Cooking Up a Storm

Who doesn't love a good meal? One prepared skillfully and thoughtfully. One that satisfies you in ways that nothing else can. I am a big fan of cooking, even though I sometimes come up with dishes that look and taste more like biological weapons than food. Not too long ago I tried my hand at making pea soup. Simple, yet delicious. Well, that was the idea anyway. The end result was.....um.....well......boring. It needed a massive amount of salt, pepper and Worcestershire Sauce to even start resembling something that you'd actually want to eat. And even then you ended up like this...

A while back I sat thinking back to the golden days of my youth (stop laughing, it wasn't THAT long ago). My grandfather used to make a pretty decent shrimp cocktail as an appetizer for Sunday lunches. I thought to myself "How hard can it be?" and bought the necessary ingredients. Well, in my mind anyway. After much measuring, adding, chanting and dancing my meal was complete. And it was terrible! Instead of ending up with a much loved childhood meal, I ended up with the edible equivalent of nerve gas.

Thankfully not all of my attempts at rustling up a good meal have ended so disastrously. Some of them have actually yielded some pretty awesome dishes. And needless to say, those are the ones I share with friends and family. That way they know that I can actually do something worthwhile in the kitchen, and that I am not secretly living on a diet of KFC and burgers. Of course, there is a slight downside to having good food. And it is one that we have to consider whenever we bite into something gloriously rich and creamy......

Giddy-Up!

There is a saying that goes: "When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount." Many people will read this and nod sagely. I have a slight problem with this saying as I fail to see how you wouldn't notice that the horse you are sitting on has dropped dead. There are a few clues to give this fact away. First off, the horse is probably not moving. That is okay, it might have stopped for a breather. Secondly, there is a good chance that the horse is on its side. Okay, fair enough, it might need a substantial breather. But thirdly, the horse is most likely partially on top of you at this point, so you have to be monumentally stupid not to notice that said horse is actually dead.

Now I understand that you will say "Yes, but this is an analogy that states that, if you are participating in a lost cause, your best chance of success is to stop doing it." Alright, fair enough. And it makes a lot of sense. But apparently not to the South African Government. They have failed to notice that the recently deceased horse is lying on top of them, and have resorted to various tactics:
1. Buying a stronger whip.
2. Changing riders.
3. Appointing a committee to study the horse.
4. Arranging to visit other countries to see how other cultures ride dead horses.
5. Lowering the standards so that dead horses can be included.
6. Reclassifying the dead horse as living-impaired.
7. Hiring outside contractors to ride the dead horse.
8. Harnessing several dead horses together to increase speed.
9. Providing additional funding and/or training to increase the dead horse's performance.
10. Doing a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse's performance.
11. Declaring that as the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the economy than do some other horses.
12. Rewriting the expected performance requirements for all horses.
And, of course...
13. Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position.

While I understand that no Government is perfect, I fail to see how the people in power in South Africa can look at a situation that is clearly not working, nod to themselves, proclaim that everything is going according to plan, and then buggering off to lunch. Einstein once declared that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. By that definition our Government needs a new clothing accessory. One that you wear as a jacket, that fastens in the back, and makes you hug yourself......

Adrenaline

This weekend my dad decided to treat myself and my two future brothers-in-law to the Airlink Adrenaline Show held at Wonderboom airport. It was a unique show featuring a blend of airplane stunts and car stunts, and it was all terribly exciting. They had everything from choppers flying sideways and even backwards to a jet car tearing down the runway at tremendous speed.

If walking around looking at various muscle cars, supercars and hotrods are more your thing, they had plenty of those as well. Every few minutes you would hear someone start up something with a massive engine and rev it much to the delight of spectators and passers-by. At some point we too decided to join the masses wandering aimlessly around and found ourselves at the supercar display. Unlike the muscle cars which were standing around with people thronged tightly around them, the supercars were cordoned off, to keep you from drooling on the paintwork. Now, my one future brother-in-law is slightly obsessed with Lamborghini. And when I say slightly obsessed, I mean that he would happily sell off a kidney, part of his digestive tract and even a lung in order to own one. I'm pretty sure that, when pressed, he would also throw in a testicle just to sweeten the deal. So the sight of a Lamborghini Huracan displayed in all its magnificent glory had him frothing at the mouth.

He declared that he was going to go find the organisers in order to get permission to have his photo taken next to it. After a brief absence he came back and declared that he had been given the go-ahead and promptly ducked under the rope before striking a heroic pose while leaning on the 6 million rand supercar for a photo. After snapping a picture of him reclining against a car that costs more than feeding most third world countries, he then had to scamper off when a gigantic bouncer appeared and approached my future brother-in-law with a look of deadly intent in his eyes. After a quick exit, I was left wondering if the organisers had in fact given permission or whether they had laughed off the request, at which point he decided to take matters, and his life, into his own hands. For the rest of the day I half expected the bouncer to jump out of the shadows, grab my future brother-in-law in a headlock and drag him away, leaving me to explain to my sister why she won't be getting married in a few months.

But all things considered, it was quite an eventful day. Pilots and drivers showed off their tremendous skill, man and machine working in perfect harmony. It was breathtaking! And the day lived up to its name, even though the biggest jolt of adrenaline was caused by being chased by a big man with evil intentions......

A Fishy Tale

A friend alerted me to a news story about a National Geographic cameraman that was unexpectedly swallowed by an Ocean Sunfish. For those who don't know, an Ocean Sunfish is something that resembles a whale that was hit by a cruise ship. It is massive but rather flat. Just to give you an idea....

Now the story goes that the unfortunate diver was filming pygmy sperm whales (because that is what one does in your spare time) when the massive sunfish swam up and swallowed him in one gulp before continuing on to wherever sunfish go for after-dinner drinks. The other divers could only watch as the massive fish swam peacefully away.

My friend and I had a long discussion about the digestive capabilities of the sunfish. Seeing as it swallowed the diver whole, what would happen once the diver's oxygen tank encountered the digestive tract? Would the fish explode in a massive cloud of blood, scales and half digested diver, or would it get a rather confused look on its face before rocketing away like a deflating balloon?

And what was going through the cameraman's head as he was swallowed up? Was he wondering if he packed a diving knife? Maybe he was pondering the rarity of being swallowed up by something that looks like a squashed whale? Or maybe he was thinking that he should have rather stayed in bed that morning. Thankfully the man in question can still be asked about the thoughts that flashed through his mind, as he is still very much alive and uneaten. It turns out the story was a hoax, but one that went viral. Ah, the joys of the internet!

For those who want to read the factual article about the diver's encounter with the sunfish, you can find it here.