In true heroic failures department, as usual, our Christmas plans got trashed, skewered, and shot down in flames, all in one foul swoop.
But in the end we still had a great day, just the husband the daughter and I for a change seeking peace and happiness with just each other. Not the usual type of day you understand but one never the less very much enjoyed.
As I lurked at the end of the day on Facebark, I noticed many complaining about eating too much or concerned a year’s worth of healthy eating an exercise had just gone down the drain due to one day’s worth of happy binging. Crap I say. What’s the point of living if once in a while and especially on the big day, you can’t proceed to happily toss all good intentions out the window and ‘explore’ different food options? Now I realise that a couple of tim tams and a bacon loaded sandwich might not be everyone’s ideal breakfast but let’s face it folks, on the mother of all blow out days it certainly covers the whole sugar, salt, fat end of the food pyramid nicely and gives clear warning to your digestive track it is in for one hell of a work out.
I can say for sure that this year I out did myself in the meat department. You may not be too aware of the humble pickled pork that haunts some butchers. It is ridiculously cheap and easy to turn into something that will have family members forgetting all about the good will thing in the battle to the death over the mind melting results. The recipe is so simple it’s almost cheating. Get a large container throw pickled pork leg into it along with a whole jar of honey and a little oil to keep the honey runny. Throw in the fridge and apart from turning regularly, completely ignore for about twenty four hours.
Then grab yourself one of those throw away tin foil baking trays, because who wants to clean? It’s Christmas! And throw into an oven at about 150 degrees for as long as it takes to have it almost cooked, that will depend on how big your leg is so you are on your own there. For the last half an hour to forty five minutes amp up the heat to about 220 degrees to make sure you have murdered all the nasty gremlins that have a habit of lurking in pork and then let it cool overnight in the fridge.
What you end up with is a heinously tender, moist ham, laced with a hint on honey. The kind of meat that will have you smirking with derision forever after at the offerings of ‘premium’ legs of ham from else where.
The goodies where greatly appreciated this year, with the final one, a lens hood for my camera turning up from overseas on Christmas Eve, along with that the wicked tripod, the framed enlargement of one of my favourite pics as seen at the end of here, and the final present the one most likely to help me not loose my mind in the coming year. Rechargeable batteries for my mouse, plus a reserve set for emergencies.
Naturally I am blaming myself for the constant near biblical rainfall in my part of the world because usually even just the mention of walking out the house with camera in hand can produce a downpour. I guess nature is really just getting it’s groove on seeing as I am now accessorised to bits in that department. From my uneducated guess after viewing the rain radar and various weather forecasts those in the know also have Boxing day at somewhere around invest in a tinnie or commence building an ark. Immediately. Child size life preservers for family pets would be a good idea too. However, I am at this very moment working on a completely valid and plausible reason why we should all venture out and about today. My camera coming along naturally….just in case.
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| To give you an idea of the dimensions, the pearl is about 6 -7 mm in diameter. |
