Food And Maths

Most People Are Fonder Of Food Than Maths

So we'll start with food for the Intro.

     Okay, here an aside.  Yes, already!  I finished watching "1917" last night, and give it a qualified thumbs up.  Art!

     'Qualified' because I didn't see any Lewis guns.  By this point in the war every platoon in the British army had a Lewis light machine gun.  Deduct one point, Mister Mendes.  I also saw a Lee-Enfield rifle mounting the wire-cutters widely distributed at the beginning of the Battle of the Somme.  Art!

     They weren't very effective and got binned fairly quickly in later 1916, so why someone still has one attached to their rifle a year later is a bit sus.

     Also, 'D' Company of the Devons are shown listening to a soldier singing with rapt attention.  Hmmmmm whilst this is possible it's not probable.  Captain J. C. Dunn, in "The War The Infantry Knew", describes an evenings entertainment, which included what he described as 'Welsh glees', apparently a variety of song.  Although very well done, the soldiers treated these as an opportunity to decamp and have a comfort break or to light up a fag.  Art!

Possibly the best book on the First Unpleasantness ever

     Your Humble Scribe is now watching the recent version of "All Quiet On The Western Front" and I will, of course, be watching like a cross between an eagle and a raptor for any mistakes.  Be warned, it's not exactly a feast of laughs.

     ANYWAY back to food.  Conrad kept forgetting that there was a jar with my home-made Kim Chee in the cupboard - there's a jar of pickled mushrooms in there as well - so yesteryon I bit the bullet and made Debbie Lee's 'Stir-fried Pork and Kim Chee' with a remaindered pork chop discovered at the Co-Op.  Art!

     It was mighty filling stuff, especially when eaten with a packet of remaindered egg noodles.  

     One of the things about Korean dishes is that a lot call for a fried egg on top when complete.  Okaaaaaay.  The thing is, whenever I fry an egg in a saucepan, it splays out all over the place.  So I bought this - Art!

     Does it work?  Well, kind of.  It keeps most of the egg in the ring, but some does still ooze out underneath.  Call it a work in progress.

     When I visited Sainsbo's on Saturday, to get more loose-leaf Darjeeling, THEY DIDN'T HAVE ANY!  <picture Conrad in a snarling rage here>.  So as a consolation I bought this packet.  Art!

With sausage fingers for scale

     Polish, you see.

     When the family returned from their Saturday excursion, they came bearing gifts, without saying exactly what they were,  to which Conrad's first query is always 'Can you eat it?'

     Yes.  Yes, you can.  Art!

     The Gin Pickled Gherkins are just the same as normal gherkins, frankly, as there's only 2% gin.  However! the Habanero Relish is delish and that jar won't last long.  Probably going to have it with lunch.

     Motley!  We're going to play Barbed Wire Hurdling.  You first.

Lies, Damn Lies - And Ruffian Statistics

Ladies and gentlemen, may I present Professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld of Yale University's School Of Management.  Art!

     The Prof was interviewed on DW's Youtube channel about the real economic situation in Ruffia, and especially about the figures for 2023's GDP in that country as estimated by both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.  The IMF forecast is for 0.3% expansion, WB forecasts a -1% decrease.

     Prof S. put the kibosh on both figures.  The IMF and WB are merely taking their figures from those put out by Rosstat, which company has had three different CEOs in the past year until Putin found a spineless apparatchik to do his bidding.  Not only do neither organisation have critical data such as figures for imports and exports or foreign direct investment, most of the IMF analysts are Russian themselves.  Art!

A.k.a. "I muffed it"

     The interviewer asked if the Prof could come up with a figure for this debatable GDP, and he frankly admitted he couldn't as there just isn't the data available to make an educated assessment.  However, YSoM has contacted organisations selling to and buying from the Ruffians, and none of their data supports anything except a very negative economic assessment.  As a metric, the Prof mentioned that car-making in Ruffia is down 99% overall, and the retail sector is down 65%.

     In case you were wondering, neither of those is good.

     There's quite a bit more, which I'm going to come back to.

     TLDR: Ruffian economy in the toilet

Short And Sweat

Another tale of manglement, because who doesn't enjoy seeing idiots get their sweaty desserts?

     Okay, Original Poster was a computer whiz kid brought in to modernise the IT systems, moving from punch cards to floppy disks, way back when floppies were state-of-the-art.  Art!

NOTE LABELS

     Being a rather shady company, OP was fired 2 weeks before he became eligible for Unfair Dismissal rights.  Being diligent and conscientious, he compiled everything necessary on floppy disks: payroll, ledgers, creditors, orders and master disks, ALL CAREFULLY LABELLED so that whoever came after him would be fully up to speed.

     Did I mention shady?  The owner's wife, being suspicious and paranoid and idiotic, removed all the labels and threw them out.  O dearie me.  Now they had no idea what was on which, and nobody with the computer skills to find out.  I bet they came out in a cold sweat when they realised this.  Art!

Dublin

     Their computer support hub was in Dublin.  Did I mention shady?  The support team had been stiffed by this company once already, and ignored any requests for help.  What Shady, Inc. should have done was contract OP and pay him handsomely to resolve things.  I should have added ' - and too proud' to that list of negative qualities, because they never bothered, and by the time they did get a person skilled and able to help -

     They'd gone bust.

"The Sea Of Sand"

Sarah and the Doctor are rather bending the minds of their audience with information about how the war is going to unfold in the future.

This news fell on disbelieving ears.

          ‘The Jerries and the Ruskies are best pals,’ argued Tam.

          ‘They are not!’ replied Sarah hotly.  ‘They avoided fighting each other so they could pick on other countries.’

          ‘What about here in the desert?’ asked Dominione, once the speeches were translated.

          Imperiously, the Doctor waved his arms.

          ‘Mixed fortunes for both sides.  The British and Commonwealth finally win the decisive battle of the desert war at El Alamein and that seals the doom of the Axis in the desert.’

          Everyone listening exchanged glances.  Albert drew the Professor aside and asked questions about temporal paradoxes, leading into a heated debate.

          ‘El Alamein!  That’s practically at the gates of Cairo!’ objected Roger, his tone as hot as Sarah’s of a few seconds before.

          ‘My uncles fought there,’ added Sarah, confusing past and present.  ‘I mean, they will fight there.’

          ‘You’re both completely bloody potty,’ snarled Roger, ‘absolutely round the twist.’

     O yes, Roger, and what about the bio-vores?

Justice Is Done!

One of my favouritest films of 2022 was "Everything Everywhere All At Once", which has just been graced with triumph at the Screen Actors Guild awards.  Art!

Hoorah!

     Conrad was further surprised that this bonkersly entertaining romp cost $25 million, because it looks more like $100 million, which is about what it made worldwide.

Finally -

Time for lunch and some of that Habanero Relish.  See you on the other side!