giovedì, gennaio 11, 2007

Ode to restless joy

Ugh. Mornings are getting grosser and grosser, and work getting less and less inviting . . . I've been trying to coast on yesterday's 'good news' that I'm not not in the running for a place at Eur0pol but that's not cutting it. My mum came through town from England last night and I gave her some re-assurance about the crazy lifestyle decisions I'm about to make, which was a good exercise for me - I ended up reassuring myself as well as her - but we were both left with the wish things would just fucking work out, like, tomorrow.

Anyways, it was good to spend some fun time with the kids at the family dinner last night. I suppose if most of my money starts coming from working with them, the fun won't be there in the same way, and once in a supervisory capacity all those young bones I've been so cheerful about picking up and throwing around in a jolly aunty type way are going to suddenly seem so much more fragile. So I'm enjoying that while I can.

Must dash and catch up on all the work I haven't been doing. Before I do, there was something else I wanted to point out - blue cheese and green grapes make the most intense flavour combination. Like, some good sweet green grapes - organic (which does make a huge taste difference here, since grapes are so watery and artificially fertilizing them might make them bigger and more inviting, but also dilutes the taste fatally until they're just pale sugary blobs) - just stuck and covered with a creamy, rich, stinky blue cheese. A tear came to my eye while I was eating it. A tear of joy. The last time I cried with joy was when I was slathering fresh foie gras on to fresh baguette after eating 24 fresh oysters, and that was almost a year ago now. So run; run to the cheese/organic produce store. Run. I'll make you an emergency phone call to get you out of whatever situation you're in that doesn't involve eating blue cheese and green grapes.

9 commenti:

Melbine ha detto...

Nah, even in a supervisory capacity you'll still have fun throwing them around - whatever you can do to get the giggles! I'm amazing at how monkey-like I'll act to get a stream of laughter out of Tink.

Blue cheese and grapes..hmm..I can see it! It's just hard for me to get over the smell of blue cheese. Do you plug your nose while eating it??

Melbine ha detto...

Oops, I meant 'I'm amazed', not 'I'm amazing'. Although I'm not going to deny that either heh heh...

Dread Pirate Jessica ha detto...

No, I just accept that it smells bad and eat it anyways. That way the wonderful taste is always a surprise. But then, Italians have a fine tradition of delicious food that smells like shit - salt cod, pig's feet, rotten cheeses. I think it's to protect our cuisine from the enemy.

Once I spent hours sitting on a bathroom counter with my neice when she was two, getting a bar of soap wet and sqeezing it so it flew across the room, yelling "slippery soap!" and laughing our asses off. It was a fucking mess afterwards but one of the nicest things ever.

Sugarplum ha detto...

That's sweet.

I had an aunt in Finland once tell me that you have to try blue cheese 11 (I think that was the number) times before you will like it. She was slathering it on her gingerbread cookie while she was saying this. I remember when it was my 11th time (I guess) because it was in Japan and they always have cheese samples in grocery stores and I tried it and it seemed to hit the spot so I bought a triangle of gorgonzola and brought it home and ate it in a sitting to the dumbfoundedness of the dude. They just got stronger and stinkier after that day. But something that always troubled me was - how do you know when blue cheese has gone bad?

Dread Pirate Jessica ha detto...

That's a good question. I guess I've always assumed it never does - that the good bacteria takes up all the room from the bad bacteria and that you can eat blue cheese for as long as it's soft. But then blue cheese never has a chance to get old in my household.

Mmm, blue cheese and gingerbread. Mmmm.

Melbine ha detto...

Hmm, funny that some things require many, many tastes. My Grandma always said that about olives too...

The day that Jericho and I tried to have Tink make foot and hand imprints for Krazy a la Father's Day was one of the funniest moment so far. We had tears rolling down our faces because he was making such a mess but was so fascinated by the finger paint! The attempt to clean him up in the sink afterwards was even funnier. These are the moments I'll treasure when I'm in my rocking chair all wrinkly and grey. :)

Dread Pirate Jessica ha detto...

I hope when I'm old and crazy it's the loveliness I remember.

Anonimo ha detto...

Cheers to it being loveliness that you remember.

Lot of things require many tastes to like - not just blue cheese and olives but also beer, coffee, spicy food - anything that is too strong tasking for kids to like. Maybe it's 11 times for everybody and everything?

I got used to blue cheese by having the knockoff Czech version of it. It's really mild, and so it didn't taste bad even at first. Did you ever try blue cheese from France? It's really good.

Dread Pirate Jessica ha detto...

Could well be, Jiri, except cigarettes, which is only five or six times before they magically stops being gross, and various other addictive thingums.

Yah, I've had blue cheese in France and from all over. I love that so much. I didn't have the Czech version, though. Must do something about that, especially if I move to Berlin . . . eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee . . .