But will it make you go blind?

Why is it that we find food so compelling as entertainment? Foodie magazines are flying off the shelves, beautifully designed high-end cookbooks sell by the truckload, and now a local version of “Master Chef” has just finished its first run here, attracting huge television audiences five nights a week. What’s going on?

The pleasures of staring at images and descriptions of gorgeous food you have no intention of preparing (or the ability or opportunity to do so in many cases) are known to many of us. The term “Gastroporn” was coined to describe all those glossy magazines and books filled not with airbrushed spread-eagled nubiles, but with superbly constructed works of culinary beauty we could only think to replicate in our imaginations and without the constraints of budget and family-driven timetables.

Why do we buy them? For my money, it’s the same thing as picking up the odd issue of “Country Life” to drool over perfect cottages or stately Grade II listed mansions with walled gardens and trout streams. There’s pleasure simply in knowing they exist, and just occasionally, you can translate a grand idea into something of your own that’s also wonderful, yet achievable on a more practical scale.

For every 3-Michelin-star-worthy dish, for every lovingly-built tower of truffle-infused genius, for every faultlessly turned baby vegetable and every perfect mousse, coulis or jus, there’s that little germ of knowledge, finesse or inspiration that makes the brave transition from haute cuisine to the family dining table.

Food is exciting, sensual and pleasurable. It’s easy and fun to experiment with, and trying new things often brings wonderful results. For most of us, it’s also less complicated and safer to share with more people than sex.

Gastroporn rules! Now where did I leave my glasses?

Oooh, let's see now - how does this thing work again?

It's been so long I'm beyond the space where apologies would mean anything. Suffice to say, it is midwinter here now, and life is burbling along busily. Dramas have come and gone, crises weathered, work done and milestones reached.

What hasn't been done is a great deal of communication outside the square of day-to-day physical life, and I have missed blogland. Knowing my tendency for obsessive behaviour one way or another, I went cold-turkey on the e-front, with the result that I'm now so far out of the loop I qualify for alien status.

Thanks hugely to those lovely ones who enquired either here or by email as to whether or not I was still alive, intact, sane and healthy. All boxes are now ticked (number 3 is debatable, but then it always was). I will be around to make some visits soon, in a controlled, non-obsessive, disciplined and time-efficient manner.

Meanwhile, I am thinking of starting work on my first book; "The Good Slattern's Guide to Modern Living". It's going to be all about maximising pleasure, creativity and quality of life and minimising the unnecessary drudgery that gets in the way of it. I'm picturing a more intellectually vibrant and creative sort of slothful Nigella Lawson type, but without the cleavage, the domestic help or personal assistant.

Wotcha think?

What a way to end the silence - updated just a little

Post script 12th Feb: In the midst of so much loss, one tiny victory. I'm afraid I never have figured out how to embed videos, but I hope this link works.

Believe me, this is amazing. Koalas are not tame, and they can actually be very aggressive. (They're not bears, either, despite the lovely CFA guy's awful pun). As a general rule, they don't drink water either, getting all their hydration from eucalyptus leaves. This is very special indeed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do9AoKyjjQg



Photo from The Age newspaper, taken by reader Jac Warburton.

Photo taken from suburban Doncaster by the Mulherin family. Again, from the Age.

This can be a merciless country at times. Last week floods devastated whole towns in Northern Queensland, and the water levels are still too high for many to return to see what they can salvage from their homes. Now, over the last twenty-four hours, terrible fires have raged, exploded and raced at speeds never before seen across vast areas of country Victoria. This morning it has been reported that 108 are confirmed dead, and the number keeps climbing as firefighters and emergency services are able to re-enter areas devoured by the fires.

The fires are still spreading. Over 750 houses are confirmed gone already, and among so many towns ravaged, there are at least two which now no longer exist in any form at all, such was the power of the firestorm. Livestock, domestic animals and native animal populations have also been lost in huge numbers.

While London was under a foot of snow last week, we were experiencing temperatures well into the forties; 46.7 in Melbourne one day, with a humidity level of 4%. On the rare moments I ventured outside, I swear I understood what a baking potato feels like. The heat was indescribable. And to fight a fire in that? Suddenly the concept of Hell is very real.

On Saturday it was in temperatures of up to 47 degrees (that's 116 degrees Farenheit) that most of these fires were born, fed by vicious North winds that created conditions akin to standing in front of a huge blast furnace. Several fires joined up to cover thousands of hectares at once with equal strength. Even cooler conditions in many places yesterday did nothing to slow the spread of firefronts which are still travelling terrifyingly fast.

The reports are horrific. People in their homes who five minutes before had been assured the fire was not an immediate threat to them were engulfed by flames driven by sudden wind changes, with fire fronts moving so fast they covered kilometres in seconds. Many others died in their cars, thinking (or perhaps beyond thinking) that they could outrun the danger and escape. Being on the road in a bushfire is never a good idea. This weekend it was suicide.

Common wisdom says if you are properly prepared, you are safest in your house. This time, the worst weather conditions ever recorded meant that even some of those who did everything right weren't able to survive, though there are many amazing stories emerging of those who did. One family, unable to save their house, ran down into an already burnt gully with bundles of wet sheets and blankets and hid in and around against a wombat hole, sheltered by a dirt mound.

We have friends in some of these areas. Thankfully, all are safe, and although one may have lost a vineyard and weekend house, none have been left homeless. This morning I spoke to Mads' lovely friend Laura, who has been at her family's farm for the weekend. We had been texting messages during what we thought was their worst time of threat, but it was only this morning we found how close they had come to disaster. The fire was a mere 400 metres from them when the wind blew it back on itself. They had no running water to operate hoses, as loss of power meant the pumps couldn't operate. I'm shaking even as I think of what could so easily have happened. The danger is not yet over for them. Winds can still change, and they have been told it is still not safe for them to leave.

The volunteers fighting these fires are as brave and heroic as human beings can ever be. To face walls of flame driven by winds so great that they leap four lane highways as you would jump a puddle, creating the sort of fireballs associated with chemical explosions is just staggering. To cope with the terror, the heat, the exhaustion of twelve hour shifts and the emotional trauma of finding victims ... these people are just magnificent.

However, there is another, darker side of humanity. There is already evidence that while lightning strikes may have started several of the fires, it is arsonists who have created much of this maelstrom. It is here that words just can't express what I feel. I hope they are caught. I hope they are charged with mass murder. I hope they are made to face some of those who have lost family, animals, houses, precious memories. And I hope they live long enough to comprehend the horror of what they have done.

Ho Ho Hop

This is an insane time of year, so in case I get too caught up in the mayhem and don't find time to do this when I should, Happy Christmas / Hannukah / Jedi Holiday or Excuse for a Lie-In to everyone.

I pinched this photo from a pack of Hallmark cards, the proceeds of which go towards breast cancer research (well at least I bought the cards!). I rather like it - it could have been taken on any one of hundreds of roads I've driven along on country trips over the years. It looks very hot.

So, while you're all huddling under blankets and chucking snowballs at each other, I'll be listening to the cicadas and slapping on the sunscreen, wondering yet again why I don't do a cold buffet on Christmas day rather than the traditional roasts and hot, flamed plum pudding. I am however a happy slave to the habits of my youth; I did briefly toy with the crazy idea of replacing turkey with kangaroo, but the moment passed.

Big love.

Update

Thanks All for your lovely comments on my last post. I'll go back there and respond to them properly soon.

We had an email from Em yesterday - the following is a taste of why I miss her so much:

She is writing "in the dodgyest internet cafe in the whole world, not just Uttaranchal", which apparently smells of pee and is run by a guy in a cheap suit and with slicked back hair. She says "this is hard, not because I miss you, or cos I can't think of what to write, but because the keyboard only has half the letters".

She says she is thrilled to bits with India, and has seen "so much that is "radtastic, unusual and unreal", and speaks of "the enormity of everything that's happened", none of which apparently we would believe without the benefit of visual aids (which she is arranging).

Then there's a short break for an announcement:
"****proprietor is smoking up the ganga in the phone booth. Not uncommon here****"

As for any lurking extremists: "btw - I'm not dead. My people will call your people if we get whisked into any international terrorist shenanigans ...."

She's obviously been hoeing into the local cuisine; so much so that I have been banned from cooking anything with curry, paprika, masala or pepper for the next three months at least. ("I could so go a lamb casserole right now"). And apparently she has just realised that I have a special smell that she misses. What is that I wonder? Possibly a strange cocktail of sauteed onions, fruit cake, anti-ageing moisturiser, Balenciaga's Le Dix, tea and claret. ("mmm smell mummy-ish. lol giggle!"). I shall get her to analyse it properly when she comes home. Funny how smell seems to be the most evocative of the senses. Perhaps she passed a street stall where someone was frying garlic and it reminded her of me in the kitchen. Or maybe I just pong.

There's more of course; all the lovely personal stuff and special comments for each of us. I think I've read the email fourteen or fifteen times already.

Two weeks down, two weeks to go ...

Out in Indiyah

Emma's in India. I hope she is having the time of her life.

Happily, she got through Bangkok 24 hours before the airports closed (they are only now re-opening), and even more happily, she was nowhere near Mumbai when those terrible attacks occurred.

She is with tigers, mountains, temples and jungles in Northern India, trekking so high (over 4000m) that she will need to take altitude sickness prevention tablets. In a week or so she will move down near Jaipur with her group to work on renovations and improvements to a local children's school.
Above:Saying goodbye to Sadie
Below: At school on departure day
The world is a big place, and having an opportunity like this to see a part of it so vastly removed from her own is brilliant. She has been preparing for this for 18 months, and has worked hard to pay for the trip herself; this is part of the World Challenge deal. You fund your adventure and you own it.

She's with good friends, an inspiring trek leader and two wonderful teachers from her school. The latter three are there to keep them safe - the group of 16/17 year-olds makes the decisions, does the budgeting, and has planned the itinerary, with the leader simply as facilitator.

I miss Em dreadfully, but wouldn't wish her back from such an experience until she's soaked up every moment of it.

For Dan

Now this is really cheating. No time to post responses and also write posts? Choose one or the other, right? Wrong. Write a rambling response to an interesting post on someone else's blog, then nick it back again and use it as a post on yours. I think I have this licked.

Seriously though, I found myself so engrossed in this just now I thought it was worth a post of its own. Call it a tribute to diversity, a curiosity of the nature of blog attraction, or some perverse compulsion to balance precariously on a soapbox for a moment, but here we go; as previously featured (hahaha!) on Dan's blog:

Hi Dan, it's good to be back. I've been a bad blogger and have't been around for a while. I picked an interesting time to visit you! I have posted my response to you on my blog too - you have made me think, which can't be bad.

I have sometimes wondered why I feel so drawn to your blog - I don't visit many (just too darned busy), but I always like coming here. Our beliefs, our politics, our attitudes are often so different, yet I like reading what you have to say, and I think you are a good, decent and immensely likeable man.

Never has a post showed so clearly how fundamentally different our beliefs are. We have divergent views on so many things. I remember a good discussion on gun laws many many months ago, and here we are again, poles apart, but I hope still friends.

My politics are clearly not yours - I celebrated madly when Barack Obama was elected your next President. I was brought up nominally Anglican, but remain unimpressed by organised religion and too much reliance on people's interpretations of the will of God. I am happy that some people find it fulfilling to live their lives within a stated religious framework, but deeply suspicious of fundamentalism in any form where it seeks to dictate how others should live their lives. Again, it appears we are different.

I was deeply saddened with the result of the vote on Prop 8 in California. Marriage has many forms, as do people. Their way may not be your way, but it is a way, and will hurt no-one who is prepared to accept and celebrate the diversity of human life. It cannot harm your family, and is an attack on no-one, simply an expression of love and commitment. Theirs cannot threaten yours.

Ah, and the big one - human life in its earliest form. I don't like the terms pro and anti-abortion. They suggest some people think it's a jolly good thing and highly recommended. It isn't. It's the result of a hard, traumatic and challenging decision, which sadly, some find themselves having to make under difficult circumstances. I cannot say I could choose it, or would not under certain circumstances, but I will not judge those who do. They have a right to do so safely and without my approbation.

Truth is a flexible concept - yours may not be mine. Fortunately, humans are flexible too, and can accept, celebrate and discuss differing views. Most of us try to live our lives within moral frameworks with which we feel comfortable, and are at least respectful of others' beliefs. I respect yours, and hope mine don't threaten our friendship.

Voltaire said something along the lines of "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".

Sound chap, Voltaire.