Things that seemed a good idea at the time

1. Giving tigris a copy of the Hawksbill Station Cookbook as birthday prezzie, with all the mouthwatering recipes for grilled, baked, pan-fried trilobite. However, the ensuing picnic-oriented expeditions in the Riddled time machine have brought home the fact that trilobites were wily anthropods, prepared for deception and not easily duped. Also, specialised lures must be designed for fly-fishing in an era long before flies.

So this is the Barbed Banana, that is what she said I call it. Just look at it! Trilobites can't resist it! The drag-&-drop Bad Ronald glasses are optional.

It is important to pack the caper butter with the rest of the pic-a-nic preparations, for certain people insist that a barbeque is simply not acceptable without it, and it is a long round-trip when you are sent from the Precambrian back to the Pleistocene to fetch some.

----------------------------------------------------------

2. Indeed, most ideas seem a good idea when they come up while we are down at the Old Entomologist, quality-controlling the Roggen-Wolfen-Dunkel-Berlinerweissen-Spezial (mit Nachtschatten), and lamenting the poor showing of Hot Needle of Inquiry in the 2.15 at the Tauherenikau Races.

The idea in this case being that horse levitation. With any number of paintings attesting to the bygone anti-gravitational equine capability. Somehow horses lost this ability late in the 19th Century in a simultaneous world-wide mutation.

With the corollary that it behooves us to reverse the change, because weightless horse racing is not against the rules, and what could go wrong?

It was a tight squeeze getting Evangeline van Holsterin's pony "Mr Kraken" into the Evolvamat (it is "an evil tempered beast given to rolling in swamps"). However, the effects were dramatically successful, as shown in this image captured by our surveillance engravers.

The problem remains of navigation, especially with Swearing Bob in the saddle. He is oblivious to the signals we are sending, via old-fashioned candle-and-billiard-cue code -- augmented with the Sherlock Holmes Dancing-Man Cipher -- to veer left before he and Mr Kraken collide with stately Riddled Manor. The library fairies may appear to be making fun of Another Kiwi's expressions but it is only that they think it is a game of Charades and they are signalling "Two syllables, rhymes with Phew".

Fortunately the giant inflatable Bobbitt Worm on the roof of Riddled Manor absorbed the impact, and no lasting damage was done, although Mr Kraken's mood was not improved.

3. The monochrome illustrations in Another Kiwi's guide to judging the ripeness of Orbs were perfectly clear [below, left].
Do they benefit from being colourised [right]? I THINK NOT.