The window of opportunity

My other half and myself both like a good film, we do. And we must have hired quite a number of them because Blockbuster actually sent me a gold card. Wow! Cool! Er, maybe. Anyway, since we've been blessed by the patter of little feet, we've found that it's been getting more and more difficult to see a film from start to finish. The little darling is fine if it is something he likes, but if it is something a little more grown-up (I hesitate to use the expression 'adult'), he takes umbridge and will remove the offending DVD from the player, exclaiming 'basta' - 'enough' and 'non mi piace' - 'I don't like it'. As you may appreciate, this makes the simple task of watching a film into something of a challenge.

We have two options. Watch the said film while the little one is taking his afternoon nap - which may or may not last the length of said film. Or watch the film after the bed time battle - which means the show starts at 10:30 pm and makes for a less than interesting experience seeing as the volume has to be kept down in order to avoid waking someone up. Low volume means that I cannot always hear everything - I do believe that I am slightly deaf - too much loud rock music and one incident on a firing range many moons ago without hearing protection methinks. That leaves the afternoon, during which times baby is sleeping, so same problem as the evening.

The only workable solution seems to be to rent films which will appeal to both child and parents, which is a lot easier nowadays with the likes of Shrek, Monsters and Co and Shark Tale, thank heavens. Otherwise, I'll lose my nice shiny gold card, which would be horrible, or worse, I'll have to put up with the 'telly for the braindead' that we get here in Italy. Not a nice thought.

Lentils and Cotechino

Up, or down, here in Northern Italy depending where you are reading this from, the traditional end of year meal consists of lentils and a meat like substance which goes by the name of Cotechino and, by all accounts the best Cotechino comes from Modena (the place Ferraris come from too, if you did not already know). Anyway, Cotechino is actually meat which comes from a pig, well, I think it comes from a pig, although I have to admit that it is nothing like pork. I did actually try to enquire as to from which part of the poor piggy this cotechino stuff originates, but I was told it was probably best not to ask. My Italian other half does not seem to know which part of a pig contributes to this traditional delicacy, either. Despite being of unknown origins, so to speak, Cotechino does taste good. It is traditionally served with lentils, which are supposed to represent money - the more you eat, the more cash you will make in the new year, or so the saying goes. Alas this does not seem to have come true for me so far, but being forever optimistic, I ate plenty of the things again this year.

I was, in fact, the one who prepared the lentils, using my own adaptation of the way in which I believe this dish is usually prepared (I've had it before, so I could just about remember what goes into it). The lentils (which came from Canada!?) did not need to be soaked overnight, which was lucky, so I just bunged them in a pan and boiled them for around half an hour in salted water to which I had added a stock cube. Once they were cooked, I drained off some of the water, added a tin of tomato pulp, some garlic paste (wonderful stuff), some cubed smoked bacon (my invention - not the cubed bacon - but adding it to the lentils!) and a dose of red wine and cooked the whole lot for a little longer. And although I say it myself, the result tasted pretty good - even my other half said so, after some gentle prodding! Anyway they helped us to see the New Year in.

So that's it, goodbye oh 5 and hello oh 6! And should we say 'twenty oh 6' (we say 'nineteen oh 6') or 'two thousand (and) 6'? OK, I admit it, I don't really know. Blathering over.