I'm Typing This Up -
Whilst my 'Sichenyky' mixture is chilling in the fridge. The recipe book has a few significant gaps, in that it list an egg and flour in the ingredients, but doesn't explain what to do with them. I've mixed them into the rest of the meat, onion and seasoning, but - perhaps the idea was to coat them with egg and then flour, all the better to bake them?
Who knows. I guess we'll find out. Art!
Out of nowhere, this is the 'Indestructible Tank' from 'Yosemite Sam The Spaceman', who rashly takes on the normally placid and indolent Bugs Bunny. O boy did he invade the wrong warren. Art!
A bit of gaffer tape and it'll probably buff out.
ANYWAY for background, I need to inform you about South Canada's Securities and Exchange Commission's 'Rule 144', which deals with registrations in order to be able to sell stocks and shares. Also, the term 'Registered Secondary Offering'. A 'Primary Offering' is where a company sells off it's own stock, to raise capital. A 'Secondary Offering' is where a private individual sells off stock that they own, in order to make a profit. Well, providing that the share price has gone up since they acquired theirs. Is that clear? Splendid! then we'll begin.
The following tale of manglement came out of the 'Crash and Burn' thread, where Person X left a company and it imploded afterwards. Cynically Amused Narrator, hereafter CAN, explained that this one was more a 'Subside and Char', as the company survived. 'Survived' not being a word one associates with a successful business. Art!
The central person in this tale was an Influential Background Man, a.k.a. IBM from this point on. He had been with the business for 17 years, he was pals with the CEO, he liked his job and workmates, and, most importantly, he held so much stock that if he sold it the business's Board Of Directors needed to approve, and said sale be registered as a legitimate Secondary Offering. The sale would also tank the company's share price, so they knew well enough not to even entertain the shadow of a notion about possibly perhaps maybe firing him.
Until, as CAN explained, a newly-minted Bottomhole Unpleasant Business Officer, hereafter BUBO, entered the corporate structure. As new BUBOs often do, they felt like flexing their managerial muscles and promptly sacked IBM, citing the fact that he didn't like IBM's face and that 'Nobody is above being let go.' Art!
CAN stated that IBM didn't make a fuss, deciding that it was time to move on.
So, he registered his stock and sold the lot, with the company's Board Of Directors having no valid reason to refuse the sale. IBM walked away with something in the region of $90 million after tax and commission, and retired in his mid-40s. That week alone the company's share price dropped by 15%, which is why they made him unfireable in the first place, bar the presence of BUBO. After all, if you dump any commodity on the market in large quantities, the price falls, basic economics, chaps.
As others Commented on this sorry saga, how come none of the C-suite executives or even HR knew about this firing?
Because BUBO, in his incalculable stupidity, didn't consult with either HR or his higher-ups, instead breaching protocol to prove how manly and managerial he was.
That saying of his? "Nobody is above being let go." It proved to be true, as he was immediately fired. 'Probably from a cannon' opined CAN. Dead right. Imagine losing millions of dollars thanks to an idiot BUBO trying to be John Wayne in an office. Art!
"HR say goodbye"
That's his future career in business scuppered, as he won't get a reference from his ex-employer, and word gets around if you tank your business's share prices by one-seventh in seven days.
Conrad Was Thinking
This usually has unfortunate consequences and the last time required a Hazmat team wearing oxygen-tanks to
ANYWAY ANYWAY I have an update on the 'Sichenyky' or Chicken Patties I was making. Art!
The ingredients. It took 20 minutes to chop up that chicken, so next time, if there is one, Conrad Your Modest Artisan will be using a food processor. Art!
The finished product. I ate a few, and they were cooked enough in the pan not to need any further baking. Nice enough, probably better consumed with sour cream. Also, verrrry messy to make, what with all the flour and meatball rolling.
Back To The Thinking
Conrad remembers, for no particular reason (see Intro opening) a folk tale he read many decades ago, where the narrator was gifted with eternal youth, and thus went globe-trotting. Travel broadens the mind as it empties the wallet.
ANYWAY AGAIN, at one point he comes to a forest, where another person has been granted eternal youth - as long as they whittle down all the trees in the forest. Art!
Later on, the narrator returns on the path he took aeons ago, being just in time to see the whittler finish off the last tree and promptly drop dead.
Conrad, ever the pedantic hair-splitter, sees a few plot holes here. For one, how big is the knife Whittler was using? Art!
A pen-knife? A machete? The smaller the blade the longer the whittling will take, obviously. Then there is Whittler's work-rate. Would a single whittle per day be acceptable, or is there a Key Performance Indicator running in the background? Does he have to whittle leaves and root systems? the latter of which would require large-scale excavations.
Another plot hole is the fact that, regardless of Whittler's knife and speed, it will take centuries to whittle down an entire forest. What takes centuries to grow? Why, another forest. Art!
By the time one forest has been whittled into nothingness, another one will have grown up alongside it. The folk tale equivalent of painting the Forth Bridge.
Plus, are there any provisions in this supernatural contract for things like forest fires, lightning strikes, timber felling, Dutch Elm Disease, ecological protesters or storm damage?
Of course, I might be overthinking this .....
"The War Illustrated Edition 209 22nd June 1945"
Back to the retrospective montage of the middle pages, where we are now moving into later 1942. The earlier part had been disastrous for the Allies, so it may be a relief to know things were getting better. Art!
Ah yes, a famous photograph of the aftermath of El Alamein, and now known to be posed. Here you see Tommies of the 8th Army in pursuit of the fleeing Axis forces. The battle that really stopped Rommel and the Axis was months before, at Alam Halfa, under General Auchinlek, whom of course Monty couldn't allow to share any of the spotlight or success with. After July of 1942, the odds against the Axis in Egypt got worse and worse, with the British (and Commonwealth and all sorts of odds and sods) being next door to all their supply bases, and the Axis being at the end of a 1,250 mile logistics trail that faltered even at the best of times. For one thing, Malta had recovered from it's summer pounding and it's ships, subs and aircraft were wreaking absolute havoc on Axis supply convoys. Rommel's refusal to invade the island when plans called for it came back to bite him on the behind.
Here's One Conrad Can Get Behind
I shall have to be quick with this, Edna is whimpering that it's time for her food, and she will only get louder and more despondent over time. Art!
One of Christopher Nolan's finest moments. In fact, Conrad considers his 'Batman' trilogy to be so good that they put to bed the need to make any more films about Batty for a generation or so. They were very much grounded in grim reality, Gotham City being a supporting character, not a trace of camp about them, and - as usual - Nolan's insistence on practical effects wherever possible made them look and feel real.
Dog Buns, I may have to go dig them out and re-watch them. Gee thanks, 'Daily Telegraph'!
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