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- The great thing about Emett's work

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is he manages to pull together art

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and engineering and humor
all at the same time.

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He was right back at the beginning

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telling stories with machines

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and if you look at the lunacycle,

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there is a story being told constantly.

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The idea of the lunacycle was that it was

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Britain's answer to the lunar rover,

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which was intended to get an astronaut

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across the surface of the moon.

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Emett wasn't gonna do
something as boring as a car.

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He was gonna do something that took away

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a lot of the functions that
the astronaut needed to do

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that might be tiresome.

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This actually gathers the
moon dust and rocks for him.

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It has two legs, either side,
with shoes on the bottoms

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so that it can actually
leave footprints for him

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without him having to get
out of the driving seat.

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It has a device on the front

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which is a zodiac navigating machine,

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so that he can select
wherever he wants to go

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by selecting the right sign of the zodiac.

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The cheese comparator
is in front of the pilot

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or the astronaut, Leo Capricorn.

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It's some pieces of cheese.

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Leo Capricorn can decide what the surface

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of the moon is made of

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because of course it is made of cheese.

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At the back of the
lunacycle, there is Astrocat.

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Astrocat is there

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because of course if the
moon is made of cheese

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then there are gonna be mice

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and so something's gotta
deal with the mice.

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But it also has the secondary function

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of making sure that because
cats always fall on their feet,

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they know which way is
up and which way is down.

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Most automata tend to be
small tabletop machines.

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Emett was unusual in that he
built large-scale machines.

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The other thing about Emett is he would

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constantly use found objects in his work.

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If you look at the pilot's
helmet, it's a colander.

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Colanders feature heavily in Emett's work

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to the extent that it
is said that his wife

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could never keep one in the kitchen.

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There are doorknobs, tea
strainers, there's an apple corer.

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It's an all-purpose lunar
exploratory machine.

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(dreamy music)

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