Phew. Many A Cake Has Been Bake

Indeed!
     Tomorrow (22nd December 2013 for those of you joining us from the far future), it is Cake Day at BOOJUM! mansions.
     This takes a considerable amount of preparation.  The minefield has to be cleared, our band of wolves sent off to Yorkshire, the guard hog and his brother the hard hog get sent on an all-expenses paid holiday to Ulan Bator, and the sentry cats need to get their laser-eyes deactivated.  Can't have charcoaled guest's corpses cluttering up the corridors!


The "Before" shot, where three untidy heads share three bodies
 

And that's it.
     Tired BIIJUM! is off to bed.  

Pamplemousse!

No, Valeria, Not A Variety Of German Dessert
     In fact it means "grapefruit" in French.
     Why is this appropriate?  Because today I spent my working hours very close to a batch of pamplemousse.
     Yes, today Conrad was working in the Co-Operative's retail store in Royton, from 9 till 5 - which sounds familiar somehow - in the Fresh Produce section.
     It was lovely!  Amidst all the chiller cabinets for hours on end - as you already know Conrad positively thrives in the cold and this environment was so cold it made Angel Square seem like Death Valley at mid-day in high summer.

7th Floor, 1 Angel Square.  Honest

Savage strictures had been laid down to friends, family and enemies - stay away!  Do not come into store with the sole aim of embarrassing Conrad!

     This was not necessary, Conrad managed that all on his own.  In the back area stood cages of goods to be unloaded and stacked on shelves; normally these consisted of great big cardboard boxes that had to be torn apart to reveal dozens of boxes/packets/bags of product.  Upon one set of cardboard boxes resided a couple of gift boxes of Lynx and a Christmas card.  Conrad, having seen where the Lynx boxes stood in a promotional tower, whisked them away and put them in the big stack.
     Five minutes later Conrad is back in the back area, and he sees another two boxes of Lynx, so he whizzes these off to the tower, too.  The two boxes he'd put there earlier are gone, so he thinks "Popular item!"
     Five minutes later Mick, the store manager, asked if I'd moved some stuff from on top of the boxes - ah yes hemmed an embarrassed Conrad, because it turned out they were things Mick had bought himself and he couldn't understand where they kept vanishing to.

The scene of the crime

 Enough Piffling Human Nonsense!

Pow!

    Yes, your petty Hom. Sap. retail operations mean nothing to one who will, one day, be master of the Earth!
     Actually you don't need to worry about me blowing up old Earth like a samosa filled with gunpowder.  I shall need somewhere to keep my comic collection, after all.

Ohhhhhh dear, old fat man needs his bed,  What ho!


    

What's This? Posting During Pub Quiz?

Well, No, Not Quite
     In fact not at all.  Due to the fact that Darling Daughter (Sally)

The article in question!

is nineteen, we have been, together with our entourage, to have an Indian at the Copper Pot as a birthday celebration.  Unfortunately for our pub quiz partners, this meant missing the quiz  (sad face).  However, it was a very nice meal (happy face).

Too Much Of A Good Thing
     That's not all.  Today our team had a Christmas dinner at Prezzo's in the Printworks.  Another very nice meal.  Afterwards Conrad ate the packed lunch he'd made the night before, having completely forgotten about the Christmas meal.  In between this he was filling-up on various biscuits and chocolates that staff and managers had provided, so whether I would have had any room for several pints and at least half a dozen sandwiches is a moot point.
     A little of what you fancy does you good, except Conrad has definitely overdone the "little" part of it.


Conrad is ready for his ethics

Keep Watching The Skies!
     Which is exactly what ESA's "Gaia" satellite will be doing for the next half-decade.  For details see Auntie BEEB: 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-25426424

Imagine the data analysis resulting from metrics about a billion stars. I anticipate the sheer amount of information means that public volunteers will be sourced to analyse the information, or be allowed to carry out their own projects with it.
     Excellent news!  - as long as they don't discover a certain bunch of tardy starships loitering about Alpha Centauri on a vector for Earth ...

Damn!  Do you think they know the truth about me?

Time to go!



Running Late Tonight

For The Best Of Reasons
     Our old friend Jane has come to visit, up from the fleshpots of Milton Keynes.  Normally Conrad would be stuck in his eyrie, reading, writing and performing hideous medical experimentation - but! - in the spirit of being proper friendly, like, tonight he was lolling in a chair watching a film.
     This is also after finishing late at work, then having to endure - which should be written ENDURE - public transport, and having to wash a small hill of dirty dishes.
     Still, it is nice to see Jane again.

     What?  You were expecting some tasteless and offensive pun based on "Jane"?  For shame!  Not again!  Please refrain! <cont. Page 96>


What Next?
     Quo Vadis indeed.  Well, there's only time enough tonight to post this blog.  I've already written out a score of Conrad's Christmas Cards.  Are these different from any other, you ask?
    Why, yes.  Yes they are.  I buy the cheapest Christmas cards I can find, then try to write a witty/pithy/amusing/won't make the kids cry caption to each card, ready for hand-delivery to my colleagues.
     Herein an example:

"Give me all your money or I'll stab you!"

Hilarity in print form!  Your view may vary, in which case go and stand at the foot of the stairs.

Time, Like An Ever-Rolling Stream
     Ah, me.  My Darling Daughter, Sally, will be 19 tomorrow.  19!
     She is pretty damn wonderful, almost by default.  I think we got a real bargain when we bought her.  Most awesome fact is that she still occasionally hangs out with Embarrassing Dad (unless he tries to dance) although that may be due to the free beer provided at the weekly pub quiz ...

Sally, eating.  An activity which occupies 95% of her waking time

Okay, got to go practice Taking Over An Entire Continent - us dictators have to begin somewhere!

The Highs, The Lows, The Day, It Goes -

Ha!  Uncharacteristically Poetic For BOOJUM!
     If you were here yesterday, dear reader, then you will have empathised with my protracted skrike about the worst possible combination of weathers: cold, wet, windy and raining.
     Today was the opposite!  Bright blue skies, actinic sunlight and nearly sub-zero temperatures.  This is what winter is supposed to be about.  No, Victoria, it isn't "cold", "freezing" nor is it "brass monkey weather".  It is "crisp", "bracing" and "Conrad is perky" weather.
     Earlier tonight the council gritting trucks were out.  These guys are very, very rarely wrong when it comes to predicting freezing crisp weather - I can remember a couple of times in the past two years - so hopefully we will get another morning reminiscent of dawn on Titan!

Jupiter as backdrop, plumes of water, temperature of minus 90, what else can you ask for?

TRAFFIC!
     If the above item was Conrad in lighter mood, almost ethereal in tone, this item is Conrad as snarling junkyard dog! (as I believe is the phrase over the Pond)
     "Why so hostile?" enquire you, the reader.



     Well, go on, enquire!

     Thank you.  Because of the ridiculously heavy traffic en route to and from work.  How did that happen?
     Well, up here in Royton I believe it was a tidal wave of shoppers heading in to the retail park at Elk Mill this evening.  They jammed the slip-road like a rubber-footed barricade.  That's after Conrad endured delays getting even that far, since obviously Something had happened on the motorway and backed up traffic -

<short pause for blood pressure to fall>

The person who invented traffic jams should be shot, hung, beaten with baseball bats, hung again, shot again for good measure, poked in the eye with a pencil and have chilli powder dusted into their underwear, although not necessarily in that order.

Dog Sausages
     No, these are not sausages made out of dogs!
     Yes, these are sausages made for dogs!
     Once again I hesitate to mention Anna, since she's bound to want a co-scripting credit for BOOJUM! if this happens again.  However, "sausages for dogs" are real, exist in the here and now and you can get them from Aldi - she assured me.

Hello - can we get a quote about dog sausages?  Hello?  Hello!  Can we - oh never mind.  He's eating dog sausages.

 Catering At The Mansions
     Conrad has been busy tonight.  Despite being stuck in traffic <see above for foaming rant> he managed to sort out the Limoncello's second stage.  This amounts to creating a syrup, decocting it into the vodka-lemon zest mix that already exists, then shaking and leaving it for a week.

It looks more palatable in real life, promise.

 Conrad's Little Helper
     Allow me to introduce my electronic scales.

Red.  Scaley.  No dragon puns, please

This is such a useful gadget: grams, ounces or Tare.  Conrad wonders how he got along without it before.

Lastly, Literary
     I bought the novel "Let The Right One In" this weekend, and am maybe 20% through the book.  The novel's protagonist, Oskar, is a whole lot less appealing than the Swedish film's lead - the novel Oskar is a fat, cowardly shoplifter.
    And that makes the book better, IMHBCCO*.  Oskar here is a real outsider, bullied and tormented and despairing.  Not at all an Everychild.

Now, I really must be going.  That wargame won't game itself!

*In My Humble But Completely Correct Opinion

Bad Heavens

Nothing To Do With Religion -
     Just rain.  Emerging into the chilly darkness of a leaden Monday morning, we had the worst of all possible weathers - cold, rainy, windy and wet.  Not cold enough for snow, just cold enough and wet enough to score 11 on the 10 point Misery Scale.  Luckily it had stopped by the time our mobile murder-machine reached the car park or Conrad could have swum to the office.
     Bah!  It's mid-December - when do we get the blue skies and sub-zero temperatures?

Conrad's phrase is "Uniform Grey Layer". 

How Dare You*!
     Young Tristan took the seat next to mine today.  Outrageous!  Doesn't he know that Conrad has the seating arrangements just so?  I shall be writing to my MP about this, don't you worry, with a specially-created Facebook page too, about seat-stealing Pattersons, and an hourly-updated Twitter account as well, not to mention graffiti scribbled in the gent's toilets, oh yes -
     Sorry, where was I?  I'm a dangerous man to cross, you know -

Ironmongery
     One of my work accoutrements is a small serrated knife from Ikea, that keeps a wonderfully sharp blade.  Dead handy for slicing up stale bread, persimmons, banana skin, gherkins, etcetera.  The problem is, I always put it in my shirt pocket - and then, because it's out of eyesight, I forget about it.  It's still in full view of everyone else and many is the time I've been scolded.
     "That's so dangerous!" ad nauseum.  Here's a 1K word-saver:

Honestly, this angle makes it look like a sword. It's really small.

I've not perforated my hide with it yet in a year and a half.  Still, I ought to remember to remove it, for the sake of my colleagues.

Tea!  Noble Tea!
     The default drink for Conrad at BOOJUM! mansions is, of course, loose-leaf Darjeeling, Twining's by preference.  Supplies of this had shrunk to such an extent that Conrad was contemplating having to drink English Breakfast or Assam, or some untitled stuff found in a jar.  Suddenly!  Wonder Wife came to the rescue with Russian Caravan Tea**.

All for £1.95.  Whoopee!  Conrad is officially pleased.

That's the tea choice for a good few months decided.

Well, I have a Yorkshire Brack baking in the oven, so I shall have to go babysit it.  Toodle-ooh!

*  Another Album title, and no! I shan't tell you who it is tonight.
** I mentioned this last night.  You read yesterdays blog, right?

Tomorrow:  Audubon's Book Of North American Curds

Mathematic Analytic

Another Milestone*
     Yes, gentle reader, BOOJUM! passed 2000 hits yesterday.  Since there were approximately 300 hits from older blogs, that means 1700 hits for this blog, which averages out at almost 10 hits per day.  Not bad for a human, as Lance Henriksen** has been known to say.  This average counterbalances the cold stark viewing figures way back in June, which never got above single numbers.

Conrad.  Beaming, absolutely beaming with ecstatic happiness

BOOJUM!'s Been Baking
     Yes.  Firstly a gluten-free apple pie.  The tricky bit is the tapioca flour, in that I have to make it from tapioca.  The food blender only works up to a point, after which there are little bits of incompletely ground tapioca in the mix, making for a somewhat gritty pastry.

Gritty but pretty.  Ignore the excessively-browned edge.

 - and do you know what?  It proved to be quite edible for a first experimentation.  I suspect Darling Daughter will find it entirely acceptable and there won't be much left by Tuesday.
     In other baking news, Abi commissioned a Lemon Drizzle Cake.

Pre-drizzle

Here it is, all ready for Thursday.  It has to cool completely in the tin before then.
     You can't see it, but two yards over at 90 degrees is a tubful of dried fruit soaking in tea and whisky for Cake Day's Yorkshire Brack.

Better go check on the ice-cream maker -

"Churn, churn, churn.  To everything there is a season -"***

Forgive the appalling pun.  This may not look like much now, but once frozen in a tub it'll be Pistachio and Pecan Ice Cream, one of my better efforts.  Luckily the recipe makes enough for 1-and-a-bit tubs, so Conrad can continue to enjoy his Breakfast Of Champions at work.

Besides these kitchen achievements, Conrad has also managed a load of laundry, a ton of dirty dishes, made his lunch for tomorrow, finished off Stormwatch Volume 3 and had a shower. Oh, and another 250 words of the Zombie Novel.

Have to go and en-tub that ice-cream!

* No metric shilly-shallying on this blog!
** Lance Henriksen.  If you don't know who he is, we are no longer friends.
***  The Byrds and "Turn Turn Turn", before they went all countrified.