Thursday, June 20, 2013

I Made a Chicken Soup So Good...

...I believe it could cure the chicken.

Gaze:


Makes you want to stick your face in it, doesn't it?

Update with recipe, by request: Nothing special here, folks. I wish I could say there was a mystery ingredient—pumpkin pieces bathed in shark urine, or something—but this is pretty plain old chicken soup, at least according to me, who doesn't really know how to make chicken soup. (Note: I was wrong, I DO have a mystery ingredient! Read on!)

1. Heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil in a pretty big pot on pretty high heat. (Note: I didn't actually use a tablespoon. Or any other kind of measuring device. Guestimations are part of the magic of cooking in Chez Little.)
2. Cut up three medium-sized onions. Because your arthritis is killing you, and you therefore can't properly hold an onion for cutting, use a large, heavy knife and simply chop each onion into a few big pieces. If you have a cleaver, use that—because waving a cleaver around makes you feel AWESOME. Take as much of the skin off the onions as you can or care to. 
3. When the oil is good and hot—just starting to smoke—add the onion. Stir with a wooden spoon to ensure all the pieces get that nice hot oil on them. 
4. Take three large carrots, hold them by their ends over the pot, and using quick, hard slicing motions, cut carrots into large pieces, with the result that the pieces fall into pot. Some of the pieces will fly around the room. That's okay. Just pick them up and put them in the pot. 
5. Fill tea kettle with water and turn on.
6. Repeat onion and carrot sequence with 3 or 4 large potatoes and one large zucchini, respectively. Add to pot and stir.
7. Open the cupboard that has cooking stuff in it and look in it, and see what wants to be in the soup. In this case, salt, pepper, dried basil leaf flakes, dried bay leaves, and Worstershire Sauce wanted to be in the soup. There may have been other stuff. Add them. Stir stir stir.
8. Open the fridge and see if there's anything in there that wants to be in the soup. Small pickled onions wanted to be in the soup. Just plop three or four in the pot, and add some of that nice pickled onion juice, too. Stir vigorously—no real reason, just wanted to say "stir vigorously." (Note: See item 15.)
9. Put cover on pot, turn the heat down a little, and let everybody in there get to know one another. A few minutes should suffice.
10. Do you like wine? Me too. Let's have some. I have a peppery and cinammon-puddingy Merlot. Very nice.
11. When the kettle water boils, slowly add it to the mix. Slowly because you want the water to catch up with the flavor, if you know what I mean. You're going to want a pretty lot of water, because this is going to be cooking for a good while.
12. When the water is boiling, add the partially eaten roasted chicken from last night's dinner. Bones and all. It's got stuffing in it? All the better. Push it down into the mix so it's covered with water and tightly surrounded by it's companions.
13. Let simmer for two or five hours, depending on how patient you are, because the smell of this sucker is going to drive you nuts.
14. Final step: use a fork and fish around in the soup for bones. Take your time, get as many as you can. You will not get them all, though, so be prepared to find bones as you eat this soup.  
Your soup is ready! Enjoy! 
15. Holy cow! I just remembered that I do have an awesome secret mystery ingredient! I totally forgot! I added a great dollop of South Coast Providores fig conserve—kind of a fig jam—around the same time I added the pickled onions! (Step 8.) That's what that special sweet figgy flavor was! 
Your soup is even more ready! Enjoy the heck out of it! And it's going to be even better tomorrow!
- This has been another episode of "I Made a Chicken Soup So Good..." You are welcome.

Saturday, June 15, 2013

Lorikeets and Their Ringwraith Babies

These birds are cracking me up.


Two parents, two babies. The babes are the ones giving the ringwraith hiss. (Sorry for the poor quality - the camera's batteries are down. This is via my old phone)



I didn't move fast enough for them:



Note: I'm no 'Lord of the Rings' freak - although I read them through three times as a teen. But I did love the screech Peter Jackson gave to the ringwraiths in the films. Exactly how I heard it in my head when I was a kid. And eerily similar to these 'keets.

Friday, June 14, 2013

Butcher Bird Just Flew Into the House

Our regular visitor Maggie Talonfail - a magpie with one bum foot - just came by with what I believe are her two babies. I mean I know they're babies, but can't be completely sure they're hers, but since she's come with them twice now, and is so confident around them - not usual - along with the fact that the youngsters seem to follow her around, makes me pretty sure. (This ignores that I really have no idea if Maggie is a she - could be male, and could be Dad to the two young.)

So I got some mince, and thereby allowed Maggie to teach her two younguns that we are easy marks, thus ensuring that magpies will be conning us for a good while.

Here's a pretty good shot (with phone, through window) of Maggie (in the middle) with her babes, showing thier distinctive ruffled grey coloring, which will before too long beome the adult magpie's distinctive glossy black. And it even shows Maggie's one lame foot.


While they were here a butcher bird came by. You can see her on the chair arm:


When she wasn't getting any of the mince, she got a bit peeved, and started jumping and fluttering here and there.

And then flew in the door, and landed on a box on the coffee table right behind me:


She hung around for a while, then flew back outside. I then gave her some mince. Everyone's happy.

Update: And back for a snack some minutes later. You can see the little hook on the end of his bill. (More here.)


(That's Christine's concrete snake sculpture behind the butchie!)

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

I'm Such a Hipster...

...my nostrils are actually an umlaut over my moustache.

#hispterking

Monday, June 10, 2013

Proposed New Use of Word "Fire"

I hereby announce a proposal for a new and exciting use of the word "fire."

This proposal would see the word "fire" used as an adjective, with a meaning similar to, but unique from and superior to, the words "cool," "awesome," "rad," and, perhaps especially, "hot," as these words are used—by certain people—to describe things in a positive and flattering way.

Example of proposed new use: "That chopper motorcycle of yours is fire, Nancy."

Note: The italics in the above sentence are used simply to emphasize the word "fire" in this new use, as this is certainly the very first sentence in history using the word in this new and exciting fashion. (You may want to mark this page for historical and etymological reasons.)

Please spread this exciting linguistic creation of mine around, i.e., by using it in coversation with friends and coworkers.

Friday, June 7, 2013

Acquitted: Texas Man Shot, Killed Prostitute

A guy in Texas hired an escort through Craiglist. He gave her $150. She refused to sleep with him.

He shot her.

The 23-year-old woman, Lenora Ivie Frago, was paralyzed, and died 7 months later.

A jury just acquitted the guy, Ezekiel Gilbert, of her murder.

Why? Because the gun industry, which wants everything to do with guns made legal, helped pass a "Stand Your Ground" type law in Texas that allows you to use deadly force to protect your property in a nighttime theft, the $150 here being deemed the stolen property.

American voters really and finally have to choose what kind of world they want for their families. This is a horrible failure of justice and civilization. We may as well still have slaves and witch trials.