Category: Memory

Mince & the disappointment of a meal gone wrong: if you cook in bad-taste, your product will be plentiful in it…

Food is an important part of a balanced diet—

Fran Lebowitz

522756_10150808745566041_675659681_nI like my kitchen, always have— I’m in it at the minute. I’m close to the kettle so a nice cup of tea is never far from reach; I tend not to snack particularly, but if I fancy a hearty round of ‘wiches, I don’t have very far to move.

As it happens, I’m also quite partial to cooking. I have a few signature dishes that I whip-up every now and then but one night decided to cook a simple mince-dish: easy-peasy right?

I like to think of a meal made from mince like a bicycle accident— easy to do but occasionally hazardous to health. I’m sure that if time were no obstacle I’d add mince to my already brimming list of clutter which really deserves a graph of some kind. But it isn’t on my list, yet— it’ll have to wait its turn along with experimental mathematics, back-burners, high-hopes and the probability of inevitable things.

Anyway, I’m digressing because my culinary plan was flawed before I’d began but it wasn’t until the mince had started to defrost that I realised I had too few ingredients. No peppers or mushrooms or any vegetation for that matter— greens-schmeens, just details, a minor over-sight, I thought. I’d learned long ago that any delicacy, mince-wise or otherwise can be made all the more fragile by bombing it with anything healthy.

I like to think of what happened next as a kind of playtime— egged on by the uncontrollable childish regression genie that’s almost impossible to re-bottle once out. I had what I thought was the wonderful idea: I could use kidney beans and tinned tomatoes to make up for the ingredient that wasn’t there … and blending the be-Jesus out of them.

Out came the Kenwood and with it, my utmost to make a mess and a mockery of the most basic kitchen etiquettes … and blend. Not because it would improve the meal in any way, in fact I distinctly remember thinking, how horribly wrong it could go, but— because it felt sneaky, and after realising, again long ago that cooking was just a caper for grown-ups; that knives and hand-held mixers were really just toys: how could I not? I decided to add three whole onions and blend those too.

And then I found the garlic…

I do like the stuff, but since I was being typically over-zealous, I got a little carried away and started mashing it, adding clove after clove— mainly because I enjoyed playing with the crushy-handle-thing you use to kill it. I couldn’t stop.

If you can imagine the properties of freshly mixed cement, you’d be on the right track in imagining what I had recreated it in my kitchen. It didn’t actually taste that bad at first. It was pretty fucking bad, don’t get me wrong— I managed to finish what I served myself up, bat I did with the rest is another matter.

If revenge is a dish best served cold, then the best dish warm would be mince; I shudder still, recalling it.

By the following day all the sense of fun and wide-eyed joy I’d had beating my ingredients as though harbouring ill thoughts against them was gone. The tearing and shredding and the foaming at the mouth over the really good bits was a distant memory. It was all replaced with the disappointment of allowing exuberance get the better of me. You see, If you cook in bad-taste; without any doubt, your product will be plentiful in it.

Leaving it over night a couple of times however gave me ample time with which to pull out all the stops and solve it’s mysteries and in due time found inspiration in The Great Escape— if you recall, they needed to destroy the dirt from the tunnels and found they couldn’t— not one of their most ‘positively brilliant’ pieces of thinking but maybe, just maybe … I could dilute it? Wean some of the vast quantities of garlic in it to a more palatable level. If I couldn’t, I’d just disguise it…

I remember it was an idea which had me grinning at the myriad possibilities. I even toyed with the notion of filling up a couple of socks with grated cheese, placing them in my trousers and using my feet to hide the offending taste, but I abandoned it, worried about becoming just another statistic. I don’t think any of us like to think we’re influenced by the what we watch— especially whilst preparing meals in a kitchen during peace-time.

It was such a horrid waste of cheese…

My own experience has been that the tools I need for my trade are paper, tobacco, food, and a little whisky.

William Faulkner

On Furniture…

Moving it, rearranging it, wrinkles, flat-pack-language, fear, stuff, unhelpful phrases, bedrooms, tea & baby elephants…

elephant_swim_07I like my sense of all things random to be ordered, which isn’t to say their appearance always need be. Upheaval and periodic change is an unavoidable constituent of life; and try as I might to slow it down, at some point a good heaving is inevitable. So when it comes,I like it like I like my piles; I like them to develop over time so I don’t notice them at first— and by the time I feel there is just-cause to say something about them— I just do something about them and leave the ‘saying’ to other ‘like’-minded individuals. Preferably those who like that kind of thing.

When I’m informed that my world is going to be ‘transformed’— small, big— it doesn’t matter, naturally, my first thoughts are of my world being heaved-up. Quite how far and in what manner it’s to be thrust is largely irrelevant— what goes up, must come down. I can always sense catastrophe is imminent— and sure enough, the ‘secret vein’i that tells me so, begins to throb wildly.

It just so happens this was one of those times, I felt the vein and sure enough, when I probed further and discovered new furniture was on the way to afford me more space— my nesting-principals began to shudder also. I’m not one for unnecessary wildlife smilies, but I felt like a squirrel might, upon discovering his secret cache of nuts had been eaten. The very idea that ‘stuff’ would have to be moved out and then moved back was dawning slowly upon me, despite being explicitly terrifying, it also had horrific undertones— just for good measure: it multiplies you see: the stuff.

Bedrooms thus, appear to made from the same substance as that famous nanny’s carpet bag. It eats things. And they don’t even have to be your own. It’s ridiculous when you think about it, but there are no known laws or governing principles which adequately describe the phenomena.

But that’s besides the point because it always gets to the point when you’ve got to unload your ‘stuff’ to get at the furniture you’ll be replacing; and find you need two rooms to store it in; and the landing between them; and then there’s the sitting room and the small corner of the kitchen that never seems to be used for anything. And if that’s not enough, it’s round about this time the twitching begins.

However, if you look at it in this way your enthusiasm for it will wan— which is hardly surprising. I don’t even like packing. There is an easy part of course, it’s not all bad— but that’s all over once the delivery finally shows. It’s just shudders from there-in out.

Constructing the new units should’ve be a pleasurable experience. A visceral act allowing me to purge certain irregularities of thought with power tools. It should have, yes. But designers feel obliged to include certain elements in their designs that not only refuse us of our right to purge— but create entirely new ones. This is I’m sure— in the hope that if a paddy or wobbly is thrown during fabrication, it’s thrown in the direction of what it is that’s being put together— so a new one must be bought— and the anger can be spread out indefinitely.

I believe then, that half the battle is delegation. Since you need ideally, three, perhaps four sets of hands to realistically complete one of these tasks without feeling obligated to swear at it or anyone else within range— which on occasion, could mean anywhere in the region of four to five households. I find that knowing what each of the two hands I do have at my disposal are doing at any one time— and more importantly, what they will do— or as is usually the case— what they are supposed to do, is far more important.

Take the slats for the new shelves for instance. They’re supposed to slot into the runners and just stay put long enough to be fixed into place by a screw: They do not, because that would be all to easy. They either all go in first time and behave until you show the drill to them— at which point they become startled and leap out which means hiding the drill from them and starting over; or you have one tricky one that seems to be testing your patience by seeing how far you can be pushed, by refusing to move no matter how hard you seem to; only to allow you to succeed in manoeuvring the awkward one into place at the expense of disturbing all the others. This is when you discover you were being observed— and for quite some for time it seems— struggling.

It is a curious thing, to become suddenly aware that you could have been in a position of smug completion as opposed to a bundle of nerves ready to launch the offending pieces of wood far, far away. Because they always say the same thing: I was frightened to ask…

To that I can contain rational judgement— but I generally tend not to and indulge instead, in a far more resounding ‘bollocks and fuck’, in a pronunciation somewhat scattered and aimed at no-one in particular— but at the same time to anyone close enough to hear it.

It’s at this point I decide to abandon my task and drink tea in the hope of expectorating visions of setting light to people, laughing. But the madness concludes with madness until certain phrases become familiar to the point of over-use:

  • Let me have a look at it…

  • It’s perfectly simple…

  • Surely not…

  • It can’t possibly!

  • Why have they done it like that?

  • Fucking thing!

  • NOOOO!

  • For God’s sake, just leave it alone…

  • I know what I’m doing!

  • Ouch, shit, fuck— bollocks!

  • You do it then…

And so on…

Naturally, to avoid predictability I cut myself eight pieces of cheese to protect me from such a fate— each approximately 5x10x30mm and eat them with the back of a curved knife.

Since the slats had been constructed the day before to form part of the shelves, and the wardrobe had been constructed with few casualties— it was time to clamber over the little space I had left, in order to move or dismantle the existing furniture. And since it defied its appearance by weighing about the same as a baby elephant, I made the decision to trade the screw-driver for a series of heavy thwacks to its joints with a 5lb yellow fibre-glass handled, double-dipped masonry lump-hammer and hacking knife— thus weakening it sufficiently without destroying it; allowing me to remove it piece by piece. It was never going to be used again so I considered the battering I administered, pay-back for the previous day’s sweating and bad language.

That part was at least fun. Getting the new stuff in was not— not because it was overly heavy or cumbersome, despite having to negotiate the over-spill— but because it wouldn’t fit. You’ll have to imagine my disgruntlement; something the TV didn’t have to, nor the bin and neither did the two slippers that made up the pair. But to their credit, they did have the good sense to detach themselves from my feet before going flying. Granted, they did so at an inconvenient time, but had they not have, they too would have been copping unfortunate ones.

There was no way round it. Dismantling was out of the question, my voice was becoming hoarse; I was intolerably thirsty and any minute soon, I’d be surrounded by cretins. I decided to stop and have some more tea before returning to the grounds being stomped upon by impudent pieces wood.

CDs went flying in the direction of the bed followed by the DVD player, books and assorted non-specific papers. The monitor displaying an AOL login page joined the party to the right of the now hidden guitar— though it was doing its best to return to the chair by sliding slowly towards the ground. I solved this by balancing the chair on top of it and hoped that God would intervene to keep it there. Next it was the clothes that went for a trip , before the turn of the delightful piece of rogue ‘wicker’ I had discovered stowed away somewhere or other. The rest of the obstructions were cleared in much the same way you’d remove water from a sinking boat— though in my experience a breach can be stemmed— and water doesn’t use nearly so many expletives.

With the new found room, I teased the items into place, admired them and then surveyed the monstrous state of the remaining artefacts and swore a little more. I think ‘for fuck’s sake!’ was uttered under every breath— sometimes more, but with an eye on the prize and the other one twitching away madly— I managed to swathe away my denial-complex until the job— on the face of it— was complete.

I say ‘on the face of it’, because it was so, only thanks to a little creativity— meaning I hid a great many of the things I could no longer bare the sight of in a large box, then secured it away from my line of sight: what the eye don’t see, blah blah blah.

They say, ‘a job worth doing is a job worth doing well’— well, yes and no. If it’s worth doing at all, you’re better off letting someone else doing it. How and why anyone would chose to move house more than once in their lifetime is beyond me.

Bedrooms are my absolute limit.

Period— the end…

i For future reference, my secret vein and wrinkles of deep persuasion are located on the left hand side of my upper forehead and around, so as to be tickling my left temple. Like pain, they are there to inform me of stuff.

image: Odd Stuff Magazine

Just a little background: noise & biography…

Everyone chases after happiness, not noticing that happiness is right at their heels.

Bertolt Brecht

iuI read that and instinctly think cats. That’s biography.

I am fascinated by the heroic age of Antarctic expedition, history, education, great sex, openness, cats, cameras; the space race; sentence-structure, lexis, discourse conventions and phatic communication; cinema; the sounds of cricket and its numbers; golf swings, sortes, piropo, productivity, logical fallacies; fagottists— which leads to the double-o phoneme and coda-less syllables; falderals, nonsense; nanism— my fear of developing it and albino-clowns who already have. Ironing, long-sleeves, compound swearing, yellow pads, yoof-speak and linguistic representations— meh. Books, tea, science, feets, unnecessary plurals and corrugated-cardboard to name but a few.

It’s a pointless list because there isn’t much I’m not interested in. I like the feeling of insignificance in knowing how little I know; and how each little thing helps me know what I already know a little better.

And I still don’t know what this makes me, but it kind of works like this:

Perhaps it just makes me English since ‘England is the paradise of individuality, eccentricity … hobbies and humors.’1 Quite whether the world thinks we are small or great, but such is the context of opinion. Goethe wrote that, ‘people of uncommon abilities generally fall into eccentricities when their sphere of life is not adequate to their abilities.’ Well spheres be damned as, ‘No one can be profoundly original who does not avoid eccentricity.’2 But to what end is thought’d: ‘eccentricity in small things [is] crazy’3 and though it ‘destroys reason, [it does] not [the] wit?’4

All I’m really trying to do here is to show a little of what it’s like to be autistic— from the ground up I’ve taken my traits and applied them to certain functions within the texts: from word orders and word types, semantic variances, repetitions and rhetorical devices— even archaic syntax to the very deliberate structure I use to present things. It’s not always easy to read and it’s not meant to be, It’s supposed to be a little overwhelming at times and take the reader in circles— but it’s a desirable difficulty designed to stimulate a little over-processing, in the same way real life does to me. It’s the only way I know how to present what it’s like to me: to demonstrate it, not write about it— especially when there are a million people out there able to just describe it so much better.

I was going to just post the blueprint, but thought the meta-language would just make it pointless— like the list…

I’m not just a linguist or educator or golfer or cricket fanatic or autistic or anything for that matter—

I’m just curious…

And I guess lists should be conspiculous by its absense, but it’s really not…

1 George Santayana
2 André Maurois
3 Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton
4 Nathaniel Emmons

Senses & Nonsenses…

One’s real life is so often the life one does not lead…

Oscar Wilde

IMG_0013Such are the senses, that we have more than five and fewer than six. Try tasting something without seeing it for instance; it almost always tastes like something other than what it’s supposed to and rarely anything other than chicken; listen to someone speak without seeing their mouths move or those unusual sounds that keep you awake at night when you’re trying to sleep that never turn out to be two thousand pound mice and you’ll forever be in that darkness— or even tasting something without smelling it and so on and so forth. Life is so much more than it appears to be, though it’s little more than it actually ever is. Unless of course, there is such a thing a two thousand pound mouse or you really were asked to shake and squeeze the band which gave King Tut its mildew…

My real life is far cry from the award winning, affluent, multi-faceted and admired jaunt and jolly through which my other self is no doubt enjoying somewhere where the senses are better understood and household pets and rodents are disproportionately large; but that’s not to say I’ll ever be to old to be everything I could have been-or too small for Autumn to call me sweetheart.

It puts me in mind somewhat rather of him— S; a splendid chap and so was his wife— K. At least she was when I knew her. She was smart too, in that sensible way that can get up the noses of people who try to sit down to quickly wearing tight pants, smoking whilst owning chest complaints and the intolerably foolish doing well, anything. She could and would point out the obvious with a style and punctuation, few of us would or could even dream about. I remember one such occasion at college, when she was trying to persuade S to disband one of his pro-radical movements— he liked to use meaningless compound phrases in those days— retro-activist-avist was his favourite— he said that it left dangling inferences suggesting guile and determination. K said it left an unpleasant odour in the air and a salty taste in her mouth whenever he said it. Her favourite saying on the other hand was, What’s with the finger E.T.? They were a charming bunch.

Anyway, he claimed the campus anti-everything lobby weren’t doing enough complaining about things that didn’t matter to anyone, so he founded the double A. E. B. The Anti-Anti-Everything Brigade, to which K merely pointed out that its tautology gave it ’all the noise of a harmless educational committee. Trying to point out the pointlessness of rebellion in the civilised world— is rather like an unwanted splinter’ she meant this quite literally; ‘a forgotten part of the Nation Union of Teachers perhaps’ she fancied, and besides, wasn’t it dishonest describing himself as a brigade, especially since he hadn‘t persuaded anyone else in actually joining him; that to disband an army of one was something that ‘reality just wouldn’t allow’ and perhaps he should try doing something useful instead like, drawing up a petition against himself and joining the N.U.T., ‘allergies allowing of course’, maintaining that she had read somewhere that ‘at least education had an ethos…’

S had missed the train again. It was the third time in as many days and he was starting to take the whole thing very personally. He wouldn’t have minded had it not been for the decrepit old fool in front of him who insisted on buying his ticket with an exact change he couldn’t really see; unless demonstrating the ability to distinguish the denomination of a coin by rubbing them against his eyeball counted as seeing.

As for me,I have a new cafeteria— reward for installing a utility next door, which brings me to my last point in a pointless exercise…

If you ask for and are expecting a cup of tea— but are given a mug of coffee instead…

It doesn’t taste well, and quite unlike either.

Getting lost and making plans: memory, crafts, surprise & the warmth of a friend…

It’s surprising how much of memory is built around things unnoticed at the time.

Barbara Kingsolver

393329_10151214974261041_349311287_nIt is surprising how much we recollect our most cherished and vivid memories around the things we took for granted at the time, but shouldn’t have. These days I’m surprised by how much I seem to go unnoticed by my memory, as it decides to take off and do its merry thing without the slightest hint of decorum, not worried that what I may be doing may be worth a second thought, or were that to seem a little too much like hard word: a glance as one does at the end of the day to ensure we were the same fellow we were when we’d awoken in the morning. This: most ungracious of exclusion, is perhaps the only thing one does notice with time and by then it is too late, or almost too late. You see, I have of late come into the habit of taking a person or persons out and about, with mine, in case I need a prompt with regards to the outing— or as is sometimes the case— the abouting after the the fact in order to fully satisfy my recollecting.

It is and can be, a most frustratingly futile pursuit; paradoxical not quite quixotical; for the ‘time’ in short, makes what time has ‘built … unnoticed’, therefore forgotten, ‘surprising’ only, owing to ‘how much’ can be lost in so short a time— hence the need for ‘persons’ to illustrate what had at the time— riddlewise— been memorable, thus bringing too my day’s end illuminate. So in a rounds-about way, I can be gloomed, or as was the case: brightened and cheered, for the yester-day was, as it turned out, not-one to go ‘unnoticed’, so-by definition— if not unsaid— then by Jove-abouts not unwritten…

It had started as much the same as any other day— ordinary or otherwise, in the morning: I awoke, performed some duties: tea making, online mail and a few alsos of the like I like before taking ablutions etcetera and therefores.

My day had been wiped clean since the appointment I had been due to keep this particular day had in fact been due the day prior, but because oversight generally requires the helping hand of hindsight in order to acquiesce even to its own name, I had inadvertently overlooked my appointments entirely. I was supposed to meet my dear friend PG, or Pidgin as she’s affectionately known, in part owing to her impossibly correct locution. The fact that we had arrangements, had not even been trembled in lieu of the text informing me that, she was ‘on [her] way to Canterbury’ on a not inexpensive ticket when taking the comparative proximity and price with mine; a fact she hesitated little in informing me when on arrival at our agreed destination shortly after politely drawing to my attention that perhaps I required companions, even when talking on the telephone. This was not a fact that has gone unevidenced in the past, but seemed to’ve become an almost daily occurrence.

I had already declared my day to be one of arts and craft and wallpaper paste. I had a twelve inch model of HMS Victory to adjust, as well as a thirty inch model of a Spitfire. D had agreed to don surgical gloves with me and make it a family affair, so much glue flinging and frivolity were inevitable. I had already been amused by Pidgin, as I’d called her, as is customary on a weekday morning to enquire into her well-being, health and other sorts, before the narrative became an unnavigable exercise to circumvent her own attempts at preventing getting any more lost than she already was. She’d only just left her house as she took my call, for the polling station to vote— quite sensibly as would have it— located just two streets away; a distance that should really have only occupied the first of the many intrusions I made of her. However, as our conversation lengthened, as did the pauses and strangely detached nature of her responses, until finally she confessed that she had inadvertently found herself very, very lost.

Were she to’ve been a new resident, the situation she now found herself in may have been quite distressing, but since this was not the case, the peculiar position she now found herself in was as comedic as it was hitherto unknown. I advised her to retrace her steps in order to find her way back to her house, which she did, but found that her house was nowhere to be seen— in fact, she remarked, she had never ‘seen’ whatever it was that should ‘ve been her house anywhere or at any time before. She then decided to return to the point she’d been originally and quite by chance, found her house, if not where she’d left it twenty minutes earlier, but for convenience’s sake, in a place that’d ‘have to do’. She nipped inside, found a map and a minute later— no more and little less— had found her way, her place, checked in, hung up and voted.

So we’d both done our best to create catastrophe from reasonable beginnings. Quite how much the balance had swung away from complacency towards imbecilic and back again before teetering on a verdict which satisfied the acknowledgement of both comedic value and annoyance, is neither mine, nor her indictment to judge upon; for we as acting, if not willing participles in both sets of troubles, were really too close to allow our experiences interfere in such proceedings. Anywise, the now immediate needs were those of swift transport to Canterbury— and thankfully for me, D was on hand to chauffeur. What little mess we’d planned but not created, was cleared up two-fold by he and his shiny blue steed. We mounted his Jag and disembarked.

Canterbury was glorious. It’s one of those little cities that feels, when the sun is high— that the sun is coming at you from all directions— a point of fact that I allow that queer breed, that of the physicist, to mull over and scowl as they do, to doff at one another and attempt to calculate the numerical value of such romantic observations and spoil them. For I care not of such things, preferring to act in inglorious ignorance of the calculaic musings of such people, concentrating as I did do, on more pressing things— scouting for Pidgin. And before too long I’d found her— unlike her and her with her house— exactly where I expected her to be.

“Hello,” I said with a quite unnecessary warmth— it must’ve been 25 degrees C.

“I’ve volunteered you for something!” was the response. Quite what? I could not‘ve said. But I had pretty good idea…

Never, never, never give up

Winston Churchill

Don’t shower alone— take them as you would suprise; with expectation & guides…

A Scout is never taken by surprise; he knows exactly what to do when anything unexpected happens.

Robert Baden-Powell

323_50880396040_113_n

For many, many reasons, I am frequently found to be resonating— more than likely because I once found Baden-Powell’s whim regarding the unexpected resonating. However, with the odd tweak to allow for inflation and language change, maintenances for such unforeseen occurrences, in a literal sense would no doubt fall these days under the protection of predictable things— if not in their entirety, then at least in their E-ssence. However, no matter how clearly I feel I’m comfortable with acknowledging his inkling valid: that we, the some-oddth generation of hunter-gather should be nurtured with fire and other outdoorsy stuff to ensure the survival of the our most basic survival instincts— I’m sure anyone reading this might maintain their own inkling that perhaps I made a typo— and what I actually meant was ‘cleanly’.

It can be no mistake that the shower has been central to some of my more memorable moments and encounters, because for reasons unbeknownst to me, they just keep on coming. Only this morning my scouting gene was called upon to subdue a salvo when the hot water became overrun, leaving me sudded suddenly, with nothing but the prospect of cold water to torture and not to cleanse. It was a vulnerable predicament to find myself in, and were it not for the intuition to cut off the supply, make a flanking dash to reinstate the boiler enabling my return once debriefed, I might never have completed my shower, and for all I know, have remained sticky for the rest of the day— something no-one should side with as a consequence of a continuous succession of moments melding into one collective experience. On the other hand, it might be OK if the experience involved being sticky for an altogether different reason.

Never-the-less, I handled it with the expertise and confidence I was trained to do around camp-fires— what I wasn’t expecting was the double-play; the muddy water where the very least of expectations take the guise of unknown forces to extend upon you, the surprise that even predictability cannot begin to fathom, let alone quantify.

I was lulled into applying a second coating of soap before realising the trap that had predicated my near demise had once again been sprung: the hot water ceased firing. This time however, there was little for it but to counter the sortie with a furious counter offensive before freezing to death— I outwitted my foe by staying put and though I escaped a touch bitten, it was no more than to be expected— and I emerged triumphant … just a little shorter.

Demoralise the enemy from within by surprise, terror, sabotage, assassination. This is the war of the future.

Hitler was onto something there—

I don’t think he had bathroom appliances in mind though…

You’ll find lots of things at my desk to assist me when the need is greatest…

Acorns were good until bread was found.

Francis Bacon

555751_10150808762961041_1512462874_nContinuing with the most unlikeliest of themes— an absolutism which despite appearances isn’t the statement of a complete cretin, considering ours is a time of constant hyperbole and overexposure to superfluous superlatives where all is garbage or great; it therefore makes its self a meta-sentiment which holds semantic weight considering the vastness of the post-modifying element of the phrase, and also quite appropriate owing to its observance to a law other than stylistics— something I happen to know a little about; but not too much.

What we expect and what are the unknowingest parts of the mundane exist only from our desire to rise above such trivialities in order to offer ourselves respite from whatever trappings we use to define our servility. Mine are deliberately superficial, affordable for the most part— in the least part not exactly cheap or morally legitimate, but congruent to my own sets of values. This tryphé may be subject to further discussion were it not of an impending consequence that I amend Mr Bacon’s alluring aphorism with something I hope is not unedifying. Acorns were indeed good, as was bread, but that was until breadsticks. Of course, once it’s possible to be in a position where you can purchase a packet of acorns at your local supermarket for recreational purposes, we may see this priority change hands once again.

I must confess, with some amusement I might add, that I had never have seen any benefits in eating breadsticks or anything else with them for that matter, because they’re a kind of non-food stuff. They’re not a snack and barely count as an accoutrement to a meal. I would never have ‘let alone’ imagined there could be any value in them outside their nutritional content, which is very little; and certainly wouldn’t have credited them with the sustenance required to cause astonishment— at least not in the quantity required for me to  link them to something as ‘surprising’. But with any such awe comes inevitability and with that we are led to the writing of the predicament I now find myself in— which is not so much the refuting of a man’s maxim, albeit not one of his best, than the fashioning of a new one.

Were I to say that I like the idea of inventors messing around in their garages, taking apart toys and microwaves to find something new that’ll change the world as we know it, would you say it was rather like being revolutionary born in Switzerland? Probably not, that’s why there are two different kinds of people, equal nonetheless, but that’s where my similarity to any form of revolutionary rests; being Swiss don’t got nothing to do with it.

I also like the idea of writers messing around in their studies, taking apart ideas and words hoping to find new ways to describe the world— they just need  something to help them do it. Things like breadsticks.

The other types of people are readers.

From the naturalistic point of view, all men are equal. There are only two exceptions to this rule of naturalistic equality: geniuses and idiots.

Mikhail Bakunin

And food, with the odd exception is food…