Despte the red, it is in black and white

     For those of you who don't know, this is a sci-fi series from 1965, long thought to be mostly lost; a review over on IMDB dated 2001 states that only 3 episodes survive, but here all 11 are.  It's a  subtle and sinister take on the hoary old alien invasion threat trope, with nary a Grey or Reptilianoid or even Dalek to be seen.
     However good it may be, your humble scribe couldn't find it, so a long search resulted until I found it.  I know what you're thinking, Hooray tale all told now we can go and watch "Pointless".
     Not quite.  I decided to therefore put all my DVDs into alphabetical order.  Ha!  You didn't expect that, did you?
     Oh.  I didn't realise I was that predictable.  Well, here's a before and after shot of my Sekrit Layr.  Art?

This is impressive, and not in any way sad.

     It took ages, let me tell you.  Each stack represents one letter of the alphabet, with the exception of "V".  For some reason there's nothing with a title that begins with "V".  
     From there it was a case of arranging them in alphabetical order and then stacking them in alphabetical fashion.  Art?

     I stacked the ones that begin with a number separately, because you might have worried about that.
     There you go, the origin of (most of) today's title!
     Now to throw an egg and the motley and mock it's tears!**

"Thaumaturges"
Yesterday we kicked off with the 'Dramaturge', which turned out to be a proper thing (a kind of literary liaison in the theatre world), and today we turn our philology on the word above, which the cynical or realistic would say is not a proper thing.  

No, Art, no.

     Quite contrary to Art's speculative post, Thaumaturges are not hideous alien monsters, because the word comes from the Greek for "Miracle", "Thauma" and "Work", "Ergon".  So, a Thaumaturge is a miracle worker.
     Which leads nicely into -

I Bring You Sunshine -
Not literally, although that would be nice, given the current weather.  Since many of you out there are shorter in the tooth than your humble scribe, I need to explain that the comedy duo of Morecambe and Wise used the song "Bring Me Sunshine" as their signature entry and exit tune.
     "Is this relevant?" I hear you ask.  "Because 'Pointless' has finished and 'Quincy' is on next."
     Well, yes, rather.  Art?

Horribly funny.***

     I post this because the BBC have managed to recover 30 seconds of a lost episode from 1968, which is not so much lost as unloved: it's a long reel of film that has degraded so much it's all stuck together and cannot be unseparated.  It's not radiation-proof, however, so some clever rascals at the Beeb x-rayed it, then scienced the shizzle out of it, and Hay Pesto! a clip of the programme.  Herein the link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/technology-43118475/morecambe-and-wise-rescuing-a-lost-film

     Go on, have a look.  Since they've managed this, I'd hesitate to call it a miracle.  It is of interest to sci-fi buffs, though, because how many decomposing "Doctor Who" film reels are there hiding in attics around the country?  The nation's favourite dramamentary might get some miracles of it's own.

More Of Medenine
I was having a quick browse at "Firepower" (Shelford & Bidwell) last night, and happened to come across a reference to the Battle of Medenine.  It mentioned the 17 pounder anti-tank gun, which we have posted about recently.  Art?

A Pheasant being unpleasant

     Interestingly, S & B mentioned that one 17 pounder hit and destroyed 6 Axis tanks with it's first six shots, and given the shell weight and speed, those tanks would have been very, very destroyed.
     Just so you know.

*  Worryingly, all these are real.  Well, "Atomic Shark" is a film (if you can grace it with that description) but it still exists.
**  Mind you, it was an ostrich egg.
***  Eric Morecambe could simply walk on stage and cross his arms and still be funny.