Henderson unfurled his towel over the sparkling sands, stretched out luxuriously under a cobalt sky, and sighed. Fitting compensation for a hectic year of research, they'd said. Just get out there and relax. Think of anything but science for once. / The rhythmic collapse of waves on the shore was reminiscent of something in quantum mechanics. I'll bet the sand is mainly tectosilicates, he thought, probably alpha-quartz. The towel was cotton, and his trunks were Rayon, produced he recalled by acetylation of cellulose. Cobalt blue probably represents a range of wavelengths centered somewhere between 420 and 460 nanometres.. / Henderson's right hand idly toyed with the portable Dobson Spectrophotometer before he raised it to his eye for another look. No doubt about it, he thought, concentrations of ozone over this part of the beach are higher than elsewhere.. .

Okay I admit it – we probably DO need a rocket scientist

"You see Thag. .? Names CAN break your bones. Especially when those names are carved on ROCKS."

"Sure been a heap more work for ME around here since those Biologists got granted research time on the ol' Supercollider.."

DON'T MOVE, or I'll fill you full of LEAD!!! / HAAA!! I happen to know that the lead in bullets is in the METALLIC form! This chemical form of lead has an intrinsically low bioavailability and toxicity!! / YES, but EARP et al (1886) have recently reported that the gunpowder-assisted acceleration of this form of lead to 1000 ft/sec substantially enhances its ability to penetrate biological membranes, effectively making it a whole lot MORE toxic!!! / I don't believe I've read that paper. .. // Environmental Scientists in the Wild West

"Okay - who put my lunch through the mass spectrometer..?"

"Bravo Professor, you stumbled upon the one fact that makes sense of it all. Unfortunately humanity is not permitted to know that the Universe was designed by a committee of ducks."

If all children are natural-born scientists, society might be wise to at least quarantine the subset of these scientist-infants who are the atomic weapons specialists, before they kill us all with their crazy little lunchbox nukes.

The only reason that 'children are our future' is that we don't send enough adults on round trips through deep-space at relativistic speeds. / (Hi kids - we're back!!) / Once we start doing that, children will become a lot less complacent, because there's a good chance that by the time we get back they'll be old enough to be our grandparents.

(NO!) / (NO!) / (FOR GOD'S SAKE NO!) / (That's it! Nuclear-tipped megadeath for you!!) // You don't knead a Rocket Scientist.

"Okay - is there anybody ELSE whose homework ate their dog?"

[Carbon Dioxide Emission Control Authority] / ['SUPER-STICK' MASKING TAPE]

Yes I agree that we've reached the magnetic North Pole. What I'm unsure about is whether anyone has previously noticed this bloody great solenoid..!?

"You're a selfish bastard, Lewis! Those stem cell lines were meant for people who've LOST an organ!"

DON'T MOVE, or I'll fill you full of 98% lead, 1% antimony, 0.75% silver, 200 parts per million nickel, trace amounts of cobalt, and other components below their respective detection limits! / Wait a minute! Are those values CERTIFIED?! / Analytical Chemists in the Wild West

Hmmm, interesting. . . Now, Thog, next YOU go in there and see where all my OTHER research students have gotten to. . . / Proto-Professor Algarth Zag, pioneer in fire research.

Scientists devise yet another way of delaying death.

"This composition was produced during the artist's 'Hay-Fever' period, and is simply entitled 'The Sneeze'."

Forget the experts: domestication of the dog only took about 8 seconds.

"Okay nanobots - our primary mission is to clean out this guy's arteries. But while we're here I can't see any harm in also building him a nice pair of man-breasts. .."

"In this laboratory we're always pushing the envelope to the Max."

"Such a pity you couldn't find your way through the maze to deactivate my doomsday rocket, Mr Bond. Perhaps now you'll admit that you're not as clever as a well-trained lab rat."

NOBEL PRIZE AWARDS / "Just a freak accident with some firefly DNA and suddenly the sun shines out of his arse!"

Techno Santa

[Techno Santa patent application]

Wait! I've had a new idea! Let's try it without the big hairy thing on the end! / Disturbing fact: the first recorded boomerangs were made of mammoth tusk

30 JUNE 1908 / Nicola Tesla during the time of the Siberian "Tunguska Event"

"Keep an eye on Davies. Whatever he's doing, it's not accounting."

"I've been sent home to lay low. If anyone asks, no one in my virology lab knows anything about a rampaging army of pangolin-bat hybrids."

Well YOU'RE clear, but your phone's got Chlamydia / Dangers of online sex

"Of course, it's still a complete mystery as to how the ancients even managed to MOVE these massive stones. .."

8000 B.C. Invention of the printing process.

The "Failsafe 3000" dead-certain 100-percent surefire lawyer trap.

"That? No that's not a U.F.O. It's on the ground now. And you've identified it. That makes it an I.G.O."

The guy on the line wonders if we stock the extra-extra-extra-extra-extra-extra-large, and also whether it's harpoon-proof..?

Dirk gasped in surprise. Aliens had landed in his paddock before, but never before in such numbers.

Eustarch the Younger. The kid who brought the Trojan Horse in through the gates of Troy "just to play with for a while."

It appears to be some sort of primitive tractor beam, Captain...

Large and hitherto uncatalogued lifeform on the windscreen, Jim. . .

"All those perfectly adequate brain-donors out there and Igor has to pick me a televangelist!"

Things You Should Know About / The little electrical device they install behind your car dashboard to make that intermittent squeaking noise. / XJ-451, a teeth-seeking nerve-agent deliberately added to your icecream. / The meter your kids use to work out how far they can push you. / An original fragment of the computer code designed to adjust your expenditure to slightly more than your income. / The mobile micro-element used to impart patchy burn-zones in your toast. / One of many public opinion polls that are used to adjust public opinion.

YOU HAVE JUST PISSED OFF A MAJOR WORLD SUPERPOWER.. . CONTINUE? Y/N

"Well to be honest we weren't going to revive you. However the rest of your species is extinct and we are in desperate need of someone to throw us a stick."

Yello..?

I don't know exactly what that thing is Virgil, but frankly I'm worried. .. / Thunderbirds meet their match

Sorry folks. .. the tractor beam's broken. We'll have to use the tractor piece of rope.

Chapter 3. Andrew's scheme backfires

Photocopiers jamming

Ask not for whom the photocopier jams. It jams for thee.

Larry will be sorely missed in the fishtank, but we console ourselves that he is going to a batter place. .. / FLUSSHHHH

"Just before we discuss your eligibility for a refund, are you absolutely sure that you read all the fine-print..?"

[Bullet pointed] Z Z Z Z Z Z / The next step in executive efficiency - Microsoft PowerNap

"Well maybe you wouldn't have attracted the attention of the Time Police, Joe, if you hadn't spent the last fifteen years of your life deliberately Capturing Precious Moments."

Meanwhile, at the end of the garden, the security situation had deteriorated. A breakaway group of radical pixies had started making enriched geranium.

"Don't laugh, you're next. St Peter says these new units are more energy-efficient."

Sign: WET PAINT AHEAD. MINED WHERE YOU STEP / The idiots can't spell / KATHOOM!

Wait a minute - that's not a MISSILE..! It's a RISSOLE..! An Intercontinental Ballistic RISSOLE..! QUICK! PREPARE SOME GRAVY..! / The start of the world's first intercontinental food fight

During the quieter periods, Lance and the boys would while away the hours by flicking bungee-bands at passing aircraft.

"Let's get this straight: either you talk, or we send you to the surface in a polystyrene overcoat."