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So, this time around it’s farewell to the DC Universe – though I’m sure we’ll be back someday – and hello to GURPS Banestorm (previously known as GURPS Yrth and GURPS Fantasy). And while we’re at it, I want to make a pledge to you regarding this chain of crossovers: I will never cross two GURPS books over with each other. Well, not unless I know for a fact that no one else has already done so On with the show: There has never been anything quite like it. On June 30, 1908, something – we still don’t know what – streaked across the skies of Siberia, and exploded in the vicinity of Tunguska. At that time, Siberia was even more wild and uninhabited than it now is. The nearest witnesses were miles away, and most of the world remained blissfully unaware that anything had happened there. But in 1920, Russian scientists began an investigation of the site that is still going on. They have discovered that the event was mostly likely a meteor that detonated in the air above Tunguska, devastating the taiga for miles in every direction in a manner very similar to that of a large thermonuclear explosion. If the course of the object had varied by only a few degrees, it might easily have hit somewhere else, where the damage and loss of life would have been considerably greater. As it is, there were no known deaths – although records, particularly of the nomadic Evenki people who lived in the region at that time, were not well-maintained. Theories abound as to what might have caused the enormous explosion, and it says something that the crash-landing of alien spaceship is one of the tamer ones. Referenced in: Tunguska – Darkest Hour
I’ve been reading through the funkspek, and I’m a little unclear on what it is we’re supposed to do with the forced aging and limited lilfespan (section a.a.a). You’re the expert in gerontology – can you explain it to me? Greta Born in 1928, Eric Allan Dolphy first came to prominence as a member of Miles Davis’ jazz quintet. He played bass clarinet, alto saxophone and flute. In the early Sixties, he became a recognized jazz leader himself. An exponent of free jazz, Dolphy’s improvisational style was so original and avant garde that he frequently transcended the boundaries of that form. On June 28, he collapsed into a diabetic coma while in Berlin. Despite being rushed to hospital, he died the next day. A journalist once wrote of his music that it was “too out to be in and too in to be out” – a fitting epitath for a man who recognized few limits in his art. Referenced in:
When a Carthaginian dies, they must cross two rivers to enter the afterlife. The first is the River of Ordeal. I don’t know much about it, but you’ve gotta admit, it doesn’t sound inviting, does it? The second is the River of Forgetfulness – Ashroket, in the Punic tongue – which is much like the Lethe of the Greeks. When you drink from it, you remember all your past lives, something which you cannot pass to your next life until you do. On the banks of Ashroket stands a great and giant elm tree, under which throng those cowardly members of the undead wait endlessly to have the courage to do drink.
Robert O’Hara Burke and William John Wills led an expedition of 18 men with the intention of crossing Australia from Melbourne in the south to the Gulf of Carpentaria in the north, a distance of around 2,800 kilometres across largely unsettled lands. The expedition set off from Royal Park, Melbourne at about 4pm on August 20, 1860, watched by a crowd about 15,000 strong. The 19 men of the expedition included five Englishmen, six Irishmen, four Indian sepoys, three Germans and an American. They took twenty-three horses, six wagons and twenty-seven camels. The party arrived at what would become known as the “Dig Tree” on December 6, 1860. Some of the party stayed behind, while Burke, Wills and another man named King pushed on. Those who stayed behind planned to wait for 13 weeks. In the event, they stayed for 18 weeks, finally departing on Sunday 21 April 1861. The three men returned only 9 hours later. Over the next few weeks, the two parties missed each other several more times. Although King found a tribe of Yandruwandha willing to give him food and shelter and in return he shot birds to contribute to their supplies, Burke and Wills both died at the Dig Tree. The exact date of their death is unknown and different dates are given on various memorials in Victoria. The Exploration Committee fixed June 28, 1861 as the date both explorers died. . Referenced in:
Outsomnia
On June 25, 1950, North Korean forces poured over the border separating the North and South parts of the peninsula, invading South Korea. This was considered a threat by the United States for two reasons: first, because the North Korean regime was Communist, and the Domino Theory was still widely believed; and second, because if South Korea fell, it would threaten American and allied forces in Japan. Two days later, America announced that it would come to the aid of South Korea. Aside from the desire to oppose Communism, the Truman administration was keenly aware of the failures of appeasement at the start of World War Two, and did not wish to repeat this mistake. In the end, the Korean War would last a little more than three years, cost nearly 4 million lives in total, and set the precedent for the Vietnam War – all for some very minor changes in the border between the two states. Referenced in: We Didn’t Start The Fire – Billy Joel
The legends are very specific: in 1284, when the town of Hamelin, in the in Lower Saxony region of Germany, was overrun with rats. One day, a piper claiming to be a rat-catcher appeared in the town. A deal was soon struck: he would play his pipes and draw the rates away, the townspeople would pay him handsomely. The piper led the rats into the nearby Weser river, where they drowned. But then the townsfolk reneged on their part of the deal. This was decision-making roughly on a par with saying “oh, what a lovely wooden horse, let’s drag it into the middle of Troy.” The piper returned on the feast day of Saints John and Paul. He played once more, and this time, he enchanted the children of the town. 130 children followed him, leaving behind only one or two (accounts vary). Accounts also disagree over what happened to the children – some say he drowned them like the rats, some say they were safely returned after he was paid several times his original price. So it’s six to five and pick ‘em whether the Pied Piper was a mass murderer, or merely a staunch advocate of contract law. Referenced in: Pied Piper – Jethro Tull
Well, I was just reading Hailey’s email about being back from her holidays… …and I thought, my holidays are coming up, and you’re going to have someone else in here doing my job for a few weeks – I want to make sure they know where to go if they need to. I mean, I hope they don’t, but just in case, y’know? | ||||||||||||||||
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