Go long

Sometimes it pays to play a slightly longer game. Too often the temptation for many people – myself included – is to go for the instant gratification, for what works right now, with little regard for how things are going to pan out further down the line. Of course, the flipside of this is being overly cautious, waiting and seeing for just that little bit too long, and ultimately going nowhere; generally something which you only realise in retrospect, or as you see that opportunity passing you by, kicking up a dust of ‘what if’s and ‘if only’s. And then, inevitably, there’s the question as to how to make a call between waiting it out and seizing the opportunity when it presents itself. As far as I know – and I’m very willing to be corrected on this one – this is only something learned with experience, through making both mistakes and welcome discoveries.

This is something which I ended up musing on as I undertook a task which could be used as an example of the benefits of taking time over things and knowing that this will improve the end result. Or at least it could if your mind works in a similar way to mine – a rather big and probably implausible ask.

I was shelling pistachios.

Definitely not something to be entered into if you’re looking for instant gratification. There are shells which need to be pried open, including ones which haven’t quite split enough, leaving you with that dilemma of working at them and risking pistachios springing out suddenly and ending up halfway across the kitchen, or conceding defeat and discarding a perfectly useful and tasty nut. Oh, it’s a hard life.

I could have bought them pre-shelled, but the principle of paying extra for something which I could achieve for free just sat wrong with me. And besides, I had the time. It was a Sunday, the kitchen was entirely mine, and Lucinda Williams was playing on my iPod. I did persevere, and along with chipping my recently applied (and in hindsight, ill-advised) nail varnish, I was rewarded with the perfect complement to the white chocolate chips which were to be added to my cookies.

Put a lid on it

I recently had a spate of activity in which I did a lot of those stupid jobs which you know you need to do, and you know will take up a negligible amount of your time but somehow you never actually, well, do. Apologies for the amount of italics in that last sentence…I often think in italics, which I don’t think is a normal thing to do. It’s not, is it? Hmm.

But anyway, I was on a roll. I deleted a load of duplicate songs off my iPod which was both satisfying and disturbing as in the process discovered that I have a disproportionate amount of Elton John on there. I know, Elton John. I was as confused and upset as you, not least because his songs outnumbered ones by Pink Floyd fairly comfortably. In addition to being brutally confronted with my questionable taste in music, I also registered with the local doctor’s surgery (despite having lived in this area for over 6 months) and cleared out a lot of old magazines from my room. I was definitely on a roll, and, spurred on by this burst of productivity, I decided to do something else which I’d been meaning to get round to- baking something to take into work.

I’d been mulling over taking some kind of baked good in for a while, but had always stopped short due to the fact that my office has a culture of certain people bringing in baking and as an intern I didn’t want to step on anyone’se toes by bouncing in in my second week with a tin brimming with tasty treats. What if one of the established bakers took offence? What if I managed to get myself embroiled in some kind of confectionary war of attrition? Or, on the other hand, what if they didn’t like what I’d made? Of course, these scenarios are melodramatic, unlikely and really quite silly, but these elements of my personality have a habit of coming out when I’m engaged in things involving butter, sugar and eggs. Please don’t ask why (to be honest I’m a little scared to find out).

Two months down the line, however, I was riding a wave of small achievements and decided that it was time to roll up my sleeves, preheat the oven, and make some cookies.

Beat it.

I had an unexpected bit of fun whilst I was baking this week – not that being in the kitchen messing around with butter, sugar and flour isn’t already fun, obviously. But an intially irritating moment ended up reminding me about the enjoyment very simple things can bring.

I’d been planning the cookies for most of the day at work, as you do. I knew I had the ingredients, I knew I had the time to chill the dough for long enough before baking it. It was so on. Once I was back home I merrily weighed out my butter, sugar and spices, placed them in my mixing bowl and prepared to inflict some serious hand-mixer action on them.

Or not.

I can only assume the fuse in the plug has gone, because despite my best efforts (unplugging it then plugging it back in…and maybe a few verbal threats) the bloody thing wouldn’t go. It didn’t even make that noise that electrical appliances make when they’re trying to work, they really want to, but it’s just so hard. Nope. My mixer was, for want of a better word, buggered.

Which really left me with no option but to beat the stuff together myself; the other option was separating butter, two kinds of sugar and various ground spices and returning them to their respective packaging. I’m obsessive, but even I draw the line somewhere. Thankfully I’d softened the butter beforehand, so was only slightly out of breath by the time I’d produced a butter-sugar combination which was to my satisfaction.

Thank goodness I hadn’t been planning to make meringues.

Cranberries Part II

It’s Sunday morning, and I wake up, not to the sound of Jon Humphrys interrogating a politician or James Naughtie insulting one, but because I am ready to wake up. My body is happy with the amount of sleep I have had, and is allowing me to open my eyes and face the world without being rudely forced into it by the Today Programme. (Incidentally, have you ever listened to the Today Programme whilst half asleep? I find it to be like drifting in and out of some bizarre alternate universe where all you’re allowed to talk about is politics. But maybe that’s just me…it probably is) Today, I can take as long as I want in the shower – or at least until my flatmates start getting irritated. I can savour a mug of tea, brewed for a decent amount of time and not [gingerly] slurped down as fast as my scalded mouth will allow. The sun is shining, the birds are singing (the railway next to my flat tends to drown them out, but I’m pretty sure they are), and the day stretches in front of me like a road waiting to be travelled. I can do anything, I can go anywhere… I am invincible.

 

Or at the very least, I’m going to bake some cookies.

And then I’m going to pile them up on a chopping board and take a picture of them. Because it’s a Sunday and I can.