#i am living in my freezer indefinitely.

[sketch-mer-6195]

Totally NOT being hot and bothered by this...........

🥵🥵🥵🥵

@nilawii @scholastic-dragon

Art is not mine

By the artist under the twitter name @XtraRiot

I don't have twitter and I can't copy the link to show proof... I'm sowwy...

[a-bit-of-owlish-fun]

Quarantine Shopping and Meal Planning

So I asked about this over on @steve-rogers-new-york​ and there was a positive response, so here we go. Date: 15 March 2020

Before I start, let me be clear that I am not a professional, just someone who deals with stress by planning, and who has some experience with emergency preparedness having lived in New Zealand during the more recent large earthquakes. Feel free to correct me or make positive additions. For clarity, I am currently in Ontario Canada, and cooking for one person, but have made allowances to feed my unprepared housemate in a pinch.

Priorities with this Pandemic Planning

Unlike some other emergency preparedness priorities, power, water, and phone do not appear to be issues. So you have greater flexibility with what you can make and keep. Your priority should be having a comfortable amount of food on hand in case you cannot leave the house. Don’t go nuts, don’t overbuy, and don’t buy thoughtlessly.

Planning What to Get and Make

When thinking about what to buy and what to make, you want to consider a few things:

How many meals do you need to make? That is, how many people are you feeding and for how long? Calculate the number of meals you need in total and make sure you have enough meals planned to cover those. Obviously, if you can prepare for more than that is good, but don’t go too nuts.

How many portions can a recipe make? You don’t want to be making single-serve meals. It’s inefficient and short-sighted. So pick recipes that make large quantities, that can be portioned up in containers to be chilled or frozen.

Am I being efficient with my ingredients? Are the quantities listed in regularly used recipes the most practical for your current ingredient availability? For example, if you’re making a stew with beef, but beef is in short supply, half the amount the recipe asks for, and then bulk up on potatoes, carrots, zucchini, etc.

What ingredients will last best? Don’t JUST get non-perishables! That just sounds miserable. I’ve had no issue so far getting fruit and vegetables, and if you’re smart with your choices and storage fresh foods can be good choices. This when picking items how long they will hold in your fridge or if they’re freezable.

Don’t forget about breakfast and Lunch!

If money is tight and buying ahead is challenging. Think laterally. Make use of dollar stores like Dollarama, Dollar Tree, or whatever your local variant is. They will often have a great range of shelf-stable foods like pasta, rice, canned goods, and other ingredients at really low prices. And from my experience so far, they seem to have passed the attention of many shoppers and are still in good stock-levels. Start there first, hit multiple ones to get a good variety, then shop at supermarkets for whatever you cannot get there. The quality is good, sometimes brand-names, and they can be far superior than supermarket prices.

Do you have a large stockpot, fry pan, and deep baking dish to make these large meals? If not, see about getting them. Large lasagne pans and other kitchen items can be found cheap at many dollar stores.

Don’t have a car? Me neither. Grab a backpack and some good re-usable bags and make multiple trips for heavier items like cans. Also, consider grocery delivery services. They can be hit and miss right now, as it’s harder to adapt to products being unavailable. This being said, they can be a good way to get bulk, heavier items to your house. Also, consider asking friends or family to get you items when they go and drop them off to you.

What Foods Hold Well and Go Far

Non-Perishables that can extend meals

Pasta and Noodles — Pasta is a great item for entending a meal. Be it soups, stir-fry, oven-bake, or just able anything, you can either cook-in, mix-in, or have as a plain side. They bulk up a meal and make it go further.

Rice  — Same as above.

Lentils and Other Legumes — Lentils are great for bulking up and extending soups and stews. Also consider chickpeas, beans, and other legumes.

Potatoes — Potatoes are great! The can be a great base, addition, or side to many many meals. While these will not last indefinitely, if you keep them cool and dark then they will last quite some time.

Non-Perishable Ingredients and Flavouring

Canned Vegetables — Don’t be picky. Yes, get fresh veggies where you can, but also suck it up and get some canned goods as a back-up. Carrots, peas, beans, tomatoes, all that. They’re good, they taste fine, and go well in so many recipes.

Canned Fruit — Many fruits have a shorter shelf-life, so consider some canned alternatives.

Herbs and Spices — Make sure you have a nice spread of these. It’s easy to grab the base ingredients for food, but if you don’t have something to flavour those meals with, you’ll have a miserable time.

Sauces — Same as above.

Canned Tomatoes and Tomato Paste — Yes, I’m listing this separately because of their versatility. With canned tomatoes, you can make soups, spaghetti, lasagne, chilli, curry...so damn much. So grab a good stock of these.

Perishables

Eggs — Eggs are so damn versatile. Get eggs. When kept in the fridge they keep for a good long time.

Vegetables — Think smart. Get items you know last well in your fridge, and avoid items you usually have to throw-out or use-up within a week or two.

Fruit — Same.

Breads — Same. Also, consider freezing loaves if you have the space to do so. It tastes just as good as fresh, honest.

Frozen

If you have the capacity to get things frozen or to freeze them. Do it. Frozen peas, corn, stir-fry veggies, meats...they last well and taste good.

My Grocery List

This is what I have been buying myself. Not all at once but in multiple trips over the last couple of weeks.

Pantry

Top-up herbs and spices: ground cumin, garam masala, oregano, basil.

Spaghetti pasta

Spiral pasta

Lasagne pasta sheets

Large bag of rice

Flour

Canned tomatoes (4 large cans)

Tomato paste

Canned asparagus

Canned coconut milk (2 cans)

Lentils

Potatoes (6 large)

Onions

Fridge

Eggs (12pc)

Milk

Cheese

Zucchinis (3)

Carrots (large bag)

Lemons (2)

Limes (2)

Bag of spinach

Bell pepper (1)

Crescent Rolls

Freezer

Peas

1kg minced beef

750g stewing beef

Box stuffed chicken breasts (I love ham and cheese and a good addition to any meal)

500g lamb (for curries)

500g stir-fry beef

Household

ONE pack of toilet paper. Seriously. Just get what you personally need.

A couple of small packs of cheap toilet paper from the dollar store.

Pack paper towels

Any cooking materials like tin-foil, parchment paper, that I use regularly.

3-pack tissues (I have killer allergies so I’ll always need them)

Plastic containers for portioning meals in the fridge or freezer.

Meals I have Planned

These aren’t full recipes, but rather a list of ingredients and volumes for grocery references. I might write-up full recipes later if people are interested. 

Lasagne

This is my fav vegetarian lasagne that also have minced meat. It makes around 6-8 servings (depending on home much you eat and size of baking dish).

Lasagne sheets (dried) or just those baby lasagne pasta if you like them better. 4 cups Milk 250g Cheese Butter Flour Nutmeg Chicken stock 3 Large Carrots 3 Large Zucchini Large bag of fresh spinach leaves 400g Canned Tomatoes Fresh/Jarred Garlic 500g minced beef Light Herbs (oregano, basil, etc to taste, but not too much)

Vegetable Stew

Technically a soup, but I never blend it and just eat it as is. Makes 3-4 servings alone and 5-8 servings when served with cooked rice.

2 cups dried lentils (soaked overnight) 1 Large Can Tomatoes (not pre-herbed, just used plain) 2 cups Chicken or Vegetable Stock 2 Large Carrots cubed 2 Large Zucchinis (quartered then cubed) Fresh/Jarred Garlic 1 Tbsp Cumin 1 tsp Ground Coriander Fresh Coriander (lots) Fresh ground peppercorn

Beef Stew

500g Stewing Beef 3 Large Potatoes cubed 3 Large Carrots cubed 1-2 cups Frozen Peas Fresh/Jarred Garlic 2-3 Tbsp Flour Fresh ground peppercorn 1 Large Onion 3-4 cup Beef Stock 3 Tbsp Tomato Paste Rosemary 2 Tbsp Cornstarch

D.’s Curry

This is just and random mash-up curry I make. It can be cooked with or without lamb and both taste great. It is not spicy. Makes 2-3 servings

2 Large Onions (one minces with spaces, one sliced) Fresh/Jarred Garlic Fresh/Jarred Ginger Ground Cumin Ground Coriander Ground Cardamon Whole Cardamon Seeds Whole Cumin Seeds Garam Masala 300ml Uncooked Rice (then cook it, obviously)

Closing thoughts

Once you have these items, don’t use them. Carry on like normal and don't use these items unless you need them. Now I have my meals planned, I am back to making normal meals with what I can get. Always have that TWO WEEK buffer on hand at all times.

Purchase your groceries gradually. Don’t buy out in one go, be considerate. Take only what you need.

Visit multiple locations, sell-outs are not the same everywhere and while one supermarket may be sold out of something, another may still have a fresh stock.

More stocks WILL come. So if you cannot find something, make alternate plans, find a substitute, and return every now and then to check stocks. Supermarkets are constantly restocking as they can.

Be kind to customer service workers. They are just trying to get through this like you are. They are not paid well, have no control over their employers' stocks or decisions. They have the same stress you do and you being an asshole is just causing them MORE stress they do not deserve. Be. Kind. Be. Understanding.

Support others. Friends, family, neighbours, co-workers. We do this together.

DON’T STRESS OUT! Be prepared. Be aware. But don’t become overwhelmed, it will all be FINE. We just have to adapt and ride it out <3

I hope this was helpful. Have further suggestions or any corrections, please do let me know, I’m always happy to correct myself. If you have any questions feel free to comment and message me. And if you want those full recipes likewise let me know!

[roaringup]

I haven’t had much to say the past few weeks. Just reading. But the experience of keeping a diary is probably a help to orienting myself in time and space so I’ll get back to that slowly.

The work hole has been easing up a bit now, my brain is a little less like ground meat. It remains really and truly kafkaesque how much of my cognitive and emotional resources I pour into huge projects that are literally of less value than almost anything else I would be doing if I did not have to work. The manufactured urgency of continually tweaking these massive documents, most of which will be skimmed and ultimately ignored, is unsurprising but still wild. I’m not like sad or angry about it at the moment, I guess, it generates money and I do send it on toward donations that are useful as well as things that are useful for my own household like toothbrushes, testosterone, mortgage payments, and groceries.

Lately I’ve been using a clean kneaded rubber eraser for stimming purposes and finding it ideal. I used to do this in high school all the time. Really recommend it if you like a small quantity of a stiff but malleable putty. They are not expensive. They do have a smell, which I happen to like.

I made some knockoff Thin Mints and have too many but they can just live in the freezer indefinitely.

The office where I work won’t be open to anyone at all until the summer is over and that seems good. As the lone public transit taker there(!) I suspect I can stay here at home indefinitely (like the Thin Mints?). I have been wondering when I will take a bus or train again though. It seems extremely distant still, especially since Robin is already sicker in the summer. I do not now care about whether I personally am well or unwell (though I’m aware I would feel very differently if that actually changed—just, no emotions are there atm. My emotions are at like 25–50% of normal saturation level) but I don’t want to pass anything on.

[hobohumanitarian6]

This is a long post so please be warned!!! I need to get some things off my chest....

⚠️ TRIGGER WARNING POSSIBLE⚠️

Feedback to this post is open-ended. You cannot offend me and will not be blocked.

⭐ So here's the thing: one of my late grandmother's friends just posted that her 29 year old son died in his sleep with seemingly no explanation. This really shook me I guess. For one, I used to hang out with this kid during the summers a lot. My specific memories are very vague, but deep in my consciousness I know that I have called him friend in the past. For another, many things lately have been prompting me to ask the difficult questions ie

Why in the fuck am I here?

What's the meaning of it all?

When is my life going to get better?

How do I prepare myself for better things?

Am I blocking me or is something else blocking me?

What am I doing wrong that the universe doesn't think I'm ready for a new chapter?

Am I really with the right person?

What about the afterlife?

Am I going to be silenced or speak out?

What if I can't do some of things I want/dreamed of?

What is going to satisfy me if my future doesn't go as planned?

⭐ I've been doing quite a bit of soul searching through all of this, established the framework of the person I want to be and

BAM! 🧱 💥 🏃🏻‍♀️

Straight into a fucking. Brick. Wall.

⭐ I am in one of the worst continental states in the US (by even statistic) and before all of the shutdown and pandemic began, I had plans to be relocated with my new job, a place to call home & reunited with family by June 1st. Clearly that didn't happen....

⭐ I am spending $900 a month for a 250 ft² motel room just so I am not out on the streets.

Homelessness. Can we talk about that for a second? People getting arrested for being out past curfew because they don't have a place to go, put in jail because they're in the way, not tested or treated for the virus because they generally have no insurance, giving people loads of food stamps so the emergency assistance funding is broke-

600 dollars of groceries is a lot if you have a fridge, freezer, microwave, oven, toaster, etc not if you have to buy your food from overpriced convenience stores and gas stations and fresh food from grocery stores that 70% of the price is for the packaging it comes with!!

Soup kitchens closing because they don't want to risk contamination. Who's feeding those without a hot meal? Do they realize malnourishment is the quickest way to get sick with any pathogen!?

Shelters closed because of overpopulation. Domestic violence homes turning battered women and children away because there's too scarce of resources and funding. Yet people care about big corporations going bankrupt? Please tell me what the difference is between a goddamn human fucking life and a couple lawsuits because you didn't know how to prepare for an ever-changing economy.

Thank the universe i am sheltered with minimal resources to take care of myself and I have a steady job due to an enormous company's "chance on a down-in-the-dumps contractor." This job I have held steadily for a year despite chronic health issues has been the best thing to happen to me by far in a long time. I am definitely not by any means complaining about my job or that I even have life necessities right now. Several million don't have that.

⭐ The problem with this state is there are no resources for a person who's struggling to make an honest living. I lost my apartment two years ago because I had to take a medical leave of absence at my job then, got behind on rent and was evicted without a chance to catch up. The power was cut three nights before I had to leave, and I owe a deposit on the electric company to get any type of service back in my name. The realty company who owns the apartment complex will not allow a payment plan without a fraction of the principle paid down, so therefore I cannot apply for private or realty housing and I have been on the waiting list for federal housing assistance for 3 years without a single word. I also had my bank card stolen with my ID when I was trying to catch a bus to work a few weeks after that so whoever it was made small purchases that my bank applied interest and late charges to so that is also standing in debt. Thank universe my current employer allows direct deposit to a savings account at a bad credit institution or I'd be royally fucked.

⭐ Before I made the hard decision to doll out almost a G a month just for a room, I tried sleeping in my pickup. I even took the effort to pallet it for a platform bed & make benches to live in free campgrounds, cemeteries, truck stops, boonie dead ends, and behind abandoned buildings. I had a 12V converter that I connected to a rice cooker and made a tin can stove to grill small portions of meat on a single-egg mini skillet. I kept getting chased off by rangers, cops, annoying people trying to do crack and not get their lives better, and eventually violently detained for "suspicious activity" - I was thrown on the ground, put in handcuffs, patted down by a male officer with no female present, searched my vehicle without consent & written a citation: this was 2 am, I had a campsite reservation, I was clearly sleeping & my vehicle was current. The officers did not give me their name or numbers so I could not make a report.

⭐ I have chronic health issues - hip dysplasia & hyper mobility (not severe enough to be EDS), anemia, rexhia (NOT PRO ANYTHING), pre diabetes, H.S, BPD, PTSD, endometriosis & chronic migraines. I have filed time and time and time again for medical assistance but have always been denied. Every time I try to see a doctor, they claim I have this-or-that infection caused by this-or-that disorder, sent to an overpriced pharmacy with illness-irritating antibiotics that just keep me in an unending cycle of flares and barely-managable pain. Do not let anyone privileged or wealthy confuse you - you are not treated the same if you don't have coverage. Sorry to say but it is indeed a fact.

⭐ With this job I work 40-50 hours a week, eat as healthy as I can on a dime sized budget, and cover all my expenses. Yet I cannot move forward in this state on to better things. I want so badly to have a family, to go to college, etc but I cannot do this with living month to month someplace that isn't even my own.

⭐ The emotional affect this has had on me is tremendous. I am embarrassed of my situation, and never allow any guests in fear they'd judge me. I never take any photographs, which is heartbreaking because it has been one of my long-time hobbies. I am extremely guarded and I lie about small details to protect myself. I have severe trust issues and I always hold a dagger at my waist because I have to assume any minute you'll pull out a Glock.

⭐ Naturally I am an empath and this has brought me more compassion and understanding than I ever thought possible. The police brutality against people of color and racism in socio-economic programs truly breaks my heart because as a white female and all the struggles and discrimination I've endured, I can only begin to understand it's 1000x harder for people of color especially. I stand behind your protests 100%. I beseech you, go fight for what you deserve! I will be begging higher powers for your protection indefinitely!

⭐ I have gained a new perspective on non-profit organizations and volunteer work. Some are truly amazing and their stories move people to tears; others are truly wicked stealing from the poor, embezzling cash flow for their own vanities. Please please please research the charity you are interested in thoroughly before getting involved. Volunteer work will always be appreciated- and will teach you many invaluable lessons. If you help these organizations and need help yourself: respect yourself, hold yourself high, and ask for the assistance. They will generally be more inclined to help. If you are turned away, try not to be bitter. Administrators only do as they see fit.

⭐ That's another thing - bitterness. This has been the most vile and roughest character default I've ever had to battle with myself. When you've been through the shit and you can't see the sewer (sts) it's so easy to stay in the dumps. It's so easy to feel entitled because you've clawed your way to the top. It's easy to feel angry with everyone because it's you vs the system. It's so fucking easy to give up completely and stop trying and just lay down and die. It's easy to step in front of a two ton bus, oncoming freight train, taking the entire package of extra strength Excedrin not because you have a migraine, but just not to feel a thing, go completely numb for one single second. It's easy to go down to the head shop and get a nickel bag of weed to chill and get a 5$ pizza and forget you have responsibilities.

IT'S SO FUCKING TOUGH MAN

⭐ Growing up strictly religious, I tend to shy away from Christianity or other "preachy religion" now. I hate having Jesus shoved down my throat at a service before a hot meal on a Tuesday night and the "speaker" automatically assuming I need to stop smoking crack and going to jail and get my life back on track and God will bless me when I'm in the 46% who has never been to county and hold a job while trying to get back on my feet.

ADDICTION IS NOT POVERTY GUYS

I still support people who go to church and speak in tongues if that satisfies them. I still support people who are strictly vegetarian and make a pilgrimage to the mecca if that satisfies them. I still support people who have 7 two week long feasts a year for something that happened 4000 years ago if that satisfies them. I still support people who believe in baptisms for the dead and not drinking coffee if that satisfies them. I still support people who call Jesus the Nazarene and believe that Lucifer the Dark Lord will prevail if that satisfies them. I still support people who call down the power of the moon into their plant babies and give thanks to the triple goddess if that satisfies them. I support religion or practices of all kinds.

I believe I was meant to be tolerant and be good to others. That this life will give back what you put in. That there is a higher power that governs all and it is up to you to determine just what that is to you. Not to tell people what is wrong with their lives just based on your personal story.

⭐ During this pandemic, I have done a lot of soul searching. Journaling, listening to podcasts, listening to seminars on values I'd never know existed, trying to discover who I am. This journey has included empathy training, reiki, yoga, somatic movement, feldenkrais methods, and astral meditation. I just have a list of these questions I'd like answered or given suggestions to:

What do you believe is the meaning of life? Is there any philosophers, speakers, teachers, theologians, writers, musicians etc that can help answer this?

What is your definition of religion in it's rawest form?

Do you know of any resources I may not have thought of?

Is there any criticism you can give good or bad?

Am I focused on one thing and neglecting another?

Do you have any further opinions on the topics listed above?

Do you have a suggestion of the next right step?

Do you have ideas on how I can help with the aforementioned problems?

How do I stop feeling like I'm wasting my time?

How do I find contentment in everything should I die tomorrow?

What is your opinion of the afterlife?

How do you find happiness in the midst of bullshit?

What did a friend/relative/mentor tell you when you were going through an existential crisis?

Have you felt trapped too? Due to the covid or otherwise?

Any curse words, songs, books, movies, etc of use?

🌸🌸I sincerely appreciate any feedback 🌸🌸

[tejasfarm]

MEALWORMS

We first bought some live mealworms from a company here in the US on Amazon in 2018, called Bassett’s Cricket Ranch (check them out here!).  We kept them going for a while until I realized I was cleaning the container too much, thinking that I was keeping them alive.  In fact, as I swiped the sides and bottom of the ‘drawers’ with a vinegar and water solution, I realized I was killing my sweet little baby mealworm eggs.  Soon, the supply was almost depleted and we were teaching our chickens to love us with mealworm snacks.  Then, we found a local company & bought another batch to add to our couple of beetle parents that were left.  We’re now back in business with a healthy supply.

For anyone debating on raising mealworms to feed your feathered friends or reptilian roommates, it is super easy and only a wee bit of work.

WHAT IS A MEALWORM?

According to our friend Wikipedia, “Mealworms are the larval form of the mealworm beetle, Tenebrio molitor, a species of darkling beetle. Like all holometabolic insects, they go through four life stages: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. Larvae typically measure about 2.5 cm or more, whereas adults are generally between 1.25 and 1.8 cm in length.”

Keep a source of moisture, a source of food, and some hidey holes.  Clean out anything they don’t eat after a while and sift out the waste from time to time.

THAT’S A LOT OF MEALWORMS

As long as you keep them in a safe environment, nature will take its course and you’ll have mealworms indefinitely.

Mealworms are not a native species, so while you’ll want to give your chickens a few of these, keep the little squiggly-wigglies contained so as to not allow them to freely reproduce in the wild.

In what seems the most humane way of “preserving” mealworms, when there is an abundance, or I am cleaning the habitat, I’ll place them in the freezer. I do this before I throw the waste from cleaning into the compost. The chickens will still be excited to sift through it all and I don’t worry about wild mealworms attacking the village.

HOUSING YOUR SQUIGGLE FRIENDS

I like a clear plastic container, if you have an old Rubbermaid storage box, that’d work great, just make sure it is clean and perhaps no deadly chemicals were stored in it. Which hopefully is the case with or without mealworms. Here is a nice option, to have 2 similar containers, either to separate your mealworms, if you like, or to have a nice spot to keep the little critters while you clean. While mealworms can crawl around quickly on flat surfaces or up cardboard, slippery plastic surfaces seem safe to contain them. So, an oblong, short see-through container would work best. You’ll never want to keep the lid closed on it, unless you want to poke lots of ventilation holes in the top. Up to you.

MEALWORMS SLEEP IN AND EAT THE SAME THING

When we first began our adventures with mealworms, we bought some wheat bran online, like this brand, which is easy and not expensive, but if you have the room, a local feed store should have a large sack of wheat bran to purchase for much cheaper. The only problem I experienced with purchasing from the feed store was that it soon had moths flying inside the bag. My solution was to stick the big ol’ sack in the deep freezer (such a useful tool – if you have the room) and what do you know - there were no longer moths flying. I am still on the same bag of wheat bran after a year or so, especially because in the winter, in our basement, the worms go a bit dormant.

CLEANING THE HABITAT

Depending on how many mealworms and beetles are coexisting, doing a bit of a clean once a week or once a month may suffice. Ours are stored in the basement and in the winter in Pennsylvania, that means the mealworms get to take a break and rest for a bit. If you want to keep your mealworms active, they’ll need to be in a warm, dark place, like a closet.

When cleaning out the mealworm house, it’s nice to have a sifter where the small dust-like waste can sift through but the large pieces of bran and the mealworms can stay behind. I usually grab a bowlful of everything, sift into my dumping bucket and then pour the good stuff back into a cleaned part of the bin, or into the second bin.

Replace scraps of cardboard if they’ve become messy or wet.  This is a great time to recycle old toilet paper or kitchen paper towel rolls. Scraps of egg carton or the cardboard berry containers make a nice dark environment for the mealworms to thrive and make babies.

KEEPING THEM ALIVE

There is a variety of foods to provide nutrition and moisture to the mealworms and beetles alike.   We generally give them scraps. Potato pieces, carrot ends, stalks of kale, broccoli trunks all work great.  Make sure it is a viable scrap of fruit/veggie, and just place it on top of the bedding.  Nuzzling it in too much might provide a moldy atmosphere for the veg.  If mold develops, pick out the whole piece with its surrounding bedding and compost it – ain’t nobody got time for mold.  Pick out pieces once they have shriveled up and dried out.  

Replace with new appetizing chunks about once a week or so.  You may need to add more veg depending on the number of critters and the temperature.  If they are super active, they may devour your carrot scraps in a couple days.

Moral of the Story

Keep your own mealworms

Piece of Mind – you know where they came from, what they’ve been eating

Cheap – a little investment up front and no more buying plastic containers of dried up insects

Chicken addiction – Your chickens will soon become your best friend and love gobbling the squigglies out of your hand

Takes up little space – What is one more storage bin in your house, I mean really?

Adventure – It is great to watch the cycle of life – from little egg particles, to worms, to pupa, to beetle and repeat.  

 Just do it & let us know what you think – please comment below if you have any questions or comments.

[toddlazarski]

Last Suppers

Shepherd Express

“Please let me go ‘round again.”

— John Prine

I thought the apocalypse would be more exciting. Some kind of heaven-sent fireball, a mushroom cloud of malaise, Mad Max dune buggies. In this far off light I’d always pictured myself bearded, barricaded, adroitly philosophical, suddenly quite adept at swinging a sort of spiked bat or other homemade zombie stopper. Instead, so far, some five weeks in, nobody I know has gotten sick. Nobody in my orbit has died. Even being accosted by our neighborhood Jehovah’s Witness on the street, being told of end times and other corporeal human collapses I couldn’t stand or fully hear—being as they were, uttered by a man six feet away, while a two-year-old pent-up from quarantine perched on my shoulders and periodically bonked my head urging movement—took place from a mindful, strangely respectable social distance. 

Mostly these days just find me as an iPhone-glued glut of dissociated dread. A musty sack of torpor filling out ironically-named Champion jogging pants and a Totino’s-stained hoodie crowned by a hastily shaved head. What I’m currently reminded of, for some reason, from somewhere deep within the lizard brain that was weaned on world-end movies, is Deep Impact, and the way it all ends for Tea Leoni’s character: in front of a beloved beachhouse, with brave acceptance, facing truth and demise in the form of an imminent asteroid death, with her—father, maybe? (This recall may be way off, as I only saw the movie once, maybe 20 years ago, but I have a current therapist-mandated pause from internet research as the slightest twitch toward dot com-ing leads inevitably, instantly to a Milla Jovovich in Fifth Element-like doom scroll of terror). Regardless, this is how I view my resignation when being generous: a soft, somber, single tear strong-willed nod and jutted-chin acquiescence. I’ve had my restaurant meals, if they never come again. I’ve had too many, at too many bars. I’ve lived. So, here I am, at the freezer again, my own beloved beachhouse, mustering strength, wondering how much Ben and Jerry’s will pass before life maybe resembles normal again, or else until I see St. Pete, or St. Paul, or whichever is the one at the gates. Measuring the days till Quetzalcoatl in pints of Chunky Monkey. Wondering if I’ll ever again eat Cherry Garcia as a little reward, for a jog and some push ups maybe, instead of a desperate substitute for therapy, lobotomy. My biggest preoccupation is really Instacart deliveries, and the thought of them, the threat of them, where we let the bags sit on the porch like sentinels with tales from the front lines, or like badges of middle class virus-avoidance privilege. We hope the wind cleans off the Corona, I suppose, and then we let the same bags sit inside, eyeing our wares cautiously, suspiciously by the door, weighing the three articles advising cleansing groceries is unnecessary versus the one—always from Medium—that states everything inside a grocery store will likely give you and your grandmother the plague. Then, between the subsequent wiping—of course—and the beginning to plan six days out for the next Instacart delivery, and then the moisturizing of hands out of necessity from washing hands far too much, there has been such a background din of quiet second-coming contemplation. With little to do but wipe the door handle again, with the closest social contact being yet another episode of Cheers, there’s been too much time to think on all this, on all that went, all that was snuffed by a brutal harsh Monday morning reminder—all our kicks, our joys, our dinner plans and drink diversions, all that was maybe never really deserved in the first place.

For one or another—or none at all—reason that I choose to not consider too closely, the last normal weekend in contemporary American existence was a big one. A Friday night trip to Enlightened Brewing to check out Derek Pritzl and the Gamble was a promising prospect, sure. They had recently introduced me to, made me fall deeply in love with, play over and over again, John Prine’s “Speed of the Sound of Loneliness.” Still, as things were, it was largely run-of-the-mill in those distant days of social possibility. Just line up one of a few willing babysitters, jot on the calendar absent-mindedly, leave it peppered, like always, with the growing-old adult notion of if I feel like it. The self-importance of a modern American. The expectation, the world owing me it’s pearls and it’s oysters and it’s artisanal double India Pale Ales, for some reason. There for taking, when we wished. It’s like we were all Mad Men men, coming home from work where you expect your dinner to be waiting, your children cleaned and polite. You did a little bit of work and now you are owed something, the other half of your existence, calm and orderly and “here are your slippers, dear.” Now there is no choosing or taking or rewarding yourself with a night out, or rewarding yourself with a night in. It’s simply like our parents have given us an indefinite timeout, with more whiskey, yes, but also more, much more, morbidity. And also our parents are not coming to our room, eventually, to tell us it will all be ok. Rather, now, they might come, and stand on the sidewalk, while we stand on the front porch awkwardly, not knowing what to do with our hands, with no Easter hugs even considered, and mom might leave sugar cookies in a bag on the sidewalk, as if we were in prison, and she was the jailer that had to slide our sustenance gruel through a slot in the door. Only her said bag came with a real wonder: do we have to disinfect that now? I ran into a friend at Enlightened, then another, then a friend of a friend, and then a work friend—hugs for all the normal tangly tendrils of an adequate social life, amplified by guitars and rollicking songs of regret and craft suds and jocular end-of-week revelry. The band was twangy and driving and jostly, and I wanted it to be louder. Actually my spoiled fragile ego knew I deserved it to be louder. Meanwhile I talked importantly about basketball and somebody told me about their trip to New Orleans. “I’ll be there in a month,” I said. Like an ignoramus, like tempting fate, like I was one of the kids on the playground in Sarah Connor’s nuclear apocalypse nightmare in Terminator 2. There was no Purell in sight, in mind. 

Later, at the Newport, the bartender handed me a beer list, and I didn’t even note that, or contemplate my mortality on the fact, he wasn’t wearing latex gloves. I leaned close, doing the thing you have to do at crowded bars where you wedge between two seated patrons, brush one or both, amplify your voice to the hunched-forward Sam Malone, spittle and open mouths and casual “excuse me, I’m sorry, man” contact with strangers not an issue or thought, let alone transgression against the whole of humanity’s existence. The bummer about the NBA that night was that the Bucks were losing to the Lakers. The saddest part about John Prine was the line: “How can a love that'll last forever, get left so far behind?” What would any of us say, had we knowl—in 5 days the entirety of the NBA machinery would be suddenly halted, a broom handle stuck in the grinding gears? That I would have no chance at seeing live music again, for the foreseeable future? And that, weeks later, due to the same crippling circumstances, John Prine would be dead?  

The next night, somehow, as if acting on some last-chance latent level, I found myself barreling south for a Saturday night in Chicago. I rode a crowded Amtrak. I held the steel handle up the steps, followed along close in line, plopped unworriedly right on the worn blue cloth seat, I ordered a Lyft, I closed a packed bar with out-of-town big-city tenacity. Old friends shared birthday cake in a corner. I flushed a toilet, maybe didn’t wash my hands for a full 20 seconds, poked at the jukebox, clinked glasses, performed once-normal finger and hand functions that would now cause me to douse both extremities to the elbow in alcohol and ask for a light. My buddy and I kept drinking like we were Goodfellas, bound shortly for a stint in the can, which, in hindsight, we sort of were. Then we ordered another Lyft back to his place, like signing the tab on the last real Saturday night. Sunday was disarmingly sunny, soft, pleasant, the kind of warm early spring sliver that catches you off balance, leaves you without the right clothes or your sunglasses. So we sat inside, at the bar at a place called the Moonlighter, where we nursed hangovers with micheladas and shared fiery chicken wings and sloppily severed a grease-dripping American-cheesed burger and shoved it down our gaping gullets and licked fingers and laughed at the bartender’s Nascar sweatshirt, bitched about his lassitude. It was still a day where you could like a bartender or not like a bartender, and you didn’t have to wonder if all bartenders had simply vanished, poof, gone on the wind, Leftovers-style. You could do your drinking business and move on to the next one. Which we did, literally, deciding on pizza and homebrews at a spot called Bungalow that takes—that took—itself probably a bit too seriously. We’ve often fallen into this habit of double lunch-ing, not so much because we are slobs, fat and greedy and gluttonous. And not as some kind of intuitive acknowledgment that we were approaching end times. It also wasn’t just a love of time together, collapsing the 100 miles that separates our lives with a collective unspoken vow of ceaseless Epicureanism. Well, maybe exactly because of all those reasons. Either way we ate, glad they take, took, themselves so seriously with each bite, sip. And I got a pie to go, tucking it under my arm through Union Station, cradling the box like a toddler’s favorite stuffed dinosaur during my ride home nap, a last pepperoni and sausaged vestige from the world of living, togetherness, an experience slice from before we began to view each other as potentially poisonous flowers.        

My final restaurant meal was the day after, at Copper Kitchen, my neighborhood greasy spoon of fluffy omelets and watery coffee that you can never get half down before a refill magically appears tableside. A welcoming diner with video poker, and some staff that still eye me a bit questioningly because I’ve only been coming here for two years, and not 30, like most patrons always around me. By now though, with some work, our regular waitress is beginning to know the score, my daughter and I having seemingly earned the corner booth I always steer her toward. I grab the high chair myself, never need a menu, she orders her own “Mickey Mouse pancakes, please” in an impossibly tiny voice. In many ways, actually, it feels small town-worn, lived-in, like a John Prine song. A surreal slowdown, a place with a cook with a “short order face.” A spot of warm plates and unjudging respite. “If I came home, would you let me in? Fry me some pork chops and forgive my sin?” Our daddy-daughter day this early March Monday was flowing in a far more friendly manner though: another successful trip to the Domes behind us, we had full-stomach cold afternoon warm bed naps ahead. I wanted to tell her some news I was suppressing too, having just briefly talked to my wife on the phone about her recent brief phone call with the doctor. The info was just beginning to gel and bacon-grease coagulate down around my ham and cheese omelet and double-buttered rye. “You’re going to have a sister,” I almost said. Instead I let her eat more bacon, I let the waitress squeeze her arm affectionately as she poured me yet more benign coffee that I would sip and sip until it was time to leave. I didn’t say anything. It wasn’t time yet. But maybe I missed the time. How could I have known, that now, weeks later, Copper Kitchen and restaurants like it, all restaurants, are in real danger of never fully opening again? How was I to know that soon there would be no business anywhere for good news?

[izzy-b-hands]

Rock/Queentober 2020, Oct. 29th: Disappear

Assigned lad for this day: John

Synopsis: Baby Robert is teething! That means a lot of crying, but isn’t it John’s good luck that he’s got three friends/babysitters/uncles to Robert that can help him while he finds a teething ring. 

He will find it. No really, it’s right here. It’s fine, it’s here just give him a minute, he’s not panicking, IT’S FINE. 

Narrator: It was not fine, but you have to read the fic to hear more about that.

My love to all who read/like/reblog!

“Aw,” John grinned. “Do you love your uncles? Look at how much they love you.” 

“We’re doing this so he doesn’t cry anymore,” Brian said quickly, out of breath as he ducked down to the ground. 

They were in a cycle, behind an armchair near the hallway leading out from the Deacon living room to the rest of the house, playing what seemed to be a never-ending game of peek-a-boo with Robert. 

It had started out of necessity; Robert was teething and seemingly unable to be soothed. He was, however, able to be distracted, though peek-a-boo had not been a planned distraction, merely one stumbled upon after a shared look of pain at Robert’s continued heart-breaking cries. 

“You’re meant to be finding the teething ring,” Roger muttered as he popped out from behind the chair. “Yes! Yes, Daddy is, but he isn’t finding it, is he? What on earth is his problem?!” 

Robert giggled and clapped his fat little hands together. 

“The baby agrees, so get on it!” Roger hissed as he ducked away so Freddie could pop up next. 

“I will, but this is cute,” John protested. “Only wanted to take the moment in.” 

“I bet you can multi-task!” Freddie said cheerfully as he waved to a smiling Robert. “Search and use your memory! Please try! My knees are starting to hurt!” 

“Fine, fine,” John muttered, and made his way over to the freezer. “Oh.” 

“Oh?” Brian asked as he popped up from behind the chair, curls bouncing with him. “What’s ‘oh’ mean?” 

“Um. It doesn’t mean that the teething ring isn’t in here,” John said as he racked his brain to think of where else Ronnie might have left it, bemoaning that they had only bought one. 

“Really, because from your tone,” Freddie said, crawling behind the chair, nearly bumping his head against Roger’s ass. “I would think that’s exactly what that means.” 

“Deaky,” Roger said warningly, even as he smiled and waved to Robert. “Find it!” 

“I’m trying, I am,” John said. “Give me a moment to look elsewhere, it’ll be just a second!” 

Five minutes later the house was torn apart, and the teething ring nowhere to be found. 

“Any luck?” Brian called from the living room. 

He couldn’t answer. They’d been at this for well over twenty minutes now. As soon as they stopped, Robert would cry again. He couldn’t have that, but he also couldn’t expect his friends to keep playing peek-a-boo indefinitely. 

He walked back to the living room forlornly, feeling three pairs of eyes on him. 

“Oh Deaky,” Freddie sighed. “Can you go get one?” 

“I will buy several,” John muttered. “I’ll buy out the damned store.” 

“Go now,” Freddie said. “We’ve got this. You’re Frodo, your child is Mount Doom, and the teething ring is...well, the Ring.” 

“Does that make you Samwise?” John pondered. 

“It makes me a man who cannot feel his knees or calves due to rug burn,” Freddie replied, again crawling on the floor behind the chair. “Please be quick about it.” 

Roger and Brian wouldn’t even look at him as they kept the game going, and he felt the pressure of his mission as he snagged his wallet and jacket and ran outside. 

How did a teething ring just disappear anyway? He couldn’t think of how, as he rifled in his pocket for his-

Keys. He had forgotten his keys. 

But, in the pocket was, of course, the fucking teething ring. 

“Let me back in,” he laughed as he walked back to the front door. “I found it!” 

“You’ve been gone five fucking minutes; that isn’t funny!” Roger shouted through the door. “Go to the store!” 

“I don’t need to!” 

“You do!” Brian shouted. 

“I don’t, I found it. It was in my jacket pocket, though god only knows why...” he said through the door. “So let me in!” 

“This isn’t a funny joke, darling,” Freddie called. “Please hurry!” 

“I don’t even have my keys!” John sighed, exasperated. “I left them in there!” 

“Why did you do that?!” Brian shouted. 

“I didn’t do it on purpose!” John replied. “Can you let me into my fucking house now, please?” 

“This is not the time for a prank!” Roger screeched. “This is your child, John!” 

“I know!” John knocked hard on the door, yanking at the doorknob. “And I have what he needs, if you’d let me the fuck back in!” 

He turned suddenly, to see the neighbors wide-eyed, staring. 

“Can I fucking help you, or would you like to take a picture?!” he scoffed, and they scuttled away into their house. 

“What is all this?” Ronnie’s voice was a light in the darkness, as she strode up behind him, a bag of shopping on one arm and her house key in her hand. “Are you locked out?” 

“I can explain,” he sighed as she opened the door and he traipsed in after her. 

“Oh, look at this!” Ronnie was delighted. “Are your uncles keeping you entertained? They were so busy with you they couldn’t let your daddy in!” 

She scooped up Robert, pulled a teething toy attached to a plush from the bag of shopping, and giggled as Robert shoved it into his mouth. “There’s a happy lad!” 

They stopped their cycle and stared, along with John, as she smiled and walked off down the hall, as if the whole scene was completely normal. 

Not a single cry was heard from Robert as she went. 

“Did you actually have it?” Freddie asked softly.

John held up the teething ring. “Yeah.” 

“Ah,” Roger sighed, and looked to the end table near the front door. “There’s your keys.” 

“Yeah,” John nodded. 

“...Should we just go have a pint now?” Brian asked. “I don’t...I don’t know how to recover from this.” 

“I don’t think we do,” John said. “But a pint sounds lovely.” 

[mymetaphorwasdrawnfrombees]

It really kills me that all of the people looking down their noses are basically saying "oh but sweaty you can save, you're just not trying hard enough. If you give up all these "non-essentials" that make life bearable and easier then you're gonna survive just fine, even though I've never had to go without these things and don't know what your life is like at all. Of course you should just stop giving gifts. It's so easy!!1!1!111 I did it once in my life so these poor people should be able to sustain it indefinitely!!!"

But these non essentials? They're pretty fucking essential in many cases. When you can't afford a cable bill? Netflix is infinitely cheaper. You can get all the escapist fantasy and freedom from life that drags you down and stresses you out. Art is important for humans to survive. Maybe not our physical bodies, but our minds, our souls. What makes us human. And that can be cheaply obtained by paying a Netflix fee. Or sharing one with family.

When you work multiple part time low wage jobs, it's hard to scrape up the energy to drag yourself to the laundromat and wash your clothes. Let alone to wash them by hand in your house. What the fuck. And not everyone has the time to wash their work uniform and wait for it to air dry before their next twelve hour shift starts the next day, or their kids' uniform clothes for school.

Smart phones are often essential for things like job applications because many people living paycheck to paycheck don't have personal computers, but don't have access to public transportation to get to and from libraries and/or places with free WiFi. Especially for low wage part time jobs with the endless hours of mind numbing surveys and personality tests and bullshit associated with applying? Smart phones are not usually optional.

When you're barely scraping by, and working your fingers to the bone, it is often easier and less strain to eat fast food. And infinitely more so if you live in a food desert and have no access to transportation to and from the closest grocery store (which could be miles away). This doesn't even account for working multiple jobs and not having time to cook, and/or any kind of disability or chronic illness or other barriers that prevent expending lots of time and energy meal planning and shopping and prepping...

When you live in poverty and christmas comes around, you may scrape and scrounge to buy them a gift because life can be so disappointing but you love them more than anything and want to give them some piece of joy. To say nothing of the shame and stigma they will feel of they are seeing their friends get presents and they get none. A parent who is willing to sacrifice even more to give a small piece of joy to their kids or loved ones? Who can begrudge them that???

Video games?? Seriously? See my point about escapism and storytelling re:Netflix. If a $20 videogame is someone's escape from their terrible life I am not one to judge them for that. And I think it's safe to say that the majority of ppl living paycheck to paycheck are single moms supporting their kids. Not exactly a huge gaming demographic.

"The point of savings is biblical" well 1) not everyone ascribes to your religion so even if this was true (which it's not) you have no right to force other people to live the way you think they should. 2) But seriously, Jesus told his followers to sell all they had and give it to the poor. He abhorred money. You wanna come at me with savings is biblical??? No bitch, it's literally the opposite! Give your fucking savings and all the food you've stockpiled in your freezer to the people you're so intent on shitting on in your post-that's literally what Jesus would do, if he had the money to begin with (which he wouldn't so you've already failed, but whatever)

All the self righteous asshats are coming from places of extreme privilege. And to presume to know and judge someone's situation based on a serious misrepresentation? That's fucked up.

And nobody on this thread has even really touched on all the systemic, institutional, legal barriers to getting out of poverty. Things like predatory lenders and payday loans and cash checking businesses and businesses targeting people with low credit/no credit for loans w/high interest rates that they can't actually afford and for profit trade schools and colleges and "tax refund advances" that are actually just fancy loans. Things like the American healthcare system where god forbid you get into an accident or have some major illness because you're fucked with a lifetime of medical debt if you do! Especially if you can't afford insurance! Things like the fact that the minimum wage is not a livable wage by any stretch of the imagination! All of these things are targeted to or disproportionately affect low income demographics who are already marginalised. None of this even touches on things like mental illness or addiction as self medication. These things are huge and overwhelming and can't just be handwaved away.

Things like saddling kids who are barely legally able to sign contracts with a lifetime of student debt to get a degree they need for a job that they can't get. Things like not having a curriculum to teach teens and young adults how to avoid these financial traps and pitfalls. There are so many fucked up things about this system, and to pretend that it's all up to the individual themselves to avoid all these things means we have failed as a society.

People living in poverty are the most resourceful and intelligent people when it comes to making a shoestring budget work. They are smart and they know their situations best and the system is fucked. It targets them and they deserve better than to be looked down on and what upon by holier-than-thou onlookers who have no idea what their life is like.

If you've reached this point and still don't agree, try playing this game to see how long you might survive if you were living in poverty: http://playspent.org/ (follow the link and click "continue to spent")

[hudson4him]

3/28/2020

Well it has officially been 2 weeks since I went inside a store.  The last place I went was Target two weeks ago after I got off of work.  Since then, I have only shopped via the internet, drive throughs, and via Walmart pick up.  And by shopping I mean for food mostly.  Yesterday I did order a new mop and lightbulbs from Amazon.  2 day shipping with Prime is now non existent.  It will take now 3 weeks to get my lightbulbs.  So many things I took for granted before this pandemic.  On a positive note, we definitely aren’t spending money like we used to.  There has been a lot of talk about stimulus checks coming in the mail over the next couple months.  I am sure a lot of people need them sooner but I am thankful that we do not. Financially we are in a very good place right now.  Praise the Lord for continuing to provide for us in all situations.  That is what I have thanked the Lord the most for in the past week.  I am thankful that we have a home, vehicles that are reliable, Marty has a job that is essential so he has work, that we have a refrigerator and deep freezer to hold food, that we have money to buy just what we need, that we are healthy, that my mom lives close enough that I can help her, when she allows me to.  My list could go on and on.  When I turn my discouragement into thankfulness it is so much easier to get my mind focused on the right things.  There are so many things that we did just before all this happened that have helped us tremendously. God has been right beside us before the pandemic, during this pandemic, and He will be there on the other side of it as well. I have always been one to replace items around the house as soon as we started getting low.  That came in handy in the toilet paper and Clorox wipes category.  However, I have been reminded more than once in the past 2 weeks of what it says in Matthew 6:25-34.

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?[a] 28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

Reading that reminds me to not get so caught up with worrying about material things and what tomorrow will bring.  

Since I last posted, Taylor’s college informed their students they could no longer return to move out until further notice.  Had we not moved her out Monday, she would have not been able to get her belongings until later.  Just another way God gave us insight as to handle a situation in the midst of confusion and uncertainty. The State of Maryland closed all non essential Childcare Providers. Disney World/Land is closed now indefinitely.  Our hospital has had one death due to COVID19. Stores are able to fill their shelves more frequently now.  I’m not seeing that yet in the availability of items on the Walmart app yet but hopefully by Tuesday when I order again.  I’m trying to only order once a week now.  On that day that I go out I am also dropping off a meal to my mom.  She is used to living alone but not used to not being able to go out in public when she wants so I know this is a challenge for her as well.  I am thankful that she is staying home though.  Yesterday she actually ordered from Instacart. I’m thankful that my mom does really well at educating herself on current technology.  She is very self sufficient at a young age of 75.  I still don’t think that a lot of our community realizes how important it is to stay home and flatten the curve.  I almost wish our governor would mandate staying home so that the infection rate will go down.  Currently all Maryland State Park Beaches are closed.  Restaurants continue to offer carryout and delivery.  My daughter’s boyfriend works at CVS and thankfully they offer self checkout.  He actually was able to purchase the almond milk we have been out of for a week now from his work.   

After today, Marty will be off for the next 3 days.  He misses his class at church where he teaches preschoolers every week.  He posted a video for his class of him singing along with one of their songs.  It was such a hit that the church has asked him to do Monday Music with Mr. Marty. Love it!  Our church has done an amazing job in trying to reach everyone through various platforms.  I do believe that Jesus will use every attempt we make to share His Word and love as a means of revival for this lost world. 

Blessings. 

[andyangus]

Monday 25th January

I made the mistake of being enticed out with Mum again and fell for a fraudulent ‘spontaneous’ visit to Mr Borkowski’s corner shop. She wasn’t desperate for a half-pound of cola cubes after all: there was a hidden agenda. I was, in fact, being pimped out by my mother as a possible successor to Caroline, Mr Borkowski’s former sales assistant who has now left to study Graphic Design.

‘Oh, really?’ said the flame-haired illusionist, rather over-dramatically, ‘I’d no idea you’re looking for a replacement so soon.’ She nodded to me suggestively with such eyebrow acting it wouldn’t have gone amiss in one of those dreadful Mexican telenovelas. She completely forgets that she’d mentioned it to Dad over mince and tatties last week while I was scraping the back of the freezer in an attempt to free a strawberry Cornetto from the clutches of the glacier within.

I played along with her am-dram and listened to the job description: part-time; early starts; £5.93 an hour; 5.6 weeks annual leave (pro-rata); under no obligation to cover shifts but it would be helpful. The bare minimum wage really, apart from a free bag of boiled sweets once a week and all the magazines you can read.

Mum chirped up, ‘Andy, isn’t this the perfect solution for you? And you’d be just next door to me so we could have coffee and lunch breaks together. And I could pop in and see you any time I wanted. We could even walk to work together.’ She was grinning so much it scared me. Then her face dropped, ‘You need a job, Andy, desperately. Your father and I can’t afford to keep you indefinitely.’ She tapped her foot again, her patience at breaking point, I had to make a decision there and then. And then the blow to the gut, ‘You’re turning into one of those sad adult men who live with their parents and never work, Sonny Jim.’

I start a week on Wednesday, references permitting. I’ve no other option, and my savings are not going to last forever. I’m now living in a cul-de-sac and have been backed into one metaphorically by my own flesh and blood. I’ve gone from a successful supermarket chain to a struggling corner shop. This isn’t the change I’d hoped for. Why won’t people leave me alone? I should be the protagonist of my own life, God damn it!

[ecotone99]

[SP] A Long Night’s Sleep?

Here's a story that I wrote during an insomniac spell. I would love some feedback/thoughts on it.

A Long Night’s Sleep?

It’s a strange sensation, dying. You get used to it, though, after the initial shock wears off. I don’t know why it happened, or when it happened. But I guess the event itself didn’t matter. The result was the same either way.

The last thing I remembered was a peaceful dream. I saw jumbled snapshots in that loosely connected and blurry fashion dreams present themselves. But, suddenly, the projector shut down and I was left alone in the dark. My eyes were hurting. Flashes of white light crawled their way through the tiny slit between my eyelids. I couldn’t move. I heard a vaguely familiar and distant voice. The voice was sobbing. Between the brief hiccoughs in which the voice uttered some words, there was a deeper, comforting voice talking. I tried to open my eyes, but the lids wouldn’t listen. I tried to move my head to the side, forcing myself to voice soothing words. “I’m okay”, I wanted to say. But my mouth wouldn’t respond. It hurt. My blood felt like boiling water. Squinting, I distinguished a vague white shape. A silhouette impossible to mark out. Like a painting splashed with water. The silhouette murmured, and the voices next to me started sobbing even louder. I heard the clunky movement of chairs, followed by footsteps, ebbing away as the sounds left the room. I didn’t know how long I lay there. Hours, possibly days.

Was this truly my body? Or am I trapped, immobilised, into someone else’s? I tried to focus. To force open my eyes. To see. I could make out my arms, recognising those scars. All those crazy adventures I went on. The scars made me sad: it was truly me, this dead person. I had so much left to do. So much new scars to get. What a ridiculous thing. I used to fret about how they made me look ugly. How ridiculous it all seemed now. It was my own museum dedicated to childhood stupidity.

My sight went black again. The voices were gone. Without the beating of my heart, a sound that has been with me all my life, only silence was left. I felt colder and colder. The heat leaving my body. Indefinitely. My muscles tensing themselves. Soon, it would be over.

Then the voices came again. New ones, different and unfamiliar. They were joking. Laughing even. I couldn’t grasp what was so funny. It was ridiculous. Why was I still thinking? As my head stopped seeing, I wanted my parts to start feeling.

A cold metallic tool sliced through my left leg. I wanted to scream louder than I ever did in my life. I couldn’t. My fluids were leaving me. My body deflating like a balloon. It felt like thousands of needles working on my skin. I wanted to get up and leave. How could this be? Can’t I go towards the people that went before me? Or walk towards white lights? Or doing whatever it is dead people do? Why was I still here? I didn’t want to be. I wanted to go somewhere peaceful. Why did I ever sign that slip? I wouldn’t do it a second time.

After they were done with my legs, the noises and metallic sounds stopped. I thought, for one glorious moment, that I was being left alone. Maybe I would finally start seeing the white lights? I could go to a place far away from here.

That brief flicker of hope vanished as I felt the cold metal finding its way through my right arm. It felt gentler this time, as if they started pitying me.

Then, the strangest thing happened. As I lay there, liberated from the burden of having arms and legs, like a caterpillar, or a turtle with his limbs withdrawn, I tried to wiggle my left toes. I didn’t expect it to work. Judging by the deafening scream piercing my eardrums, neither did the person holding my leg. I couldn’t tell what happened next. Voices were coming from everywhere, footsteps were entering and leaving the room. As the noises stopped and order restored itself, I tried to tell my toes to wiggle again. They didn’t listen. While my torso was still immobile, blooded sheets touching my skin, my arms and legs were again on the move. It was hard, trying to keep up with all my different parts.

The stiffness was hurting. I wanted to try to move again, but as I again tried to wiggle, I heard the wheels under my bed creak as they, with a brief jolt, started moving. The many lights of the hospital corridor flashed before my eyes. The bed shaking on the uneven floor.

My left arm started to feel cold. Like someone dipped it in ice-cold water. I guess they had no immediate use for that one and put it in a freezer. I hope they keep it cool. Otherwise, the blowflies and maggots would move in. Using my decomposing organs as a breeding ground for their children.

As I was coming to terms with the biting coldness, I felt someone sliding a bag over my torso. Surely, this would have been the end of my ordeal? In my bag, far away from the rest of the world, the first flames started to feel themselves around my body. Little by little, they chipped away at the remaining body I had left.

When my body started changing into ashes, I kept thinking about those arms and legs that served me so well in my lifetime. Where were they know? I couldn’t feel them. Then, as suddenly as a snap of a finger, my torso ceased to be. I was disconnected.

It was strange, existing in a void. I could stay there forever. But, to my own surprise, the void vanished. I felt my legs and arms starting to inflate again. Warm blood gushing through them. They started moving, but it wasn’t me moving them. As my leg was strolling happily through the corridors, my tendons reverberating every time they made contact with the concrete floor, I tried to imagine what the new owner would look like. My arms were embracing skin I never touched. I felt the outside wind, a thick and cold autumn air, gushing against them. It was liberating. How fast it all went. I only just stopped making use of my parts, now they are of use to someone else. I felt the skin on my face lighting up. Fingers were stroking it. I felt a smile, rippling its way across the skin. It wasn’t me smiling.

As the weeks went by, my pains began to lessen. It was like learning to walk all over again. Remembering what it was like to, for the first time in your life, touch something. With every new walk, every new embrace, I felt more at home.

Oh, how I wish I could talk to other people’s parts. The stories we would tell each other! Stories of long walks, of long embraces. How the sand slides between our fingers. How skin feels against other skin. That sudden jolt of happiness when you realise what the cold metal sliding over your finger means.

I died, but was reborn in different lives. There are worse things than this.

submitted by /u/VDCSoc [link] [comments] via Blogger https://ift.tt/2L1tgVL

[longislandweekly-blog]

Once again it’s time for Munch Madness—that competitive time of year when snacks from the frozen food aisle are hand-picked for a tournament-style smackdown. It’s time-honored favorites pitted against cocky newcomers; scrappy underdogs squaring off with unmatched dynasties; and awkward perennial losers who you feel really bad for because it’s clear they don’t belong versus literally any other challenger.

A field of 16 was chosen by a seasoned professional in the snack food game—namely, me. Your food writer, Steve Mosco. As a frozen food enthusiast who was raised in the frigid end of the local supermarket, I have an intimate knowledge of every product to grace those sub-zero shelves. A firm believer that frozen vegetables take up far too much real estate in the freezer and that anyone who spends their money on frozen breakfast foods ought to be barred from the aisle indefinitely, I take this cuisine more seriously than any so-called five-star meal.

With my credentials laid out before you, I present to you the Munch Madness Tournament. Keep in mind that this list was whittled down from a much larger field that I do not have the space to list here, and the first-round matchups were chosen completely at random.

Round 1

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Super Pretzels vs. Bagel Bites

The first matchup seems like a no-brainer, and it is. Super Pretzels, though soft and warm, do not stand a chance against Bagel Bites. For starers the salt is far too sparse on these pretzels. Secondly, Super Pretzels are only really good with some spicy mustard or cheese sauce on the side. And since neither mustard nor cheese is included, Super Pretzels have no shot. Bagel Bites on the other hand, which is essentially pizza on a bagel, can be eaten anytime.

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Hot Pockets (all products) vs. Jamaican Beef Patties

Hot Pockets have come a long way. From humble beginnings of ham and cheese to an ever-growing array of fancier products, Hot Pockets have grown confident in its own abilities—but perhaps too confident? Hot Pockets suffer from serious mission drift, with the core values of a simple, lava-hot interior wrapped in a crust that is somehow both crunchy and rubbery, completely lost. Meanwhile, Jamaican Beef Patties have remained true to the core values it was founded upon. It’s spicy beef in a crust. Enough said. Ladies and gentleman, we have our first upset—Jamaican Beef Patties are moving to the second round.

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Smucker’s Uncrustables vs. State Fair Corn Dogs

How someone thought peanut butter and jelly needed to simplified, I’ll never quite understand, but Uncrustables have a loyal following of rabid supporters—possibly people without the pantry space for a jar of peanut butter. State Fair Corn Dogs come in as a hot dog covered in corn batter served on a stick. Side note: I scorched my mouth on a frozen corn dog that I failed to let cool long enough, and I still have the scar. Be that as it may, Uncrustables has no shot. It doesn’t even have crust. Corn Dogs, moving on.

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Morning Star Farms Chik’n Nuggets vs. Totino’s Pizza Rolls

Chik’n Nuggets? Uh, no. In what will be the most lopsided victory of the entire tournament, it’s Totino’s Pizza Rolls by a mile-wide margin.

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Gorton’s Fish Sticks vs. El Monterey Chicken Taquitos

First of all, who else grew up thinking it was Gordon’s and not Gorton’s? Am I living in a parallel universe? Be that as it may, Fish Sticks are a classic treat that stands as the lone ocean entry, winning points for originality and crispiness. El Monterey Chicken Taquitos are essentially rolled up tacos without wilted garbage lettuce or flavorless tomatoes. That said, it works. The cheesy, smoky chicken devastates with flavor, while the bad reputation of fish sticks alone is enough to sink Gorton’s.

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Frozen Pizza (various brands) vs. El Monterey Beef and Cheese Burritos

Under the frozen pizza tent is included Red Baron, Mama Celeste, Newman’s Own, Ellio’s, Tombstone and numerous others. Here’s the problem with frozen pizza—this is Long Island. Chances are there’s a fine pizzeria sharing the same shopping center as the supermarket. Just get a pizza there. El Monterey Burritos wins.

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Tyson Any’tizers Hot ‘N Spicy Chicken Wings vs. Hebrew National Beef Franks in a Puff Pastry Blanket (pigs in a blanket)

To me, Pigs in a Blanket takes this easily, and here’s why—there has never been and there will never be a frozen chicken wing that can compete with a tiny hot dog rolled in buttery pastry dough. Frozen wings are flavorless bastardizations of actual chicken wings. They are fine in a pinch, but crumble against all challengers.

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White Castle Cheeseburgers vs. Stouffer’s Macaroni & Cheese

Here’s why Frozen White Castle Cheeseburgers are so great—they taste exactly like the burgers from an actual White Castle. It’s as if the quality of the burgers from actual White Castle is somehow less than ideal. Stouffer’s Mac & Cheese is warm, comforting and a meal in itself. All it really needs is a little touch of meat protein to put it over the top. And anytime a competitor needs something that wasn’t included in order to win, it’s an automatic loss. White Castle takes it.

Round 2

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Bagel Bites vs. Jamaican Beef Patties

The first match in the second round sees Bagel Bites riding high—the combination of pizza ingredients on a mini-bagel are a bite-sized slam dunk when the munchies take hold. And yet, somehow the allure of island life draws me back to thoughts of Jamaican Beef Patties. The spicy beef hidden within that impossibly golden crust is actually well-seasoned with eye-opening jerk flavors. Meanwhile, by comparison, Bagel Bites are far more shallow in overall taste. Yes, this is happening. I’m going to the jerk store. Jamaican Beef Patties are on to the next round.

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State Fair Corn Dogs vs. Totino’s Pizza Rolls

Who doesn’t love food on a stick? With frozen corn dogs, the heavy hot dog essence isn’t relegated to the tubed meat, as that singular flavor also seeps well into the corn bread casing. And folks, that is not a bad thing. The only downside to a corn dog is that the stick itself is not edible. Meanwhile, Pizza Rolls are also a singular food item. The thing is, they are called Pizza Rolls, but they don’t necessarily taste like pizza. And somehow, that makes Pizza Rolls better. The flavor within the crust is something that exists precisely nowhere else in the culinary world. It’s as unique as the Pizza Roll itself, and it is carrying Totino’s to the next round.

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El Monterey Chicken Taquitos vs. El Monterey Beef Burritos

It’s the battle of El Monterey! This showdown is exactly what makes Munch Madness so special. A completely random drawing leads to these two Munch Mavens of Mexico in a heated face-off. Taquitos with the ulta-crispy exterior and stringy chicken on the inside are up against the big beefiness of the burritos. And that’s what ends up deciding this—the big beefiness of these burritos isn’t quite big enough. Taquitos takes this match- up of crosstown rivals.

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Pigs in a Blanket vs. White Castle Cheeseburgers

Teeny-tiny hot dogs in their warm flaky crust—it’s buttery, salty, doughy and downright fun to eat. Then there’s frozen White Castle, which as we established before is just as good as the burgers from an actual White Castle. But in round two, that is not a good thing. White Castle is just too soggy, too limp and too weak to make this a close one. It’s Pigs in a Blanket moving on.

Round 3

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Jamaican Beef Patties vs. Totino’s Pizza Rolls

In any other situation, these two champions of munchie time would be great friends. They share similar strengths—enticing exteriors and a surprisingly well-established inner flavor. They also share similar shortcomings—you have to let them cool before eating or suffer the consequences of third-degree burns in your mouth. The one quality that Pizza Rolls has over Beef Patties is their strength in numbers. You can sit down with 20 Pizza Rolls and never tire of popping them into your waiting maw. Unfortunately for Beef Patties, this is the deciding factor. Pizza Rolls move on to the finals!

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El Monterey Taquitos vs. Pigs in a Blanket

Much like the previous contest, these two combatants share similar constructs: an outer vessel with hot meatiness on the inside. What it comes down to is consistency. Are you a fan of a tortilla crunch or a pastry doughiness? My mouth makes the call—Pigs in a Blanket wins by the slimmest of margins!

Finals

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Totino’s Pizza Rolls vs. Pigs in a Blanket

First, a standing ovation for our two deserving finalists. If it were up to me, we would call this a draw and go home to eat fistfuls of both. But the Munchie gods must be satisfied. Both snacks are well-suited for snack time, whether that happens at 3 p.m. or 3 a.m. Both offer texture, as well as taste. But only one stands as the complete package of crunch, heat, saltiness, and…cheesiness.

That’s right, after a long journey to the top of the mountain, Totino’s Pizza Rolls is the winner of Munch Madness 2019. See ya next year!

In perhaps the greatest conversation he's ever had with himself, Long Island Weekly's Steve Mosco presents Munch Madness, a tournament-style showdown between all of the frozen foods of your childhood. Which one will come out on top? You must read to find out. Once again it’s time for Munch Madness—that competitive time of year when snacks from the frozen food aisle are hand-picked for a tournament-style smackdown.

[meditationsinausterity]

A Little Goes A Long Way: donated green tomatoes and a cheeky bit of chicken.

So initially I'd envisaged these zero-waste food posts as neat little triptychs of three meals that succinctly used up primarily one product, as that's how it's worked before. But leftovers and cooking with them is never that neat and tidy, especially if you're only really using enough for one person every time, as things get carried over to different days of the week to avoid repetition, and you tend to be working with different combinations of the same ingredients a lot of the time, as most things aren't readily available in the small portions necessary for those of us extending our early twenties living situations indefinitely (and we are legion, just as a heads up).

This juggling the same combinations of ingredients is increasingly the case of what is now becoming a typical cooking week for me, in which I bring home surplus produce from the trash cafe, often in larger amounts than i would need for one meal, and have to think of creative ways to use it. I'm not sure I actually purchased a single ingredient for this particular set of meals, because I didn't need to, most of it coming from my volunteering stints. As I'm employed now, I'm sure purchases will start to pop up here and there in the form of storecupboard ingredients and so on, but actually, I'm rather enjoying the challenge of my ingredients choosing me rather than vice versa, and it feels pretty good to be feeding myself on food that would otherwise have been going to waste (probably landfill as well, which it doesn't bear thinking about).

Meal 1: Cumin-fried Green tomatoes and cream cheese on toast.

Purchased for this meal:

Nothing

Items I already had:

Green tomatoes: Donated to me by my lovely friend Lou, after a fry up and a catch up about work, art, the universe and everything. She'd bought the plants from her son's school and had a glut, so it was really sweet of her to share them with me.

Cream cheese: Surplus from cooking pasta at the trash cafe

Bread: last few bits from a loaf kicking about in the freezer

Gram Flour: the bedfellow is having a major Push Toward Adulthood as well at the moment, and it's manifesting itself in him clearing out the kitchen cupboards at his. He had loads of bag ends of flour that he wanted rid of and I shotgunned them rather than letting them get chucked out.

Cumin, ghost pepper garlic salt.

Pretty straightforward this one. I actually really love fried green tomatoes, I can still remember the first time I ate them, in bed with the American head waiter from the bar across the road from mine, still pretty buzzed from the night before, idly talking about theatre and drinking coffee. I usually dust mine in cornmeal, but I didn't have any, so I went down more of a pakora route with cumin and gram flour, and just shallow fried them in batches until crispy, before turning them out onto kitchen roll and absolutely dusting them with chilli salt. Then you just pile them onto toast spread with cream cheese and dig in.

I can't really recommend this enough; it's basically like a socially acceptable version of jalapeno poppers, which are the deep fried, ruthlessly chavvy, junk food of the gods. I would eat an order of them right now, or any time in fact, stone cold sober, i don't even care. It was a most excellent breakfast, to the point where I was actually tempted by a repeat the next day.

Leftovers from this meal:

None

Meal two: Salami and Mushroom scrambled eggs on toast with green tomato 'salsa'

Purchased for this meal:

Nothing

Items I already had:

Green tomatoes: half a bag left from Lou's donation

Rye bread: from the trash cafe

Salami with black truffle: We had diced this in the kitchen in preparation for a spicy tomato pasta, but then we got delivered a load of defrosted chicken from a famously 'cheeky' peri peri franchise, so a change of plan resulted in me bringing what we'd already diced home.

Eggs: we got delivered loads of eggs mid-service at the trash cafe so had no time to put them out that day because we have to check the dates and for breakages. I made scrambled eggs on toast for another volunteer's little boy, because he was poorly, so I put the rest of the box with the things I was gonna take home.

Mushrooms: had half a pack left after making lemongrass and coconut chicken at the trash cafe, so true to my 'open it, use the whole thing' policy they came home with me

Parsley: half a bag left from use in the kitchen at the trash cafe. Onion (left over from my last food shop which was aeons ago now) Lime juice (bottled, blech, but needed using),

Ghost pepper garlic salt.

I am not going to insult you by telling you how to fry things off and scramble them with eggs. And if I ever have to explain to somebody how to toast bread then I've gone wrong somewhere in life, or had children; neither of which are scenarios I'm holding out for.

I will have a word about my salsa though; obviously my default salsa recipe is diced onion, chopped tomato, lime, salt, and coriander. I had fresh parsley, and honestly, while it may not be 'authentic', and may be a slightly different flavour profile, I'm a 'love the one you're with' girl in the kitchen. I don't need my food to be by the book, I need it to be tasty. And this so-called-salsa managed that just fine. It was spicy as fuck as well, which is how I like pretty much everything. This was a definite breakfast of champions, and made me glad I didn't just lazily repeat the previous day's efforts, tempting though it was.

Leftovers from this meal:

Half a jar of salsa: fridged and kept to use on something else (with the hope of it becoming more spicy as the flavours melded).

Meal three: Chicken noodle soup

Items purchased for this meal:

None

Items already had for this meal:

1/2 precooked chicken, bone in: A leftover from cooking at the trash cafe, I shredded and stir fried 2 half-chickens, and ended up bringing home one half-chicken on the bone and some leftover shredded meat, because it had already been frozen and defrosted, therefore and needed using up. onions, carrots, garlic

Parsley: leftover from use in the kitchen at the trash cafe

Tub of mixed, chopped, stir fry vegetables: From the kitchen of the trash cafe, We had several packs of these that needed to be used on that Wednesday or they would have to be chucked. I think I got through about eight packs and took two home with me,but there were still, sadly, loads left. If I had more freezer space I'd have bought more home, but there's no sense in me taking what I can't use.

Birdseye chillies: leftover from a packet opened in the kitchen at trash cafe.

Noodles: I always have noodles. Still on those Aldi straight to wok badboys.

Soy: requisitioned from my mother's cupboard on my last visit cos she had two bottles.

So my shift at the trash cafe on this week involved the surprise curveball of several alarmingly big-titted (I speak from envy) half-chickens, pre-cooked, and frozen, from a well known peri peri chain. I merrily defrosted and shredded them and served them stir fried in a chilli coconut lemongrass sauce with insane amounts of stir fry veg. Sadly, during service, I didn't get through as much of the chicken as I would have liked, so I ended up bringing home half a bird on the bone, and probably about half a bird's worth of shredded meat. If I'd have been really thinking, I'd have saved the bones from the birds I shredded during service, because I knew I was going to make stock with what I bought home; in true zero waste style. But I wasn't thinking, in true Kirsty Mitchell style. 

So first thing in the morning I diced onion and carrot, smashed a few garlic cloves, and lopped the stalks off the parsley, gently frying it without colouring on a low heat. I stripped the white meat off the half chicken, not too intensely, as I wanted the dark meat to help flavour the stock. I lobbed in the bones and topped the pan up with water, then once bought to the boil I left it to simmer away for the whole morning, skimming off any scum and occasionally topping up with water so that the bones were covered, before straining.

The actual assembly of the soup took literally minutes. I fried off a sliced chilli with as much stir fry veg as I could fit in a pan with a block of noodles, before topping up with the stock, chucking in a handful of shredded chicken meat, and letting boil until the noodles were just done. chucked it in a bowl, topped it with a splish of soy and loosely chopped parsley and that was literally it.

Is it beginning to be obvious how into noodle soup i actually am? I honestly eat enough of it in different guises to really notice how much BETTER it is with homemade stock. I was so impressed with the quality of the stock i managed to get out of these pre-cooked chain restaurant chickens. As I mentioned, they were incredibly top heavy birds, and often you find birds bred for their meat aren't much in the bone department, but actually this was one of the better chicken stocks I've made in a long time. I know that a lot of what I cook isn't very complicated, at least I don't think I'm using any skills that could be considered above and beyond the average home cook, but it's the taking the time to make every last ingredient count, as in the case of making stock, that I find really makes the difference between an alright meal and a deeply satisfying one. This was a perfect example of that.

Leftovers from this meal:

2x portions of stock: I will own up to the fact I liked this so much I had it three times over the course of the week. Good job and all because I had a glut of stir fry vegetables and shredded chicken meat to use, but it definitely undermines my 'I don't like to eat the same thing all the time' protests. I guess there should be a noodle soup get out clause on that, cos I really do eat it all the fucking time, and it doesn't irritate me one little bit. I think it's because I can be quite remiss at eating carbs as I don't like the soporific effect of them, but in a soup they tend to slip into my system unnoticed.

Meal Four: Herbed chicken and Green Tomato open sandwiches

Purchased for this meal:

Nothing

Items I already had:

Rye bread (from the trash cafe)

Shredded pre-cooked chicken (from the trash cafe)

Creme fraiche (From the trash cafe)

Parsley (from the trash cafe)

Green tomato salsa (leftover from previous cook)

Black pepper (storecupboard)

So this was a really simple, not-really-cooking-whatsoever thrown together number that I whipped up after I'd got home from my interview and accepted the job offer. I was absolutely starving, and the pressure I've been under had lifted, so my body seemed to finally let me feel tired, all at once, meaning i was also absolutely aching for a nap.

I had the tomato salsa leftover from my scrambled eggs the other morning, but also a whole world of chicken, so I decided to be lazy and make sandwiches. I try, as previously mentioned, not to overcarb, so I went the open route to minimize that, toasting the rye bread as it was frozen due to being a trash cafe, due-to-expire rescue. all I really did was toss a load of the chicken in creme fraiche, black pepper, and shredded parsley, mainly to combat any dryness that might be going on because the chicken had been pre-shredded and fridged.

I just piled it on the toast, whacked the salsa on top, and ate it curled up in bed with my book before nodding off to sleep. By no means complicated, but it doesn't always have to be, does it? Delicious nonetheless, especially since the salsa had been allowed to sit and get spicier in the fridge.

Leftovers from this meal:

None.

Meal Five: Spaghetti with Salami, chilli, and Tomato

Items purchased for this meal:

Nothing

Items I already had:

Diced Salami with black truffle (i by no means used all I had at breakfast the other day)

Cherry tomatoes (A handful not used in the salads at the trash cafe kitchen)

Parsley (the last handful from my trash cafe kitchen leftovers)

Oregano (trash cafe leftovers)

Spaghetti

Birds eye chilli (from my neverending stash from the trash cafe kitchen leftovers)

Onions, garlic. Black pepper

An exercise, pretty much, in clearing the fridge before another shift at the trash cafe, combined with a need for some quick fuel for a writing burst on a day off.

 Really simple, as most of my pasta dishes tend to be. I put the spaghetti on to boil, and sliced some garlic and onion, which I softened in some oil without colouring. I threw in the salami, sliced chilli and oregano leaves, and turned up the heat to let the meat give up it's oil in the pan and crisp. at the last minute i put the cherry tomatoes, untouched as they were so small, into the pan, and lightly crushed them as they softened to let them give up their juice to the mix.

When the pasta was done, all I did was toss it through the mix with a few spoonfuls of the pan water, until thoroughly coated, before adding black pepper liberally and chucking some shredded parsley over the top.

So spicy, and satisfying, eaten while typing furiously and, therefore; shamefully, not necessarily given the attention food should deserve. Modern life is rubbish, and so on. At least in my hasty multitasking I'm eating something satisfying and homemade, I suppose. My days off these days seem to be either stuck in a whirlwind of inspiration at keyboard, or furiously swearing at tumblr's html formatting - it's odd how quickly i've gone from oceans of time to write, to having to force it into my schedule around shifts, and I need to make sure I don't slip into bad habits of procrastinating around the house. A quick, twenty minute burst of cooking like this, followed by a kitchen clean, is a good way to take a breather before going back to re-edit, without getting myself lost in a meditative kitchen session. Don't get me wrong, those are handy sometimes, but the best way to be a writer is to write, and if I'm constantly at stove, that's not happening, is it?

 Anyway this was another dish that felt more than the sum of its hastily thrown together parts; it's great when things that really need to be used up come together in a way that doesn't feel like deprivation, no?

Leftovers from this meal:

None. I was obviously on another cold-snap carb rampage.

Another week of not feeling in any way hard done by in my quest to use up every last bit of food that comes into the house. Amazingly, purchase-free, as well. I'm pretty sure the only edible I bought this week was a jar of instant coffee, because, well, remember that episode of the simpsons where Barney gives up alcohol and becomes a tweaked out caffeine addict? That's basically what's happening at Mitchell towers. And don't say shit, yeah? until caffeine ruins my emotional health the way alchohol did, I'll be using it as a crutch. Especially since nicotine is rapidly becoming less and less of a viable option. The fact that adulthood seems to mean slowly relinquishing things I love makes me revise my previous pride to have made it through the 27 club.

I think with my next one of these posts, what I might do is begin with a run-down of what I bought back with me from the trash cafe, and take it from there. Just because then I'll avoid repeating myself too much, and it will also, I feel, be more coherent in the reading. When you have a fridge literally teeming with things begging to be used up, you have to get somewhat creative in the order you use them in, so I feel like this week's meals skipped around a little bit, since I was trying to mix it up so I didn't get bored of the same thing day after day, not to mention trying to get various different food groups included in my diet. i feel like starting with a 'master list' of sorts will help everything make more sense.

Still, I'm pleased with how this is shaping up and evolving; it's giving you a far more accurate and coherent picture of how I cook and eat day to day in order to avoid wasting anything; and I'm also looking forward to seeing how patterns emerge as I get more time-poor due to full time work. I'm gonna have to get more savvy on prep and re-use of leftovers in order to feed myself at, and after work, which I feel might make my writing more relatable to more people, who don't have all day to potter. It's all welland good being unemployed and having all the time in the world to let things sit on the stove while you get on with things around the house, but with only two days off a week to fit in all that and the other things that keep an adult life ticking over like laundry, volunteering, and let's face it, in my case, getting laid, I'll be interested to see what directions my cooking develops in.

[sailingbrisa]

March and April

February seems so far away as I sit in the Shelter Bay Marina at the entrance to the Panama canal awaiting Brisas Panama cruising permit….. 

Lets pick up where we left off…. 

Leaving the BVIs for St. Martin is never a pleasant thing to have to do.. but I had to get backt here to pick up a good friend, to get ready for the trip to Panama on Brisa and to plan my adventure to New Zealand to see my family. I left nice and early from Virgin Gorda and motor sailed for 16 hours in confused seas and 10 know winds… arriving about 11pm at night into Marigot. I fished the whole way, but didn’t even get a single strike ….. dropped anchor and passed out. I love to sail alone as it is truly peaceful, but anyone that has sailing the Anguilla passage upwind from the BVIs will tell you it is not something enjoyable… even on a good day!

 I spent the next couple of days working on Brisa and on short notice jumped a plane to Bogota to visit Tania. I spent a very nice week or so in a bed that didn’t move, eating well and taking long hot showers… eating great food with her and her mom, followed by long walks around Bogota. It is such a drastic comparison from the humidity and movement of living on the boat that it is quite hard to describe. We had a fantastic few days together and I really enjoyed the time there in civilization. All too soon though it was time to get back on the plane to Panama for a day on my way back to Brisa, to sort out my apartment and to see friends and visit the office.  I still enjoy Panama. A great country full of fun people.

I got back to St. Martin on the same COPA flight as Joel…. not planned just great timing. We cleared customs and went out to do a big shop for food, as I had learned how expensive  it is to shop in Virgin Gorda ( and how miserable the selection ). We spent a couple of days in St. Martin waiting for a nice weather window to make the short 88 mile run to Virgin Gorda…. We went to Pizza Galley (http://www.pizzagalley.com/story.html) and the owner, JP, an old acquaintance from many Pizza Galley visits generously gave us three balls of gluten free pizza dough and his wifes secret barbeque pizza recipe. We threw them in Brisas new fancy little freezer with all the yummy frozen food we brought. The next day nice and early, think 3 am, we left St. Martin bound for Virgin Gorda. The sea as always wasn’t that comfortable…. But we made the most of it and within a few hours we were out of sight of St. Martin and headed to one of my favorite cruising grounds. Our plan was to hit Virgin Gorda.. check out Necker island then head down to Canre Garden for the little swell.. then back to eat lobster in Annegada and kite or surf there if we could.

Joel managed to hook a little yellow fin Tuna and shortly there after turn it into a great seared Tuna salad…. No limit on how much tuna went with the salad and a bit of a bumpy 14 hours later we rolled into a beautiful calm anchorage  in Gorda sound. Slept like babies .. had a little look around and then set sail for Cane Garden. A couple of days later we awoke to a beautiful little swell rolling along the point and….. absolutely no one else out there. I have no idea what happened… but the stars aligned and I surfed all alone for about 5 hours…. Dragged my tired ass arms back to the boat and ate a huge breakfast. Had two sessions that day and a lot of great long waves and a few standout barrels and somehow all alone. I can only guess the waves were absolutely firing somewhere else….. The next day similar conditions, so all in all an amazing two days surfing in Tortolla. Joel got himself some solid waves in Apple Bay in front of the legendary Bombas Shack… We ate well, we surfed endlessly and we had an awesome time. One thing that we saw that was pretty impressive was a big fancy new charter catamaran with professional crew… had up a spinnaker that looked like it was stuck up. They couldn’t get it down, so they thought it would be a good idea to come into cane garden and pick up a mooring and try and fix it from there…. They got pretty close to little Brisa and I started to get a bit worried. At the last minute the bore off and the lady crew picked up a mooring ball and tied it off…. As she did the boat bore off, the stuck spinnaker filled and the cat took off at full speed ripping the mooring right out of the bottom of the bay. Quite a show I tell ya.

 We had a visit form the Coombes family and they wanted to go back to St. Martin… so we made a plan to get them before we went back the following week. Joel and I headed back up to Virgin Gorda and met up with Matt and Hilary, old friends form SXM and now proud crew on a beautiful charter boat called Lady Katlo  ( https://www.ladykatlo.com ) They were heading for Anegada the next day so we signed up and made a plan to meet them there and go see the island and eat some lobster. The next morning noce and early we set off.. hoisting the spinnaker for its first real fly and having a beautiful broad reach to annegada. Lady Katlo caught us up and got some amazing drone footage for us as we crossed the 12 mile gap. We arrive behind them and followed them up to the east of the anchorage into s very beautiful private little area where we were all alone. WE dropped anchor and raced to town, rented scooters ( Hilary wasn’t allowed to get her own one due to some strange whisky throttle problem with her wrist) so she double with Matt while Joel and I tried our hardest to back flip the scooter. I still don’t really know how I didn’t crash the thing as I was really trying to get air…. The dirt roads and beautiful beaches make this kittle island a MUST see for anyone in the BVIS. Really a special little place. Than night we went to the WONKY DOG (http://www.thewonkydog.com) for lobster. Sadly there was no WONKY dog at the restaurant, but the lobster was world class.  Great time there with Hilary and Matt. They have been invited to join Brisa whenever they like wherever they like and I hope to see them soon in Costa Rica.

 Joel and I bailed out to go and check out Necker island and then we had to go get the Coombes family from Trestle Bay. OF course giving me another excuse to gorge myself on chicken Roti. MMMMMM. We grabbed the Coombes off of Puffin.. and motored up to Spanish Town to check out… about an hour away. Upon arrival James and Fran discovered that the damn kids had left the passports back at Trellis…. HAHAHHAH. Love it. So they jumped in Noisy Taco ( Brisas Dingy ) and zoomed back to Trellis to get the passports and get back before customs closed. Finally we checked out, and set off to Salt Island for the night before leaving super early for St. Martin. 

Joel was at the helm the next morning at 3am carefully taking our precious little boat and her crew out to sea and back to St. Martin. It wound up being one of the nicest return trips to BVI I have ever heard of. We fished… we stopped and swam.. we all took naps, we saw water spouts and whales… we caught a stinky barracuda and arrived happy and safe back in St. Martin.

 Joel left the next day.. well he almost left… but the airline cancelled his flight due to the discovery of a large amount of cocaine in the avionics compartment of the plane. It took him a couple of days to get out ( no not of jail ... ) … but he spent the days in a nice hotel with everything paid for by the airline… not too sure how much trouble he got in for that with the wife and kids… but I imagine he is still paying. He was a very welcome and pleasant guest onboard. Fast learner and I think a natural sailor. He is also welcome back anytime, anyplace.

I however had only a few more days until I returned to NZ to see my family and happily Tania got herself the required visa to go with me. We booked our flights and with no other plan than to meet Matthew in the airport we briefly saw each other in the LAX airport departure lounge…. She left on air NZ I left on American and we raced each other to Auckland. 

The Coombes sadly left Brisa and returned to England. We are in discussions as to when they will be coming back to visit Brisa and catch some more waves with us. I miss them every single time I watch the Penguin movie….. I did ask them to leave the kids… but they didn’t think it was a good idea. Not too sure why though? Fran.. James.. Heath ... Isla???? Comments?

The next Blog post will talk about our trip to NZ, the return and preparation on Brisa as we prepare for our first long passage. 7.5 days at sea, leaving St. Martin and all my friends and the Caribbean behind. You will meet the new crew and get their thoughts on the trip… before and after. We will see the last of our pretty yellow, black and blue spinnaker and we will eat fresh fish for days! Blood on the boat! Woohooo!

Right now we are in Panama … about to go to Boccas Del Torro tomorrow as we await our Panama canal Passage date on the 21st and prepare for my birthday on the 18th.

Do you think Brisa will like the Pacific? I hope she does as it will be her home after we cross the locks and panama canal for the indefinite future.

You can see exactly where we are now by going here :

 https://www.marinetraffic.com

 and in the search box type Brisa 302 and it will show you our exact GPS location.

Thanks to Bob for installing an amazing piece of technology. A Vesper Marine AIS transponder. Now the big boats will see us too. (www.vespermarine.com )

 By the way, the Pizza Galley pizza on the barbeque was incredible!!!!