How To Care For Wool

I

Impure thoughts should always be hand washed.

Soak them for ten minutes before rinsing thoroughly

until not a spot is left,

except for that bit that is hard and swollen.

Maybe cold water will help?

II

Our love and our prayers have been treated to prevent shrinkage,

making them perfectly safe to bring anywhere you wish,

to do with them as you wish.

If in doubt, check the care label for instructions,

or ask us again. And again.

But please, when you wring us inside out,

be gentle?

That’s all we ever ask.

III

Love should be gently folded & kept flat and neat.

Never, ever put it on a hanger.

When packing it up, at the end of the season

make sure it is fresh and clean

before storing it away, sealed and tight.

IV

My love stretches itself easily, so lay me down on a clean towel

and gently roll it up to draw my tears out.

Unfurl, reshape my love and let me dry

my face away from sun and heat.

I need the dark and cold

to bring back my natural softness.

Or you could do it the hard way, the violent way.

Shake me. Reshape me

And lay me flat to die.

I want this! Freewrite Traveler Typewriter

The dream is to write. Just do it, an inner voice always says, but I keep having an excuse, usually nothing at all related to actual writing; like I need a great notebook; I need a new iPad; I need a new desk with a marble top; I need two weeks off; or this one- I need a Freewrite Traveler Typewriter!

From Uncrate:
Staying away from distractions on a phone, laptop, or tablet so you can think and write is very difficult. So difficult that a device like the Freewrite Traveler makes perfect sense. It has a main 4.76" x 2.75" E Ink screen, with a smaller status screen below it, a full-size, scissor-switch keyboard with 2mm of travel, and very little else. It's constantly saving in the background to its internal flash storage, has WiFi for backing up to the cloud, and has an internal battery that lasts for up to four weeks, recharges over USB-C, and enables the device to weigh just 1.6 lbs with a footprint half the size of a typical laptop.

Starts at US$429

A list

1. A list brought to you by a cute kitten from the SPCA. We went to the SPCA the other day and it was intense. Each animal had case histories, a list of dos and dont’s, an actual character. We were warned that kittens were hard work- and not only that, the expense was equivalent to raising two kids (at least in the Philippines). But there was no harm in looking and hoping that you would fall in love- and be heart-broken- all over again.

2. I think I’m making some head-way in mentally conditioning myself not to get worked up when I read the news. I feel a little bit better not using the NY Times app that much lately- the pain of reading through nothing but chaos, despair and stupidity - because I was able to renegotiate my subscription which used to cost me NZ$40 a month. Today, I read Laura Ingraham’s tweets and was amazed at how easy it was for me to wish her and her kind a thousand painful deaths without even feeling remorse or shame; but I didn’t tweet it! I didn’t feel super aggravated! This is what Trump and Duterte have inflicted on this world- a legitimisation of behaviour we would have thought unthinkable and horrifying.

3. Whether they lose or remain in power (if not them, their minions will), how do we undo this? How do we unsay every horrible thing we’ve said; unthink every evil thought?

4. All this negativity I think has aged me. I sit up in bed, looking at myself in selfie mode with my phone and thinking, my neck looks slack. There’s a crease at the corners of my mouth. And my eyes seem worse. The consolation is when I take my glasses off, there is a comforting blurness to everything.

5. Thinking of putting a moratorium on all clothes-buying for the next 6 months; save all of it for one go at the dermatologist’s clinic; at the dentist (now that getting dental care overseas is out of the question); for customised meals and a personal trainer. Throw in a couple of hundred dollars for pilates classes.

6. Write a novel. Yup!

Red-letter day!

We had planned the dinner a week before, but afterwards, sated with Korean fried-chicken and a ton of seafood, and watching the results unfold on the news, it felt quite apt and celebratory.

Nothing like the feeling that everything is right in the universe at least in this part of the world, where right is right and wrong is wrong. The right party and the right leader was elected.

And yes, I just had to reactivate my Twitter account just to be able to ‘scream’ it loud and who cares if like I said, nobody hears about it. It’s so satisfying just to be able to say, ‘you’re a CUNT’ (though you can’t say this on Twitter of course).

I’m going to enjoy this for a few more days..

What gets your vote?

Since buying a house, I haven’t had the chance to change my electorate- so it’s still Papakura with Doyet and family walking down to Chini’s school to cast our votes (Toni can vote now, how time flies) and it feels like old, old times when dad was running for office and we would all be dressed, smiling very hard smiles as we voted at our precinct in Naguilayan, waving to people, our eyes meeting familiar faces and thinking, is this stupid cunt voting for my dad or not?

Always that small hard knot at the pit of your stomach, a flash of premonition and of the question- how much of your future will ride on the results?

But dad got felled by a stroke while in office and while he wasn’t fine, we actually were but we didn't know it yet. It would take time for reality to catch up with fear, with uncertainty. And one day, we found ourselves at the beach without dad and while his absence was a small, omnipresent shadow, the day was bright and glorious; we were truly fine.

I deactivated my Twitter account just the other day because I realised that the amount of energy I was putting into it didn't translate to anything tangible really; because who am I, a nobody with zero influence, with my persistent stabs at the status quo? The comfort you think you get believing that your opinion somehow counts is outrageously inconsequential compared to how others actually profit from it. Fuck Twitter and fuck Facebook.

And guess what- the majority really don’t vote the way they should. The dissonance has grown to a point where I just give up because you know what, whoever wins, I’m fine. I’ll live. I’ll survive. I’m buying a new $2,000 iPhone when my current one is barely a year old because I could.

But I voted today because I could and because in this country at least, there’s still more than a fistful of hope; and who am I to begrudge others that?

Life is a bowl of (instant) ramen

I bought two styrofoam bowls of instant ramen at the supermarket for the grand price of .99 cents each and was surprised that they tasted really good- like the real thing, if there is ever such a thing as real ramen.

And this is the thing about life lately which is why I’m seizing this ramen metaphor and squeezing every bit of significance out of it until my hands bleed- because what the goddamned fuck is ‘real’ life, or the ‘good’ life or even (shudder) the ‘right’ one?

I honestly can’t tell anymore, and the more I try to figure it out, the more I get confused, or worse, get distracted from the life I’m currently living which is actually really good- like a bowl of instant ramen.

You just need to live it; appreciate it; share it as you’re able; and most of all, to augment it- to make the noodles more substantial, I added leftover (very expensive) organic beef fillet, two hard-boiled eggs and a dash of Knorr seasoning.

Meat

I was late to the party, so now I’m currently catching up with the NBC show Hannibal which you can watch on ‘Netflix’. Never really bothered to watch it until now partly because just by looking at Mads Mikkelsen, I didn’t think the role suited him. But it actually does because if you put aside the Silence of the Lambs film and Anthony Hopkins, it’s a totally different uhm, monster. Haven’t read the book so I’m not sure what age Dr. Lecter is, but having him in a much younger body presents a different physicality, perspective and taste.

Whereas I’m sure Hopkin’s Hannibal would be satisfied with proper China, heirloom cutlery and conservative French cooking techniques, Mikkelsen’s is something you might have at a purposely hushed Michelin starred New York restaurant. It’s the theatrics that can sometimes be off-putting in this show which extends to murders so stylised that you begin to suspect, the show’s set stylist probably also does the food.

And the food! The parade of meat- prepped, cooked, styled and given as much airtime as the murders themselves (the victims after all, have a very close connection with the meat) - has given me a craving.

Don’t normally eat a lot of beef but when we ordered our meats when the 2nd lockdown started, I thought what the hell, let’s get 2 kilos of prime eye fillet (which is also known as beef tenderloin and filet mignon).

Two kilos is actually a whole lot of meat- was able to divide it into three generous portions/meals. I’ve been craving Bistek Tagalog & Beef Salpicao so I decided to do both.

Used two heads of garlic and nearly 40 grams of butter. Fried the beef in three batches- didn't even need to cook them that long. I added two large white onions and dried shiitake mushrooms which I didn't mix in with the beef. Cut up a large potato into medallions and deep fried them- this is what dad did when he made his Bistek Tagalog, though at the last minute, I changed my mind about adding lemon juice because the thing is, it’s never really the same as calamansi.

My only complaint and reminder? Use high-end butter, preferably French. You’d want to taste that creamy, buttery note that melds with the Kikkoman..oh well, there’s two more portions to go.

It's that kind of day

Obsessed with furikake

From a Google search:

What is furikake? Furikake, or furikake seasoning, refers to a range of dried, normally mixed seasonings made especially for sprinkling on top of rice. As a unique type of Japanese seasoning furikake comes in a wide range of flavours, including wasabi furikake (with dried wasabi as a main ingredient), nori komi furikake (containing tiny pieces of seasoned nori seaweed), shiso furikake (made from seasoned, dried, and crushed red perilla leaves), and salmon furikake (with dried salmon crumbs). Furikake may also contain dried omelette pieces, roasted sesame seeds, bonito fish flakes, and even matcha green tea on occasion.

I’m going to be sprinkling Furikake on everything now:
1. Furikake chicken wings
2. Furikake popcorn
3. Furikake crumbed salmon
4. Furikake dumplings (you stuff the dumplings with them along with prawn)
5. Furikake potato chips

Back into it again

You try to believe there were signs- a friend gifts us with face-masks, we suddenly change our minds about going to the mall- but really, there’s nothing remotely pre-ordained about the virus. Sure, it’s invisible, but it’s just like you and me; it moves (transferred really) latches on, tries to survive in its host.

It’s not personal.

Monday

I think this is the problem- we try to push ourselves to do things that are not always inherently natural.

Charred with a hint of soy

We had Saturday dinner at Daisy Chang in Howick. Small menu, the usual South-Asian suspects and from the photos it was hard to tell how big the portions were, because certainly, wasn’t $10 for four dumplings too much? At the night markets you could get 15 for $5.

But I like looking (discretely) around the moment I enter a restaurant, and I happened to see two baos being brought out of the kitchen and even at 15 feet I could see that they were huge. From that, we were able to make a determination that two items would be sufficient. We all ordered fried chicken (I wanted squid but they’d run out) and baos (I picked pork belly). For sides, we had the charred cauliflower stems and fries.

Charring is another big trend and there is something about it that lends vegetables, a perfect foil to their freshness especially when the only seasoning is salt and paper and a modest dressing of hoisin. I would happily be charring all my vegetables except that cauliflower stems or even broccolini are rarely available in the supermarkets. You either hunted them down at Farmer’s markets or grow your own.

I remembered that I still had the Chines broccoli that Berta gathered from the week back as well as half a kilo of pork belly leftover from the week’s previous dinner so I whipped up a dish that could happily be included in Daisy Chang’s menu. The Chinese broccoli were a bit limp now, but they still had crunch, and a bit of peppery bite reminiscent of arugula. To lighten the hint bitterness, a splosh of lemon juice before serving.

Since they were just a handful, I got savoy cabbage which I haven’t had a chance to cook until now, in about 50 grams of butter and sea salt and they’re now my favourite cabbage.

Where you at?

There’s this friend who only communicates with me via What’s App- just a hello or a how are you every now and then for the last couple of years. My response has always been, ‘I’m busy’ or variations thereof. Always that, always busy.

But then it’s true. The world shudders underneath the weight of chaos and continued idiocy and I wince, but it’s far off in the distance, like a clap of thunder on an otherwise sunny day and you wonder if it’s even real. So you carry on because yes, you’re busy.

And it’s beautiful here where you are, in splendid isolation. Just the other day, there were strawberries at the supermarket grown from somewhere down south where there is a pocket of land with a warm micro-climate. Strawberries in winter would you believe? Maybe this is where we should go- do our own thing. Eat and grow our own stuff. Keep the door closed. Indefinitely. What would we miss??

Well, we were hoping to go to the cinema again. There’s a boutique one that opened just before the pandemic went full blast and everything closed; it had individual recliners, only 16 plush seats to a theatre and a discrete button you could push to summon house sauvignon and pork-belly bites slathered in spicy hoisin. The sequel to A Quiet Place had a September date we were looking forward to and then it was pulled out. But then really, just get a tub of ice-cream, a packet of crisps and there’s all the streaming you could ever want. Cinemas don’t know it yet, but they’re doomed.

Lately when I get home, I don’t even glance at my emails. The line has been pushed to the very edge that finally, it’s clear and defined. When I hear my Apple Watch beeping to remind me to stand up and walk for a bit, I am able to think of strategies, refine ideas and remember tasks in those 5 minutes between standing up, walking through the expanse of the office and and back to my station. Not a minute is wasted.

Because I’m busy and because finally, there is clarity in what we’re supposed to do and of my role in it. The pandemic made that happen.

I just wish maybe that I had more time to do other things on the days when everything that needed to be done has been done and I only have my concerns to think about, which I realised, aren’t much. You don’t really count laundry, house maintenance and meals as concerns. I do them on auto-pilot and perfectly at that.

We had a couple of spring-onions from the supermarket and I decided to do this hack that everyone did during quarantine. By putting the cut bulb ends with roots in a container filled with water, you could have an endless supply of spring onions.

I wonder though as to why you would need an endless supply of them- nonetheless, the hack worked. The plants have grown tremendously fast and i’ve transferred them into a jar so they could grow upwards, held neatly in place inside it.

Looking at it, I feel oddly comforted at the idea that it doesn't take much really to grow, to survive. All you need is to somehow still be intact at the core, at the root- to put yourself on a spot, to stay there and do what you need to do for now, because yes, you’re very busy.

Remembering rainy July days from another life

By July, the novelty of new school stuff would have all worn off. The fresh notebooks carefully wrapped in plastic are sodden in some places because it seems, the Batman themed bag you thought was cool, isn’t really impervious to rain.

And so are the new leather shoes, your socks soaked through with regular warnings not to take them off to wade in the puddles- not that you’d want to anyway because you hated being in bare feet.

On nipa shingles, the rain is a constant hum, like a cat sleeping inside a blanket. Then my parents built a new, modern house and on corrugated iron, it’s louder and we used to raise the TV volume to hear the dialogue but when the rain was more intense, the TV signal would drop and we would just turn it off.

How we managed during those days without devices to while away the time is something I could no longer remember, but we did. And I think I just read and read; Le Guin, Tolstoy, Raymond Carver, Asimov, Barbara Cartland, the entire encylopedia, Stephen King, Terry Pratchett, Pearl S. Buck, John Irving, John Updike.

And we ate and ate. It makes me crave for beef boiled for hours in a clay pot with potatoes, cabbage and plantain bananas thrown in towards the end. You eat it with fried fish with a dipping sauce of fish paste and citrus.

And when I was older, we drank and drank. I remember cold naked gin and fingers greasy from fried fish. We start when the rain just starts to peak and finish - or when nobody is physically able to buy another bottle- just as it settles into a steady rhythm until dawn.

I would also take my bike out or my motorcycle and stop in the middle of this high bridge a few kilometres away where one can see the vast flatness of the town. In the rain, it is a different landscape, suddenly full of tall, craggy darkened mountains and deep, black-holed valleys.

Here, I can hardly hear the rain. The rains of the Southern Hemisphere are tepid and predictable. Outside, the suburban street lamps cast a warm comforting glow over low, clapboard bungalows, manicured hedges and neat gardens. I settle into a Netflix movie and call it a night.

Food jag

See how stupid the English language is? If a crying jag means a period of uncontrolled crying or coughing, then you’d think that a food or eating jag would mean a period of uncontrolled eating right? Apparently not. A food jag means the practice of eating just one food over time. For instance, a child may only want to eat boiled potatoes for every meal. Okay.

Using it anyway for what I think it means.

Maybe its the relentless work load, or the exhaustion of waiting and catching for the bus, but everyone knows that sometimes, the easiest palliative is food. Eat whatever you want. Comfort yourself.

Thursday
It started with Spam, fried eggs and rice for Thursday dinner. Fried the Spam pieces the way my nephew Matt likes them- crispy , and it works, making the saltiness stand out.

Friday
We went to the Auckland Night Markets for the 1st time since the lockdown. I had my usual Korean two-meat dish with glass-noodles but it wasn’t on par with how they used to make it, perhaps because the cook sans her usual two helpers, was also fielding orders and serving them instead of focusing on the dishes. Then we stumbled onto an American couple selling traditional American desserts- pumpkin and pecan pie by the slice, giant, red-velvet whoopie pies and a chocolate cake aptly named blacked-out cake.

I got a slice of pecan pie and a whoopie pie to go.

Saturday
We were supposed to do roast chicken with plain rice and steamed broccoli for Saturday dinner but ended up at the bakery in Manurewa run by the most affable Vietnamese people you’ll ever meet who also happen to have a perchance of making fresh fries every time you order. The fried chicken- a Tasty Chicken franchise- was also just coming out of the fryer so we had that too and make it two thigh pieces please!

Sated at 3pm, we decided that having roast-chicken for dinner was too much so that was cancelled (the chicken was later cut-up and made into adobo).

But it’s always weird to skip dinner so at 9pm, we decided to pick up a large, $10 thin-crust New York style pizza from Pizza Hut and who was I NOT to order a side of 8 chicken wings?

Sunday
And on Sunday was our third year attendance of the fabled Nicoll’s Rib Dinner- eat all you can ribs and sides (I just stick to the meat of course), in a gorgeous early 20th century restored boarding-house and hosted by the most interesting person you’ll ever meet, B, who also asked me to make dessert for next year’s dinner.

Burp.

I love winter, but I'm exhausted

It’s also possibly the post-covid lockdown effect; your sense of time is still unbalanced. I honestly thought I was remiss from blogging for just two weeks, but it’s actually nearly an entire month!!

The only comfort (aside from work ironically) is physical like nice, warm clothes. They put you in the right mind-set and like armour, they make you sit up straighter and make you walk as if you don’t have a ton of work on your shoulders (you do!).

I wish I could buy new winter clothes every week- I mean I can, but of course that would be dumb.

Acting cash...

Clae sneakers; Tight Terry Nudie jeans; Country Road cable half-zip knit.

Acting mature

Cole-Haan Zerogrand wingtip oxfords; Barkers wool pants; Kathmandu Merino Awanui Men's Pullover

Acting southside...

Nike Flyknit trainers; Tight Terry Nudie jeans; Kmart jacket

Acting young-ish

Nike Epic React Flyknit 2; I Love Ugly Anton Track pants; Country Road sherpa jacket

Weekend eats (wings and brownies)

Nothing is more satisfying in cooking than implementing a tweak and to see it work, and following a recipe to have it turn out exactly as the recipe intended it to be.

Pizza-Hut styled spicy chicken wings
Chicken wings are my go to every weekend and I’ve done them hundreds of ways in every flavour imaginable, but my standard (or preference) is still the way fast-food establishments- specifically Pizza Hut- does them, which is wings that obviously have a starchy coating, but cooked in a steamed environment that melds that coating with the chicken skin and meat. And to savour that melded sumptuousness, you need to clamp on the wing on one end with your teeth, and pull it out on the other- a clean stripping that leaves you with clean bones you can stack nicely on your plate.

I remembered that I had done this before- coating my wings with flour- but did not do the steaming part; so this time, after dredging the wings in a plain flour and cornstarch mixture, stacking them on an oven tray, I covered and sealed the whole thing in foil. Into the oven it went at 180 degrees for about 40 minutes. Took them out, removed the excess liquid some of which I mixed with the buffalo sauce (butter and sriracha), coated them in the sauce and put them back in.

Now, this would’ve been a near-perfect turn-out save for one tiny thing- I should’ve covered the wings wth the foil and steam-baked it about 20 minutes more (after which you can take off the foil and change the oven setting to grill).

But it was damn near perfect so not complaining.

Butterscotch brownies
I’m always shocked at the amount of sugar that goes into baking cakes, pastries and desserts. But when I cut the amount down, I’m disappointed at the taste; I can immediately tell it’s really not the same.

So this time, following this recipe by Melissa Clarke, I decided to be faithful to the ingredient amounts to achieve what Melissa describes as brownies as sweet as candy and almost (with) enough dark brown sugar to make your teeth ache. But not quite.

RECIPE HERE.

Brownies are probably one of the 1st things I’ve ever attempted cooking as a child and I can remember the results of those attempts which clearly showed that the outcome always depends on your ingredients- we never really had quality flour back then and as for the butter, it was such a luxury that we made ours last. To use 225 grams in one go back then would’ve meant a walloping from my mother.

But in this recipe, it’s all in-two sticks of butter, chocolate, organic pecans and 2 1/4 cups of brown sugar, packed in.

The result is exactly what Melissa described; chewy, candy-like with more of that molasses kind of sweetness, and decadently oily from all that butter.

(photos taken by the Lumix G9, with a Lumix G 25mm F1.7 lens)

Be extra

Added compound dark chocolate and pecans

More extras

Four tablespoons of chocolate Baileys mixed with espresso

Use a bigger pan

This was a 9x7 inch baking pan and clearly not big enough

Candy-like

First day back

LUNCH. Last night’s leftovers of grilled boneless chicken thighs and spiral pasta and anchovies

Well not really. I just had to go in for a workshop-meeting with a project manager and we finished just before lunch. I did bring lunch so I stayed a bit enjoying the AC now doing a nice even heat; fixed up one of the girl’s Adobe account; fixed up my desk which didn’t really need that much fixing because I sorted it all out before lockdown. The coffee machine wasn’t turned on though so had to do instant which is fine. I also needed to wash my coffee cups and plates because we weren’t doing a washing-machine run.

But that’s fine.

In fact, everything is fine. Without going into specifics, the company is fine- it had the foresight to prepare for a financial downturn of some sort- and the whole country is relatively fine.

New Zealand is going back to Alert Level 1 next Wednesday after one week of no reported cases of Covid-19. We’re officially going back to the office Wednesday as well and I could already hear the groaning of some people who are loathe to exchange their comfy sweats for office clothes.

WORK ESSENTIALS (lol): Armnani Exchange progressive glasses by OPSM; Bailey Nelson prescription sunnies; Prada Pour Homme; Khiel’s Oil Eliminator spray; anti-bacterial gel; Auckland Transport card (coz commuting is better than driving).

Spotlight

Three weeks ago, on my I’m-Going-To-Do-A-Million-Things-While-In-Lockdown binge, I obsessed on buying a starter sewing-machine and taking up on my Project Runway fantasies.

Frankly, I would’ve probably struggled even doing hemming for my pants which is perhaps the only thing I would’ve used them for anyway. Today at Spotlight helping Mary hunt for a specific set of knitting needles, the discounts for a variety of sewing machines became even steeper, even reaching 40% for some pretty good overlocker brands.

But I held my attention deficit disorder in check- there’s a SHITLOAD of other important stuff you need to do first I told myself, passing by bolts of cotton, jacquard, wool and tartan.

I remember my mother buying a sewing machine once when we were kids with exactly the same aspiration, as she had grown up, a beautiful, doted on, only child whose dresses were sewn for her by loving aunts and family friends. And all she ever made were curtains, I swear to God, unless I’m remembering it wrong!

Imagine- goddamned curtains- when you can buy them now in any set size, shape and length, all ready to put up.

So it’s a sobering reality check really to know that for some things, it’s never just enough to buy the tool in order to learn the trade.

Sunday eats

I like oatmeal cookies and I like raisins = oatmeal raisin cookies.

This recipe is from here; and I was wanting chewy which is why when I find myself on Queen Street in Auckland’s CBD, I always buy a couple of Mrs. Higgins Rum Raisin cookies which sadly, they don’t seem to make anymore (I also love Rum Raisin ice cream).

But portioning the dough is tricky as I don’t have enough cookie-making experience to know what constitutes a ‘tablespoon of dough’ which doesn’t make sense when dough is neither a liquid nor a powder. And portion is crucial to this recipe especially when you need to refrigerate the dough for a bit so that it doesn’t flatten out really quickly in the oven; and that it bakes for only 12-15 minutes at 170, leaving a centre that’s supposed to be the chewy part. But I had to do what I had to do and the dry stickiness of the dough actually made it easier to form uniform shaped balls.

The dough did bake within the prescribed 12-15 minute period but I extended it a bit to like 20. I also switched the two trays because even if the partition was exactly in the middle, the lower tray cooked faster.

Was it what I expected? Not really. I could taste what seemed like baking soda (even if I had used only a teaspoon). The centre was chewy yes, but not as gooey rich as I hoped.

I may do this again, but will find another recipe.

(photos taken by the Lumix G9, with a Lumix G 25mm F1.7 lens)