Going Down Precipitously

Yes!  More Of Money Misery!

Orc! Orc! Orc! as Ruffian Chef would say.  Just to clarify, unless you see the phrase "Ol' Tolky" in the blog, rest assured we're talking about Ruffia when the word "Mordor" is trotted out.  Although Putinpot would gladly sacrifice 143 million of his state's population to have Sauron's abilities.

     Witness the imagination and creativity of Conrad at work - you see today's title?  Well, those initials also stand for "Gross Domestic Product", which is one way to measure the economic well-being (or otherwise) of a state.  Art!

     Nothing to do with the Intro, I just wanted to bring this novel to your attention, as it wasn't in the library yesteryon and it would cost £4 to purchase from Abebooks, £2.50 of which is post and packaging, which is a rip-off if you ask me, and even if you don't.

     ANYWAY thanks to Konstantin of "Inside Russia" for his keen ex-accountant gaze as cast over Ruffia's GDP for the past two years since the Special Idiotic Operation began.  Art!

     Rather than go by anecdote or personal experience, Big K. went with official Ruffian data and Peter The Average's speeches.  His first point was that not hitting Ruffia with fuel export sanctions for nine months allowed Putinpot to accumulate a windfall that helped sustain the economy through 2022 and 2023.

G.D.P.: Bloaty Gas Tout boasted that this increased in 2023 by 3.63%, which might surprise you, or not, as you can tell when he's lying because his lips are moving.  Big K. pointed out that unwelcome or just plain bad economic data is published in obscure outlets such as the "Omsk Intelligencer And Advertiser" (circulation 1,227).  This allows the state to crow that they didn't censor or ban the news, and it's your own fault you didn't buy a copy, there aren't any back issues and it was three months ago.  Art!

     Konstantin then looked at the official Rosstat figures for GDP and found that their totals were rather different.

4.4% increase in savings and reserves

2.9% increase in consumer demand                Total = 7.9%

0.6% increase in military production

     Why only claim 3.63%? because Puffy Petroleum Pimp would surely like to gloast about a figure twice the size of his boasting.  Read on, pilgrims, read on.

Exports: Well, this is where the bad news comes in.  Ruffian exports fell by 34% in 2023, which amounts to a decrease in GDP by 4.4%.  Ooops.  Big K gave two examples of this.  Prior to the SIO, Ruffia was an exporter of aluminium, but has dropped out of the market completely and it's position as supplier has been taken over by other countries.  Then there's - an abbreviation for "there was" - enriched uranium.  Again, Ruffian exports are now nil, and their market position has been usurped by Kazakhstan.  Art!

"Savings And Reserves": Put in quotes as - you may be ahead of me here - this really means stockpiled stores of goods and materials in anticipation of further sanctions.  Whilst this may be sound near-future planning, it also harks back to the disastrous state of the Ruffian economy in the Nineties.

Military "Investment": Under Putin's watch, the production of military equipment is classed as an investment, hence the quote marks.  Thus the production of tanks, planes and warships accounts for 2.2% of the overall GDP growth.  Joe Blogs has pointed out that this is the exact opposite of an investment, as it's single-use kit that doesn't benefit the Ruffian population one iota.  Not only is this stuff not capable of being re-purposed, an enormous amount of it has already been destroyed in Ukraine - about $1.2 billion in aircraft losses this past fortnight alone.  Art!

$50 million up  the swanee

Unemployment: This remains at an historic low of 2.9%, which was being bruited about by the state media as a hot topic and proof of how wonderful things were in Mordor.  However - my favourite word again! - that very same state media is now radio silent on the subject, which Big K, in typical cynical Russian style, reckons that something bad is about to happen or has already happened.  Essentially, Ruffia has run out of workers, thanks to it's incredibly skewed demographics and the unwillingness of migrant workers to - well, be migrant.

Inflation: Again, this is not being mentioned in state media, because it's difficult to disguise rising prices as anything but bad news.  Eggs, fish, chicken, carbon-fibre turbine blades - the list goes on.  Food inflation has increased by 10% to 50% for some items and is even higher for finished goods.  Inflation was officially announced as 'defeated' in 2023, which didn't stop the rate increasing to 12% officially, with the unofficial estimate being 20 - 30%.  Art!

     You have to feel a twinge of pity for the workers at the Mordor Tourist Board.

Couldn't Pull A Pint Let Alone A Crowd

Yes, we are slagging off Donald Trump again.  Conrad is pretty certain nobody from MAGA will tolerate even looking at BOOJUM! let alone read it, so I can say with confidence that, were DJ Tango to pull a pint, he would wet himself.  Let that stay as ambiguous as it sounds.  Art!

     Given how intrinsically conservative and disapproving these kind of people are, Conrad finds the venue's name to be hilarious.  Art!

     Well it made me laugh.  I cannot find the photographs I wanted, of the rally where there were hundreds of empty chairs, which the organisers had to scurry and collect so that Bloaty Biffer Bafune Boy wouldn't be offended by his inability to fill an auditorium.  Remember when this guy held rallies in sports stadia? (which he avoided paying for).  Art!

The ultimate in social distancing

     What's that clicking noise?  O it's this - 

     DJ Tango, the blog content creator that keeps on and on and on.

     It's not just me, either - 

B̴o̴r̴i̴s̴ Trump

@BorisTrump6

·

12h

Trump is old and badly out of shape. It's clear from North Carolina tonight that he's using drugs to keep himself going. This can't go on much longer. This pace will kill him.

"The War Illustrated"

Okay, that was Issue 185, let's bring on Issue 186.  Art!

     The caption describes this as being in Italy.  Note that the tank doesn't appear burned out, but is missing a track, so it may have hit a mine and been immobilised, in which case the crew abandoned it without setting it alight.  Naughty naughty!  Also note that it's merely been shunted off the road and left there; Conrad imagines that by this time - the summer of 1944 - enough had been captured and examined to not need another intact one.  I wonder what they used to push it over, because that's 60 tons dead weight.

"City In The Sky"

A welcome relief from excoriation and strife, hmmm?  Davros is ensconced in a very private meeting with the head of 'Washington', one of the American spheres in orbit.

     This puzzled the other man, who plainly couldn’t reconcile the possible culprits.

     ‘I hope you aren’t going to suggest the Australians are responsible, Davy!  They’re still at the steam engine and horse-cart stage.  They aren’t eavesdropping on anyone.’

     Looking around the pristine room, as immaculate as any operating theatre in the Archipelago might be, Davy chewed his inner lip.  This would be an intellectual leap.

     ‘By third party I don’t mean another human entity, Marty.  I mean aliens.  Real genuine aliens from outer space.’

     The Veep looked surprised before bursting out in a guffaw of laughter that quickly died when he saw how serious Haritanian was.

     ‘You cannot be serious!’

     ‘We have people working Downstairs who flushed one of these aliens out of hiding.’

     Miss Martigan’s scribbling on her electronic notepad paused and she looked up.  Waukegan shook his head.

     ‘Dunno what you’re trying to pull, Davy.  You’re familiar with Occam’s Razor surely?  Aliens!’

     Haritanian continued on.  Whilst Waukegan didn’t look persuaded, Miss Martigan’s eyes had shone with a sincere curiosity.

     ‘They’ve been here on Planet Earth for decades, hiding out in the desert.  Their biggest asset has been secrecy – we’ve never dreamed they ever existed until Doctor Smith warned us.  These things blend in by hiding inside a human-shaped robot.  They can’t manage human behaviour very well, they end up behaving like the Wanderers.  Our people in New Eucla have one of these robots.’

       Hmmmmmm I wonder, I wonder - he mentioned Doctor Smith.  Will this have a dramatic repercussion?

Finally -

Once I post this it'll be time to venture into Lesser Sodom and see what's going remaindered at the Co-Op.  I need cream cheese to put on bagels in order to consume that date-expired salmon!  Five days past the 'Sell By' is practically nothing, am I right?

All Hail Commando Cody

No, I Shan't Use An Exclamation Mark Again

Two in one day would be rather over-doing it, and we're British here, you know.  Low-key.  Understated.  Art!

"Atom Heart Mother" anyone?

     As I was saying - and the band above are from the Netherlands, claiming to be an 'experimental acid metal' band, which probably involves a lot of feedback and trippy light shows - understated.

     You see, they took their name from a Republic Pictures studio serial featuring 'Commando Cody', and here the exclamation marks do indeed come into their own.  Art!

     This is a truthful poster as the serials were in monochrome.  You can see Ol' Code in the background with his - er - 'streamlined helmet' and an unusually large weapon.  Before we venture any further, WASH OUT YOUR SEWER-LIKE MINDS! and yes I used an exclamation mark.  I believe the chap in the space-suit - or what Hollywood's cheaper studios thought a space-suit ought to look like - is Retik, the Chief Bad Guy.  Art!

In colour for your delectation

     Your Humble Scribe has read the plot for this serial, and - you may be ahead of me here - surprise surprise, the Men From The Moon have nothing whatsoever to do with radar.  Or, Radar.  What they do have is an element supposedly superior to uranium, to wit 'Lunarium', which sounds as if it's a zoo for moon monsters.  

     Here an aside.  Yes, already!  There is a fantastic shot of the Moon from orbit in the film "Moon" (which is still to date the best film Duncan Jones has made), where we see the extent to which the lunar regolith has been mined for - no, not Lunarium.  Helium³.  Art!

     I suppose I'll have to eventually dig out the DVD and play it to catch that scene, which last for a second, at most.  Live in eager anticipation, gentle readers.

     ANYWAY back to the aside.  Helium³ is an isotope of helium, and it's reasoned to be THE fuel for fusion reactors, when we get them up and running.  It has been accumulating on the Moon's surface for millions of years and is just lying around for the first nation that feels like collecting it; so perhaps Ol' Retty spoke truer than he realised. 

     ANYWAY ANYWAY I refer you to "Watchmen", the graphic novel not the film - which did a pretty good job of filming something so inherently unfilmable - where Ozymandias make a sly reference to film serials such as RMFTM: "Dan, I'm not a Republic serial villain. Do you seriously think I'd explain my master-stroke if there remained the slightest chance of you affecting its outcome? I did it thirty-five minutes ago."

I found the picture!
Also, note that Ozzy avoids over-emoting, hence - no exclamation marks.

     He has a point, because Ol' Retty explains his entire plan to Commado Cody, probably feeling a little sad that he has nobody as smart as himself to gloast to.  The perils of being an intelligent villain, you see ("The Incredibles" satirised this tendency to comic and dramatic effect).  Ol' Code inevitably escapes and is thus forewarned and forearmed, in the sense of bearing weapons not his ulnus.

     Okay, you've now seen what creative usage of a single film title can achieve.  To come in our next thrilling instalment of BOOJUM! - "Zombies Of The Stratosphere!"*

The Haul

Conrad won't bore you with the groceries he got in Sainsbos, except to point out that they still don't have any loose-leaf Darjeeling, and I am NOT going to settle for tea-bags, thank you very much.  I did pick up a couple of packs of Cinnamon, which is a good thing as we were running low.  Since I also got a ton of suet, there may be another Clootie Dumpling in the offing tomorrow.  Art!

     Those two at the top are only temporary members of my Book Mountain, as they're library books.  No, they didn't have either "Damnation Alley" nor "I Am Legend" so we may need to <wallet squeaks in anguish> buy them.

     Conrad is always interested in works about the Civil War - you see, South Canadians?  You see how disconcerting it is to assume that "The Civil War" refers only to a single conflict? - especially as it concerns possible wargaming scenarios.

     "Fox Killed In The Open" appears to be a privately-printed work.  The title refers to "Wavell's Thirty Thousand", and "Operation COMPASS", the British winter offensive of 1940 that rolled up the Italian Tenth Army in an incredible feat of arms.  Watch this space.

"The War Illustrated - Edition 185"

We're coming to the end of this issue, as Conrad is deliberately ignoring the Sinister coverage, because it annoys Putinpot so.  Art!

     This, ladies and gentlemen and those unsure, is a British 6-pounder anti-tank gun, which is surely not expecting bad news, or the photographer wouldn't be stood up behind it out in the open.

     The 6-pounder came as an hideously unpleasant surprise to the Axis in North Africa, as it could knock out any tank they had, bar the Tigers later encountered in Tunisia, and even they were vulnerable to a lucky shot.  At the range we see above in a Normandy lane, it would give anything, including a Tiger, the colander experience.  Art!

     Those are the shells, clipped to the gun-shield for quicker usage.  Note how large the shell casing is compared to the projectile; this is why it had such a high velocity and did such damage when it hit.  By this time in July the anti-tank gunners were starting to get APDS (Armour Piercing Discardable Sabot) rounds for 6-pounders, which made any Teuton tank vulnerable from 1,000 yards off.

     As you can also see, the 6-pounder had a low profile, meaning it was harder to spot and thus harder to hit, and a crew could (just!) manhandle it around a position to change the direction of fire.  The British had hundreds of these guns and the South Canadians thought so highly of it that they made a version of it under licence.  They, horribly, mis-named it the "57 mm anti-tank gun" because they jibbed at using IMPERIAL PROUD IMPERIAL measurements.

"City In The Sky"

Davros, the head of Arcology One, is paying a visit to 'Washington', one of the two American Bernal spheres.

     Davy took a deep breath.  Visiting Washington always made him feel awkward; if their paramilitary culture had helped them survive, it also made guests feel out of place.  He was also beholden to the Vice President.  With Pangolin out of commission for weeks and Dart 3 not suitable for reusable sphere-to-sphere transit, Arcology One had needed to plead their case for what amounted to a bus trip in outer space via M3.  His requirement for discretion also meant trying to influence the Veep by inuendo.  Waukegan’s stolid matter-of-fact approach to everything made this difficult, as did the necessity of communicating laboriously via signal laser thanks to the jamming.

     Now, sitting in the blindingly white, aseptic meeting room under the scrutiny of Orbital America’s highest official and his “scribe” who probably doubled as personal spy and ninja bodyguard, Davy felt incongrously sweaty and foolish.

     ‘I had to meet face-to-face to avoid eavesdropping.’

     Waukegan’s heavy brows contracted.

     ‘Damn!  You mean the Chinese sphere is still active!’

     Davy coughed in embarassment.  As expected, a touch of paramilitary paranoia.  Damn!  If only California had been the senior sphere aloft!

     ‘Ah – no.  Not at all.  Eavesdropped from Downstairs.’

     The Veep sat back in thinly-veiled surprise.

     ‘Downstairs?  There’s nobody with the ability to - ’

     ‘Mister Vice President, I know who’s been carrying out the jamming.  The same peo – ah, the same agents who blew up our shuttle in mid-air, and the one that got down to Australia.  The same peo – agents, agents who started the Great Northern War.’

     Way to work up to it, Davy, stout fella!

This Is Getting To Be A Habit

Yes, the Ruffians lost another Su-34 this morning.  One wonders how many Su-34 aircrew are now turning up in front of their squadron's Medical Officer with a 'sudden-onset serious illness'.  Notably the Ruffians haven't put up another of their now-much-rarer A-50 'Mainstay's.

     Also, 'Sharky' on Twitter posted a photograph of a - I suppose you could call it a 'drone-dropped munition'.  Art!

     Yes, that's a now-shredded tyre on a Ruffian truck.  No, it didn't fall apart through being a cheap Chinese knock-off.  No, the rasputitsa didn't destroy it.  No, it wasn't consumed by a horde of mice (the orcs live in filthy conditions that encourage vermin).  Art!

     This is the culprit.  It's formally known as a 'Caltrop' and used to be a weapon deployed against cavalry on the battlefield.  As is apparent, it is a four-spiked device that always has one spike pointing upwards however it falls.  They will cost pennies to make and cost the Ruffians thousands of rubles in replacement tyres.

     And no, you can't drive a four-wheel truck on only three tyres.

Finally -

Hmmmm six o'clock in the afternoon and it's still not dark yet.  We shall soon be upon They're Stealing An Hour From You Day! which definitely merits an exclamation mark.

*  Perhaps.

Serendipity!

Your Humble Scribe's Over-Fecund Imagination

I've looked up "Fecund" just in case and it means what I thought it did, and as for you, then you'll have to go look it up, too.  Don't whine so, it's splendid intellectual exercise.

     Right!  I had an idea about what to have this Intro be all about, which was "Commando", that comic book purveying endless tales of derring-do amidst the First and Second Unpleasantnesses.  I did have a compilation of them, 12 stories in one volume, which seems to have gone a-walkies or I'd have a photograph for you.  Art!

     Then, from the depths of my cesssea mind (like a cesspit but worse) I dragged forth the above band's name.  They are described as 'country rock' so we're not going there, "Sweetheart Of The Rodeo" was quite enough for Conrad.

     ANYWAY I did the minimal amount of due diligence required, and found that their name was a rip-off/homage/nod to <delete where applicable> none other than - drum roll please - 

     This is a bit of a cheat, as the original film series was in monochrome, although I can claim this one's a lobby poster to advertise the serials.  Very Nineteen Fifties, fittingly, as that's when this schlock was made, since it made a shoestring budget look positively lavish.

     He's also making rather a large claim there, isn't he?  Not simply "Protector Of The Planet" or even "Guardian Of The Galaxy" (although there might have been copyright issues with that one), but rather the whole Universe.

     It's a big universe.  Mr. Cody must have been extremely busy.  Why, he already had to t

     ANYWAY back to "Commando", which seems to have been pushed aside, rather.  Your Humble Scribe, with his dynamited-filing-cabinet mind model of storage, was wondering about the artists who filled the pages of these comics.  One of them I knew well - Cam Kennedy.  Art!

    Cam has been in comics for at least fifty years, as I remember his artwork being around in the early Seventies in both "Commando" and mainstream comics.  Aha!  Here's proof - 

Kennedy went freelance and worked as an illustrator on D.C. Thomson's Commando, a well-known British war comic, between 1967 and 1972, before leaving comics altogether to become a professional fine artist

     Fortunately for comicdom, he was lured back to "Battle" in 1978 before making the transition to "2000AD", which is getting off-topic a little.  Art!

     Enter "Bear Alley", a comics blog to beat the band.  This is a real afficionado's web resource, and it had a long list of artists who worked on "Commando", which is where I lifted Cam's name from.  In an introductory blurb, Steve mentioned two of these stalwarts by name, one being Gordon Livingstone.  Art!

     Conrad is especially glad to have seen both the artist's name and his artwork, as this artist was one whose style I remembered, and this is indeed it.  According to Steve, Gordon spent most of his career doing "Commando", with side gigs in 'women's comics' whatever they were, not going there, and here's a collection of covers from "Down The Tubes" which is another splendid comics resource.  Art!

      Remember me qualifying that colour picture of Commando Cody?  The same applies to these covers, because the artist would spend hours creating a detailed painting, whereas they were on a production treadmill for the actual monochrome contents.

     I think we'll leave it there for this Intro, because that list in "Bear Alley" was extremely long and requires quite a bit of digging to extract background information.  Art!

Aguilar
Juan Gonzalez Alacreu
Algarra
Matias Alonso [Matias Alonso Andres]
Jeff Anderson
Mick Anglo
Luis Arcas
Victor Hugo Arias
Asian
Raphael Auraleon
Martin Baines
Dan Barnfield
Ken Barr
Bea
Bellalta [Jose Maria Suarez Ballalta]
Benet [Manuel Benet Blanes]
Luis Bermejo
Jordi Bernet
Bevia [Aurelio Bevia Pascual]
Bielsa [Jose Maria Fernandez Bielsa]
Blasco
(Jaime?) Blasco
James Bleach
Rafael Boluda
Armando Bonato
J. P. Bridson
Bujeiro
Alan Burrows
Buylla [Adolfo Alvarez Buylla]

     That's only the artists down to "B".  You'll note a lot of jobbing Spanish illustrators there, as the Iberian Peninsula was the place to go if you wanted a lot of artwork cranked out pretty quickly.  When they were under the whip, "2000AD" used to resort to them.  Which is another story for a different day.

Did You Know?

This is old news, but last year the Kremlin's television presenters were all pushing the line that we here in the UK were so desperately short of victuals that we were resorting to eating squirrels.

     Conrad rather thinks not.  For one thing, squirrels in the wild are remarkably agile and fast, meaning running after them with a club is unlikely to fill that pot on the hob.  You might try to set traps for them, but squirrels are canny, crafty creatures adept at dodging, diving, ducking and dithyrambing.  Art!

     This is obviously a dedicated squirrel trap, where the creature is dropped into a pickling jar after the cyanide works it's baleful magic.  No, I have no idea whether it would be safe to eat.

     That's another thing.  Squirrels are small.  Art!

     You'd get a single mouthful of meat from an entire squirrel.  Conrad is pretty sure this is why they aren't farmed for eating.

Conrad Speculated Idly

As I'm sure I've told you already, I have the complete run of "Invincible", all 22 trade paperbacks if I recall properly, and I also remember when Mark and Eve attempted to coin money by offering Invincible's services on contract.  Art!

     Please note that Mark "Invincible" Grayson is quite capable of besting a modern jet fighter, as he is impervious to whatever missiles it might use, whereas said jet would crumple like tin-foil were he to hit it.

      It's just a thought.  Art!

     Something's going on over there.

     

"City In The Sky"

Somewhat against the odds, the alien Lithoi's lethal drones have both been destroyed in battle at the township of New Eucla.  Meanwhile, the cities in the sky are communing.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: Would You Believe?

      Washington’s martial rigour had decreased significantly in the past decade, but they could still marshall an imposing ceremony for their very occasional visitors.  A joint Russo-Japanese mission with new mutant chlorella strains to exchange had been their last outside physical contact, seven months previously.  The Russians liked their pomp, and the Japanese liked their procedure.  What the Brits in the original Bernal sphere liked –

     Vice President Waukegan shook his head.  From his reading, the old British had been sticklers for ancient ceremonies that went back thousands of years.  Doctor Haritanian, on the other hand, seemed very ill-at-ease when he came out of the big boarding airlock and found an honour guard of US Marines waiting for him, ceremonial (and unloaded for safety reasons) induction rifles pointing at the walls above.  Their old dress uniforms were handed down from the previous generation and would have revealed nips and tucks to a close observer, but the whole thing went well.

     The Veep, as he knew his nickname went, personally conducted Doctor Haritanian to the Closed Conference Room and shooed out the waiting staff, all except Miss Martigan the scribe.

     ‘Now, Davy,’ he began, dropping any formal address and indicating that the real discussion had begun.  ‘Tell me what’s so important that I sent the MEV to collect you and get rid of my personal staff.’

     "MEV" = "Martian Excursion Vehicle", which I think I stole from Zero-X.

Conrad is an unpenitent thief

It's Big, Orange And Is Not Designed To Fly

It cannot be a Brannif airliner, then, can it?  Nor is it the Toxic Tangerine Toad.  Art!

     No, no, it's not his Live Debt Tracker either, although that is a big sum and the numbers do have an orange glow to them.

     No, I am talking about a 4-ton sled on wheels, which is painted bright orange to heighten visibility, and then hurled from the deck of an aircraft carrier to test their electro-magnetic catapult mechanism.  Art!

     The clip on Twitter doesn't provide any data about speed, but if you can propel a 4 ton sled hundreds of yards with sufficient force to make it bounce, it's going Fast.

     As to why they did this?  Answers in the Comments, please!

Finally -

Conrad is thinking of taking a trip into Babylon Lite's library, to espy certain sci-fi volumes, have a nosy at cookbooks and peruse the military history shelves.  We shall see.  I've doubtless already got more mil hist books than they have.

Ramas Bun!