Bread and pandas

Adelaide has been in a state of pandamonium for the past two years, ever since the zoo announced it was getting a pair of giant pandas on loan from China. Hi, I’m Red and I’m underwhelmed. I’m not quite sure where all the excitement has come from, really, because most people just seem to say, “Meh, pandas. Oh, look, is that an ingrown hair?” Nevertheless, the Traumatiser and all the tellies and radio stations have gone panda crazy. There’s been a panda countdown clock and Melbourne Street has claimed the title of Panda Central. As you do. I suppose it could be being driven by all those awful eastern suburbs mothers who make it their business to see that their children have every opportunity available. “Pandas? Why of course you’ll be first in line to see them, Veruca! Yes, I’m sure they’ll sell us Funi and she can live on our little hobby farm with your pony. We’ll all hop in the BMW and drive down to see her on the weekends.”

As far as I can see, pandas are kind of cute because they look like teddy bears, but otherwise they’re completely useless. The stupid things arrived on the weekend and have basically done nothing but chomp through bamboo shoots and apples and pee on the walls of their brand new panda palace. The rather patchy ABC show Hungry Beast did a debate on its first episode on whether pandas should be allowed to become extinct. One of the arguments was that since they were fat and had short willies, nature was conspiring against them. And fair enough, too.

Predictably enough, panda merchandise is also out of control. You can buy Wang Wang and Funi toys and T-shirts and lunchboxes and key rings and Christ only knows what else at the zoo. I think chocolate maker Haigh’s is the only one with the right idea, with their chocolate pandas. Which naturally got me to wondering what panda might taste like.

My guess is that it would be pretty fatty, but there must be ways of serving it. I reckon that anything you could do with pork or duck, you could do with panda. Smoking might work – we could make pandacetta. Barbecuing should work too, but we’re going to need a bigger barbecue oven than any of the ones they have in Chinatown. I was thinking of an eight course degustation menu, with fairly small portions. After all, there are only two fairly large ones to go around and everyone in town is going to want a bit.

Here’s what I have so far:

Pandacetta two ways: barbecued asparagus wrapped in pandacetta and sprinkled with parmesan shavings and mushroom risotto with crisp pandacetta
Wok-tossed panda fillet with bamboo shoots (for the irony value)
Panda cotta with toasted pandatone

Any suggestions to complete the menu?

In which Red takes the piss out of a nitwit

A little while ago, I received this comment on an old post on shallow bush grave names.

“I decided to search for my daughters name online as it is quite unique name, and the name has personal meaning to my wife. this is the only site in the world that mentions it and because you happen to be from adelaide and have the name Kyealea on your blog I guess we probably know you.It must be a sad existance to be 36 at the time of blogging this and finding enjoyment from being the first person to tease young children because of thier names. Be brave and send me your real name to holdensblow@yahoo.com.au

this crap is why I dont blog because its a safe place for pathetic people to show how brave they are while being completely Anonymous. Heres some advice get off the computer go out get a partner and live life or if you already have one get a new one because they are obviously not doing anything for you, you twisted bitter old pathetic bitch.

hope to hear from you soon
David (yes a real name!!)”

Oh, Dave, Dave, Dave. Sweetie. Darling. Where can I even begin?

For a start, thank you for dropping by. It’s so nice to find a new person to offend. That’s the wonderful thing about old posts: they continue to piss people off for months and even years. Now, a few things:

(1) I do not know you. Promise.

(2) You seem to have missed the point. I feel sorry for children with appalling names. It’s actually you, their parents, that I’m having a good old Aussie go at. I’m guessing your daughter's name is probably pronounced just the same way as "Kylie", because let's face it, “Ky-a-lee-ah” would just be too Kath and Kim to contemplate. You also fail to understand that it makes no difference to me whether it has "personal meaning" to your wife. I don't care. My point is that your unique name is so unique that the poor kid will have to spell it for the rest of her life, every time she phones for a pizza, books a doctor's appointment or calls a taxi.

(3) As for emailing you with my real name, if you think that’s going to happen, you’re dumber than your email address. I mean, really. holdensblow@yahoo.com.au? Sorry to disappoint you, Dave, but you’re just going to have to look elsewhere for a pen pal. Try Bogans R Us. But in the meantime, if anyone would like to sign Dave up for some nasty German fetish porn, please feel free!

(4) I think the real reason you don’t blog is because you can neither punctuate nor spell. I'm pleased to see that you know the difference between "of" and "off", but I think you'll find it's "existence", not "existance". Basic literacy skills are usually required to write, despite what you may have seen on MySpaz.

(5) Thanks for your concern, but I have a man and a fun social life (that does not involve Ford motor vehicles in any way). Would you believe it, I even have friends? But guess what? I still have time left over for being a bitch. I guess I’m just multi-talented, me.

Love and kisses,

The Twisted, Bitter, Old, Pathetic Bitch
(See Dave? I understand the use of commas.)

PS I'd still like you to write out "Kylie" 100 times in chalk on the asphalt of the playground. Do let me know when you're done.

Welcome to Dadelaide

Remember when you were 14 and hated the world and your dad would wander through the living room wearing his cardigan with the leather buttons while you had friends over and were listening to music? And he’d try to be cool by making a dad joke or saying, “How about that Madonna, eh? Doesn’t wear very much, does she?” And then you’d notice he had a bit of Vegemite on his chin?

Well, Adelaide is your dad when you were 14.

There’s a new trend. Any event organiser worth his piss-and-party-pies at the work Christmas do is stuck on world record attempts. Last year, there was the attempt at the world’s biggest guitar band at the hugely underwhelming Adelaide International Guitar Festival. It failed dismally, but they refused to be deterred and decided to give it another good Aussie go at this year’s festival. They’ll fail again, of course, unless they bus people in from sheltered workshops all over the state.

Then there was yesterday’s stab at creating the world’s biggest and longest Mexican wave before the Christmas Pageant. Captive audience, you’d think, as people waited for Father Christmas and dumpy little fat chicks dressed as clowns to pass by. Epic fail. They tried twice and couldn’t get past the halfway mark. No one took into account the complete apathy of the local populace.

A week ago, a little town in Peru decided it was going to break a world record by hook or by crook, so it made the world’s biggest pair of jeans. I don’t know what bastard is going to wear 114-foot-tall denims (“Hi, can I get these taken up please? They’re a little long.”), but that’s beside the point. Now Lima gets to be home to the world’s biggest blue jeans and the previous record holders in Medellin, Colombia can sit around plotting revenge and drinking rum while they wonder what to do with their 113 foot jeans.

Sure, it’s a record. But it’s still pants.

Really, what were we going to do if we had broken the record? Change all the car number plates to “The Mexican wave state”? Erect a sign at the airport reading, “Welcome to Adelaide, holder of the world record for biggest Mexican wave?” It’s all so Dogpatch, USA. What do you do when you have no other claim to fame? Why you set a world record, of course. No point in going for anything that requires talent, of course, like eating 300 hotdogs in two minutes, and bona fide freaks are in huge demand, especially in India. And Lima has the biggest jeans, so that’s out. Ooh, I know! A mass participation record will make us sooooo cool. Madonna cool.

By the way, did you know you had Vegemite on your chin? Just there under your lip. Big smear.

Separated at birth?

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

And since I'm already going to hell, why not Exhibit C as well?

One rests one's case.

Behold, the crisper of death

(David Attenborough voice)

“For hundreds of years, men have sought the answer to this question: where do cauliflowers, those giants of the vegetable world, go to die? Now, with the discovery of a fridge crisper in a beach-side suburb of Adelaide, we may have found the answer.”

Sadly, that crisper belongs to me.

I have such good intentions when I visit the fruit and veg. Soups, stir-fries, curries, meat-and-three-veg, salads. The colours are bright and lovely, but they all end up going the same way. The zucchinis and cucumbers melt to a pale green slurry that looks like stepped-on caterpillars. The tomatoes sprout black spots and weep in the darkness, while the eggplant get sun-burnt. The broccoli pop pimples, the cauliflowers grow mold and the cabbages turn to sauerkraut.

I know. I’m a bad vegetable parent. I’m also sadistic, because I like to make Bloke look at the squishy mess when I drag it out of the crisper.

Me: “Euwww! Sludgy!”
Bloke: “I don’t want to know.”
Me: “But look! It looks like it’s melted!
Bloke: “La la la! Not listening!
Me: “Look: it’s a Mold Slushy.”
Bloke: “Oh, GOD! You just had to make me look, didn’t you?”
Me: “Yes. And your point is?”

But thank Ford for plastic bags, or I’d have to irradiate the fridge once a fortnight.

In other news from the fridge, I realised today that my youth had officially ended.

Yesterday, while waiting to be served in an interminable deli counter queue, I caught sight of a veritable mound of bung fritz. For Sydney types, this is ‘devon’. I have no idea whether anyone else is insane enough to make it, but if the words ‘fritz’ and ‘devon’ mean nothing, imagine a sausage the size of your elbow made entirely of minced lips, ears, arse-holes and random off-cuts of lard. Sounds tasty, doesn’t? Don’t worry, it gets better. Ordinary old Chapman’s fritz comes wrapped in plastic and looks a bit like dog food loaf, but bung fritz is another matter altogether. It’s orange and random in shape, with odd twists and turns created by tying bits of string at intervals of about eight inches. Think of a fat chick in orange bike pants and you’re close.

When I was a kiddledink, I was passionately attached to a fritz-and-sauce sandwich. Doughy white bread (no crusts, thanks), a good layer of spread (Flora or Meadow Lea), four slices of fritz and a solid layer of Rosella tomato sauce. By lunch-time, the sauce had soaked into the bread and it was all pretty soggy. Heaven. Some people prefer fritz fried, though. Cut in slices, remove the orange skin and cut little nicks all around the edge or it curls up like a cupped palm.

I can’t remember the last time I bought fritz. It must be at least eight or nine years. It’s usually salami at our place. I sometimes think that if Bloke were forced to choose between salami and me, I would have had my marching orders many years ago.

But for some reason yesterday, I thought, “Mm, fritz”. Why I didn’t think, “Mm, Danish feta” or, “Mm, bocconcini”, I’ll never know.

Anyway, this morning, I asked Bloke whether he’d like a fritz-and-egg muffin. He showed more than a passing interest in the concept, so I whacked off a couple of slices and dropped them in the fry pan.

By the time it was fried, I’d well and truly gone off the idea and suspected it would ruin a perfectly good egg, so I cut off a thin slice and had a sniff, then a bite.

The wonderful primary school lunch had somehow turned into salty, pink sludge: spam minus the spice and with no ham.

Ah, farewell, childhood. It’s all downhill from here.

Greetings from Randomland

Yesterday morning, two women stopped at the base of an empty escalator, blocking the way.
"Excuse me," I said, politely.
They both turned and looked at me as though I'd spat on them.
"Could I get past, please?" Politely, again.
They mustered up some more outrage, but moved as little as possible. I slipped past and climbed the escalator. When I got to the top, I heard one shout, "You kno-owww, there are STAIRS if you want to WALK!"

***

On the train home, an eight-year-old boy restored my faith in humanity by running up and down the carriage, chanting, "Snot-snot-snot-snot-snot-snot-snot-snot-snot-snot".

****

Tonight, after leaving a civilised booze-up that was showing signs of turning messy, a guy approached me in the street.
"I had Portuguese chicken!" he said with a grin like an old sneaker.
"Well, that's just great."
"It was so good! It was Portuguese!"
"Fantastic, mate. Glad you enjoyed it."
"And spice-eeeee!"

****

And it's only Tuesday.

Listen to Felix

Felix says, "Go look at red's holiday snaps. Or I'll eat you. ~purrrrr~"