Born To Be Wold

Since We Have Been Dealing With Heavy Metal Of Late

I thought I'd post a parody of Steppenwolf's genre-defining hit - was it their only hit ever? Conrad unsure as not an expert in the field.  Talking of fields, a 'wold' is (according to my Collins Concise) defined as open rolling country, especially uplands, and it comes from the Old English 'weald', meaning 'bush'.  I thought it seemed more apt for This Sceptred Isle than a picture of a bunch of scruffy-looking thuggish musicians, who probably take drugs and pass port on the left hand side, the dirty curs!  Art!

Art, you bafoon!  Where are the rolling uplands?

     Just look at 'em.  Bad news for gentleman's couturiers.  Excuse me whilst I prod Art with a red-hot toasting fork -

Stow On The Wold

     Let me pause briefly here to access my "Concise English Dictionary Of Place-Names" which I bought in a charity shop last year, which I've never looked at and which is going to be departing The Mansion O So Soon.

     Hmmmmm, interesting.  "Stow" is down as being a "holy place" such as a monastery or church; BUT they state that "Wold" derives from the Old English 'Wald' meaning 'Wood'.  OMG ONE OF THEM IS LYING TO US!! 

     I think I'll go with the Oxford on this as they refer to <deep breath> the "Rolls of the Justices in Eyre for Gloucestershire", "Index to the Charters and Rolls in the British Museum" and "Charter Rolls".

     Incidentally, if you feel mischievous, ask a foreigner to pronounce "Gloucestershire".

     Well, all I expected from this Intro was a few lines about the countryside in The Sceptred Isle and a few cheap cracks at a band, when in fact we have ended up mired in unbelievable controversy.

     Motley, go put some ice on Art's burn and prong marks, he's making a fuss.

"Samothrace"

Ah yes, another random word popping up in my mind.  If you can explain why this happens, I would be very grateful.  In the meantime it does provide a source of material for BOOJUM! so I cannot complain too much*.

     Who, what and where is it and can it be eaten? are the questions I like to get settled first.  Okay, it's an island, so not edible.  It's one of the Greek possessions in the northern Aegean sea, and if Art will -

     As you can see, it's very mountainous, so there's not a lot of land for agriculture.  Nor does it have any natural harbours, so it got bypassed for most of the ancient period, until someone began promoting it as a religious destination, thanks to it possessing the Sanctuary of the Great Gods.  That put it on the map, so to speak.  Art!

Before

     A lot of a fixer-upper, hmmmm?  Whilst poking about amongst these remains in the nineteenth century, a French archaeologist found the fragments of a winged statue, which has been dubbed "Nike - Winged Victory of Samothrace".  He promptly stole them and the re-assembled statue, minus it's head, now stands in the Louvre.  Art!

     So there you are.  Samothrace, so called because it fell under the administration of Thrace and was settled by people from Samos.

Imitation Is The Sincerest Form Of Flattery

It says here.  Okay, cast your mind back a good few decades to the Second Unpleasantness, when Perfidious Albion flew the Mosquito, an aircraft with an airframe made principally from wood.  A light body and two powerful engines meant that it went like stink.  The Teutons were appalled and fascinated in equal parts by this birch-bound beastly bird of bomb and bang, and after a while decided to build their own version.  Art!

     Note that this is a 'clean' prototype, without weapons or radar.  The Teutons only began development of this aircraft in mid-1943, which meant that development and testing would last until well into 1944.  Matters were not helped by the rivalry and outright hatred between Luftwaffe general Milch, who backed the Ta 154, as it was known, and aircraft designer Ernst Heinkel, who backed a completely different aircraft.  Teuton efficiency at work, hmmmm?  Art!

Working model with cannon and radar aerials

     The working model was still slower than the Mosquito, by 15 m.p.h. and only 50 were made by late 1944; so it was outnumbered 154 to one by the Mozzie.  Nor is that all ...  The wooden airframe was glued together by a Teuton invention called "Tego", which was a stable and highly effective wood adhesive.  However, the RAF then inconsiderately went and bombed the Tego factory, meaning a less effective substitute was used instead.  When I say 'less effective' I mean it ate through the plywood and aircraft fell apart in mid air that summer.  By September the plug was pulled and the "Moskito" got swatted.  Art!

Suicide squad assemble!

Business As Usual

Conrad's crotchety combat contra Codeword compilers continues.  I shall refrain from uttering the string of swears after completing one today, lest your ears blister and your eardrums implode.  Let us kick off, whilst fondly imaging that a certain set of compilers were within kicking distance.

"CRUX": Who let the dogs out?  Never mind that, who let the Latin in!  I believe this is the Latin for "Cross", which is what I am.  English is spoken by 98% of the world's population, SO USE IT INSTEAD OF ZOMBIE LANGUAGES.  Bah!

Conrad being Crux

"TORQUE":  This is something spin-related to engines.  I think.  Conrad pretty hazy on any kind of engineering detail, SO WHAT ARE WE ALL MOTOR MECHANICS NOW?  Is there any way Art can clarify this?

     Well, I am no clearer about what torque is.  I shall simply call it and define it in future as 'spin'.  And you're welcome.
"SCRAG":  Grrrrr.  Now they're using slang.  Is this even in the Collins Concise? <checks>.  No it doesn't O I can't lie, it does. "A scrawny person or animal", or "A person's neck".  First I've heard of it used like that.  I always use "scrag" as a slang way of implying someone or something, like a Codeword compiler, has been done to death in a deadly way, being dead.

Dead right

     There was more - O so much more, Jude Law! - but the human eye can only tolerate so much Frothing Nitric Ire.

      See you tomorrow if neither the Robot Revolution or the Zombie Apocalypse strike.

*  But still do.  

Heavy Metal Fusion

Okay I Lied

I know what you were expecting - an item about music where bland jazz-rock musicians with supreme artistry and zero creativity noodle about on tracks that last for an hour, and have silly titles like "Eulizing Spitzdometry", and credit the guitar string manufacturer -

Or -

     Hmmm, that sounds a little bitter, doesn't it?  Nor is it anything to do with heavy metal, unless it was Weather Report because then that could be construed as 'heavy weather' <ouch>.  Alternatively you might have been thinking along the lines of Deep Purple and that album they did with an orchestra, ooooh what's it called now - aha  "Concerto For Group And Orchestra" where they were obviously saving their creative energies for the music, hmmm?

     Then, finally, even though it's not heavy metal either, you might suddenly be struck by the possibility of the fusion in question being "Sahara Elektrik", that excellent album by Dissidenten.  Art!

Proof I am not raving

     "Conrad lied to us!  How is this possible?" I hear you quail.  O grow up, we are an unreliable narrator of the unlikely presented as an impossibility.

     Ha!  What I really wanted to talk about was nuclear fusion, because I've just read an article about a revolutionary (literally so) new British design for the tokamak fusion reactor, called "M.A.S.T." which stands for Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak, and if Art could put down his anthracite butty -

The mass of MAST

     The main problem in running a fusion reactor is disposing of excess heat, because the temperatures inside a tokamak are at least those on the surface of the Sun.  MAST uses a proprietary bit of technology dubbed "Super X Divertor" which nobody is describing in detail (£££ at stake you know), although it is titled an 'High Power Exhaust System", and it is ten times more effective than any previous technology in bleeding off excess energy.  This matters because you don't want your miniature man-made sun melting all the tokamak's insides on a regular basis; replacing them would be expensive, nor would you want Culham, Oxfordshire, to vanish in a ball of plasma leaving only vapours and a bad smell.

Being deliberately vague

     Now, I know you're quibbling about today's title, because that's the kind of whiny pedantic hair-splitters we all are, so - Nuclear fusion is the combination of two smaller atoms, usually hydrogen, into a single heavier one, which is helium, also generating a release of energy.  Conrad admits that this process runs at incredibly high temperatures BUT you can get metallic hydrogen if the pressure is sufficiently high and the temperature sufficiently <coughcough>ow.  We're talking millions of pounds per square inch, so we suspect there's lots on Jupiter.

     

     Motley, I want to to read all of "The Expanse" novels and note where they mention nuclear fusion.  There's eight of them so get to work promptly now.

The Haul

Today being my day off AND YOU'RE ONLY GETTING THIS SINGLE POST Your Humble Scribe decided to venture forth into Babylon Lite (Oldham if we're being formal) and spend the remaining balance on his Gift Card.  In addition to taking a few books off the shelves at the charity shops and Waterstones, as it would be cruel to have them sag under all that collective weight.  Art!

     A quick flick through the bib. at the back of "D-Day Through German Eyes" reveals the worrying inclusion of that hack Max Hastings and the very-likely utterly fake Dieter Eckholtz, whom Jonathan Ware tore a new one for on Twitter, and which we have also covered here.  We shall see. Yes, a book on lighthouses, because Conrad is interested, and we will be sharing some facts from this book with SIT BACK DOWN! it is interesting.  Two volumes on military history during the First Unpleasantness and "Heart Shaped Box", since I seem to remember reading good reviews about it a way back, possibly when I was chasing up information about Joe Lansdale or Peter Strauss.  Art!

Hap and Leonard

     I'll get back to you on that.

AAAAAAGHGHGGHHHHHHHH!

There I was, picking over the list of artists and other guests due at the "The Thing" art festival in Portland, and the next name on the list is "John Hill".  Art - proof!

 - which I immediately and mistakenly input into Google as "Joe Hill", and then shuddered in fear as the author of "Heart Shaped Box" immediately came up, because Coincidence Hydra!

     Then I realised I'd input the wrong name and my pulse went back to normal, until I read that he was the creator of "Locke And Key" and COINCIDENCE HYDRA AGAIN! because I've got the first three trade paperbacks.  The universe is clearly trying to tell me something.

     Okay, shall we try 'John J. Hill'?  Art!

     Aha, one of that unsung breed of comic-book creators who nevertheless serve a vital function: lettering.  These people have to provide captions and dialogue that drive the visual narrative, and they have to do so by occluding the least amount of artwork possible and using the smallest font that's still legible.  Conrad's order of business when reading a new comic is to make a first pass and read all the dialogue and captions, in order to know what's going on, and then to go back and then pay more attention to the artwork.

     John, we salute you!  Now get back to doing those fonts and be snappy about it.

     I see he took my advice to heart.  Next!

Finally -

We only need a short item to hit the Compositional Ton, so I can reveal that Darling Daughter is coming to visit along with Quiet Tom, most likely this weekend on Sunday, so I've got some extra beer bottles in - shockingly there was no Plum Porter in stock at Morrisons! - and I'm not sure if Bulmer's still do Pear Cider, as there was none on the shelves either at Morrisons or Sainsbury's.  We shall have to make do with Kopparberg instead.  I can also palm off that book of soup recipes, meaning one less of my own books to swap out since I bought five today.  

     And with that we are done!

If I Said "N.W.O.B.H.M." -

Most Of You Reading This Wouldn't Have A Clue What I Was Talking About

Which is a good thing, because now I can show off (not that it takes much prompting).

     Actually - yes, this is an aside - that acronym also causes the old grey cells (probably more white than grey by now) to throw up another acronym from one of my favourite novels, "The Sands Of Valour" Art!

Excellent and accurate rendering of the early Pz Mk. IV and Honeys in the background

     "WYBMADIITYW" which transposes as "Will You Buy Me A Drink If I Tell You Why?", presumably referring to some mysterious event or happening 'Up the blue'.  It can also be read backwards as "YTIIDAMBYW" which transposes as "You Thought I Intended Drinking A Mild But You're Wrong", which is just someone being a cleverbottom.  'Mild', I should explain, is one of the popular types of beer here in the Pond Of Eden, having less bite than bitter.

     ANYWAY back to NWOBHM, because I can't be bothered to add in all the full stops.  Just use your imagination, okay?  It stands for "New Wave Of British Heavy Metal" and refers to a rash of bands that emerged at the end of the Seventies.  Widely promoted in "Sounds" when it was still a going concern, and Your Humble Scribe knows this since he used to buy it when the self-important posing of the "NME" got too annoying.  Art!

     The NWOBHM was enthusiastically embraced by "Sounds" because it had a freshness and dynamism old HM bands from the beginning of the decade lacked, and because the appeal of punk had long worn off.  Thus you get bands that were influential if commercially unsuccessful like Venom, Raven, Diamond Head, Nuclear Assault*, or Napalm Death; and you also had bands that became internationally famous, such as Iron Maiden and Def Leppard, perhaps including Motorhead in there as well.  Art!

The reason it's deaf is because you're TOO LOUD

     The phrase just cropped up in my head and I decided to see what history thought of it, not trusting my calcified brain cells to recall days of yore.

     Motley, we're going to practice for your first heavy metal concert, by putting a metal bucket over your head and hitting it with a hammer for ninety minutes.

Whilst On The Subject Of Music -

Don't forget, young people, it is essential for your parents to hate whatever music you love; if they go around humming the tunes you are listening to, your listening is wrong.  If they repeat the lyrics and muse thoughtfully over them, SMASH THAT CD WITH A HAMMER.  This has been a musical-awareness prompt.

     Let us get back to a little musical critique and analysing the lyrics to "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds", shall we?  <rubs hands and cackles>

Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain

Follow whom?  The girl who just vanished?  How can you follow an invisible person!

Well yes if they keep their clothes on

Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies

HOW!  How, I ask you!  Also DO NOT TAUNT THE DIABETIC

How can one of these consume anything at ground level?

Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers

Hang on, are we back in the boat again?

That grow so incredibly high

That's because they're actually Giant Hogweeds

CAUTION! Will cause chemical burns if touched

Newspaper taxis appear on the shore

Pshaw!  As if - any structural engineer will sneer in disbelief at this

Waiting to take you away

Destination; the nearest padded room

Climb in the back with your head in the clouds

Did you stick it through the fragile paper roof?

And you're gone

Yes, that is the function of a taxi; to take you from A to B

I'd give this one a miss.

     I can hear Paul crying so we'll leave it there for today.

"Dithyramb"

Again with the music!  Conrad is pretty sure he's only ever read this word in any modern literature once, in a ghost story by M. R. James.  What is it?  Of course it goes back to the Greek, being a hymn sung in honour of Dionysus, originally "Dithurambos", which got filtered by Latin into "Dithyrambus" and then shortened in English still further.  Art!

Dithyrambling.  Not going to enlarge as I suspect nudity.

Staggeringly Stupid

Conrad caught a glimpse on Youtube of an event so the above that it's hard to credit that it actually exists.  A little background digging revealed that it was from a South Canadian show called "Jackass", where the presenters get up to ridiculously harmful stunts, presumably after signing a waiver because no studio's insurers are going to be happy with what they do.  Art!

     Okay, four idiots on see-saws.  A touch bland, because any activity can only be enhanced by adding extra additional BULL!   Next!

That is not a happpy, carefree bull.  O no.

     The idea is that they see-saw their way out of danger as the bull approaches, except they don't appear to have thought this one through in terms of height and speed.  Art!

     There was only just sufficient clearance to get out of the bull's way, if one's legs were horizontal and forward, and it could close the distance before the next victim got themselves properly airborne.  They all ended up getting horned by the bull - not gored as it's horns were capped - and were probably purple for weeks afterwards.  Their see-saw ended up getting demolished by the furious beast.  Wannabe Darwin Award winners all!

Finally -

We only need a short item here, so - what can we use for inspiration?  Aha!  Art!

     The Curse Of The Brass Bra strikes again!  Except this time it seems to be made of aluminium, or perhaps steel.  Whichever, undoubtedly cold in the morning when donned.  Probably best to leave it on the radiator for a few minutes, dear.  O and compare her attire with that of the chap having a refreshing nap on the floor - she looks like a walkway model at a lingerie convention, whilst he appears to shop at Potato-Sack Fashions.  The brute leaning in the window doesn't look very friendly, so what is our vapid maiden doing?  Throwing up her arms and shrieking, when O look there's a hand-weapon mere inches from her starboard hand (Yes, the future will still use Imperial measures.  A man can dream).

     And with that, we are done!

*  I like them already!

Matte Gates

Ha! Yes Indeed, Except Not The Way You Expected

NOR IS IT A TYPO!  O no.  Firstly, I must mention that some of the images here present are from the highly wonderful and very deeply researched website run by NZ Pete.  Link!

http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/

     Conrad hopes you never visit there, stay away generally and badmouth it to all your friends, since it goes into matte work in the cinema in awesome depth and detail, making BOOJUM!'s occasional sorties into the field rather limp by comparison.  Art!

    This is from one of those "Starry Treck" films and here we see Los Angeles with a superimposed flying-car and the Golden Gate Bridge, which is wholly painted, as is the background landscape.  Pete puts up the scene before it's composited.  Art!

     No need for costly and large-scale miniatures (excuse the irony) or location shooting with licences and permissions needed.  If you check out Pete's page he'll probably give the artist, too, as he's good like that*.  Let's have more of gates.  Art!

The cemetery gates
(IGNORE THE REFLECTIONS!)

     Here the matte line is everything from just below the horizon, and Conrad isn't too certain about that tree, either.  If you ever happen to catch this film be sure to cast a critical eye over that party gathered around the tree, and if they don't move then they are indeed part of a matte.  Those artists could be craft types and no denying it.  Art!

     This is cheating, really, which I wouldn't include if it didn't feature the Golden Gate again.  The foliage hanging from the bridge itself, and that rust-scabbed car in the foreground are all superimposed via CGI.  Still a gate, though.  Art!

     Pete showcases evocative matte work on Roger Corman's "The House Of Usher", featring a Gothic gate.  Says I, if you have any questions.  Corman didn't have a lot of money to throw around, so a matte recreation of the very house in question was a heck of a lot cheaper than building a set, and it looks very convincing with pyrotechnic effects composited in.

     Hopefully this item will result in sufficient visitors to Pete's site to assuage (not a word you expected to see today) his ire at traducing his site's good name in search of a tasteless pun.

     Motley!  Lie down on the doorstep whilst I fire up the steam-roller.  We need a new welcom 

Sicker Than A Vicar

Oo-er!  "Conrad's getting politically-relevant by being critical of religion, O Heavens!** where will this end up?" I hear your quivering qualification.  Actually it's because I couldn't think of anything else that would rhyme with "Sicker" and still be relevant.  "Sicker Than A Sticker" or "Sicker Than A Wicker" don't really catch the eye, do they?

     For Lo! we are back to Doctor Hope and his Rapid Trauma thingummy, which I promise we shall finish today.  Honest.  Is this not the face of a trustworthy man?  Art!  Quick, before they manage an answer.

Yes, thanks for that, Doc, I'd never have noticed otherwise

     The thing is, since Your Humble Scribe has read all the "Invincible" comic books at least three times over, he is well aware that The Immortal (he being human-kebabbed above) is - well, immortal.  It's on the tin.  An injury like that would be instantly fatal to anyone, bar him.  He can take it and revive later, in an unspecified manner.  Omni-Man would have to rip him into small pieces, put each piece in a jar, fill each jar with cement, then scatter them over the Atlantic Ocean to prevent any comeback.  Art!

     Hmmm, that appears to be Battle Babe with her head involuntarily rotated through 180 degrees.  "Blade Runner" to the contrary, this would indeed render one most effectively dead, even if it's a lot harder in reality than Hollywood makes out.  Er - so I have been told.

     And that's enough of the good bad Doctor for one day.  He has proven his impeccable comic appreciation chops, though.

Dig For Partial Victory!

For Yes, we are once again back at the Gallipoli peninsula in mid-1915, and amongst the Ockers and Polite Australians.  You may recall - or not, in which case you will lose brownie points - that they had come ashore wildly astray from their intended shore, and were consequently rather cramped in their beachhead.  The Ockers, for one, were diligent diggers, who would excavate tunnels and trenches with nothing more than a teaspoon and an attitude.  On short water rations, in temperatures of 350 and with enemy snipers ever-attentive.  Art!

Ocker shocker!  Seeking to meet with local natives and steel a kiss.

 
     In preparation for their attack on the Turkish Lone Pine position - which will mean nothing to folks outside the Antipodes, and PLEASE do not confuse it with "On The Trail Of The Lonesome Pine" because carrying your teeth home in a carrier bag can cause offence - the Ockers decided a gallon of sweat was worth an ounce of blood.  They dug shallow tunnels beneath No Man's Land*** to within a few dozen yards of their Ottoman trench targets, and waited.  Again, this is in August in Turkey, and in confined spaces underground, so we might be talking tons of sweat rather than gallons.  Art!

"Under new management" - the Ockers in Lone Pine

     When H-Hour arrived the attacking troops burst into the open from their concealment, practically atop the Turkish trenches, and proceeded to attack.  Their casualties were still heavy; if they had been forced to cross NML in the open their attack would simply have failed due to casualties inflicted.  The shallow tunnels were then breached completely and served as communication trenches to the now-captured Lone Pine.  Art!

There was a rumour about beer in the enemy lines ...

     Okay, having insulted the Ockers, it is probably time to move on.  Those British Sword Pattern Bayonets look pretty frightening.

     Hmmmm.  One wonders what one was thinking a couple of years ago.  Your Humble Scribe is playing an old Spotify playlist, and has come across some peculiar EDM variations of classical musical standards.  That's "Electronic Dance Music" thank you very much, not "Esoteric Death Machine" - hmmm, I wonder what one of those would look like? 

STRANGEROUS!

     We will DEFINITELY be coming back to this! (whatever it is).

Finally -

Conrad has made out the TOE and dug out his Historical Miniature Replicas, in order to conduct a wargame a la "Blitzkrieg Commander", which only needs another paste table, a camouflage cover and a shallow hill or two before the mayhem kicks off.  Conrad now sitting musing how the rules will manage to convey national doctrine, as against the Three Hundred Foot Commander.  If this last sentence makes no sense to you, please ensure you avoid all subsequent posts on this subject.   Art!

A Scorpion Flail.  Yes, someone has to sit in that little metal box.

*  The dirty cur conscientious chap.

** The irony ought to choke you.

***  No gender inequality at this point in time.