Culture Vulture

Challenge: To cook 5 different continents meals over the 5 working days off the week. Continents are Australia, Africa, America, Europe and Asia... I'm not separating North America and South America because well- North American cuisine is... McDonalds... and I'm not counting Antarctica because I'd basically be eating ice for the day....

Things Learned / Skills Developed: Learned how to make pizza from scratch. Learned how to make two delicious chinese sauces from scratch. Generally culinary awesome-ness...

Overview / Rant: I'm not a bad cook by any means. I enjoy cooking- I enjoy the feeling of having prepared a meal for some time and then serving it up to others to be enjoyed. All things considered I am a good cook.

Day 1 - Australian Cuisine - My initial google searches wielded results that initally had me intriged... "Chook cuisine"... what was this cuisine- I'd never heard of 'chook' before... after some further reading I established the following helpful equation for solving what 'chook' is...

With this complex equation I ignored the menu I was used to and looked for something a bit more interesting. Eventually I found out that Vegemite on Toast is an iconic food to Australia... Another Australian icon is Skippy... and I thought he'd be fun to eat... so I found the only butcher in Ireland who sells Kangaroo (lovely lovely people- find it here)... and my dream to eat Skippy was finally looking like a reality...

The Woolshed Bar & Grill was the only place that offered Vegemite on Toast... so myself and my trusted assistant went to see what all the fuss was about. I also ordered a Fosters as it seemed fitting for the day.

Both were awful... so far Australia had a lot to answer for...

It was decided that the Kangaroo and Antelope meat (why not?) should be BBQ'd... of course it started to rain... everything seemed to be going wrong...

But wait...

Skippy is f***ing delish! I don't know why someone didn't eat him sooner... antelope was also lovely- but Kangaroo won out as the tastiest. Happy that I'd tried Australian Cuisine for the day, I decided that Day 2 I should move in a clockwise fashion around the globe.

Day 2 - African Cuisine - cooked a delicious chicken and lime sauce meal with cous cous. Surprisingly tasty. Not much more to report here...

Day 3 - American Cuisine - South American to be specific as I feel I have intimate knowledge of North American style foods. Also feeling a little bit tired of cooking- I prepared a simple, yet delicious, meal of fahijtas. The secret is to dice some jalepenos into the chicken while cooking it to give it that extra kick... mmmm... spicy goodness...

Day 4 - Europe Cuisine - Specifically Italian Cuisine... I set myself the task of learning how to create my own pizza from scratch... i.e. making a base, making a sauce- adding topping etc etc. EVERYTHING was going epically... I'd laid the base onto a plate- added the sauce- added the topping... then tried to remove the base from the plate... now- I don't know if you know this about dough... but it sticks... to anything... apparently you should add flour to the underneath to stop it sticking... HINDSIGHT is a beautiful thing (other beautiful things exist here... I wonder how exclusive a site it is?) but FORESIGHT would have been better. Eventually the pizza's were tossed into the oven, in bits, and just left to cook. They were awesome- tasted amazing- looked like shit.

Day 5 - Asian Cuisine - cooked two delicious Chinese meals, creating the sauces from scratch- which is surprisingly easy. A pork and pineapple dish and a chicken soy and ginger dish. Served to family and extended family- positive responses all round...

Conclusion / Recommendation: Really enjoyed learning how to cook different meals. The whole experience taught me that I need to be more adventurous with my cooking! No longer shall I fear the cookbook and it's mysteries...

Next Challenge: Next week is probably going to be the toughest challenge to date. I will fast for five days. I will only drink water, tea and coffee (no milk). It's going to be tough- possibly pointless- but I've always been curious to know what it would be like to fast for that long. I've been fasting now since 3am (was drinking heavily until then) and I'm f**king starving!

Also I'm not allowed drink alcohol for the week (wanted to fit that one in somewhere!) and I figure now would be a good time... mainly because alcohol would probably kill me at this point.

Finally I'm going to attempt to learn 100 of my facebook friends date's of birth. I've been reading Darren Brown's book where he discussed memory techniques and I'd like to try a few out- I figure this would be a good time to try it.

Random Stuff: This guy is a hero in the cooking world...

Diablo thy name be Diabolo...

Challenge: Learn some basic tricks on the DIABOLO...

Difficulty: 5/5

Skills Developed: A devout unrelenting hatred for the diabolo.

Overview/Rant: Firstly- I would have saved hours (days) of timewasting had I correctly learned how to spell the diabolo... my research did bring me back to the original Diablo game, which quite frankly, is better in so many ways than the diabolo. I mean- it had FIREWALL (see below) an entire WALL of FIRE (the writers had a tough day coming up with a name for that spell)... but, seriously, how awesome is that?! Does Diabolo have FIREWALL?! I think not.

The diabolo is also known as 'the devil on two sticks.' I attempted with great gusto to accomplish one single trick on the diabolo... I failed... miserably... I WAS going to record what I'd learned but the video would have only lasted about 2 seconds... including set up time. It was frustrating and soul destroying. Anyone that attempts this should have there head examined. Never in the history of the world has anything as frustrating as the diabolo been invented.

Conclusion: Shit- I've already covered my conclusion in the Overview/Rant section... um... this challenge was challenging and hateful in so many ways. I almost cried. Happy?

Random shit: I finished my Post Graduate Diploma in Education! Fully qualified now (got a first!!!). I also got a JOB... in Kuwait (holy shit)... and I watched through all 21 current existing episodes of Glee -it was inevitable... which leads me too...

Challenge next week: Get a group of singers together. Rehearse and record a song 'Glee' style. Anyone wanna volunteer to join then just leave a comment. Any song ideas? Then leave a comment... and on that note...

Breathe deep

Challenge: To learn Tai-Chi (Tai-Chi-Chuan) in a week.

Rating: 3/5

Skills developed: A small sense of enlightenment and calm.

Overview/Rant: My only knowledge of Tai-Chi prior to trying this challenge was that Angel used it as a very seductive (and successful) move to score Buffy in the ever infamous 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer.' This seemed as good a reason as any to learn Tai-Chi. Also- the name literally translates to 'Supreme Ultimate Fist' which is another awesome reason to learn this martial art.

I feel I picked the perfect time to undertake this martial art as it is renowned for its calming techniques and tranquil methodologies... this coincided with me taking a piano grade 3 exam (see previous posts) and my driving exam... and passing both! Was the art responsible for helping me pass the exams? Who knows? Will we ever know? If life mimics LOST in any way- then the simple answer is most likely no...



Tai-Chi involves channeling your energy into simple, slow, very controlled movements. Your breathing must match your actions and ever action is deliberate and significant. I found a very good instructor online which helps capture the essence of Tai-Chi (see above). Obviously there's only so much you can do in a week (actually I did it for two) but I definitely felt a sense of calm while I undertook the exercises. While youtube is a brilliant resource for learning new skills (or watching cats do funny things...) I can tell that an actual instructor would really help in getting one to understand the heart of Tai-Chi.

Conclusion: Very enjoyable, non-exhausting (then again, I may have been doing it wrong) but very calming. Give it a go. If it's good enough for Buffy then its good enough for you...

Next week: Learn some tricks on the 'diablo.'

Random thoughts: Just watched the finale of LOST today... thankful that I had Tai-Chi-Chuan to calm me.

ALSO- jumping out of an airplane on Friday- first Skydive ever- I'll let yaz know how that goes!
    

Being A Reflective Practitioner...

Right so- it's been a while... My sincerest apologies for the delay- this annoying 'Postgraduate Diploma' was a bit of a hindrance over the last few weeks... but now... I'm.... FREEEEEEEEEEEE!!! And what helped my through it? 





And I would be remiss in not thanking all my family and friends too- thanks xxx


But enough of that... here's the last 5 weeks condensed into ONE post- it's like your getting more bang for your buck.


Week 12 - Learn Spanish for a week


Difficulty: 3/5 
Overview/Rant: Spanish is awesome. I had a lot of fun learning it at this brilliant website found here. It a teaching website that is completely free and has really helpful tutorials. I spent about 15 hours learning the language, which over a week is considerable I think. Completed 5 online lessons and feel I got a good understanding of creating day-to-day verbs and sentences. In terms of getting in touch with my Spanish speaking friend(s), I totally screwed that up with the whole 'life' getting in the way. So yeah- you can give this challenge the olde 'Epic Fail' stamp if you like- personally- I think Senor Juevo more than made up for the lack of success.


Oh- Senor Juevo died after he tried to make a run for it... yeah.. sorry about that... he did survive another 2 weeks though...




Week 14 - Record a song in a week


Okay- originally I was supposed to WRITE and record a song in a week... but yeah- life was busy. I DID write a chorus and verse which were both quite good- but totally didn't relate to each other... so that was scrapped. Instead I recorded a song I wrote about two years ago. Anything which sounds remotely good is all thanks to a certain Mr. Keith Burke with his awesome recording skills and even awesomer hair.


Here's the song- feel free to abuse it to no end. I know it's not perfect- but anything that sounds remotely good is down to Keith's editing skills. 


Special Thanks: Keith Burke for giving up his time to edit the track. Check out his own stuff here. (check out the hair while you're there) Also thanks to Laura for attempting to help me write lyrics. 


*** Note: For some reason youtube is being douche- I'll repost the link once it's working. Apologies for delay.




Week 15 - Buy the Lotto for a Week

I spent a total of €24 on the lotto this week (€4 quick picks in every store I walked into that week). Zero winners. My personal hatred of the lotto comes from the fact that it gives you this false belief that you're holding on to the winning ticket. You're sitting on the bus and you're looking around at strangers thinking "Sh*t, that dude knows I'm holding the winning ticket... okay... just be cool, get off at the next stop and wait for another bus..." 



In future I'm going to spend the €24 on pints, get drunk and imagine how awesome it would be to win the lottery... I might also buy myself a panini with the remaining euros... 


It could be me? It IS me... living the dream...




Week 16 - No Caffenine for a week

Difficulty: 4/5
Overview/Rant: Anyone who knows me knows 3 things... 1.) I can be grumpy, 2.) I can be tired and 3.) points 1.)and 2.) are dictated purely by what degree of caffeine is present in my system. No amount of loving family or friends can replace the caffeine fix I so need. I found this out the hard way... 


Monday - Wake up at 6:00am... "Feeling okay- wouldn't 'mind' a cuppa tea, but sure- I'll drink some hot water." 11:00am... "Man, is it me or have the students got more annoying..." 2:34pm... "Wow, what do non-tea drinkers do with themselves?" 


Tuesday - "No feelings of wanting tea... ha... maybe it's easy to give up tea. I CAN DO THIS! Maybe I should give up tea and coffee for good, I mean- who needs em?"


Wednesday - "Oh my god... what is this feeling in my brain? It feels like someone is cracking open my skull with a jackhammer... I feel ants behind my eyeballs and there's definitely a leprechaun making an appearance in my peripheral vision..."


Thursday - "MUST RESIST URGE TO KILL EVERYBODY!"


Friday -  (Steve sits huddled in a corner) "I'm a little tea-pot short and stout..."


Suffice to say- no caffeine had two major noticeable effects...
1.) I got incredibly bad headaches...
2.) I slept like a baby... (that's to say "I slept well" as opposed to "I cried all night and wet myself")


But... *dilemma*... is a good night sleep worth giving up caffeine... science would say "Oh god yes..." but what do I say... (Steve downs his tea, some of it dribbles onto his chin) ... the short answer is 'no.' The long answer is best said by... 







Week 15 & 16 - Finishe PGDE and get Blog up to date...


DONE... quite challenging. I finished my Postgraduate Dimploma in Education- I'm going to be a fully qualified teacher in a month or so.... uh... god help the children... well guess that's another 2 weeks challenges done... *cough cough*


"But wait one second!!!" (I hear you say with anger and confusion) "We were promised 52 challenges?! Surely finishing your course doesn't count? And updating your blog is a bit of a cop-out?!" 


Well my angry and confused friend.... 52 challenges you shall GET... although I'm gonna have to double them up during the summer (heck- maybe even triple those bad boys) because I'm finding it incredibly difficult to balance them with the rest of my life at the moment- so I'm EAGER to do them- but I want to do them justice! Worry not though- challenges will be undertaken down the line... with gusto (and possibly pesto... dunno why)... and 52 challenges will be COMPLETED... or so help me god- I'll kill somebody...


That's my cue to get some caffeine...


Cheers for reading. Thanks to people who've read so far and please keep sending me on challenges! Mucho gracious! 


Oh- this weeks challenge is to learn tai-chi... 


Steve out.

The piano man

awww... look at the kitty playing piano...

Challenge: To be able to do my requirements for piano grade 3 exam in a week. 

Difficulty: 5/5.

Skills developed: Sight reading improvement. Increased piano dexterity. A renewed love for Meat Loaf.

Overview/Rant: Firstly I'll completely and honestly admit that I took this challenge out of fear of a certain Ms. Susan Bourke who has displayed infinite amount of patience at my lack of piano practice to date. The exam date is May but, as you will see, the pieces are quite difficult and need to be learned and rehearsed for months before the examination date. So I effectively used this blog as a study guide... [insert tongue sticking-out emoticon]

 Theory, scales, arpeggios and four-note-broken-chords make up for 20% of the test and are probably my strongest area at the moment. The other 20% is for sight tests and ear tests, all of which will come over time and practice. SO essentially my key area of concentration was my pieces...

So in order of difficulty...

EASY - Landler in A by Daniel Steibelt... which is unfortunately to available anywhere on youtube it seems. Well- imagine its easier than the other two... [insert smiley face emoticon]

MEDIUM - Wilder Reiter (Wild Horseman) by Robert Schumann... which I found played by what looks like a six year old... wow- how crap do I feel?

HARD - Prelude by Johann Sebastian Bach... okay... now they're taking the p*ss...

Hardest Parts: The left hand section in Wild Horseman and the entirety of Prelude. Also- watching kids a quarter your age doing it better than you ever could is a bit of a ball buster too...

Result: Well... I think Meat Loaf said it best when he said... (and we'll ignore what Susan said about the whole thing... [insert oh-dearie-me emoticon]

Recommendation: Piano is awesome- difficult if you actually try to do the grades. I can't really recommend it to anyone if they haven't studied piano before... BUT to those that quit and say "oh I wish I'd never quit..." then GO BACK TO PIANO! I quit when I was 15 and only came back to it a few months ago and it's the best decision I've made in a while.

Conclusion: I totally underestimated how much work I had to do for this exam... [insert omfg smiley face emoticon]

Special Thanks: Susan Bourke for her patience and encouragement. [insert super smiley face emoticon]

Next Challenge: It's the beginning of MYSTERY MARCH... this is where I do challenges WITHOUT telling you what they are... until after... obviously... or else I'd just have done nothing... an example, but I won't be doing, is "trying to start as many conversations about butter as possible in a week"... the challenges are 'mostly' harmless fun... [insert evil grin smiley emoticon]

Random Thoughts: Meat Loaf is awesome.

This post was bought to you by emoticons... cus a picture speaks a thousand blah blah blah...

Skip me with your best shot...

Okay... so I took some artistic license there...

Challenge: To learn to skip like a boxer in one week.

Difficulty: 3/5

Skills Developed: Basic skip techniques, the double skip, the criss-cross and the matador. This video below highlights the main ones. I attempted the cradle and the backwards criss-cross... but... yeah... epic fail...

Overview/Rant: Firstly- I'm two days late due to Valentines Day, laziness and procrastination (in reverse order of actual reasons for lateness...) Anyway- apologies for the delay... Back to the review... SKIPPING is awesome... wait, let me try that again.... skipping is AWESOME!!! Within 3 minutes you can work up a sweat, you can choose to go for an hour or a minute and all it requires is a rope and room to do it. It requires a lot of practice though. I only for the criss-cross in the final days and I didn't really get the matador at all. The simple single hop on one foot (see video) took me a few nights of practice to perfect. Really though- there's not much to say about it apart from that... here's a break down of the techniques learned- at different points...

8 seconds - double hop on both feet

14 seconds - double hop on one foot alternating

20 seconds - single hop on both feet

24 seconds - single hop walking forward

27 seconds - single hop walking backwards

30 seconds - the skier hop

34 seconds - the double skip

44 seconds  - the criss-cross

52 seconds - attempts the matador

1 min 9 seconds - epic giving up....

I originally planned on recording the techniques with backing music- but I couldn't continuously skip for several minutes without making a mistake... I think my matador days will have to wait... don't want to end up like this guy...

Hardest Part: The matador... 

Recommendation: Totally recommend this. Take the time to learn the techniques and hon them. I'm going to try maintain skipping as it can be done anytime and is a fantastic cardio workout. Honestly- not much to say except DO IT...

Conclusion: Great challenge- well worth the week and something I will probably continue to research to find more challenging techniques. 

Special Thanks: Luke Walsh for providing the new leather skipping rope.  

Next Challenge: Complete the fitness requirements for the Irish Army. There's a one minute press-up assessment, a one minute sit-up assessment, a 3.2km Run Assessment and a 10km loaded march. Check it out at:  http://www.62infantry.com/Annual_Fitness_Test.shtml

Random Thoughts: Maybe someday...

Life's a stitch...

Just a little epic knitting and epic looking into the distance...

Challenge: To learn how to knit and to knit a scarf in a week.

Difficulty: 1/5

Skills developed: Learned how to cast on, cast off and basic knitting.

Overview/Rant: The earliest example of knitting dates back to Egyptian times in the form of decorative socks... which probably lead to the first (and worst) fashion mistake of the millennium.

I began the knitting late Tuesday night with my 'awesome/legendary' mother getting me started with a quick knitting-for-idiots tutorial. She showed me the cast on and attached a row of 50 knots to get me started. (This was the entire length of the knitting needle)

I spent the better part of Wednesday to Friday knitting like a god (hey, someone's got to blow this trumpet). I observed a few things while knitting... 

ONE- women think it's cool

2- guys think it's 'gay' but are the first ones lining up to have a go

c- knitting on the bus is a guaranteed way of not having anyone sit beside you

iv- when you overhear two knackers discussing there up and coming court hearing, its time to hide the knitting needles and get the hell off the bus... 

So Friday night I had completed this much with one ball of wool...

This of course left me with a little dilemma- I only had one other ball of wool and there was no chance of me getting to the wool shop to buy more (plus- €7 a pop! F*8k that) so I had to wave goodbye to the aptly named Scarf 1.0 and welcome in a new era of scarf... it'd be sleeker and thinner than before with only 15 stitches to a line. 

But I was running out of time... I needed something to motive me... something to give me drive... that something came in the form of...

I was ready... I knitted... my god I knitted...

Then I went to a mates house for drinks...

Then I knitted drunk...

After several minutes, of what can only be described as 'epic-ripping-the-shit-outta-Steve,' my friends (who are so understanding of my choices in life...) decided to come up with knitting puns on famous films/songs/people/things... 

Casablanket / Wool Metal Jacket / Harry Potter and the Stitch / Lilo and Stitch / Dances with Woolves / Sow Patrol / Knitty O' Shea / Superstichus / Judge Thread / Knitting Hill / Knitty Knity Bang Bang / Knitwits / The Thin Blue Twine / Heard it through the Grapetwine / Lady in Thread / Knitty Women / Jeremy Needle / Aknitomy of Murder / Grey's Aknitomy / Robert Patternson / Twinelight / Good Wool Hunting / Wool Smith / Hey Yanrold / Yarnold Swatsnegar / The Land Before Twine / The Twining / Knit-up and Wool-ups / Alfred Stitchcock / Stitchy and Scracthy / Last of the Summers Twine / Where's Wooly / Wooly Harrilson / Wooly Allen / Woolfred Owen / Ragin Wool / Come Twine With Me / A F Wool / Wooliver's Travels / Wooliver Punkknit

 

I awoke the next morning/afternoon and 'hangover' I did have (english good speak yes?)... I picked up the scarf which had mysteriously dropped one stitch... to 14 stitches... do I stay on with the 14 stitches and hope that that missing stitch will not come back to bite me in the ass?

No... for a stitch in time... saves nine... *sigh*

I undid everything I'd done the drunken night before. I went back and found the missing stitch... the lucky son-of-a-stitch was reunited with his fellow stitches and together we finished scarf 2.0... Suffice to say...

So I present to you... Scarf 2.0... 

Bored now with having completed my challenge... I then pondered the different fashion statements on could make with a sexy hand knitted scarf... this lead to my next digression...

The 'Fonz'

The 'Rambo'

The 'Chamber Maid'

And lets not forget 'Jordi' from Star Trek

 

Hardest parts: Cast on and cast off. That is all. The rest is just awesome. I gave this challenge 1/5 cus it was simple and enjoyable- THAT SAID... I only knitted a scarf and I'm betting knitting anything non-rectangular shaped would be much harder.

Recommendation: DO IT.

Conclusion: Love it. Expect to get knitted related gifts this Christmas!

Special Thanks: Mum for the knitting assistance. Susan Doyle for the inspirational idea. Thanks to Margaret and Killian McCarthy who offered their assistance and equipment. Thanks also to DaLLan, Brendan, Celina, Erin, John, Kirsten and Alfla for their pun related goodness.

Next challenge: Fitness February is beginning- starting with me getting fit enough to get into the army... or pass their requirements to get in... read more at:

http://www.62infantry.com/Annual_Fitness_Test.shtml

Random thoughts: 

V is for Vagitus*

Challenge: To learn violin and be able to play a popular tune by the end of the week.

Difficulty: 4/5

Skills developed: I learnt the basics of violin and violin upkeep. I also improved on my playing by 'ear' AND I learnt how to upload youtube videos... which take ages by the way... and I learned a new word- 'vagitus*'... 

Overview/Rant: This challenge was very enjoyable. I love the violin and learning to play it was really fun. The string layout of a violin is similar to that of a guitar, provided you strip it of its higher strings and leave only the G, D, A and E string. This makes learning the notes relatively quick and easy, although unlike the guitar you don't have the aid of frets to help identify where to place your fingers, thus making it quite challenging at times. Realistically you want to have a good ear to identify when you're hitting the correct note or whether you're a semi-tone off.

The hardest part of the violin, in my opinion, is the bow technique. Granted it looks simple when you watch someone else do it, but trying to keep the control and not allow your hand quiver over a note is extremely difficult to do. In the end I found I was concentrating completely on the bow and hoping my fingers would hold the correct notes at the correct times. 

A fantastic modern day violinst, that you should totally (like omg) try catch, is Nigel Kennedy. He is a stylist b**tard who has no airs about himself. I got the opportunity to see him perform several years ago and it was one of the best gigs I'd ever been too. During the performance he heckled an audience member who turned up late, "You just missed the whole f**king concerta!," and he played a mix of classical and popular pieces (you can find him doing Jimi Hendrix covers on youtube). A really brilliant showman who makes classical music interesting and fun to watch. He also succeeds in eliminating the pompous attitude often associated with classical music. Here's one of his classical covers of Vivaldi's "Spring." (Those who sat the Junior Cert music exam around 2003 should be pretty familiar with this one!)

Suffice to say- I did not achieve this standard of playing. The melody I attempted to learn was the opening credits to the Buffy spin-off show 'Angel.' Below is how it should sound. 

Take note that the 'Angel' theme is played on a viola which has a lower register than the violin. So everything I play will sound distinctly higher pitched... and shitter... here is what I came up with... we'll call this attempt number six thousand and two...

Okay- so it's far from perfect- but I'm pretty happy/exhausted with it...

Recommendation: Really enjoyable- if you're interested then it's easy enough to get started. There's tons of online tutorials which were helpful and its a very easy to learn the theory to violin. Practically it's as difficult as any musical instrument and will require tons of practice to get anyway decent. 

Conclusion: Awesome challenge- a good mix of enjoyment with difficulty. Seriously considering buying a violin now...  

Special Thanks: Susan Bourke for providing the violin and assistance! I did my best when taking care of the violin... it was touch and go there for a while though...

Next Challenge: Knitting- gotta learn to knit and knit me a scarf in a week! Anyone interested in joining me then let me know! Nothing like a good olde stitch and bitch! http://stitchnbitch.org/

Random Thoughts: The violin is a fantastic tool for demonstrating how the frequency of a stretched string is inversely proportional to its length... aaah physics... is there anything you can't do?

* Vagitus - a baby's cry or wail...