How Dare You!!!

My dogs have a habit of getting me into trouble. Today was no exception.

I was out over Bradlaugh Fields with the four of them and we were half way round our walk when Marley - the idiot dog with an unpredictable nature - starts acting a bit fidgety; like something has spooked her. Running along side this specific part of Bradlaugh is a footpath that runs all the way up to Moulton Park and from this footpath emerges a woman pulling a suitcase on some wheels.

Marley does no more than start barking and runs up to the woman. I shouts at her to come away, but she's got a bee in her bonnet now. "Come here you stupid cow, it's a black suitcase!" I shout.

A few seconds later, Marley is running off in another direction barking at some school kids. I start to follow her when suddenly I hear, "Excuse me." I didn't think it was aimed at me, so carried on walking. "I said, excuse me!" I turned around and the woman with the suitcase is heading in my direction.

"Yes, love."

"How dare you!! Do you think you can insult me just because you have dogs?" I really have no idea what she's talking about.

"I'm sorry, but what are you talking about?"

"Do you think it's funny to call me a stupid cow with a black suitcase?" Realising what has happened and unable to stop myself, I start laughing, which appears to anger the woman even more. "So you think it's funny do you?"

"No. I'm sorry but you've got the wrong end of the stick." She's standing there giving me daggers. "I was talking to the dog. I called her a stupid cow because she was barking at your suitcase." And I gave her the most charming smile I could muster.

"Oh." She says as little Ness wanders up to her and starts sniffing her wheelie bag. "Oh..."

"I'm sorry if the dog alarmed you, but I was just telling her she was being stupid; not you."

"You must think I'm mental," she said, but to be truthful I could see how she could get it confused.

"Not at all. Easily done." And I started to laugh again. "My wife is going to find this hilarious."

"So's my husband," she said and suddenly a potentially nasty situation was reduced to a good humoured misunderstanding. She wandered off towards her destination and I walked back to the car, still chuckling.

Thom York ate my Snotty Naan

I remember when Radiohead's Kid A came out. Neil, my brother-in-law, was working at a record shop at the time and when a customer walked up to him and asked what the album was like, he replied, "Give me some pots and pans and a kazoo and I'll knock you one up in half an hour." It wasn't the only funny thing he's ever said, but sometimes the humour isn't quite as accurate or well placed.

King of Limbs feels like it comes from the same pots, pans and kazoo stable that Kid A does. Have this band, the one that did such indie classics as Fake Plastic Trees, Street Spirit (Fade Out), Karma Police and The Gloaming, forgotten how to write a tune? It almost feels like they felt obligated to do an album, so they locked themselves in a studio for 45 minutes and came up with a 38 minute long album - the other 7 minutes was having a fag, drinking a mug of coffee and watching Thom go through some moves for the video of Lotus Flower.

I thought In Rainbows was evidence of the law of diminishing returns; King of Limbs does nothing to change that opinion, it actually reinforces it. I'm betting 99% of the band's fans would welcome an album that they can interact with again.

***

Last night, feeling slightly healthier than I have for a fortnight, the wife and I ventured over to Leicester to see Jay and Selina and go to a restaurant we've attempted to go to for about 5 years. Sharmilees on the Belgrave Road has become something of an Indian food Mount Everest for us; we see it, but we've not managed to sit down in it and have a meal. We had a takeaway from there about 3 years ago; just after J&S got Loki, their little man, and didn't want to leave him alone for the night; but that was the closest.

Selina booked up and amazingly the place was half empty - it's always been packed to the rafters. The food, in a nutshell, is good. Maybe not as good as I'd been expecting, but good enough to make the journey worthwhile - although the company would have more than made up for it even if the food tasted like pig shit. But, and you knew there was a but coming, it wasn't the kind of food that I expected from a place that once had a 'book well in advance to avoid disappointment' policy. My criticisms were few - it could have done with being a bit hotter in temperature; I was disappointed to see the use of frozen vegetables and there seemed to be an over eagerness from the staff, which sometimes isn't needed and can be a way of detracting from the rest of the service.

Perhaps I'm just used to the wonderful food from Pooja in Wellingborough; but I've yet to have a complete meal in Leicester that compares with my favourite restaurant. That makes it sound like I don't rate Leicester; I do and in a big way. I just can't help wondering if it has become slightly Anglicised and has forgotten its roots?

***

(To be read in a blues stylee)

Woke up this morning and wondered if this ongoing bout of metamorphosing cold was ever going to end. I have a horrible feeling that whatever this cold is doing, it's seriously considering having a go at my chest again. The wife reckons its revenge for having avoided everything that's been floating around over the last 6 months - because it will be 6 months since I packed up smoking at some point in March. But I've now had 3 consecutive long weekends where I've felt much less than 100% and this is not fair...

***

It very much looks like I shall be serialising my autobiographical comics book on http://alifeincomics.blogspot.com/ as the bits I've looked at and edited so far have been okay...

The Comic Book Diaries (Prologue)

http://alifeincomics.blogspot.com/

This is the name of a new blog that I am going to be producing*.

It will be many things; a lot of which I'm undecided about. It will, hopefully, be worth following, especially if you're a comics fan; so I urge you to bookmark it for your future delectation.

Think of it as an idea in progress. Skirt round its edge, because I'm not sure if it will bite or not. If you follow my blogs and have no interest in comic books, you might choose to avoid it; but equally, you might learn something about an industry - yes, it is an industry - that is at times so complex and nasty, it makes Dallas and JR Ewing seem positively squidgy and fluffy.

It's an experiment. One that delves into the past and drags it into the present, exposes it and asks whether it's relevant and regardless of the answer, whether it's worth pursuing.

On June 6th, I will have been involved, in a hands on way, with comics, for 35 years. It was on a hot summer's day in 1976, that memorable hot 1976, that I first ventured into the world of comic marts, fanzines and sweat fuelled fraternities. I had been reading comics for longer, but it was that day that changed things. Not all of the following 35 years are relevant, but a lot of them are...

It's active now!

*Never say never

While My Catarrh Gently Weeps

I can tell you the last time I had a really bad cold. It was April 2009. The last time I had a chest infection was October 2008. I have been reasonably blessed with phlegm related good health for a few years (just a shame about my bones, eh?), therefore the current bout of snot related nastiness was always destined to be green, sticky and unmovable.

I sort of blame myself really. I'd had a mild chest infection the week before and had gone to the pub quiz much against my better judgement; had sat in a damp car listening to the second half of Spurs versus AC Milan; gone back to work - sat in an office with people dropping like flies from coughs and colds and then, the day before my big interview at Northampton Academy, my new mate Billy, who works at the Queen Adelaide egged me into going for a couple pints last Thursday night. Roger, my usual Thursday night squeeze was off seeing the Penguin Cafe Orchestra or something like that and with my interview on the Friday putting paid to my usual Friday lunchtime drink with One El, I saw this as an opportunity rather than an excuse to take it easy.

On the drive up to Kingsthorpe, I noticed that the tickly cough, for which I had consumed 18 antibiotic tablets, seemed to have returned, but not put off by this sometimes tell tale sign, I went and had a couple of pints and as the hour wore on I found I was feeling a bit hot, a bit sweaty and a bit pooh. Friday arrived and I knew I was coming down with a cold rather than anything else; so I dosed myself up with Lemsips, went to (and failed to get) the job interview, came home and my health fell apart about 3.45pm on the 18th.

By the time I took the dogs out, I was sneezing, coughing and feeling generally shit. By the time the wife got home I felt like a sack of the aforementioned shit and went to bed before midnight on a Friday night, for the second week on the trot and not for a shag, but for sleep. The wife was up at 4:00am giving me paracetamol and I was trying desperately to warm up. My biggest fear at that point in the morning was if the chest infection came back it was a weekend and I'd just finished a course of antibiotics - emergency doctors are, by and large, massive fuckwits (although I'm sure it's not entirely their fault).

I emerged from bed at midday on Saturday, looking and feeling like something from a HP Lovecraft story and sat on the sofa with a blanket over me all day. The wife knew I felt crappy because I wasn't actually making a lot of complaining noises. Her theory being - the worse you are the less noise you make about feeling ill. There is a degree of absolute truth in that assessment. However, by Saturday night, I'd started to feel like the back had been broken. I was feeling human again and figured that with a bit of luck I could be well enough on Sunday to a) go shopping and b) entertain Neil and Jenny.

And that is exactly what I did on Sunday. I went shopping; prepared the dinner, felt human enough to go for a walk with the wife, Neil (her brother), his girlfriend Jenny and the four dogs of the apocalypse. And for 40 minutes everything was fine. I threw a ball for Marley; knackered my trainers and figured that by Tuesday, when I was due back at work, everything would have cleared out. Oh, how wrong could I be...

As I said, I can only blame myself. By the time the walk was drawing to a close, I'd stopped talking and was getting some anxious looks from the wife. She'd noticed a sheen of sweat on my brow and the fact I was now hanging back. I was sweating profusely and feeling really quite horrid. By the time we got home, the only thing I wanted to do was change my clothes. my winter raincoat's arms had already started to feel damp, that was because my sweatshirt had darkened in colour, as had my green t-shirt. In fact, you know them action films with Bruce Willis, where his t-shirt is soaked with sweat, radiating out from armpits, middle of the back and between his abs? Well, that was me! I was soaking wet.

I managed to get through dinner; our guests went home and I sat, quietly, watching TV until the wife went to bed. I then sat in this office for an hour and had a little blog while my Lemsip kicked in. Monday morning arrived and I felt as bad as I had on Saturday. I figured going for the walk was a mixed blessing - yes, I needed the fresh air, but ultimately it had been detrimental. I watched 2 dreadful films and a documentary (both of which I blogged about) and cooked a veggie stew that was apparently very nice. I couldn't taste much.

Yesterday, I was supposed to go back to work; my second extra long weekend on the trot spoiled by ill health. However, I felt awful, was bunged up beyond belief and figured that going to work would only aggravate a bad situation. I sat and watched some films - The Blood on Satan's Claw which was pooh and Star Trek IV - The Voyage Home which wasn't. By 3.30, I was thinking I felt a little better, so I took the dogs out for a walk - bad move. By the time I'd got home I felt pretty crappy again and to prove just how ill I felt, I opted not to go to the pub quiz - the first one I'd missed since late September 2009 - heck, I didn't miss it when I prolapsed my disc and was quick to ridicule Roger for missing one recently because he was being a wuss...

I sat in and watched Spurs get humiliated by Blackpool and then watched a 1963 Hammer film called The Damned, with MacDonald Carey, Shirley Anne Field and Oliver Reed - what a bizarrely grim movie that was! If people behaved like that in 1963, I'm glad I was only one.

That brings us nicely to today. I got up early to go to work, felt like shit again and phoned in sick. I still have this god-awful sinus headache that has been there now for 4 days and has meant that I've had a headache for 7 of the last 10 days; which hasn't been nice. I'm pretty sure my body has just invented a new shade of green and Catarrh isn't just another Middle East country facing revolution...

And Then They Were Fascists

As I'm still recovering from man flu, I decided that today would be a vegging out in front of the telly kind of day, watching the things the wife would have no interest in at all.

I began the day with the Scandinavian horror/slasher movie called Insane. It was pretty rubbish and had me wondering if Insane was a Scandinavian word for Crap. It was set in a 1960s styled hotel, a kind of reworking of Psycho with little going for it, some very poor acting and editing that was, I believe, done by a blind idiot. Or perhaps the film makers were trying to convey that feeling of insanity? The premise was essentially girl gets murdered by a gas mask wearing stalker; this is followed by another girl being murdered by a gas mask wearing stalker, but not before she manages to send her sister a picture of her standing in front of the hotel. Sister turns up, goes through the same dance again before sort of revealing the situation, with the aid of her boyfriend and then eventually getting killed. It was a truly awful film and at times seemed like an attempt to do a pg-13 version of Saw, except some of the violence was OTT.

Figuring that things couldn't get much worse, I opted to watch the monumentally titled Nude Nuns with Big Guns and wished I hadn't. I'm going to be downright sexist now, just for a few lines, but this film was wrong; totally and utterly wrong. There was not a single nude nun in it that you would have wanted to look at; all of them were a load of munters (I believe that's one of the terms young people use nowadays). Essentially it is the tale of a priest who uses the nuns in his convent to producer top quality heroin; he then trades it with a local wanker, um, drug dealer and every so often the drug dealer gets to take one of the nuns back with him to sell in his brothel as a genuine nun; who commands a much higher price than his other prostitutes. The wanker and his buddies are essentially a bunch of amoral pieces of shit, who wander round their corner of the world defiling every single thing and laugh about it. The clergy, who condone all of this activity are portrayed as money grabbing idiots and all of the nude nuns look like the ugly girl from your school. You get the impression they had about $50 to spend on the actors.

One of the prostitute nuns gets the chance to become the wrath of God and after some weapons training goes in search of all the bad men and blows them away. It is Death Wish with nude nuns and bad acting. There are a number of gratuitous lesbian scenes featuring, one presumes, drug addicts the producers dragged off the streets and just as you think the film cannot sink any lower, it manages to scrape shit off the bottom of the barrel that had been fossilised. it ends with a ludicrous scene involving a dismembered member and a couple of nude lesbian nuns.

Now, to some people, some of the bizarre imagery I've alluded to might make you think that this is some kind of B movie classic waiting for you to discover. it isn't. It left me feeling slightly dirty and a wee bit ashamed that I even downloaded it. it's a nasty, vicious waste of time and you will hate yourself if you watch it.

After all of this I decided I needed to change tack slightly. I had recorded a programme off of Sky Arts; it was called Genesis: A History and as I was once a huge fan of this band, I figured it would be interesting to watch this documentary. The first thing I noticed was that it had been made in 1990, so it was actually 21 years old; the second thing was it was a documentary designed to be shown around the time of the band's second Knebworth concert; the penultimate time I saw the band live and what should really have been the last time I saw them considering how fucking awful it was.

The first thing that struck me was that I was in it. they used the footage from the Nationwide documentary and there was me and my brother Steve standing in front of the stage at Knebworth in 1978 with three other people and no one else. So it was weird watching me on TV, albeit for just a few short seconds. The second thing that struck me was just what a complete trio of wankers Collins, Banks and Rutherford were. Jesus Brian Christ; never have I seen such a group of pious, self-loving, back-biting shits. I mean, I knew Collins was a wanker years ago, but was not really aware that the other two were just as fucking horrid. Both Peter Gabriel and Steve Hackett came off really well and you got the impression that between the lines of the actual words they said about leaving the band was the real reason - the other members were a bunch of smug pricks.

Tony Banks comes out of it the worse as he actually criticises everyone in the band; suggesting that Collins wasn't up to fill Gabriel's shoes, that Rutherford wasn't that good a musician and this wasn't before they split up. Collins just blames everyone else in the world for them thinking he was a twat and Rutherford just seems like he's living in another reality. The first 45 minutes of the documentary was interesting, the second half was cringe inducing, with all three laughingly suggesting that Invisible Touch was the best thing they had ever done.

I remember the second Knebworth concert. I got pissed and stoned throughout the concert. Got tearful during the 20 minute old stuff medley and insulted a lot of people around me by suggesting that pop song Genesis were just a load of shit and any one who liked them had no real idea what quality music sounded like. I really can't believe that I went to see them at Wembley Stadium two years later. I can believe it was the last time I saw them, because they were dreadful and Paul Young supported them and he was shit too.

Apparently Phil Collins has some kind of arthritis that prevents him from playing drums any more and subsequently figures that any chance of Genesis reforming isn't going to happen. Thank fuck for that; it's a shame he doesn't get some kind of throat disease putting a stop to any chance he has of ever appearing on stage again in any capacity. Or perhaps a big fucking meteor could crash into the mansion him, Banks and Rutherford will meet in to discuss reforming and wipe these fucking posh twats off the face of the planet once and for all.

Everything after Steve Hackett's departure should be consigned to a chemical toilet!

And breathe...

Cow and Bungle

I suppose it would be very non-pc of me to suggest that some kind of extinction event were to happen that just targets chavs; but frankly that's what I'd like to see. Some kind of The Stand like flu event that just affects the section of society that need a sign on the toilet to tell them they're facing the wrong way; the section of society that stands around open mouthed looking at some riddled with sugar BOGOF in a supermarket, while people who want to just get on with things have to do slalom impersonations just to be able to keep on track. To be totally honest with you, I could write a list and it would be a long list and the list would include people like one of my brothers; but they should all die and leave the planet to people that actually give a shit. To people who are courteous and conscientious; people who have manners and are aware of the world and its occupants and what they are doing.

Now, breathe.

***

Someone, probably God, must have a really twisted sense of humour, having fucked me over for two weekends on the trot. Last weekend, I had a chest infection, this weekend, the mother of all cold viruses. The wife reckons that after 5 months of not smoking and not having so much as a sniffle, this is my body's revenge, which, if my 'everything bad comes in 3s' theory is correct, then I'm going to be diagnosed with diabetes next week or something is going to happen to prevent us from going to Leicester next weekend!

***

I've been watching this US medical drama called Off the Map for the last 6 weeks. It's basically a bunch of American doctors stuck in the Amazon rainforest (except it's filmed in Hawaii using the old Lost sets) The wife gave up on it because she just didn't find it compelling enough and thought it terribly formulaic; I, on the other hand, decided it had enough about it to warrant further examination. However, after 5 weeks, I came to the conclusion that it was a bit like watching Casualty back in the early 1990s, guessing who was going to be sick and who was going to die. Every week, it was one unexpected death or one martyr like moment mixed with a quirky ailment cured by some rainforest plant or medicine man. You could almost set your watch knowing someone was going to die.

But this week, faced with no pharmacy (emptied in a robbery) and with viral meningitis and an appendicitis, both of which need drugs they didn't have, it was refreshing that both patients survived. The quirky subplot involved a young girl bitten by a parasitic insect who needs a simple course of antibiotics (which they don't have, because of the robbery) to prevent her from developing deadly heart disease which will kill her by the time she's 25, but whose mother is reluctant to let her go to the city hospital because she earns money for the poor family working in the market. In the end, the appendectomy, the meningitis and the young girl are all either sorted or are on the way to being sorted and all are put on a helicopter to take them back to the city. The first thing that went through my head was how refreshing it was that no one died this week; the second thing was wouldn't it be funny if the helicopter crashed killing all on board.

The helicopter crashed.

In many ways it just followed the same old formula, but remarkably, in other ways, it changed it completely by killing all of the patients off rather than just one of them. The problem is that during episode 5, I was about to turn it off and give the series up, but thought I should persevere; after all, it isn't some SF or horror series that I appear to be hooked on, it's just a medical drama - normal TV. I'm not sure what constitutes 'normal' in this show, but I don't think I'm going to bother watching it any longer. It needs something else other than death to keep me watching and with this it seems that death is the only denouement the writers can think of.

Coincidentally, about 18 months ago, we were just about to give up on another TV series when something happened at the end of the third episode that made us stick with it for a bit longer and now it's a must see piece of TV. I'm talking about The Vampire Diaries, which I'm happy to say was also highlighted by The Guardian recently as one of the current must-see US dramas. It, as I have said many times in the past, is bonkers television; it's everything Twilight wants to be, but falls at every hurdle. I even concluded that it's the 2011 version of Buffy, with it's smart dialogue, likeable supporting cast and unexpected twists and turns.

The main problem with Buffy was that towards the of the show, well, actually during large chunks of the show, the most annoying thing about it was Buffy Summers herself. Yes, she was lovely eye candy and without her there wasn't a series, but her supporting cast became far more interesting and you cared far more about them than you ever did her. I don't know if that was purposeful or just a strange quirk, but for me it was the absolute truth.

Now, Vampire Diaries has the same problem. The main character is arguably the most annoying and dislikeable in the show. Plus to make matters worse, the actress is in a dual role. Nina Dobrev plays both Elena Gilbert and a vampire called Katherine whose lives are connected, entwined and inextricably linked. Dobrev's characters have to be in it otherwise there wouldn't be a series, and for the last six weeks or so of season 2, she has been nothing more than a peripheral character and subsequently these weeks have been the best episodes of the entire series.

It is a show with sparkling dialogue, interestingly diverse characters, unexpected twists and turns, a sense of humour and more than a knowing wink and a nod to the aforementioned Twilight. The problem is that Dobrev's characters are now very much back on centre stage and I fear that this will mean a drop in quality. I know there are people out there who have given this show a chance, but ultimately given up thinking it's vacuous and facile. Well, it's worth watching purely for Ian Somerhalder's Damon, undoubtedly the best vampire since Spike and over the course of the series the character that you tune in every week to watch - he's the real star of the show. But also, its worth watching out for Caroline Forbes (played by Candice Accola) - really nothing more than a bimbo supplying blond sexiness during the first series, who during the second season has developed into an unbelievably brilliant cast member - I won't tell you why in case you decide to watch it, but she's like this show's Nina (from Being Human).

It's a show that has vampires, werewolves, witches and warlocks, immortality rings, ancient vampires who are in many ways completely different from the main vampires and a real arsehole human. I'm pretty sure there's going to be a few more weird and wonderful new creatures introduced over the next few years, but it wouldn't spoil it if there weren't. It's the kind of thing I'd recommend for a box set treat.

If I had to choose between this and Fringe as my favourite TV import at the moment, I'd struggle to pick one over the other. However, if you don't want horror or weird and wonderful SF, you need to watch the US version of Shameless. It is arguably better than the UK version and that's a big and bold statement. It's like Paul Abbott has had the chance to do it all again, but this time he's cut all the shit out and just left the excellent elements of the first 4 series. Plus, I believe it is considerably more risqué than any of the UK episodes and that surprises me, but could be why it feels so much better.

***

I met with the spinal surgeon on Wednesday. He offered me an operation but I turned him down. There has been an improvement in my back and leg since December and I want to see if it improves any more.

We talked about medication and I'm coming off the tramadol and going back to co-codamol; I'm going back on amitripyline and we're going to review the situation in May. He was pretty straight talking and made me feel better about my 'temporary' disability. He sympathised with me about crap GPs, ridiculous disability laws and weird nerves. He feels that I should see an 80% recovery from the prolapsed disc, but I'll probably struggle to avoid pain especially when I walk any distance or exert myself too much.

He also told me to be honest with myself about my spondylosis. The MRI indicates that it's been there for a few years now, but my big pain and bone problems started about 5 months ago; shortly after I stopped smoking cannabis. The thing is, most of my friends have known that I've smoked drugs for the last 32 years, with barely a break; but for the benefit of possible work colleagues and other people, I've been disguising the fact in this blog; suggesting that I stopped 9 or 10 years ago. I've got into enough trouble because of blogs without admitting to something that could lose me my job. This was because I didn't want 'outsiders' to know of my drug habit and I didn't want it to be used as an excuse for any mistakes I might have made. The thing is I don't smoke it now and there's a direct correlation between me stopping and the amount of pain I've been in; something that both my GP and my surgeon have agreed about. My lungs might be better, but my bones ain't.

Many people have suggested I return to the drug; maybe eating it or smoking it neat; but the problem is I'm an addict - not of cannabis but of nicotine and I know that if I started ingesting pot in some form, I will eventually go back to smoking it and that invariably means I'll end up mixing it with tobacco and that's something I'm not going to do. Being addicted to nicotine is as bad as being addicted to alcohol or heroin. I always used to suggest that I had a dependence on cannabis; but that was the nicotine talking; the only difference in my life now that there's no cannabis in it is the pain. I smoked the stuff for 32 years, by the time I stopped, I'd forgotten what it was like to be stoned; it was a medicine and nothing more. I didn't realise it until I stopped taking it, but I actually don't want to start again even if it does mean less pain and more mobility. Funny that.

Glass Onion (Part F)

I was asked today how do you make potato crisps and it got me thinking. Making crisps is actually a pretty complicated procedure, in that you literally have to fart about a lot to get them to the stage where you can fry them.

For starters, you need a good frying potato and amazingly golden wonder - of which the crisp company was named after - is probably the best. But the bottom line is, if you want to make crisps this is the way to do it.

First off, you really need a mandoline and that's not a musical instrument, but a tool to allow you to slice things very thinly. You could use a knife, but boy have you got to have a sure hand and a good eye and you'll still never get it as thin. Once you've sliced your spuds into crisps size, you need to put them into some cold water and wash them. You need to flush out all the starch and once you've done that you need to do it again a few minutes later. Washing starch off works, but it doesn't get rid of it all, so you drain the water, leave the washed rounds to drain and then wash them again. Once that's been done, you need to dry the raw crisps and that is a massively time consuming exercise; but the rounds have to be dry otherwise you won't get crispy crisps.

Once you've dried the spuds, you then really need to give them some air and chill them. Put them in the fridge and about twenty minutes later you need to pat them dry again with some more kitchen towels. see what I mean about it being time consuming and fiddly?

Then you need some clean, fresh hot oil. It needs to be hot and you need to drop your crisps in individually, but quite quickly, so that you don't have overcooked crisps and undercooked ones at the same time. You do them in batches and set them out to drain on kitchen towels sitting over cooling racks. You then do something even weirder; you get some salt and crush it even finer - you can do this with a spice grinder or just by putting it into a mortar and pestle and crushing it into a powder; but the thing is it sticks better to the crisps than just bog standard table salt!

***

Perfect rice is something many people find impossible to do and in reality it's considerably easier than making potato crisps! However, there are similarities and the main one is you need to wash your rice!

Let's say you're using basmati; this is a starchy rice at the best of times, so it's best to put it in a sieve and then rinse it thoroughly through with hot water until the water stops looking milky - at times, you might even think that there is so much starch being washed off it makes up an entire grain. Then you need to rinse it through with cold water and then you need to leave it to drain.

The next thing is to boil your water. Now, when I make rice for two people, I fill a cup up with rice and then another half a cup; so when you cook it you need to put your salt (and turmeric, if you want yellow rice) into a saucepan and then add two cups of boiling water to a pan that is already sitting on a lighted flame. Add your rice, bring to the boil, stir and then get your lid, wrap it up in an old tea towel and put it over the pan, then wait it down with something heavy. Turn the heat down to simmer and time for 4 minutes. Once the 4 minutes is up, turn off the heat and leave it for another 8 to 10 minutes.

You should have a pan for of perfectly cooked, fluffy rice, that you can fluff up with a fork. if you haven't, you've done something wrong.

***

Old fashioned mash potatoes

I'm fed up with chefs who seem to think that mash is actually 50% potato and a varying mixture of 50% fresh cream and butter, that eventually means you have a thick soupy splodge that has a vague taste of potato. Mashed potato should be what it says, potato that has been mashed, that has some additives - salt, black pepper, butter and milk or cream to smooth it out, not over power it and turn into a white coronary aid.

So with that all in mind, if you need me to tell you how to mash potato then you shouldn't be allowed near a cooker. but essentially you bring to the boil and then turn down to a very slow simmer until the potatoes have cooked in their own generated heat. Get a masher and do the biz, adding the salt, pepper, and butter as you do the mashing, ensuring that you don't have any lumps in it. You can do all of this with a masher; you don't need to use a food processor or one of those hand held things.

***

Next time I hope to have a really funky paneer dish and a couple of new potato and aubergine curry recipes, that I intend to try out over the next week or so.