Late night chocolate? What could possibly go wrong?

WELL I AM GLAD YOU ASKED THAT VERY LOADED QUESTION ALLOW ME TO ANSWER.

Dreams, that's what. Horrible horrible dreams. Dreamt I had a radioactive grape in the back pocket of the swimming trunks I was wearing, which I accidentally burst releasing the radioactivity into my buttocks which resulted in my voice box turning to stone and death. I proceeded to die several other times last night, as well as my loved ones. Even my indifferent ones seemed to die too.

I would prefer if the level of dream mortality returns to "striking" from "wake up feeling traumatised". 

***

Discovered some odd eating habits of housemates. There's a Chinese guy called Leaf who, as well as being the most wonderful person in the world, allegedly (I don't share a kitchen with him, I am merely propagating whispered stories) will eat half a meal, leave it in the microwave, return a few hours later and finish the meal. A bit odd, sure to be sure.

Also, he'll make a meat sandwich. With belgium waffles. 

Once cooked a meat pie, ready meal from the supermarket. He then removed the pastry top of the pie, threw it in the bin and replaced it with a slice of toast.

What gets me is there is no consistency with the provision of bread. Sometimes it is forgone, othertimes it is crudely crowbarred in place of good pastry. WHERE IS YOUR LOGIC, MR LEAF. 

Additionally, there was one unknown member of my kitchen who confused the oven for the microwave when cooking a pizza, so 16 minutes in I opened the microwave, puzzled as to why it had been going for so long. I was assaulted by a wall of smoke which clawed my eyes, tore at my lungs and softly caressed my earlobes. It wasn't even on fire - it seemed to have transcended the usual realms of matter and was sitting comfortably as a black bubbling plasma, spewing dark smoke. Acting quickly, I opened the window and left a passive-aggressive note detailing the differences between the oven and microwave and their locations in the kitchen. I am a practical man.

***

It's unfortunate that I can only seem to write about food and dreams, both things which are as thrilling and exciting if I started to post pictures of my laundry cycle. Luckily, I don't have either photos or a laundry cycle. Will need to try harder - and I damn and bloody blast twitter for robbing me of the ability to have an idea which extends past 140 characte

Kiltman2

GLORIOUS FOOD

I must inherit this from my parents. When I asked them about their honeymoon and where they went, they started with all the places they'd been to, and a couple of stories about the people they met, punctuated with every meal they had and a review for each. It came down to an argument about whether Dad had the surf n turf or the king prawns by itself in the teriyaki marinade. 

Raised in a household where we sit down at a dinner table and conversation is silenced because there's more important things to deal with: food; where portions are so big and proud that when Rachel had the pleasure of having dinner with us she broke into a sweat and struggled to finish half; and where even the dog enjoys roast chicken every day, it might be prudent to say I have a bit of a fixation on food.

Which so far has lead me well in life. None of that non-edible eating for me! Oh no sir -- my food fixation has ensured that only the most digestible of materials have graced my luscious lips (with the exception of that 1p coin I swallowed once. I didn't understand what all the pain was about until the penny dropped). But now living in self-catered accommodation means getting all this delicious edible food is entirely MY RESPONSIBILITY. It's up to me to fill the cavernous space where a normal stomach should be, and effectively!

I've learned from this newfound independence that though my cooking may have been enough to impress other freshers for a couple weeks and keeping me from starvation for a bit longer, my chefery skills are not as all-conquering as I once believed. Indeed, "Callum surprise" where I threw everything into a pot and hoped for the best was less a "surprise" - more vaguely disappointing. A tomatoey, vegetably, stock cubey, fried ricey, garlicy disappointment. AREN'T THEY THE WORST.

But the greatest chefs don't get to their position of loftily hurling contemptuous remarks at restaurant owners on primetime TV by dwelling on their failures - bollocks no! They maintain and continue failing until their failures become somewhat less failsome. Fail. 

Go think of how I jumped at the opportunity when, returning back to the house after much hard work (hah), I found some housemates grating a lot of carrots. And I mean, a lot of carrots.

"Can you grate?" One asked.
"Uh, yes."
"Then start" She said, handing me her grater.
"Why are you grating all these carr--"
"NO QUESTIONS, MORE GRATING"

And so it began.

Some time and 4 saucepans filled with grated carrot (no joke, 4 FULL saucepans) later, we began boiling down the carrots to make what was advertised as wonderful wonderful soup.

I had a plan.
"We should totally have a soup-off."
"What?"
"I'll take these two pans, and you the other two and the better soupist will win!"
"We're not having a soup-off."
"Well I am, and you are free to get beaten if you wish."
"You're on."

So came about the epic soup-off. It was an arduous process, standing around looking bored and making trash talk, mostly looking bored. 
An hour later, after the carrots had gone from hard to less-hard, and all the water had boiled away, I needed results now!

"I'm adding the other ingredients."
"No, it's not ready yet."
"IT IS MY BOWL OF SOUP IN THE SOUP-OFF, I THINK YOU'LL FIND."

So I added the orange juice and creme fraiche. I'll stress - this was not my recipe, I was merely following hers.

I went for the taste test.

I went for another taste test.

Just to be sure, again.

I know I often exaggerate to the point of killing all your family, but I'm not exaggerating one iota when I say
IT WAS BORDERLINE INEDIBLE.

As in, it tasted a little bit like a very lacklustre lunch returning in the form of acid reflux, possibly due to us not owning a blender, most of the carrot was still in grated form floating about in a creamy orange foam. I was heartbroken.

Thankfully for a lovely Nord-Ironman called Dylan nearby retrieved herbs and spices of all descriptions, and we threw them into the pot along with garlic in the hope that "it can't get any worse". 
It didn't get any worse. Just... different. A different kind of inedibilty which threw me into near hysteria, and drew derision from my rival soupist.

So me and Dylan sat down with our bowls of "food", and attempted to eat it with a copious amount of bread. After the initial gag reflex was overcome, it wasn't entirely dreadful.
Then, the beautiful man Dylan said something of the purest genius: "How about we try it with those sour cream and chive Pringles?"

And my dear goddess gracious, ladies and gents, it worked. I don't know how, but it worked. It passed right the way through into the realm of food, and even bordered on tasty.

I am glad to say, I firmly won the soup-off. 
(She was still cooking 4 hours later :O).
WINNER 

Kiltman2

I'm in University!

Just clocked in my fourth week, and starting to realise it's not a holiday camp but home for the next 5 years - which makes me even more effervescent with excitement than a coke can in a tumble dryer. I have a lot to cover, so I will use the medium of bullet points and haiku! 

•  Little did I know
  How quickly one integrates,
  With both life, and maths.
  
  (zing!)
  
  Feels like my city,
  Learning labyrinthine streets
  And misleading paths.
  
  (Not nearly fast enough. Got lost looking for botanical gardens for 2 hours. Ended up getting scared by a clown, going down slides and introducing an American friend to chips and cheese.)
  
  If I could send back
  A note to my arrival
  I think it would be:
  
  Hey, just a heads up.
  Some folk are fucking crazy. 
  Go with it.
  Bring money. 

So yeah, towering pretentiousness aside for just a moment, I'm having a great time. Experienced such weird and wacky fun as a poetry slam, salsa classes, tequila nights, bouncy castles, getting quite exposed on stage, playing chess with a juggler... yeah. 

And my degree looks pretty darn interesting to boot, MechEng isn't so bad after all.

Everything's coming up roses :D

What qualities make a person attractive in your eyes?

If they would kindly remove themselves from there: I have quite an attachment to my retinas, you know.

I just answered this Featured Question; you can answer it too!

An artist's representation of a recent decision.

So I crumbled.

I gave in. I listened to the near constant bombardment of "what about future employment?","what about financial implications?","what about the children? Won't someone please think of the children?" and decided it's probably for the best to do an engineering course.

I accepted the course yesterday, so it's been done and is set in stone now. The next 4 years will be spent in Edinburgh studying Engineering, which is a pleasingly alliterative statement. A near on three year struggle between this and English Literature has been concluded, English literature lying on its side with a soldering iron sticking out of its ribs, it rolls over and makes a pithy quip before it dies.  

So, what does this mean, then?

Well, my dream to become a writer of some description has been stunted, if not killed. The advantage of studying English for 4 years on one's writing prowess is one which will work against me as a large number of other people vying to get their work published will have that wealth of experience and practise to back them up. The sheer number of books these courses go through anyway - I can't keep up with that. Almost every contemporary writer I can think of, whether they're a poet, novelist or playwright has studied an English degree. They'll be learning techniques and tools which they can utilise in ways I can't even imagine. It's like becoming becoming a professional artist without much training beyond, say the basics in painting technique. You can have talent by the bucketful but without learning the craft of the trade, your work is unrefined and messy.

And that's that. Professional writerdom seems further away than ever. I'd love to paint the scene as me collapsing under family and school pressures, and it is partially true, but I made this decision for myself. I could have gone down the path of wordsmithing but I didn't and chose the highway of... uh, highway building.

What's that? I'm one for the dramatic? Hah! Whatever gave you that idea!?

It's certainly not the utter fuck-pillow I'm making it out to be. I'll be living for a good span of time in one of the most beautiful cities in Europe, where there are countless festivals come summer and one of the most vibrant art scenes in the UK. There are numerous societies which encourage creative writing so I don't have to give it up. And, of course, at the end of the 4 years I'll have a degree I have a decent chance of getting a good job with. I can use the job to, for example work 6 months of the year and use that money to supplement creative expression.

Y'know, it's just that uncomfortable realisation that something I truly love is more than likely to become a hobby for me. Which is fine: loads of people play music just for the crack of it, simply because they enjoy doing it. They're not going to quit their job and be a rockstar, but it gives them a good amount of pleasure. I'd be the same with writing.

But still. Niggling regret. And worried that I'll curl up and die creatively. At one of the lectures I travelled down south to see, some barely functioning professor said there was a misconception that engineering is not a very creative course. Well yes, I can understand there needs to be a certain level of problem solving and being able to think laterally for solutions to, say a malfunctioning sewage system. But what about in terms of feelings and emotions? I write the occasional love poem and although they're terrible, I think they are a more effective means of communicating my feelings than "I was struggling to find a solution to the sewage overflow, but than I thought of you and the mechanics of shit spilling out over the landscape become so much clearer. LIKE YOUR EYES."

I will just have to suck it up. It's not a bad situation by any means, and there is still hope for the dream.

I just worry it will just always stay a dream.

Kiltman2