Rant #1,982: Red Rubber Blob

In an instance proving that truth is often stranger than fiction, news reports are that a new, real-life “blob” has overtaken London's sewers.. According to these reports, British engineers say that they have launched a "sewer war" against a large blob of refuse that is clogging its sewers, and no, nobody by the name of Steve McQueen is among the engineers working on this project.

The word "blob" is defined as a formless mass, and this London gunk fits that description, consisting of congealed refuse--baby wipes, diapers and fat and oil. It reportedly measures 250 yards long--two and a half football fields--and weighs thousands of pounds. Engineers say that it will take three weeks to dissolve it and rid the London sewer system of its own real-life monster.

This real-life blob has been described as "a total monster" and its removal is "like trying to break up concrete.”

It almost sounds like a real-life version of “The Blob” featured in the 1958 film starring McQueen, but the London blob did not come from another world, it came from people flushing items down the toilet that should not have been discarded this way.

Fifty-nine years ago, Paramount Pictures released a low-budget horror/science fiction film called "The Blob," which was about an alien mass that crashes to earth from outer space and ends up eating up and removing citizens from the small town in Pennsylvania where it crash landed inside a meteorite. Each time it did this, it became larger, and eventually, it became as large as a building before it was overtaken.

As the movie moves along, the Blob is consuming everything--people and even brick and mortar structures--in its path. Through trial and error, McQueen, playing Steve Andrews, the film's hero, sees that the Blob recoils from only one thing--cold.

In an unlikely climax, he and a group of high schoolers get every fire extinguisher they can find in a local school and spray the contents of these extinguishers on the huge creature, freezing it until authorities can come on the scene. The Blob is then parachuted to the Arctic, where it presumably isn't destroyed, but is in some type of hibernating, comatose position due to the area's extreme cold.

The film was very successful on the drive-in circuit, has had a sequel and been remade, had a popular theme song on the charts, and the town where the Blob did its dirty work, Phonenixville, Pennsylvania, has an annual "Blobfest" to celebrate the movie.

Again, while there is no Steve McQueen in sight for the real-life Blob hitting London, it is pretty obvious that authorities want to do away with this mass for good, and do not want any return engagements or sequels to this situation it has on its hands.

And no, it is doubtful that London will have its own Blobfest to celebrate this mass of gunk any time soon.

Speak to you again on Monday. Have a good weekend.