Cooking

Last night I cooked myself goulash. It was amazing. I would like to think that it was because of cooking skills, but I think it's mostly due to reading the Hairy Bikers recipe. I had some lamb pieces and was going to make myself a lamb tomato/garlic dish with pasta. But as I was cooking the lamb, I thought 'Will, why don't you make some goulash?' and I replied 'Yeah, that's a great idea, I even have the caraway seeds and potatoes'. So I did. Hmm, reading that back over, I realise that I have just come across as having a split personality. While I do speak to myself when I'm alone, I don't really have conversations. I just say odd words or sing a few lines of songs. Anyway, the goulash was really nice and I had enough left for lunch, which I have just eaten. Bare good. When I went to Hungary with Uni, I basically lived off the stew. That was a cool trip. I used to be a big drinker then too. We would work 8 hours on the archaeological site, then go straight to the pub and I'd drink 6 pints of Stella. Everyday for a month. Weird. I can't stand beer now. The Hungarians we used to hang out with used to brew there own Palinka, which is a brutal fruit based spirit. It's like alcoholism in a bottle. We were hanging around the table and the talking switched to dares. I get surprisingly confident when it comes to dares, since I don't really care about much. Suffice to say, my friend dared me to drink 8 shots of palinka, in a row. I think the stuff was about 60%, because it was moonshine stuff. Not being the type to turn down a challenge, and living by my mum's mantra 'Always give into peer pressure; it makes you more popular', I happily accepted the dare. My friends lined up the shot glasses and I went for it. By the 7th shot, I was beginning to choke up. The 8th went down awkwardly, but it went down all the same. I just sat there and my friend's were like 'Cool, now what should we do?'. I looked around and I knew that I had earned the respect of my peers, particularly the stoic Hungarians and somber Scandinavians. Things weren't really going so well though. My stomach was really not happy. The alcohol was beginning to affect me too. My body was going into defense mode. It knew that it had been poisoned and that there was only one way to fix this situation - by vomiting. Thankfully, I had enough willpower over my body that I didn't vomit there at the table. My friend, Rich, looked at me and said 'Will, are you ok? You're visibly sweating'. I wasn't ok... 5 minutes ago I had drunk a lethal amount of homemade Hungarian spirit. I looked at Rich and grunted 'Er, no, I'm going home'. I stood up and stumbled out. I walked past another friend who was entering the pub, 'Hey Will, where you going?'. I looked up at him and grumbled 'home, uhhh'. Fortunately, he was a good friend and he left me alone, which is what I wanted. I got into my apartment block and crawled up the stairs. I felt my stomach was going mental. For some reason, I went to my room, instead of the communal toilets. I lied down on the bed and that's when the spinning started. It was hell. It like like my brain was metaphorically spinning at 500 rpm in my head. That was the final straw, my willpower was failing. I lurched up and ran to the toilets, I started vomiting before I reached the toilet bowl, but the majority went in. I stumbled back to my room and my bed. The process of bed/toilet repeated about 4 times in total.

It was a horrible experience. I don't really drink much nowadays, it just makes me feel really ill. There are a lot more drugs out there that are better for you. Though, I do still drink cider. That stuff is amazing. I don't understand why anyone drinks beer and not cider. It's like apple juice. Jaegarbombs are pretty nice too.

This is the only photo my Hungary field trip. I'm not even in the photo.