Just Letting The Parents Know, I am Looking After Myself!

This is just to show mum and dad that I am looking after myself.

Spicy Beef Stew, I add a curry paste a lady makes from the market to the meat and it gives it some real kick.

Everything ready to go, I remember when I used to cook and not be prepared and would be stir frying something and the recipe would say, “add two teaspoons of salt” and I would just go, “Bugger that” and leave it out. Now I have everything ready to go and I just have to throw everything in.

This was very spicy, but bloody good (I thought so). The girls prefer the stew I make with pineapple. I have been told I have to make that this week.

I often make salads as they are so bloody easy to knock up! Noot’s younger sister Benjawan asked me the other night, “Jay, when you going to make a salad?”

“I don’t know, why?” I replied. “You make good salad.”

I did scratch my head and then said, “You could make, it is very easy.” But Ben replied, “No, the sauce (dressing) you make is delicious.”

Now sometimes I do make dressing from scratch but also buy some and then tweak them a bit. I have shown Ben the recipes for the different sauces but I think it must be daunting being in English.


Spaghetti bolognese is another dish the girls like but most of all is my little princess Nong Ja. Ja loves spaghetti and I actually knocked this up an hour after I had had my toenail ripped off. I don’t think the local had completely worn off but a little later on it ached a bit.

My parents have just returned to Victoria after spending a few months up north, in sunny Queensland. Each year they escape Melbourne’s cold winter and end up near Bowen. There they play golf whenever they like as the course is a minutes’ walk away.

Lawn bowls is another activity they have also taken to in recent years and really enjoy rolling up and having a bowl. The beach is also just a couple of minutes walk, mother can wonder up and down and dad can go fishing off the beach. Apparently this year it was very windy, much more than any other year, so not a lot of fishing was done.

They are now back home for spring, Melbourne is beautiful in spring. My brother’s dog, who adores mum and dad, as they completely spoil her. Each day my brother will drop her off with the parents on the way to work; there she has the run of the house.

Sleeps where she likes, apparently she even thinks she owns the bed at times when she stays over, some evenings my brother drops in to pick her up but she hides and doesn’t want to go. She sleeps in the bedroom and more than likely thinks she is a human and not a dog.

They will take her up to the Laanecoorie reservoir or Lake. They have a permanent caravan there and spend many weekends away there. Other mates have vans there and it is only a 2 hr drive from the city. You can water-ski and fish there or just sit around a fire and have plenty of cold beers while chatting to mates.

Also the grandkids will have missed them, well one for sure. He had already asked mum to go down and pick him up. He doesn’t get spoilt, of course not.

I thankfully have three weeks holiday on the horizon. And I can tell you I need a holiday after working so hard for the past 20 weeks.

Brunty