She taught me how to speak to death inside

[sovay]

Rabbit, rabbit! It turns out that if you have a migraine for five days straight, the day after it breaks you are not magically restored to feeling wonderful and in fact feel rather as though someone has hit you several times with a bag full of freight trains; in other words yesterday was terrible. I spoke to way too many doctors and sent some necessary e-mails and finally in the evening read Nevil Shute's Landfall (1940), which I loved and whose film adaptation I realize I am wary of tracking down despite its attractive supporting cast for fear it should diminish the heroism of the novel's co-protagonist, the barmaid who is not just the love interest but the one person in the story who's in a position to put together the pieces of what really happened to HMS Caranx on December 3, 1939. "Not quite from the top drawer, you know. But she's got a very nice mind." Trying to figure out afterward if the obliquely electrified secret weapon which the other protagonist is dangerously testing for the Navy was the sort of thing that could have come out of the Department of Miscellaneous Weapons Development led to me trying not to corpse while reading spatch descriptions of the Panjandrum epically not working. Honestly, this discovery was the best part of the day. Even the Wikipedia page is funny. I am vaguely amazed I never saw any of the test footage during the Oops! portions of Square One TV (1987–92). I did observe the claim that the entire device might have been a hoax per Operation Fortitude, but I can't help but wonder if that's just less embarrassing than admitting that for four months the Admiralty seriously investigated the military capabilities of a gigantic unsteerable Catherine wheel that in full view of seaside civilians got chased by dogs, fell over in the surf, and/or almost blew the top brass up.

Comments

[selkie]

I can’t believe you went to all that effort when the bag of freight trains had just hit you!

Actually, that is incorrect now that I read it over; I can absolutely believe it HOLD STILL FOR THIS BUBBLE WRAP.

[chanter1944]

*epic announcer voiceover voice* Erasers! Don't leave home without one.

I'm all a-squee at the Square One reference here. I was a tiny Chanter in 1991, so was a bit young for some of that show's concepts (not that that stopped me) but not at all too young for its storytelling!

[davidgillon]

and in fact feel rather as though someone has hit you several times with a bag full of freight trains

I shouldn't laugh, but that description totally made me laugh!

Having checked out the plot summary of Landfall, there was a real incident, I think in '39, where a British Coastal Command aircraft bombed a British submarine scoring a direct hit. Which is when they worked out that the 100lb anti-submarine bomb might not be as effective as hoped - the total damage being several broken lightbulbs.

And the Panjandrum trials never fail to amuse :)

Stargazing

[nodrog]

Some while back, we were talking of how astronomy can elevate you to a higher plane, above viruses and migraines and bureaucracy:


https://theatlantic-science-feed.dreamwidth.org/441100.html

[choco_frosh]

"For testing, engineers packed the drum with sand instead of explosives, which may be the smartest thing anyone involved in this project ever did."
GREAT LINE.
(I had known about the Panjandrum, but had temporarily forgotten its existence. To be fair to its designers, a lot of the other things that the British came up with during the war - the bouncing bomb, Hobart's Funnies, everything connected with the Mulberry harbours - sounded just about as ridiculous, but ended up working.)

I am now imagining the obliquely electrified secret weapon as ASDIC.

[gwynnega]

I'd never heard of the Panjandrum before. The footage of it reminds me of early Doctor Who! Or maybe The Prisoner.

[skygiants]

I can't believe I'd never heard of the Panjandrum before! Appalling oversight on the part of Ben Macintyre, I think.

[ashlyme]

Good. God. They should have just used it as a giant cotton reel instead. The DMWD need their own sitcom. I don't suppose Spatch is related to C. R. Finch-Noyes?