How To Split A Hair Into 127 Parts

Tricky, But It Can Be Done

I think you'll find that you need an obsidian blade so fine you can't see the end with your unaided vision, with micro-gearing, and a powerful microscope.  Steady hands, too.  Yes yes yes, I know the record is only 18 parts which happens to be 35 years ago and technology has improved since then.

Sorry.  Couldn't resist

     ANYWAY once again we have dived down a rabbit hole that was itself an adjunct of another rabbit hole, because the hair-splitting is entirely metaphorical.  What I wanted to do was focus on an early scene in "The Recruit" which is Episode Seven of Series Six of "Dad's Army", where we visit Captain Mainwaring in hospital, the victim of surgery to cure his ingrowing toenails.  Art!

     Here we see the salient point: he is reading a newspaper and remarks about how well the British were doing in the desert.

     CONRAD IMMEDIATELY BECOMES INTERESTED IN THIS DETAIL.

     As you should surely know by now, Your Humble Scribe can bore at Olympic level on the campaign in North Africa, and will do so if given even the slightest encouragement.  So, what date can this be?  Don't forget, in "My British Buddy" we met South Canadian soldiers, who only arrived in This Sceptred Isle at the end of January 1942.  Thus after that date.  We don't see any snow or ice present in this episode, so Spring has arrived.  No mention of El Alamein, so before July 1942.

Lack of snow, don't you know

     Well now, young snappers of whip, Conrad has a solution here - the Battle of Gazala.  This began in May of 1942 when the Axis forces beat Perfidious Albion to the punch and attacked first, and May in This Sceptred Isle can be pretty chilly still, as Corporal Jones remarks.  Art!

Happy shiny ordnance.  And people.

     Alan Moorehead covered this battle in his excellent "Desert Trilogy" and pointed out the relentlessly positive propaganda drivel put out in the British press about the battle - hence Captain Mainwaring's confident yet completely incorrect assumption - because things went very badly wrong for Perfidious Albion as the battle progressed.

     Yes, to answer your question, I have had a nosy and no, there doesn't seem to be any reference to what date the DA episodes are supposed to be set in.  Google away to your heart's content if you want to prove me wrong.

     Of course, I may be overthinking this a little ...

Martin's Mucky Midden Manoeuvring 

Rejoice that the inestimable Martin Zero goes poking around in dirty, wet, muddy, dark and smelly places so that you don't have to, and that he presents videos of his excursions so you, too, can experience claustrophobic subterranean workings.  He and his compatriots were exploring what is known locally as "The Devil's Hole" NO SNIGGERING AT THE BACK! and needed to access it via the River Medlock.  Art!

     That's a rather dis-chuffed Martin in the rain - which will become important later on.  They stroll off into the Medlock and negotiate a padlocked entry grill - taking care to not show how - and into stage one.  Art!

     You can see it's dark, cramped and very damp.  What you can't see is the treacherous river bed underfoot, full of rocks and boulders and very slippy, too.  Not only that, it was very deep on the starboard side, so they kept away from that.  Art!

     The other urbexers had been here before and placed the ladder, as the top of that wet, slimy brickwork is a good eight feet high and impossible to scale otherwise.  Martin noted with a touch of trepidation that a concrete arch had been erected under the original stone and brickwork, seemingly in order to reinforce the tunnel roof and walls.  Art!

     What you see as the 'ceiling' here is actually the floor of the old Park Bridge Iron Works and it's not in good shape.  It might be difficult to detect via the image but Martin said the ceiling had a visible sag to it.  A little un-nerving.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oqx2zFWNmns

     That's the link to Martin's video.  I shall call a halt here as they have a lot further to go.  A lot further, and equally unpleasant.

Conrad: Still Consistent

And ANGRY!  O so ANGRY!  Did I mention that I was ANGRY yet?  Well I am, and for the usual reasons: the Codeword compilers are being a bunch of bottoms again.  For example:

"GEISHA": A five-letter word that has three vowels and ends in one of them.  Do you have any idea how difficult this kind of word is to parse and solve?  VERY DIFFICULT! because it's JAPANESE NOT ENGLISH as I should not need to point out.  But have still done so, because I am thorough <with the proper English pronunciation>.  They are, or were, as Conrad isn't sure if they're extinct or not, professional companions for men, trained in the arts of music, dance and casual chat.  Art!

A giggle of geishas?

"MATINS": NO!  Not a mis-spelling of MATINEES.  "The first of the seven canonical hours of prayer" and something you will only ever find in historical romances like "The White Company" so it's a good job I've read it, isn't it?  CAN YOU GET ANY MORE OBSCURANTIST!* 

Chattin's at matins

"JOCOSE": Or to be in good humour.  Which you can take it, I am NOT.  Fortunately this word occurs at several points in "Para Handy Tales" and I have been going on about same of late, so yes I recognised it.  YET THESE ARE TALES FROM WELL OVER A CENTURY AGO.  I think you both see my point and appreciate why I am so liverish.  Art!

My salvation

Finally -

Conrad has bestirred himself to a commitment; he is going to be travelling into the office in Gomorrah-on-the-Irwell to work at his still coyly un-named employer next week.  Part of doing this is carrying my works laptop both into and out of the office, which means a new rucksack is needed, for my old one's straps are about to part company with the sack, and the new one is both inconveniently small and inconveniently small.  Yes, the same thing twice, because it's a pain.  SO!  I bought a new rucksack, which is more like a sack with  zips.  Art!

     Big enough to hold a body.  Er - so I'm told.

     And with that, we are done!

*  An comment not a challenge.  Ta.

From Starboard To Larboard

As You Should Surely Know -

 - we here at BOOJUM! sneer and snort at the words "Left" and "Right" and use "Port" and "Starboard" instead, because they're much cooler and also confuse people without a marine or aviation background.  Art!

HMS Belfast from port in port

     "Port" doesn't seem to have a proper origin, instead taking over the duties of the previous word "Laddebord" (meaning "Loading Board") that evolved into "Larboard".  Art!

The thuggish Hawker Typhoon from starboard

     "Starboard", however, does have a definite origin.  The Old English term for the paddle used to steer any marine vessel was "Stoerborde", which was stuck over the right-hand side of said vessel.  This then evolved over time into the word we know and love today.

     And that has to be the shortest, pithiest Intro for years.

     Motley!  Here's a dustbin.  Find port and starboard on it and paint them up, won't you?

BOOJUM! Reviews Films (And Perhaps Television, Too)

You know how we manage these things: go solely on the title, generalise hugely and lie if it looks good and guarantees extra traffic.  Or ignore any of the above if we feel like it*.  Set the oven at Gas Mark Six and let the roasting begin!

"Vigil": At first scan I thought this said "Virgil" and was tolerably excited that we were about to get a biography of the distinctly second-string brother from "Thunderbirds".  I mean, how do you charm the ladies when you're essentially a flying HGV driver? 

I prove my point.  From port.

 Whereas Scott can boast about his enormous engines and how his sporty steed can do Mach 27 and would you like a trip in

     ANYWAY I accidentally read a blurb that described how this (television series?) was set on a submarine called 'Vigil'.  Art!

Mister Putin's Nightmare.  From starboard.

     "Vigil"?  THIS IS SURPASSINGLY STUPID IF TRUE!  <ahem> allow me to compose myself.  It would indubitably be called 'VIGILANT' or "ARGUS" or "SINISTER SNIVELLING SAUSAGE-SCOFFER SMASHER" perhaps.  NOT a word as namby-pamby as 'Vigil'.  Bah!  And because it's a murder mystery everyone will have a clutch of skeletons in the closet and it was the Captain all along.  Next!

SHE'D BETTER BE VIGILANT, HMMM?

"RESPECT": No idea and couldn't care less.  Doubtless a neo-spaghetti western set in the town of Respect, where everyone has a clutch of skeletons in the closet and it was the Mayor all along.  Then the Wild Bunch show up and everybody dies in the apocalyptic ending, thank you and goodnight Sam.

OBVIOUSLY the sheriff

"EXTINCT": Hmmmmmm this looks like an hideously unfunny cartoon - O I beg your pardon, "computer animation" - aimed at children.  Don't tell me, don't tell me, one of the protagonists is an argot-spewing streetwise tough and the other is tender and sensitive and takes ballet lessons, yet over the story arc they reconcile and get married.  Then the Wild Bunch shows up and everybody dies in the apocalyptic ending, thank you and goodnight Sam, because only that way does the title make sense.  Art!

"Suddenly, two shots rang out ..."**

     Having hurled ordure at art, I think we can shamefully slink away.  Until next time!

A Touch Of Poignancy

Your Humble Scribe watched the last episode of his "Dad's Army" last night, the one called "The Recruit" and noted the absence of Private Walker.  His missing was covered by a scribbled note claiming to have gone off to "The Smoke" (London if we're being formal) to indulge in some spivvy goings-on.  Art!

     In reality he had become seriously ill and, whilst the episode was being filmed, was lying in a coma in hospital, from which he never recovered.  He died three weeks later, much to the shock of the cast and crew.  From Series Seven onwards his name was never mentioned again and to the producer's credit, they never bothered to try and cast another actor to play him.

     If you are unfamiliar with the term 'spiv' then think of it as 'black marketeer with connections' and you're in the right tennis court.  Art!

How Very Apt!

Your Humble Scribe is so impressive/sad/creative <delete where applicable> that he can be found standing perusing cans of beer at the supermarket, not for anything of a particular type - as far as I am concerned it can be pale and ail - but rather a design or name that we can use on the blog.  Thus we come to -

     How could Conrad resist a brew with such a name?  Well, I couldn't, and I didn't and so here it is.  I am making a fuss about it because it cost £2.20 and there's not a lot of it, which 'it' turned out to be a stout similar to Guinness.  Art!

White hair.  Black heart.

      Thankfully they hadn't flavoured it with chocolate or grapefruit, which is a particular thing with Brewdog.  I flatly refuse to consume anything claiming to be beer that flavours itself with chocolate.  Nor pineapple, either, just to get that in before Rekorderlig come out with another ghastly cider variant.

A Water Pie?

Also known as a 'Depression Pie' and not a cookery item Conrad had ever heard of before.  Yes, we are back to "How To Cook That" and Prof. Anne Reardon, who was watching a Youtube video on how to make a pie with Coke.  Art!

     "It's cooking!" lies the Youtuber.  "No, it's not," clarifies Anne.  It's frothing because that's sugar being added to the Coke.  In goes some flour, vanilla and butter on top - Art!

     Anne then describes this as being a Depression-era cooking cheat where one used water as the main filling, thickening it with flour, then adding sugar and butter: hence a water pie.  This one used Coke instead of water.  It came out looking very sloppy (and not tasting of Coke) - Art!

     Anne then decided she can go one better and makes her own version as well as the TikTok recipe, using coke concentrate normally found with Sodastream machines, to ensure the bake ends up as Cokey-fied as possible.  Art!

     Of course we cannot have a HTCT video without Dave gamely testing the end results.  Art!

TikTok verdict: a bit meh.

Anne's version: a palpable hit!

     Dave's question still stands, however: why on earth would you want a pie flavoured with Coke?

*  Freddy Mercurial, that's me

**  I know, I know, I'm several kinds of horrid

T.Q.E.

I Know What You're Thinking

"The senile old boakbag is going to be rabbiting on about that film from the Polite Australians, you know, where there's only three people left alive in the whole of New Zealand.  Sad, you know.  He once had a promising career in nitrification enhancement processes."

     YES THANK YOU.  Pausing only to insist that I am not senile, let me explicate.  Your Humble Scribe had indeed scribbled an entry in his notebook "T.Q.E." and you might be forgiven/won't be forgiven/will be sent to the uranium mines <delete where applicable> in seeing this as a reference to "The Quiet Earth", except you are, of course - indubitably! - wrong.  Art!

"The Quatermass Experiment"

     This antiquity from the dawn of television in This Sceptred Isle is being referred to as I have just reached it in my edition of "Into The Unknown", a biography of Nigel Kneale, the chap who wrote it in a tearing hurry to fill a gap in the television broadcast schedules.  Art!

Bernard Quatermass to port; doomed astronaut Carroon with - er - astronaut gear

     If you have only seen the (admittedly excellent) film version then you are missing out.  Sadly, only the two first episodes of all six survive, and then only in a rather rubbish version that was filmed off a television monitor.  Unlike later television serials like "Doctor Who" or "Steptoe And Son" there is nil possibility of obtaining the missing episodes because they were never recorded in the first place <sobs quietly> Art!

Carroon, as played by Duncan Lamont
(and very well, too, according to Nigel)

     You see, back in 1953, as is made clear in ITU, they performed live in the studio in front of the cameras.  Of course they rehearsed extensively to ensure they hit their marks, didn't blot out the studio lights or tread on anyone's toes, but what you saw on Sunday was subtly different from what you saw on Thursday; these being, as Kneale explains, the two weekdays that actors were unlikely to have previous commitments to.  Art!

The hands of Orlac Kneale

     The scene above is from the serial's climax and I shan't spoil it by revealing how it ends.  What you are seeing are Nigel's hands, wearing gloves covered in twigs and shrubbery and leaves and mold, gesticulating mildly against an enlarged photograph of Westminster Abbey.  Even in those days the BBC loved to cut corners and if an

     ANYWAY it pulled in an audience of 5 million viewers, no mean feat when television sets were uncommon (10% of the population watching, actually ), and, more importantly, IT SCARED THE LIVING **** OUT OF ANYONE WHO WATCHED IT.  Art!

Prof saves the world*.  Not for the last time!

     Motley!  We've composed a chemical cocktail akin to that which Carroon sups, and we'd like to see what it does to you.  Don't worry, it's perfectly safe, you don't have an alien parasite taking over your mind and body**.

And Now For Something Considerably Lighter

If you have been following the blog with any regularity, then you know we bow the knee and tug the forelock to Professor Anne Reardon, stolid champion of truth and seeker after veracity, which is just truth dressed in a different banana skin.  She has another video up on Youtube, debunking the toxic tat put out by content farms, especially when it concerns 'life hacks' that tell fibs about cooking.  Let us examine one such.  Art!

     All these people are taking part in attempts to use a Sodastream or generic equivalent to - er - make carbonated milk.  I don't know, perhaps they're rich and bored.  The process requires one to only fill the bottle one-third full of milk, otherwise you get the explosive shower effect in picture three.  The end result?  Well, step up Anne's valiant husband Dave, to test a batch she made.  Art!

Rave for brave Dave!

          Anne almost - but not quite! - feels guilty for inflicting this horrid concoction on Dave.  As she explains, the carbonation process creates carbonic acid, which effectively spoils the milk and so it tastes rank.  So now you know.

     Currently listening to The Doors and "Strange Days" for the first time, and do you know, it's a corker, especially the title track.  Just for your information.

 

"King's Lead Hat" 

It's a song by Brian Eno, you snapping whippers, from the musically prehistoric days of 1977.  Conrad has no idea why it popped up in his consciousness, only that it did.  The title is an anagram of 'Talking Heads' who also happened to be a band only just emerging onto the music scene at the time, and Your Humble Scribe could kick himself that he's never realised in all that time.  I just thought it was a rather uncomfortable piece of headwear.  Art!

     I know what you're thinking, "Time for a little musical critique!" hmmmm no, or at least not yet, as there are pages and pages of lyrics, and brevity is the sole of wit, last I heard.

Scarcely Credible

Some celebrities turn out to be prodigies in other fields entirely un-associated with their primary claim to fame.  Will Hay, for example, was a talented amateur astronomer.  Jeff Goldblum is a talented musician.  Steve Buscemi is a volunteer firefighter.

     ANYWAY - Edmund Crispin, the author of murder mysteries, whom we were whanging on about last week?

     It transpires that he was actually Robert Montgomery, Oxford don, and a talented musician, to the extent that he was their official organist and choirmaster during his tenure.  Art!

     Not only that, he was much in demand to score films in the Fifties, so much so that the first six "Carry On" films were all scored by him.  He scored about forty in all, but it was the sheer incongruity of an Oxford don known for MURDER (fictional, but still) being the composer of such lightweight stuff.  Art!

Finally -

Your Humble Scribe is breaking out into a sweat, his limbs are quivering, and a nasty case of hives is imminent.  Still, I have managed to go yet another BOOJUM! without ladling vitriol onto a set of Codeword definitions.  Lulling the compilers into a false sense of security, don't you know.  Then, when they are complacent and sluggish after a seven-course meal with port and nuts, I shall POUNCE!  In metaphor only, I know MI5 read this stuff to see if there's any chance of a prosecution.  Not today, chaps.

"MI5 were disappointed yet still resolute.  They knew they'd get the evil alien swine one day."

     And with that, Vulnavia, we are jolly well done!

*  Ah, but I'm not saying how.

**  Not at last medical examination, anyway.

Attack Of The KILLER ONIONS!

Because Tomatoes Are So Passë, Cassie

Your Humble Scribe continues to chortle his way through "Dad's Army" Series Six on that charity shop DVD, and was both amused and impressed that the episode he watched last night featured what appeared to be either a real Smith Gun, or a convincing facsimile of same.

     Conrad now realises he has to explain to you snapping whippers exactly what a Smith Gun was, hmmmm?  Art!

     This gadget was bodged-up in the dark days of 1940, when it looked as if Teuton tourists in tanks were about to arrive within days.  It was a smoothbore 3" gun, and you see it ready for action above.  Art!

     It could be towed, you see, when horizontal - note the towing lug on the gun muzzle.  

     The thing was, it came into service in 1941, by which time the Teuton tourists were turning east to best the beast, and not looking to invade Perfidious Albion.  The Home Guard, who were issued hundreds of them, rather took the improvised article to heart, and overlooked the odd case of ammunition exploding prematurely and rendering crew-members suddenly dead.

     "But - the onions?" I hear you querulously query.   Yes yes yes, patience or I'll turn you into patients!

     This particular episode of DA is called "We Know Our Onions" where the platoon have been sent on a proficiency course and have been doing dismally.  In their final test they have to scale an electric fence - without setting it off - to acquire a set of inert bombs for their Smith Gun. Art!

     That's their platoon transport, full of onions that Private Walker ('The Spiv') had sold to Hodges.

     The previous day it had taken them five hours to get over a similar electric fence; on this day they had fifteen minutes.

     FIFTEEN MINUTES!

     Sergeant Wilson ('The Patrician') then recalls that the Smith Gun is a smoothbore weapon.  It will fire anything you can put down the barrel.  'Bits of metal, sir!' enthuses Corporal Jones.  He is dissuaded from this course of action because the gun will be firing at a platoon of Regulars, who are to feint an advance.

     What hits horribly hard yet is non-lethal?  Yes, an onion. Art!

The Regulars, pummelled with high-speed root vegetables, flee, and the platoon is awarded twelve stars by their delighted examiner, for sheer ingenuity and improvisation.

Smith Gun in travelling mode
(The right wheel, acting as base, is flat)

     

A Display Of Relentless Logic

As you should surely know by now, Conrad hates and detests logic, except when he doesn't and instead applies it, usually to boost his own ego.  Let us now examine how Conrad parses and cracks a Codeword SIT BACK DOWN! Art?

     As you can see, we have "I" and "L" already.  So, what can "11" be?  If it's a vowel then it can't be "E" or "A" because it only occurs four times.  Statistics, dear boy, statistics.  Could it be "O" or "U"?  No, because they can only make nonsense words.  So, 11 must be a consonant.  If that's so, then "20" must be a vowel.  It only appears five times, so, again, not "A" or "E".  We already have "I" so it can only be "O" or "U".  It doesn't appear in any pairs nor end a word, so Conrad favours "U" and works on that principle.  Yes, it might have been "Y", except it doesn't end any words, so that one's on the back-burner's back-burner.  Your Modest Artisan then does a quick run through the alphabet and finds that PUPA works.  If that's correct then "4" could very well be "M" and "18" be "Y" for IMPLY.  A moment of whatnottery as this means 1 Down is  _ _ IUMP_, until this resolves as TRIUMPH.  Thus we have deduced U, P, A, M, Y, T, R and H.  Art!

     Perhaps now you understand why Conrad seethes with volcanic hatred for compilers who use ridiculously obscure words like NONET.

     Hmmmm after all that forensic etymology I can't really hold forth on why Codeword compilers will become an endangered species after I take over, can I?  Let us move on to pastures new.

Chopper Chick Is Upside Down

Metaphorically*.  Conrad caught an interesting Youtube video featuring Vernice Armour, the first black female South Canadian combat pilot, who flew Cobra gunships in Iraq for fun.  She was explaining how very little of what you see in films as regards helicopters is correct or accurate.  She cut "San Andreas" a bit of slack when The Rock was hanging out of his helichopter.  Art!

     She explained that the majority of 'wind shear' (the downward air thrust by the blades) is actually at the last third of the blades, so Dwayne could have hung on there.  However -

Nope

     Vernice explains, several times, that a helicopter CANNOT manoeuvre like  a fixed-wing aircraft, and this includes flying at ninety degrees to the horizontal.  The rotors wouldn't generate enough lift and it would fall out of the sky.  Because that would result in a film about seven minutes long, the crew went with unrealistic physics.  Bad aerodynamics, good screen presence.

     We'll come back to this, Vernice has a great screen presence.

Vernice and her ride

I Missed A Trick

You know how I was blathering on about Alastair Reynold's "Redemption Ark" last week?  How could I have foregone the chance to blather on even more about another Ark in space, namely from that premier British dramamentary series "Doctor Who" and "The Ark In Space".  Ark! - sorry, sorry - Art!

It crawled out of the woodwork

     You may not know, but the later story "Revenge Of The Cybermen" used the same sets as TAIS, which the BBC loved, because it saved them money.  Conrad forgets what hokey old nonsense they used to justify this.  "It all happens in the far future so it might be like this!" their defence, one assumes.

Finally -

Hmmm it seems that the advent of September has brought an immediate chill in the air.  Your Humble Scribe donned a cardigan for the first time in ages, and had to shut the window in my Sekrit Layr thanks to a cold wind a-blowing.  We thus seem to have progressed straight from Spring to Slutch to Autumn, season of mists, fogs, bogs and dogs.  Probably also frogs, given how wet it is going to become.

édes álmok! (which is Hungarian for 'sweet dreams')

*  That word is so useful in getting me out of literary trouble!