Signing Off Bake Off

I'm Afraid So
Originally I had planned to do the full review, going over the Signature, the Technical, the Showstopper and what terrible puns Mel and Sue committed, but I looked at the page of notes and all my motivation shrivelled and died.  Could I be bothered? 
     No! For the night is dark and full of errors, caused by touch-typing in the dark.  I know what you're thinking, that I'd slept through the whole episode, woken at the end with a sense of loss and resorted to lying.
     Not so!  Art?

Proof I do my homework

     I suppose it's no secret that Candice, whom the blog knows privately - keep it between ourselves, okay? - as The Woman With A Mouth Like A Cat's Bottom, won this series.  As you may infer from the above, she was not Conrad's favourite contestant, being a woman so driven she must compete in Formula 1.  Had she not won, I strongly suspect she would have murdered everyone in front of and behind the cameras, before blowing up herself and the whole of London*.  Emily at work, a colleague with the good taste to appreciate both zombie films and "Police Interceptors", agrees with this judgement.

We've seen enough of Candice.  Have a massage pillow instead.

How To Define Yourself
Referring back to the Pub Quiz, from which I am squeezing the last drops of creative nuance, Janet, the landlady, enquired about BOOJUM!.
     Not that this was a random encounter and occurence; she is the landlady of The Pleasant Inn, where the Pub Quiz takes place.
     Initially she enquired if your humble scribe took away the question papers.
     "O yes!" burbled Conrad, enthusiastically.
     "Why?" asked Janet, which is where I explained about having a blog, except she mis-heard this as "having a bloke", so I wrote down "Blog" to be clear.
     Conrad found it difficult to sum up BOOJUM! concisely yet accurately.  'Nonsense' gets it right, if a bit lacking in flavour.  "Tanks, zombies and atom bombs" is closer to the mark, although perhaps with a bit too much flavour.

There is no self-referential picture of BOOJUM! here as this would destabilise time and space

That Jean Paul Getty - He's So Petty
Just a quick item here about the South Canadian billionaire, who is credited with the aphorism "If you can count your millions, you're not a billionaire."
     Conrad, who is neither a businessman nor a billionaire**, begs to differ, Mr. J. Paul Getty.  If you can't count your millions then you're innumerate.  Also, your accountant is robbing you blind. 

Google it

The Secret Of Silly Mid On
It sounds like an Enid Blyton mystery novel for eight year-olds, doesn't it?  Featuring the Green Ginger Gang and Scroggins, their lovable pure-bred Pompanin pooch; these scamps get into and out of trouble on a regular basis but thanks to good old British pluck they always come up trumps!

Pompanion replaced by mongrel for budgetary reasons

     Er - sorry for the sustained flight of fantasy there.  Oh, you want the truth?
     Well, the truth actually requires good old British pluck, actually.  "Silly mid on" is a fielding position in cricket, positioned on the "on" side of the pitch.  The "mid" refers to a position that is intended to prevent the batsman making an easy drive.  The "Silly" part refers to the fielders distance from the batter - as short as 5 yards in some cases.  The fielder is thus in a prime position to catch the ball, but also to get pummelled by a VERY hard ball travelling at 120 m.p.h.***
     Silly, yes.  And bruised.

Well, it made me laugh.

Repeat Please
I spotted the following credit during the screen roll at the end of the first episode of "Stranger Things":  "Second second assistant director" and wondered exactly what the job involved, and why they don't get called "Third assistant director".  In the case of queries like this, Wiki is your friend.  Art?

• The second second assistant director (second second or 22AD) deals with the increased workload of a large or complicated production. For example, a production with a large number of cast may require the division of the aspects of backstage manager and the call sheet production work to two separate people.

     And what do you know, there is actually a Third and Fourth Assistant Director position, although you'd tend only to find these on film or television productions with very large casts.

Well worth watching!

*  Which would be a bad thing.  Just so we're clear.
**  Do Raelian Sterlings issued by the Bank of Proxima Centauri count?
***  BOOJUM! - proud to use Imperial measures.

Bread, Bikinis And Bombs

Ah, Three Things That Render Life More Interesting!
Particularly for men, as they tend to be the ones designing, manufacturing and then dropping the bombs in question.

The yellow band is to warn that this item is Dangerous

  Whilst they might not know the first thing about a bikini, they are most certainly aware of bikinis being about, even if pretending to have their eyes shut and especially if wearing sunglasses.  

Bikini atoll.
What, did you think we were going to post nearly-naked ladies?

As for bread, it has been described as "The Staff Of Life" and you can't beat a good array of morning goods.

More - a slice of life

     Now, I bet you're wondering why I'm posting such wildly varying stuff as part of the title today.
     The same reason as every day.  TO FOOL PEOPLE INTO VISITING!
     Also, it was inspired by a colleague at work today.  Anna and I had settled down for a quiet, serious, intimate chat (or at least I had, whatever she had planned) over our chilli cheese dip and noodles, until those raucous ruffians Tom and Russell arrived.  They were snickering evilly in ill-disguised glee* at fellow worker Domini, who had rashly decided to get a grilled bread sandwich in the canteen and thus faced a queue, poor lass.  Five minutes later she appeared with her hot sandwich - 

Wait for it, wait for it -

     Of course Conrad, ever up for a pun at someone else's expense, pondered that, if she had been at the seaside, she would have been Domini, in a bikini, eating her Panini.  This went down surprisingly well with everyone, so I have dared to recreate it here.
     "Yes, but the bomb?  The bomb!  Where does that come in?" I hear you prompt and pester.  "Tell us!  Tell us!  For we must know!"
     Stop harping on.  In fact, drop it.

Red Dawn Of The Dead
Bah!  My forensic deconstruction of this film continues.  I talk, of course, of the entirely un-needed 2012 remake of a film that was hardly a modern classic back in 1984.  I don't remember being canvassed about a remake.

Either stopped by or for a McDonalds

     Anyway, this bit can serve as a focus on bombs, since you seem determined to get your fix of things that go BANG.  If you recall, yesterday I described how the screenwriters had tried to cram in at the end of the film an explanation about how Sauron had used the One Ring to invade America from Mordor, overthrowing the Elves.  Or something.  

Aragorn leads the Company of - no, hang on a minute -

     Okay, the "something" was an Electro-Magnetic Pulse, a gigantic burst of radiation created when a nuclear weapon is exploded at height.  For once, it's harmless to humans, at least directly.
     Directly.

Bufo Bufo now comes with mutually-opposable digits and the ability to speak

     You see, unless anything electrical or electronic is specially shielded or hardened against EMP, it is likely to be toasted like a Mars bar in a deep-fat fryer.  So there you are in a passenger jet, and suddenly it falls out of the sky ...
     As I said, directly.  The problem is that to thus neutralise the entire Continental United States of America, you'd need an aerial blanket of nuclear explosions.
     You'd think someone would have noticed.

1)  Film screenwriters suffer creative dementia

Konrad:  Kwiz Klutz
Forgive the horrible Americanised spelling and alliteration.  What can I say?  I have a weakness for messing about with words.  It camouflages my ineptness at the Pub Quiz yesterday.  Art?

The ghastly evidence

     The idea is that the quizmaster calls out the clues and you add the answers into your circles.  If you get a line - which can zig-zag - then you leap up from your chair, quivering with excitement, present your sheet and see if the answers are correct.
     When I say "leap" I actually mean "creak" as your humble scribe was the youngest person in the room, bar the two young ladies serving behind the bar**.
     As you can clearly see, Conrad was a winner twice over here, except he didn't realise the circles could be in a zig-zag pattern.  This is where the "Klutz" bit comes in.
     Back to lunchtime again - Tom and Russ, not to mention Domini after she put her sandwich away, all wanted to know what the questions were, so I tried to recall what they were from the answers, as I'd left my actual scrap paper with questions on at home.  Your humble scribe managed this fairly well, impressing Domini with his recall.  Life (and skill) in the old dog yet!

Like a scorpion, this picture is small, yet terrifying

     Of course I flatter myself, but if I don't, nobody else will.

*  What our German chums call "Schadenfreude"
**  Do you see what - O you do.