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Possible slight conflict on interests, since they are my employer, but Agros do a pretty good range of bookcases for under £30.  You can see one in the third of my pics.  The shelves adjust enough to allow for five shelves of trade-sized books with a smaller shelf ideal for comics (or National Geographics in my case) plenty of colour options too.  They come flatpacked and take about ten-fifteen minutes tops to put together.  Delivery's pretty cheap as well if they dont fit in a car (£8.95).

Going back to the Northern Lights for a bit - I've seen it on the horizon a few times as a vague, barely discernible, green glow, but once, about ten years ago, they gave a more impressive showing.

It stretched across the entire sky from north to south in swirly green streaks with patches of red. The largest of these patches was directly overhead and (rather disturbingly), made it look as if the sky had cracked open.

It's very unusual for them to be as impressive as that around here (I'm pretty far down to the South of Scotland in East Lothian), but a facebook friend of mine insists he saw them one night way down in Derbyshire. I asked him when this was, and it was roughly the same time I saw them. Might even have been the same night.

I remember that.  It wasn't the Lights but a similar phenomonomnomnom, whatever, casused by ice particles in the upper atmosphere.  It was clearly visible here on Teesside and looked slightly eerie, after all the skys not supposed to be green.

So how much have you bid then? 

My own pitiful collection, in context however the none-2000AD is pretty good since they've all been purchased in the last year.

Starts on FX at the end of October, about a week after the US debut.  And I for one am somewhat excited about it.

[Mandroid]

Finished reading Mandroid yesterday. Really enjoyed it, and I can see why people would recommend that as a novice introduction to Dredd.

When Mandroid first ran in the Progs my opinion was "Meh, seen better", don't know why but it just didn't appeal to me at all.  Last year though I had a bit of a prog slog whilst sorting out my library and when I re-read it I thought "Wow, this is a cracking read why did I dis it first time round".   Have to get round to buying the trade at some point.

I bought volume 26 of Fullmetal Alchemist the other day and realised I'd forgotten the plot of the series so I've started from the beginning again.  Up to volume 16 so far and I'd also forgot how complex the actual plot is and how many characters there are in it.  Still it's a cracking read and very funny at times.

Mooching round a very small book shop in Whitby today I was suprised to see an equally small graphic novel section.  I was even more suprised to find Book One of The Losers and Volume 6 of Y: the Last Man both for £4.99.  Needless to say copies of both are now sitting on my bookshelf.

The Kamov Ka-50 "Akula" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamov_Ka-50) has a working ejector seat.  When the pilot (it's a single seater) pulls the chicken switch explosive charges seperate the rotor blades before he is "launched" out of the cockpit.  They used the idea in one of the Bond movies, Goldeneye I think.  Apart from that one though I don't think they bother.

I don't know about the TADIS, but have a close look on page four of Dredd, where the Judges are searching Ms Torsen's luggage.  Is that a large novelty pen in her case or something else? 

Very well put CF (for a monkey hanger  *), couldn't agree more.


(*and of course I know the legend about the monkey's false, people from Hartlepool don't hang monkeys, they elect them to high office )

A Blob recently appeared in passing in a Dredd Story. Don't know which story or whether it was Prog or meg, only that is was within the past 2 years. It was only in one panel and among a crowd. So they are still around.

I believe it was a riot scene in "The Hotshot" Meg 256.  And I'm sure I recall seeing some during one of the strips featuring H.G. Wells.

Personally I don't mind the lack of explanation.  There may well be a scientific reason why the dead are reanimating, but Rick and the others probably wont ever hear about it because there's no-one left with the scientific knowledge to discover it and explain it to them.  The survivors will be like medieval peasants wondering where the plague has come from and blaming whatever explanation suits them - viral, bacteria, biblical curse, whatever.

My own theory is that the last ever issue will show Rick as the last man standing fighting off a huge horde of zombies, and just as he's thinking about turning his gun on himself he'll look up into the sky and see a million-miles tall figure with a huge nose (with arms growing out of it) muttering to itself "well it may be slower than the usual stuff, but that Zombit Bang really does a good job at wiping out civilisations"

Just out of curiosity does anyone else think the visual effect of Dredd's gun movement on the cover looks a bit like a scythe/sickle blade?  Or is it just one of my hallucinations kicking in?

All in all a cracking Prog, but why should Dredd be too annoyed with a judge praying, he's worked with a muslim judge before, on that trip to the moon chasing Zombie!Dredd

My pull-cord shower switch doesn't work. I'm sure it's the fourth one we've had in eight years. I am not looking forward to having that apart, buying another one or doing all that fiddling about with wires to replace it again.

Our pull-cord died last year, fortunately my brother is a bit of an electrician so he fixed it for us.  Do you leave your shower switched on when its not in use? (I mean the power, not the water) because Mark (my bro) reckons that's what buggered ours, it causes some sort of welding effect on the circuits inside the switch.

I reckon thats Ravne, Verse is way taller than that.