Andrew Ian Dodge admits that the 430th Carnival of the Vanities is “rather tardy,” which as sins go is pretty doggone venial. I mean, it’s not like he’s going to have to work up a prayer similar to the one Augustine did: “Da mihi castitatem et continentiam, sed noli modo” (“Grant me chastity and continence — but not yet.”) The fact that he’s now referred to as Saint Augustine suggests that his prayer was answered, well in advance of his death in, um, 430.

This week, Andrew Ian Dodge is proud to present a “Rumbling” Carnival of the Vanities, the 429th in the series.

Speaking of rumbling, this car did its share:

This is, of course, the semi-legendary Boss Mustang 429, which wasn’t as gosh-darn fast as everyone believed, mainly because Ford built this engine for NASCAR and had to sell at least 500 copies of it to get it approved, but the darn thing wouldn’t fit very well in the ‘Stang’s nose, meaning the intake and exhaust it got were unduly restrictive. Damn laws of physics. (Picture borrowed from TopSpeed.com.)

This time around, Andrew Ian Dodge is happily (I assume) CoTVing into the 4th, just in time for Independence Day, with the 428th edition of Carnival of the Vanities.

Speaking of 428, it was in that year that Armenia’s newly-minted king, Artaxias IV, was deposed. This did not bring any form of independence to the region, however: Bahram Gur, who ruled the Sassanid Empire, the last of the pre-Islamic Persian empires, annexed eastern Armenia, declared it a province, and installed a governor.

Drizzle is not an unusual phenomenon, so seeing it in Andrew Ian Dodge’s “while it drizzles” title on the 427th Carnival of the Vanities, I thought, might make my obligatory semi-deft reference to the number a whole lot easier.

Not so. Drizzle is so ordinary, in fact, that nothing about it makes it sufficiently noteworthy to make the history books. I looked up the ill-fated USAir Flight 427, which crashed just outside of Pittsburgh in 1994, but apparently drizzle did not contribute to the rudder failure that took down the plane.

I can tell you, though, from a blog entry this past spring, that there was plenty of drizzle in Janesville, Wisconsin on 4/27.

“Duke Nukem not CoTVing very well,” notes Andrew Ian Dodge in this week’s Carnival of the Vanities, the 426th in the series.

I was going to say something about the 426 years of development hell through which Duke Nukem Forever has recently completed, but this is obviously an exaggeration — couldn’t have been more than three hundred or so — so I’ll confine myself to pointing out that there’s been a mobile version of Duke Nukem, allegedly in 3D, which is downloadable from various sources as a .jar file, and that downloading that file will eat up 426k of your bandwidth allotment.

It’s the Flashing Sky Carnival of the Vanities, the 425th in the series.

I couldn’t tell you about the atmospheric conditions when Raban Gamliel VI, the last head of the Sanhedrin, shuffled off this mortal coil in AD 425, but given the nature of their contribution to Biblical history, a flashing sky might not be all that inappropriate.

This time around — it’s the 424th — Andrew Ian Dodge is “Greying” the Carnival of the Vanities.

I’d point out that if I did anything 424 times, I’d be grey too, but that would be obvious, so instead I’ll direct you to the proper use of MIT’s Graphic Identity Colors, which are red and gray, and the specific gray is Pantone 424.

For this week’s Carnival of the Vanities, the 423rd, Andrew Ian Dodge is “out of the fog (but it’s coming back this weekend).

The Royal Canadian Air Force has seen its share of fog. An incident in 1958:

On 10 October, 423 Squadron wrote off a CF-100 without, fortunately, loss of life. The Canuck in question overran Runway 15, ending up in the crash barrier. Ground fog, which had dominated the base for over a week, was the probable root cause of the accident. At the end of the month, the squadron took advantage of the poor flying conditions to give its members a four-day stand-down.

Before you ask: “Canuck,” in this context, refers to the aircraft, not to its pilot.

The 422nd Carnival of the Vanities coincides with Andrew Ian Dodge’s fourth wedding anniversary, which of course is something to celebrate.

I hope the Dodges had a wonderful day, perhaps incorporating a relaxing evening at the theatre. (Aristophanes’ The Wasps, a classic of Old Comedy, debuted at the Lenaia in 422 BC.)

“I love it when a plan comes together,” said Andrew Ian Dodge as he compiled the 421st Carnival of the Vanities.

Assuming he’s quoting John “Hannibal” Smith, it would seem reasonable to mention that the producers of The A-Team planned to get Hulk Hogan and William “Refrigerator” Perry to play themselves in one episode, which they did — in episode 4.21.

For some reason, the 420th Carnival of the Vanities is “not for AV.”

Which is perhaps odd, because at the time 420 culture began to evolve, it was sold to the marks participants as an essential part of a true audio-visual experience.

Andrew Ian Dodge, declared candidate for the Senate, knows he can’t just breeze into the seat — which is a shame, since the title of the current Carnival of the Vanities, the 419th, suggests that there’s a gale going on.

Far from Dodge’s perch in Maine is the Roanoke Valley of Virginia, where Lewis Gale Physicians operates a clinic on Route 419.

(Sorry to disappoint those of you who were expecting aspersions to be cast upon Nigerian scammers.)

The 31 March edition of Carnival of the Vanities, the 418th, was delayed until today because of Comcast, says Andrew Ian Dodge.

I have no dealings with Comcast myself, but at least one of their customers has had good luck with this RF Remote Control Extender, which operates on 418 MHz.

For some inscrutable reason, Andrew Ian Dodge has hung a Best of Me Symphony title on what appears to be the 417th Carnival of the Vanities: “FEC confirms BoMS.”

So we’ll work with what he gives us. I direct you, therefore, to this picture of FEC 417, a locomotive once in service along the Florida East Coast Railway.

There’s “lots to offer” in this week’s Carnival of the Vanities, the 416th in the series. This does not mean, of course, that Andrew Ian Dodge is selling real estate: not that kind of “lots,” guys.

Something they tell you in about the twentieth minute of real-estate school is that they’re not making any more land, and therefore it’s a good buy. What they won’t mention is the fact that every so often, land vanishes:

A thundering sound was heard from the mountain Batuwara which was answered by a similar noise from Kapi, lying westward of the modern Bantam. A great glowing fire, which reached the sky, came out of the last-named mountain; the whole world was greatly shaken and violent thundering, accompanied by heavy rain and storms took place, but not only did not this heavy rain extinguish the eruption of the fire of the mountain Kapi, but augmented the fire; the noise was fearful, at last the mountain Kapi with a tremendous roar burst into pieces and sank into the deepest of the earth. The water of the sea rose and inundated the land, the country to the east of the mountain Batuwara, to the mountain Rajabasa, was inundated by the sea; the inhabitants of the northern part of the Sunda country to the mountain Rajabasa were drowned and swept away with all property [...] The water subsided but the land on which Kapi stood became sea, and Java and Sumatra were divided into two parts.

This is not the plot of Krakatoa, East of Java. For one thing, Krakatoa is west of Java. It is, however, a description of events in the Pararaton, the Javanese Book of Kings, which supposedly took place in the year AD 416.

It’s sleeting on Andrew Ian Dodge, judging by the “Sleeting to CoTV” title he’s affixed to the 415th Carnival of the Vanities.

For a couple of months after WWII, the 415th Tactical Fighter Squadron was temporarily assigned to the Alaska Air Command (now the Eleventh Air Force); however, those months were during the summer, so I’m pretty sure the squadron didn’t encounter any substantial sleet.

This week, Andrew Ian Dodge is “CoTVing outta Wisconsin,” as per the title of the most recent Carnival of the Vanities, the 414th in the series.

The largest city in Wisconsin is Milwaukee, which, if I remember correctly, is located in area code 414.

“Like, gag me with a spoon,” quoth Andrew Ian Dodge for the 413th Carnival of the Vanities. Fer shure, fer shure.

From Karabars in the UK, we are pleased to bring you this lovely example of quality wheeled luggage from GAG, style 413, for twenty quid off list while supplies last.

Snow has a decidedly-unpleasant effect on me, as does winter generally; among other things, it causes me to turn inward, meaning I miss some of the things around me, such as last week’s Carnival of the Vanities, the 411th in the series, which was titled “CoTVing in 2 feet of snow.” Which is a figure you don’t see often in Oklahoma, except over the last ten days.

By the time this is up, #412 will likely be ready to go, so to cover both these numbers, here’s a Volkswagen Type 4, which first appeared in 1968 as the 411, replaced by the 412 in 1972. I assume that, like pretty much all rear-engined VeeDubs, it was good in the snow.

(Photo from Wikimedia Commons.)

Update: And now, #412.

This week’s Carnival of the Vanities, the 410th in the series, was sensibly dubbed “SoTU.”

Speaking of the State of The Union address, I admit to not having heard it. (I’m one of those “read the transcript later” types.) I did, however, keep one eye on the one tiny section of the Twitterverse that I follow. The more-liberal folk on my lists were at least somewhat enthusiastic; those toward the right tended to be just a hair snarky, and a couple of them opined that it was basically a big bore — as opposed to the .410 bore, which is rather small.