Flight 101.

 This is what should have been last weeks release before I found out that one of my childhood heroes died. 

The Secret Agent on flight 101 is the 30th Hardy boys book here, and 46th in America, its basically the Hardys doing an Elvis and touching down in Scotland for a case involving a stage magician with his own castle and sideline in international espionage.

The two groups SKOOL (good guys) and UGLI (not good guys)  are basically  two sides of the same coin, being counterterrorist and actual terrorist groups. It starts with a magic trick that makes Fenton Hardy disappear and the boys spend half the mystery trying to track down their missing father. 

The other part is about the flight 101, a transatlantic route from the east coast to Glasgow, Scotland, and some pretty exotic planes. The enemies have a STOL at their disposal (helioplane in the original) and the boys have a hot air balloon and a trimotor plane piloted by Angus McHugh rather than Jack Wayne. 

I somehow neglected to add the original US version here but it has some differences, mainly about UK police stuff and Scotland yard. I did make notes of this when it came out, but this is a full pick through with revised notes and some more proof reading. 

You can read the original here.

Necrolog Juan Atkins

 Today we lost one of the heroes of dance music, Juan Atkins, the first creator of Techno. 

One of those people that was supremely talented and seemed quite a quiet and reserved guy. If Derrick May was the Playboy and Kevin Saunderson was the family man then Juan to me was always the professor. In fact I was to learn later, he had a daughter Milan Ariel, who also entered the business as a singer, but to me this was the ideal hero. 

It helped a lot that every track he seemed to make was a banger. No U.F.O.s, Off To Battle, Interference, Starlight, and the Flow which got a video on MTV Partyzone back in the day. It helped that you didn't need to sing to feel music speak to you and as a mindless soulless robot autist, that was key. 

I wanted to post about a new revised edit of Secret Agent on Flight 101 but finding this news just as I was about to leave Twitter (X) was a real kick in the teeth.

So I will say rest in peace guy and know that you have left a legacy of music that will stand for all time. 

Eden and Heaven

 I don't think anyone has covered this, but why is heaven so good when we have the Garden of Eden. Disclosure, I don't believe in god, I'm not some U.S. atheist who was balls deep in the church before crashing out. I was the typical births, deaths marriages type of ex godshagger with a bit of Sunday school thrown in, because my mates went there. 

I say this because I've been musing on such things as late. Why is our supposed destination either Heaven or Hell and not the Garden of Eden, instead. 

Looking at the relevant passages in Revelation, it just details what kind of semi-precious stones the walls and foundations are made of, and blabbers on about gold and angels. There is a total absence of life, an aseptic, sterile, paradise where you'll spend eternity praising god and watching those burn for eternity in Hell. 

At least hell is honest, an eternal punishment in fire and darkness, Heaven is just the same but with wealth and light instead. The Jehovah's witnesses get it sort of right with a mix of building site and petting zoo where the people of all nations get to toil endlessly with Jesus. 

Like I say why not Eden when you die. A garden is something that gives life rather than a city of gold in the sky. We were kicked out for eating the tree of knowledge, but I see that as no barrier. We die, we are reborn and if god is in heaven now, surely this is a place for us.

For me, I always said this, give me all the things I never got in life and set me up there for a normal lifespan and then when I die there, either give me oblivion or reincarnation knowing I shall return there when I'm dead, as a reward for enduring the mortal realm.  

Necrolog. Marmalade.

 You may wonder who this is or even why this gets a blog post. Well the reason is our picture of the cat with the crown added in MS Paint is of Marmalade the cat from the popular channel Cole & Marmalade. 

He always was the goofy one from the show and there's a popular clip of him having his mind blown by a money box. Cole died a few years back and in a weird kind of irony both him and Marm passed away on the same day. There's an official obituary video from their owners, which, as a former owner of a ginger cat, hits hard. 

Me, I hope he's with Cole cross that Rainbow bridge.

I would have entered that tiger's den, but then I took a arrow to the knee. 

Oh, in a related note, a guy was mauled to death by a tiger up north. He was, as in most of these cases a Schizophrenic, but that doesn't stop the Mail from saying that he could have been influenced by playing... Skyrim. It's a tragic case and doesn't help when you have cunts like Trump making AI content of him palling up with a Tiger. 

BTW I've played Skyrim, enough to get a thrall (Lydia) and a demon dog and a place to live in IIRC Stormguard (the big city near the start), all the stuff my autistic ass doesn't have IRL. But, yeah, go with that line about Skyrim being an influence.  Oh and online.

Menorca pt3 The rest of the jam

 So, finally back home after two weeks away and already wanting to go back. The reason why is simple, it feels like home. Seriously if you've ever seen the east coast of England* it reminds me of this. An extensive dune system with a few wetland bits including a lot of Ducks and other waterfowl making their presence known on the beach. 

This is representative of  what you can see

 Got pecked by a bastard of a goose when I went to take its photo and it pecked mum when she was giving out bread. That and the storm was the low light of the holiday, though. 

The upside is that there is a lot of great scenery here, thanks to sensitive dune restoration, they've been stripping out the Carpobrotus that normally infests the shoreline and letting the native plants grow. 

Quite a lot of Clouded Yellow and Hummingbird Hawkmoth flying around which was nice to see as both are rare in the UK, and when it rained we saw a tortoise out for a stroll. 

Alongside the cats here, the most prevalent things as I've mentioned before were chickens. Crossing the road as in the old, unfunny joke. Sitting on the roundabout, but mostly situated throughout the dune scape and at any point in the day you can hear at least one cock crowing. 

A handsome boi

They never venture onto the beach, which is the ducks domain, but elsewhere, pretty much rule the roost.

Nice dual set up with our hotel with the main part holding reception, bar and restaurant and our bit the gym and an abandoned reception and restaurant, which I got to walk around, though not sure I was strictly allowed in. 

We looked out over the football pitch and the outdoor bit of the gym so at any given time some one is either hammering the exercise bikes or playing football. 

Pools were cold compared to the sea but at least walkable for those who are tall enough, with a small pool for the kiddies and such. 

The upshot of this is we are seriously considering going back next year when its the high season.

Menorca pt2

 This is just another stupid update. Weather has taken a turn for the worst, we have a storm, well some flashing in the sky and no thunder. Still hate it, mind but as storms go this is about perfect for me.

Menorca pt1

 You have another low quality blog post until we're back. But, can say, I've been enjoying this holiday so much more than the last. It helps that the last time I was here was 30 years ago.

Memories being limited to seeing a Kingfisher for the first time and my first praying mantis. Apart from that... No recollection at all.

Oh and getting bubble bobble PT 2 for Gameboy in Ciutadella (not a patch on the original).

So far, am really enjoying it. A lot of chickens for some reason and cats.

Would revisit 15/10

Blackwing Puzzles.

This is it the last of the British Hardys* and quite the contentious one at that. This is the book I should have started with back then, as it covers another of my special interests. Butterflies. If you're wondering what I did start with, that would be book 7 The Melted Coins. 

Contentious, how you may ask? The boys are called to an old mansion out past Bayport bothered by a flying ghost, the owner was a man called Moray Thaw, an old slave ship owner that bought up the mansion that was a stop on the underground railroad leading runaway slaves to a new life in Canada and the non slave owning northern states. 

I could see this being cancelled by some weirdo lefty types but that would be a shame, as its very good. Also its highly likely he was done in by his former crewmates after ripping them off and running with the money. 

The butterfly angle of course is Chet's new hobby and along with an enthusiast Drexel there is a reward up for a missing Cethosia myrina specimen. The weird ghost machine is based on another butterfly Prepona deiphile and a item of jewellery found is also based on this species. Finally a few species are mentioned none can really tie down the location of Bayport as they have a wide range over the US. These include the Great Spangled Fritiliary, the lovely Great Purple Hairstreak and mentions of the **Camberwell Beauty aka Mourning Cloak which is a bucket list item for me to see. 

You can read the US and UK versions here and here, though there are no differences between the texts.

Edit Links now live, 

*Danger on the Diamond is actually the final book released here.

** One of those species that is said to come in low numbers in the UK but our winters are too wet and mild for them to overwinter. I sub to a few migrant lepidoptera groups and have never really seen them show up. Striped hawkmoths however. . . 

Kew and the Titan

 Don't know if I've posted this but, its been an exceptional year for plants, here, especially at Kew, where they've had not one but two Titan Arums flower. 

I've seen both but came too early for the first, as I could only get the day off a few days before it opened, but a Facebook notification got me to see the second bloom, as they posted on a Friday and said it'll be open for the next 24-36 hours. 

So we decided to head on down to West London and have a look. A disclosure for those, I also wanted to have a butchers at their Agave montana which was also going to flower, but am far too early for that, its in the same general area but outside near the alpine house. 

Love that this is marked as the Agave Death bloom

There's another Agave in bloom this one is marked as X Leopoldii and Wiki has it as a hybrid between filifera and schidigera. You can see that outside the front of the Princess of Wales conservatory.

x leopoldii in bloom

The Titan itself is of course inside the tropical zone and while over now, is huge. I'm guessing at most 3m / 10ft 5 tall but can see it easily over 2.5m 8ft. I couldn't determine a smell but supposedly its bad, and the typical rotten meat stench to bring in the pollinators. More on that below. 

Amorphophallus titanum 

You can't go all this way and not check out the arid zone, especially if your a cactus nut like myself. A few mesembs are out including a Lithops and one of the shrubby Cephalophyllums but the two I'm singling out are the popular starfish flowered Stapelia grandiflora and the unknown Pyrenacantha malviflora.

Couldn't smell this one either, but you get the idea.

I'm guessing this is what was going on inside the titan arum, but made more clearer to see from this Asclepiad (and on a much smaller scale). The flower attracts flies to pollinate it and while it doesn't have the size advantage of the titan or broadcast range, this will still bring them in the dry South African desert. 

Not to be confused with Pyracantha or firethorn

This Pyrenacantha was also flowering, but this weird caudiciform hasn't got much in the way of flowers, those long catkins are what passes for its bloom. You can see the fruit form in the corner and from what I've read could be viable. It may need a male and or female or its flowers could be Bisexual (having male and female blooms on the same plant) its not clear.

With the main halls done, I had a look outside before taking the long bus ride home back to the suburbs. 

Jackdaw, not common in London

Some Mario's for you

 For some reason there is a Sega Master system version of Mario now, as part of the SMSPower's summer of Homebrew, the original Super Mario Bros has been ported over in either enhanced mode or original flavour. 

While not being quite the insane port that the C64 version was, this is still quite the feat, and it means that the humble SMS gets a quality platformer to join Wonderboy 3 and Psycho Fox.

Oh and if you're wondering about the other direction, there's also an Amiga version of Sonic in the works as well as Somari for the NES. The latter had a thread on RHDN where they were slowly turning it back into an actual Sonic game for the NES.

World 2-1 SMB SMS.

I'll leave you with a screenshot of it running in Ares.

Croyd- gone

 Took a trip down to Croydon yesterday for the first time in ages, and damn if it isn't a ghost town now. 

I can understand the antisocial behaviour and vast amounts of immigrants and that which made it look like it was Africa with trams, but I've never seen it so empty before.

Going through the Whitgift centre and noticing that half the shops are boarded up and closed down. I know the rain kept most people of the streets apart from the Hare Krishna lot who gamely set up a drum circle to preach. But this used to be busier, we had Kangz before along with ever flavour of weirdo Christian and Ispamist. The only nice thing I've seen was a mural of birds you'll never see, including a Shrike, Dartford Warbler and Goldcrest, along with the more attainable Grey Wagtail and Ring Necked Parakeet. 

Full birb mural for you.

Left there empty handed and didn't even check Beckenham because of the rain. 

This is a Saturday it should be packed.

The thing is, back in the day it used to be amazing, posh and upmarket. Went to see Father Christmas in Allders back in the day and in the 90's was a place to buy stuff in the sales. You could get there from Woolwich with either a 54 or 75 both services are much shortened now. I can't understand why this is not on par with Bromley as a hot location in South London. 

Voodoo Plots

 This one must have slipped my net. The Voodoo Plot is basically Hardys go Jazz, as a series of thefts from antiques boutiques lead them down to New Orleans. 

It's a bit more involved than that. The Voodoo comes from a sub plot where a friend of the boys, Peter Walker, has his grandpa threatened so he won't play on their basketball team. It seems that his Grandad is also quite a renowned jazz player with his own club. And of course the two cases are involved when it turns out that the voodoo gang threatening him are also in league with the thieves.

This is also the first time I'd ever come across the no step on snek / Gadsden flag as the American revolution was never covered here in detail. And, yes, there are elements of this in this story too, as someone is dressed up as the Swamp Fox and another as George III. 

Anyway you can read both the UK and US versions here and here. Though there are no differences between them. 

Happy 80th

 As the net is fucked yet again, I'm having to do this as if I'd on holiday, via the phone. 

I will give a big shout to my mum who turned 80 yesterday. Thanks for all you did for me, may there be many more years to come.

Some arcade hangovers

 We have had a nightmare journey to Folkestone today took two hours and stuck in traffic, next to a lorry going and some stop start bits down the M20 going home. It was OK there (Never been) but, fuck this am not waiting in traffic again. 

As an aside. this is a quick update. Mostly for two games I've seen back in Mallorca and never really noticed anywhere else. 

A Whack-a-Mole called Ghost Hunter, seems to be Spanish in origin. Some Engrish, but apart from that, crickets online.

Ghost Hunter

Next is a Japan cab called Dino Land 3. 

Some googling on Jim Breen's Japan Page, gets a Chinese translation of the Kanji / Hanzi on above coin part as Lottery Ticket Outlet. So this I'm guessing is some sort of ticket redemption machine where you win tickets and redeem them for prizes

A bit more searching gets you a ticket redemption mech by Yenox on BeGay. And a search for redemption game gets you Dino land a ball shooting game for kids. Not by Yenox who seem to do parts instead. 

Zombie Trax

 The Track of the Zombie or the Hardys join the circus. It's half right as they are hired to look into the case of a zombie of a Hessian soldier setting fires close to an old house in Burlington, Vermont.

The circus case is one of sabotage, and has almost the entire retinue of Hardy chums working on this. It's also a coincidence that said circus is rolling into Burlington itself. 

Its not a bad case either, not a stand out nor Witchmaster's key bad. It does rely a bit on a detectives kit the boys have but not as much as Trapped at Sea. 

Oh and the only difference is now sic is put in the UK version. You can read both here and here. 

Necrolog Kevin Keegan.

 One of those straight out of the blue posts. Someone you didn't think about for absolutely ages and then, bam, he's dead. A good sort by all accounts, and who's loss will be felt across Newcastle as well as the larger Tyneside area. 

The real reason I've highlighted Kevin Keegan is here is because of two games. Both the same titles, sort of, and both with surprising bits. 

The first is a home computer version of Kevin Keegan's player manager, a  middling management title officially released for the SNES back in the day, but thanks to games that weren't was going to get a PC and Amiga conversion. But that is neither here nor there. The real reason is this.

Half Keegan half Leslie Grantham

Saw this on Bluesky ages back when the proto surfaced, but this bug eyed Kev is one of the images that come into my mind from time to time. 

The next post set it all off for me. Its the PS1 update called Premier Manager 99 endorsed by Kev himself. That is not why I'm posting, though. 

Imagine logging onto Facebook after work and coming across a post by one of your favourite band's The Black Dog. There is a post saying that they worked with Kev on this in some capacity. Going down to the comments you find its artwork rather than the soundtrack. Although was hoping for something from their Spanners era. Anyway proof below.

Nestalgia

 Forgive me if I've done this one before but after 800 odd posts I've got the right to repeat myself. It seems the clowns at the Metro have done a piece on the NES. Some of it is accurate others are less so, you'll want to drop down to the comments for the true experience of what it was like being a NES owner back then. 

First of all pricing. 

Your average NES game was £30-40 here, only two games stick out as being priced at £50, this would be Star Wars and Maniac Mansion. The black box line of games and Donkey Kong Classics (in its orange box) were priced at £20. Oh and for the equivalence on 8bit home micros. £2.99 for budget stuff and £10 for full price stuff.  As games cost big bucks back then, it was essential to read reviews in Total and NMS (Mean machines originally) before purchase. Couple this with the rise of the Boot sale and you'd get games cheap, from stalls from like 1993 onwards. 

The NES was distributed by Mattel who also did Barbie as well as Nintendo themselves later on. It  was mostly sold through Argos and Index aka Littlewoods. The games were pretty much sold everywhere and while moderately popular weren't quite ZX Speccy or C64 popular, which were genuinely sold in the 80s. One final fact is that I may have misremembered from back then was that they had a HQ in Fleet, Hampshire. At least that's what was printed on the cards for Club Nintendo back then. 

Secondly popularity.

 It was never an 80's console here, it really hit around 1990, and twinned with the Ninja Turtle craze did well enough but was a distant second to the Master System which was a very distant second to the Home Micro's we had. Best I can say was it was locally popular and coupled with an extensive swapping system in place meant that you could play a lot of games and not get any you leant out back. I lost Donkey Kong Classics and Gradius which genuinely was a shame. 

Thanks to the half life of it all it remained a cheaper alternative to the SNES for a long time as was the Master System, can remember seeing games for both long after both systems were coughing up blood and the PS1 era came out. 

Thirdly. Games

Never owned the original of either Zelda, Megaman or Castlevania, did own the sequels and went down like this. Zelda 2 from a bootsale, Megaman 3 first ever import when I got my NES converted in Terry's games in Sidcup and Castlevania 2 I think was a full pricer. 

You skipped out on Bubble Bobble (Never a duff port) and Kid Icarus, which was tough but fair. Beat this when  Bryan Adams was Number one here for a decade or so back in 1991. Metroid I got from a swap with no instructions. It's also quite poignant as we had our family cat, Whisky put down on the day I managed to work out how to open the missile doors.

Oh and one final thing before posting. If I was to sell this pile of trash at CEX, I would get my money back. Rock hard and slow, and yeah, because you had no choice you persevered with it. One of those games I wish had been traded out then 

Back home round up.

 Now we are fully back home and don't have to rely on me tapping out posts on my phone, I can explain a bit more of how it went. Stayed in Palmanova in Mallorca, not far from the beach and near the supermarket. Which if you've seen my previous post, contains a chicken.

Sadly had to spend most of my time with the French, which seem to be prevalent in this part of the island. Some are hot, but mostly they are a drag and are the most miserable race on the planet.

We have three beaches, our main beach, the Playa de Palmanova, Platja Son Maties to the left and Punta Marroig which is our local dog beach and leads around the bay to another strand of sand. Saw a big Rotley there swimming in the sea with its owners and a lady with a Greg Mitchell on another occasion.   

 

Punta Marroig

 A few good places for drinks and such, the fish restaurant / bar Il Chiringo  and Diana's beach bar which is also nice but more expensive. 

We were served quite well for travel links and while expensive, you can get to Palma for under 5 euros via the local bus services.

We saw a few nice things out there. A few cats, an octopus, and a massive crab which means I've got sod all chance of finding this online. Also the usual fish plus a massive mullet.  Not so many plants this time, but what I did find wasn't bad, a few cacti and stuff to keep me entertained. 

TV. Never really had it on but, can confirm that, they were showing Doraemon still on Spanish TV, whenever I did. Oh and this channel (and link) turned out to be both German and folk music.

Hotel is good, and if you are into food, well worth a stay. Be warned the lifts are small and slow and you won't get a pool view (no one does) but the views we do have are great. 

Is this love?

Eroski carpark chicken.

 We're come to realize that our local supermarket here, has a big white cock living in the carpark.

It's  a big chicken with it's own bowl for food and I for one would love to know how it got there.

Is it someone's pet? (unlikely) Part of a farm? (there seems to be none local) Or something else entirely.

It's not there all the time, but when it is it seems to rule the roost.

Holiday

 So, we finally got away. We're in Palmanova in Mallorca and having escaped the heat back home are enjoying the weather here. Jumping through a billion hoops just to post, means a full write up will have to wait til I'm back, of course. But, let's just say it'll do.