It feels just too cold to write anything meaningful
this week, but I will try. My fingertips
hurt when I type, my collarbone aches from a nasty break a number of years ago,
my kneecaps groan as I flex my legs to try and stay warm.
According to the weather report, it is a cool 7°C outside,
but if you read the fine print, well… it feels like 3°C, with snow predicted for the next three days. Fun… Not.
Now I know there are colder places out there. It only takes a quick Google search
for the coldest place on earth to make me feel truly grateful that TVoR did not
apply for a job in Vostok, Antarctica; the Russian research station that holds
the dubious honour of being labeled the coldest place on earth.
Jobs anywhere in Russia, Greenland or Canada would
also be frowned upon at this stage, for that matter! When we got married, I said I’d follow him
anywhere. I have since written in some
serious caveats into our contract!
Truth be told, it really does not matter too much
how warm or cold it is elsewhere. Point is, I am not there so I can only comment on what I am experiencing now or have
experienced in the past.
So, at the moment, in Amman, Jordan, I am
absolutely freezing. It is bitterly
cold, wet, grey and nasty outside. The
wind is howling through the cracks in the windows. (For some strange reason, the windows do not shut properly, hence the
eerie howling that makes it seem that much colder) My supplies of hot chocolate are running
dangerously low, I have finished all the lovely lentil and bacon soup I had
prepared earlier and the only ready-to-eat food I have to nibble on right now
are some red apples and two sad looking pomegranates – not exactly my idea of
deliciously warm comfort food!
But I have a plan:
we have invited Andrew and Emily over for a curry evening tomorrow, so I
will have an excuse to cook comfort food to my heart’s content! Looking forward to a belly-warming lamb Rogan
Josh curry with sambals and coconut rice, with a milder (if I can control my urges to add too many spices) chicken Balti for
Emily.
I have spent two days looking for poppadoms, to no
avail, so we will have to substitute poppadoms and naan with regular old
toasted olive bread, but I am sure it won’t make too much of a difference to
the meal.
I consider myself to be quite a decent cook. Not chef-standard, understand, but a pretty
reasonable cook in my own right. The one
dish I cannot make, however, is rice. Lucky
for me, TVoR hates rice, so I mostly get away with this gaping hole in my
cooking repertoire. But what is a good
curry without fluffy white rice or fragrant coconut basmati rice, so, attempts
will have to be made later today to try and perfect the rice-situation.
Let’s hope the rice fairies take pity on my frozen
fingers, aching bones and creaking kneecaps and help produce a perfect rice
dish to accompany tomorrow’s curries!
And now you must excuse me, I have to go find
another layer to add to the three layers of clothes I am already wearing…
“Winter
is nature's way of saying, "Up yours.”
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