A Pocketful Of Pills And Promises

Quite Poetic, Non?
     I can't take any credit, it was Dee*.  The phrase came to me in a dream, dear reader, one of the few occasions where a dream has actually contributed to the blog or my writing in any meaningful way.
     Now, if only I knew what it meant ...

Can't mean him - no pockets!

Revolution, RAJAR and Revenge
     Up until 2008, "96.2 The Revolution" was a radio station that someone, somewhere, had decided to design for Conrad explicitly and specifically.  It was wonderful!  I just left the car radio tuned to 96.2.

     Then came that fateful day in 2008 when the station's owner changed the music format to Bland Mainstream Stuff Everyone Else Is Playing; the station staff walked out and he sold it.
     To Steve Penk.  Dog buns!
     I know, it couldn't get any worse, could it?  This idiot, deeply in love with the sound of his own voice, stated that he wanted to take on the radio big boys.  By playing Bland Mainstream Stuff Everyone Else Is Playing.  And with his own brand of humour, which makes lowbrow look highbrow.
     Conrad is delighted to say that Penk got a proper Penking.  

Penk, post-process

     RAJAR     
I can actually prove this by reference to RAJAR - "Radio Joint Audience Research".  RAJAR is a website where anyone can check in on radio stations across England and see what potential audience they have, how many they actually broadcast to, what this is in terms of figures.  It's free - but for the bells and whistles version you need to register, which probably means paying.  Don't complain, the basic spreadsheet is great and goes back 10 years.
     You can see where this is going, can't you?  Yes.  In terms of statistics, when The Rev was actually being run properly by the owner, it got figures like 32,000 listeners in the quarterly analysis.  After it got Pencked, figures declined - in December 2009 and Dec 2010 they averaged 23,000.  

A Blue Rajah.  Close enough

     Revenge!
     The Curse of Conrad is slow, but it is undeniably effective.  During 2013, audience figures averaged 34,000 - in other words, the Penk version of 96.2, after 5 years, was barely above what the original awesome Conrad-approved version had been in it's day.  The increase in traffic, might, unkindly, also be down to the fact that Penk stopped presenting.
     As for going up against the big boys, how did Penk do?
     Very badly.  XFM Manchester doubled it's audiences from 2008 to December 2013 - to 200,000 listeners.  Compare that to the Penk-era 96.2 with it's 3% increase.
     
     In January 2014 Penk caved-in to the Curse of Conrad and sold the station.  When last seen he was living in Surrey, where we hope he will stay.

Impecunious
     Once again, dear reader, Conrad ventures forth into unfamiliar words in order to better enrich you, the audience
     "Impecunious" is obviously - obviously! - one of the later Roman emperors, circa 300AD, given over to debauchery of a kind that BOOJUM! dare not describe but can only hint at - in fact, no, not even hints - and who neglected the Eastern Limes, thus once again allowing an influx of Vandals, who displaced people still further into the more settled western provinces.

A debauch in progress.  Don't look too closely!

     What's that?
     It's not?
     It merely means "poor"?
     I say, reality, you don't half bring a man's world crashing down around his ears!  I was all ready to go look up what Impecunious had done with the oiled leather and pine martens-with-piercings ...

The Kraken Wakes, The Scientist Talks ...
     Yes, Conrad is still wrestling with that screenplay.  I have just noted a section in the book where the author can say that a character reads out a scientific description of what we would nowadays called "genetically-engineered living weapons".  The problem is, there isn't any actual speech - it's only mentioned, not written-out.

"Ha!  Set you a  pretty puzzle, eh? Serves you right for mucking around with my book."

     Now, Conrad can throw a bit of scientific verbiage around, but not to any convincing degree in biology, not when describing "pseudo-coelenterata".  
     Oh if only he knew someone qualified in biology!
     Wait a minute - Dogsitter Daughter's boyfriend Tom is a biology graduate.
     How cheaply can he be commissioned to write convincing nonsense?

One or two of these.  You know students ...

That's Quite Enough Of That!
     The "that" in question being a cookbook.  Allow me to show you:  

That should read "Slow CookER".  It's not about slothly chefs

     Of course they had to add "Healthy" to the title.  Obviously.  Because there are so many other cookbooks with "Unhealthy" in the title, not to mention "Bad For You" cookbooks, the "Very Bad For You" cookbooks and - unlikely to sell well but you never can tell, people are odd - "Toxic For You" cookbooks.

Small Dog, Large Ambitions
     Yes, yes, Conrad is shamefully abusing the cuteness of small animals to generate traffic for his blog.  Do I care?  No!  Alien spies have no conscience, thank you very much.  
     Anyway, here is Edna:

"Oh no!" squeaked the evil cushion.  "Spotted!"

     She likes to grab this particular piece of padding and fight with it, growling and doing her best to throw it around - no mean feat whan it is clearly much bigger than she is.  Unless prevented she will also drag or carry it off to her Killing Ground at the foot of the stairs to really go to town on it.

Finally
     My friend Anna is going to do the Edinburgh Marathon next weekend (25th May), on behalf of all dogs everywhere through the Dog's Trust, and she's doing it with her sister Georgina and despite injuring her foot. In her words:"I am raising money for Dogs Trust because they never put a healthy dog down they will keep them till they find them new homes!"
     If this tugs your heartstrings at all, let Conrad also assure you that a charitable contribution will ensure your continued survival when my starship invasion fleet buddies get here.
     The link:

http://www.justgiving.com/edinburghmarathon2014