Four Your Reading Pleasure

My demanding nap schedule has prevented me from keeping the blog updated the last several days. This one will catch you up on the stuff I found noteworthy over the last while including reviews of four different DFACS along with all new, disgusting bathroom hijinks and an update on developments on the A front. I know!  Exciting, right!

Are You Bananas?

Oh my, lunch at the Northline can be madcap and exciting, especially as we eat there every goddamn day. I was overwhelmed by the 3 types of rice which were available a few days ago. I mean, vegetable, steamed and medley all at one serving seemed rather extravagant. Medley sounded so exotic that I had to try it and boy, am I glad I did. It was completely different than the plain old vegetable rice because, umm, it was in a different spot. Yeah, Northline, giving a dish two different names and then separating them by 15 feet isn’t fooling anyone…well, not for too long anyway.

Hunter Sauce

Jaeger Schnitzel with Hunter Sauce sure sounds tasty, huh? The meat was ok although the breading was a tad mushy and I think they took some liberties with both the word “hunter” and the word “sauce. My “Hunter Sauce” consisted of two insipid looking mushroom pieces. Try tracking a moose for 2 days on two pieces of mushroom. And isn’t a sauce supposed to be…oh I don’t know…liquid!

Nothing on that plate is the colour of food.

L had two desserts as part of her diet plan (yeah, I don’t get it either). For those new to the blog, that Barbie pink shit is strawberry ice cream. Writing about it makes me nauseous so you can read all about it here. Her second dessert was labeled “Banana Pudding”. Yes, it is possible to use bananas in various baked products after they’ve gotten a little too soft to eat and even if the peel has turned quite brown. However, once the inside, edible part of the banana is deep brown it is time to throw it the fuck out! L bravely tasted the feces coloured concoction and declared it “shite”. No surprise there I suppose.

Donuts! Is There Anything They Can’t Do

I’ve complained before about the crap music they play in the Far East. For those doubters who think I may be exaggerating the awfulness of it, I’ve captured a few bars. Click on the arrow below to listen to a cover version of the Stones’ “Satisfaction”. I understand that musical taste is very subjective and some of you may enjoy this version. That’s fine…it just means you’re a tone deaf asshole.

Buckets o' donuts

When writing about our trip to Bosnia, I mentioned that we had donuts as an appetizer at one meal. Apparently, donuts are a big hit all over eastern Europe. The two soldiers beside us (from either Bulgaria or Romania…we couldn’t see their crests and weren’t even sure if those are two different countries) loaded up on about a dozen of the things. They must have been planning to eat them at one sitting because you’re not allowed to take food out of the DFAC. Maybe they’re Military Policemen.

I’m Gonna Eat Like Six Whole Onions!

Ugh...Lentils

So we go to the Lux for dinner a few days ago. They have Portuguese Chicken on the menu. I really have to become more knowledgeable about other cultures. I did not know that the Portuguese liked their chicken dried out and rubbery. I also went for the Saute Potatoes. My wife, Joan, and I make something that looks very similar to these potatoes at home. We call them Mary Purchase Potatoes. Mary Purchase was a neighbor of my wife’s family when Joan was a little kid. Apparently, she was some kind of culinary genius and the first person to ever slice potatoes and bake them with butter and salt. You can’t really over cooked them either. Just throw ’em in the oven and eat ’em whenever you like. Yeah, they’re that easy to make. I love Mary Purchase potatoes. So, why the hell were the Lux version of Mary Purchase potatoes so bloody bland and weird tasting. They didn’t even have a potato taste. What step of the slice potatoes, add butter, add salt, bake did they screw up? I don’t know…but they sucked. Poor Mary was turning in her grave as my stomach was turning in the DFAC.

On the brightside, they had really fresh tasting tomatoes and those little pickled onions on the salad bar. Man, I love those little onions. You can be like “Hey, I’m gonna eat like six whole onions” and they’re like “hey, no way man, that’s crazy” and then you’re like “but they’re only this big” as you hold one up and everyone laughs and laughs. Unfortunately, I had to be content to have this hilarious dialogue playing only in my head as my dinner companions sometimes don’t understand sophisticated humour.

The Choux Buns were really good too. What the hell’s a choux bun? It’s like a chocolate eclair except totally different because it’s called a choux bun and not a chocolate eclair.

A LUXurious 3 course meal.

Bathroom Break

So A was in one of the stalls in our accommodations bathroom the other day and heard the fellow in the stall next to him hock up a loogie and spit. He then saw it drip off the wall of the stall onto the floor between the stalls. This occurred several times until A made a comment that had something to do with pigs and hygiene. On the bright side, spit is one of the least offensive bodily fluids we have to deal with here. Just thought you’d like to know.

The Hurl of Cambridge

White or dark meat, sir? Gray, please.

I sat down with my meal at Cambridge and noticed that J’s chicken looked good while mine looked not good. I’d gotten the roast chicken from the regular steam line while he had the Tandoori chicken from the curry line. So I had to go all the way to the curry line to get some chicken that didn’t look anemic. The contrast is rather startling. While the Tandoori chicken was much more nicely cooked, I’m afraid that’s about all I can say for it. Even Wikipedia knows that Tandoori chicken is chicken, yogurt and SPICES! How can Indian chefs not know this? It’s Indian food… add the damn spices next time, I promise not to complain about it being to hot. For the love of god, I just want to taste something.

There's nothing I can say to make this anything but sad.

A had the spinach. I’ll let the picture speak for itself. Oh, that reminds me. Joan, are Henry and Memphis still eating grass?

A, J and I spend a lot of time together here and, frankly, we’re not very interesting to begin with so we’re sometimes desperate for dinner conversation. To fill in one of those awkward silences, J asked A to tell me about his concerns re: the concrete walkway at the Far East then J sat back and grinned. A very animatedly and earnestly told me that they keep hosing down the walkway to get dust off of it which forms mud puddles that people have to walk through to get to the walkway thereby tracking mud onto the walkway which necessitates another hosing down which forms mud puddles that people have to walk through to get to the walkway thereby tracking mud onto the walkway which necessitates another hosing down which forms mud puddles that people have to walk through to get to the walkway thereby tracking mud onto the walkway which necessitates another hosing down which forms mud puddles that people have to walk through to get to the walkway thereby tracking mud onto the walkway which necessitates another hosing down. It wasn’t as interesting in person.

As A wound down, J then said “And how about those roundabouts“…then sat back and grinned again. A has quite a thing for roundabouts and ranted for a several minutes about people stopping in them and the erroneous signage. He then said that some people have the audacity to treat them like traffic circles. At this point I should have just nodded in agreement but instead, like a fool, I asked “What’s the difference between a traffic circle and a roundabout“. “A traffic circle goes around things, say there’s a park and there are one-way roads around it, oh and it doesn’t have to be round it can be square or rec…(5 minutes later)…the Champs Elysee is a traffic circle for example”. Daft as ever I smirked, “What, is there some international association that decides what a traffic circle is and what a roundabout is?” “Yes” he answers. Holy shit, there is. The scary part is: A knew about it.

Naustalgia

7X4 feet all to myself.

Coming out of the PX we saw where the old Canadian tent lines were. Now it’s just a bunch of bare concrete slabs. I took a picture of my old room for those interested. A, J and I reminisced about the good old days when we lived eight to a tent with a 100m walk to the showers ,unpredictable temperature control and the stench of sweat and ass. Oddly, I don’t miss it.

A’s Breast Intentions

Still nothing to report despite his continued copious consumption of soy milk. We're all disappointed.

Bottom Line

I’ve gotta stop procrastinating and update the blog more often.

“I’m writing a book. I’ve got the page numbers done.” – Steven Wright