Tuesday 24 September 2013

Mentally undressing women at parties


Today, the mist will clear into bright, Autumn sunshine, and I will be on the top of a high hill attending to a massive sculpture which lords it over the valley below. Think 'Monarch of the Glen'.

I can park my car within about half a mile of it, before the land begins to rise and the 2WD Volvo cannot cope, so my first trip up with all the kit will be in a ATV taxi. From then on, it's exercise.

The great thing about my current work is that it involves all sorts of different materials and environments, just as when I used to do general building and masonry all those years ago. It gets me out of the potting-shed.

My latest toy is one of these hand-held, baton metal detectors, just like the ones they pass uncomfortably close to your private parts when you go through airport security. I should have got one years ago, but I suppose I would never have developed my X-Ray vision to the extent that I can mentally undress women at parties without them ever being aware of it (I kid myself) as Ray Milland did in the mid-sixties. At least with the acquisition of this scanner, I will probably not have the urge to tear my own eyes out on the instructions of a small-town preacher (I hope).

I had to survey some wooden sculpture recently, which showed signs of falling apart and becoming a menace to anyone walking beneath it. In former times (as my German friends are so fond of saying) I would have gone into a trance and waggled the arms and legs a bit, then made an informed guess.

Now - thanks to a little man in China - I just press a switch, pass the magic wand over the article, wait for the green light to go red and hear the irritating bleep sound which tells me that metal hides within the object, and I can say with great authority that the thing is - in fact - reinforced. It paid for itself on the first job.

There is a rather sinister setting on this gadget called 'Low Sensitivity Switch'. If you hold this switch down when using the scanner, it ignores innocent items like keys, buckles and watch-straps, etc. and concentrates of heavier, bulkier items.

The instructions say that it is particularly useful when looking for '.38 calibre handguns'.

Why .38s? Will it ignore .45s? A little knowledge could be a dangerous thing.


22 comments:

  1. Was this originally made for spoiling all those 'nail through water pipe' comedy moments?

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    1. I used to use one of those 'where's the water-pipe?' ones, but they are bloody useless. This one was originally made for 'bullet through head' comedy moments.

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    2. I always dowse for water pipes works every time regardless of the material.

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    3. Thank gods you don't dowse for guns at airports. We wait long enough as it is.

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    4. Especially for ceramic barrels and plastic bodies. ONE steel spring is all they have to go on these days. Druid security - who'd have it?

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  2. I could use that for 'has the dog eaten the key/nail/earing?' moments too Tom. Thanks for the tip.

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  3. Great tool, what fun.
    Slightly sideways, I got scanned whilst trying to pay a parking fine today. It brings out the worst in me. I know they are just doing their job but fuck, how old is that line?
    Funny thing was they made me put my handbag to one side while they ran their bomb-detecting wand all over my body. Then I picked up my handbag and continued inside. What the fuck.

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    1. Oz police are - by all accounts - the worst. They lay in wait behind a rare hedge on a stretch of highway for some mates of mine at a T-Junction, and because they didn't stop - despite being able to see for 20 miles in both directions - they fined her $650. Cunts.

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    2. Sarah even they took my tiny nail clippers/scissors gadget off me at X airport as it was in the required clear plastic bag with my toothbrush and my stone for doing my feet. At airport X you could buy at that time a few pints of Polish vodka bottled in glass and windproof petrol lighters like pilots use in adverts on the way to boarding. So what's the real agenda?

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    3. You know the rules, Gwil. Give up your stuff before you go through, then buy the same at 5 times the cost while you wait for the plane. Simples.

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    4. But I was paying a parking fine!
      Bah

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  4. It is apparent TSA has been formed for purposes of providing employment to thousands and thousands who otherwise would roam the streets.

    Your monarch of the glen engagement should provide us with months of reading. Buildings? Statuary? Statuesses?

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    1. I've signed an Official Secrets Act for both issues, so no, this will be the last posts on both too. What a tease I am, eh?

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  5. I have managed - for the first time in my life - to say 'simples' not once, but twice! I love bad Enlilsh.

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    1. We are far too polite to mention your errors because we All know how sensitive you can be!

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    2. You? Polite? I always thought you deluded, but not to this extent.

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    3. Noticed 'simples'.
      Kept dignified silence.

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  6. I sincerely hope nobody does this to me at parties Tom. The time when I could be undressed (mentally or otherwise) passed long ago. (I was at one time an artist's model, but it is all a faint memory in the long distant past).

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