Minnie the Wonder Bunny

When I was a wide-eyed early twenty-something, I moved from my hometown of Auckland to Sydney to work at a hotel in King’s Cross and no, it wasn’t offering ‘private client services’. At work, I made many wonderful friends, most of whom were gay because (a) the hotel industry is known for being a pink profession and (b) this particular hotel was located within a stone’s throw of the gay mecca that is Sydney’s Oxford Street.

My education there was manifold. The (male) switchboard manager knew more about face creams than I did and during Mardi Gras another manager offered me a ‘bonus’ of those little tablets that would make you see the good side of Ted Bundy, serial killer. I declined. Perhaps Obama is right when he says we need to regulate bonus structures.

One of my best friends from that time was a Japanese girl called Kay. If there was a gay man in the room with her, she was prone to fall in love with him. If the man was straight, she wasn’t interested. Kay was one of those girls who thought that her special breed of love could make  a gay man straight so, as she lived in the gay capital of Downunder and worked in a predominantly gay environment, she was in a near-constant state of heartbreak.

One day, Kay went shopping at a big weekend market down by Chinatown. There, she spied a rabbit in a cage and stopped to stroke it, thinking it was a pet. The Chinese stallholder was keen to make a sale, chatting away about rabbit preparation techniques. Realising that the caged fluffball was ‘fresh meat’ destined for someone’s dinner plate, Kay was horrified, quickly pressing a crush of dollars into the stallholder’s hand in a bid to save the rabbit’s life. And so, a bunny named Minnie went to live with Kay in an apartment overlooking Rushcutter’s Bay.

At work, Kay kept us all intrigued by her tales of house-training the rescue bunny and from her brightened eyes we could tell that this was one love for Kay that wouldn’t be returned to sender. Then, one day Kay (and Minnie) invited me over for lunch.

I already knew that Kay’s landlord had a no-pets policy, so we’d have to be discreet about Minnie’s existence, but hey, how much noise can a rabbit make? I wondered. As Kay prepared a delicious Japanese lunch in her tiny steam-filled kitchenette, I watched Minnie. At first, she lay full-length along the top of the sofa, looking at me hard with her stony little eyes. I wondered what she was thinking because she was definitely thinking something. It was as if she was trying to work me out in the same way as I was trying to get her measure. You have to realise that this was no ordinary bunny. To this day, I’m sure she didn’t like me.

A little later, Minnie moved, jumping down to the ground and across the pristine living room carpet to the bathroom. Then she jumped up onto the toilet seat.  

“Kay, I think we have a problem,”

I called through to the kitchen,

“Minnie’s on the toilet seat. Should I get her down?”

“Oh, no, don’t worry about that. She probably just needs to go.”

“To go?”

“Yes, you know. To go pee pee or something. Didn’t I tell you she was house-trained?”

“Well, yes,”

I replied,

“But I thought you meant house-trained like cats with kitty litter and stuff.”

Kay laughed at my lack of sophistication.

“No, no. Kitty litter stinks. This way is better because I can flush. More hygienic.”

Meanwhile, I’d watched open-mouthed as little black rabbit poo pellets fell straight from Minnie’s bottom into the bowl of the toilet. When she was done, she jumped back to the floor and headed for a patch of sun to bask as bunnies of leisure tend to do. Apparently.

Kay and I sat at her tiny table, chatting over our meal,  the rabbit dozing nearby. As we polished off the home-made red bean dumplings with some green tea, Kay suggested we go for a walk. With Minnie. Images of rabbits disappearing down holes, never to be seen again, flooded my head.

“Are you crazy?”

I said,

“She’ll get lost!”

“No, no, don’t worry about that,”

Kay reassured me,

“I’ll just put her on the lead.”

An already surreal afternoon was about to intensify as we smuggled Minnie out of the no-pets building and let her bounce along at our feet as we walked to Rushcutter’s Bay.

Minnie’s collar was regular enough. Kay had managed to find a little pink one with a bell – something you’d usually see on a cat. But she hadn’t yet located a store with little pink leads, so Minnie was currently tethered to her adoptive mother by a length of pink curling ribbon.

“Minnie’s a girl so she has to have pink.”

Kay explained. That’s when I thought I’d seen it all.

A couple of years later, I was living in London and there I received a letter from Kay. On opening the envelope, out dropped one of those photos with a printed greeting down the side. The photo was of Kay’s wonder bunny and the greeting said:

Dear Friend, I am sad to say that my daughter, Minnie has now passed away. Thank you for being a friend to her during her short life.

Oh, my sainted trousers, I’d just received a death notice for a rabbit! Now, that sort of thing doesn’t happen every day. Poor Kay was devastated. There would be no more bunny plops to flush in her loo and the little pink collar with the curling ribbon need was no longer required. On the other side of the world, I smiled as I remembered the day when I first met a toilet-trained rabbit and took it for a walk in the park.

RIP Minnie.

Patronage at a Venetian Palazzo – The Peggy Guggenheim Collection

Once upon a time in Venice, I was a museum intern, and once upon that long time ago I fell in love with this dreamy little metropolis of canals and palaces and chilled glasses of sgroppini and steaming plates of fresh spaghetti alle vongole. How can one not fall for a place where you wake to the sound of church bells, where angelic music wafts out of buildings as you pass by or where art is everywhere, even in the paving stones? When I left, I thought I’d be back within a year, but real life got in the way so I wasn’t back for the longest time. It would take me more than a decade to return, but when I did, it was with a man we’ll call Monsieur.

Bar da Gino

I felt a little nervous as we wended our way along the Dorsoduro calli to the Guggenheim Collection where I’d once dressed and undressed the artworks, told visitors “Please don’t touch!” in umpteen different languages and giggled at the Marino Marini with the unmissable erection. Along the way I showed Monsieur the cafe where I’d seen Woody Allen when he was filming ‘Everybody Says I Love You’, and pointed out the bank where interns cashed their monthly stipend cheques, becoming millionaires for a day because the Italian currency was still lira back then and because we hadn’t yet paid our rents. Then, there it was: Bar da Gino, the witness to many pre-, post- and during work snacks. This was where Kim bought her morning coffee, where I’d hum and ha over which tramezzini sandwich to have for lunch or groan if my lunch break was late and they’d all been sold. It was also where we’d take empty water bottles to be filled with table wine for a couple of thousand lira (roughly 80 pence) a time, and we’re not talking small bottles here. Across the way, the tabacchi where I used to buy stamps and phone cards and Baci chocolates wrapped in love messages was still there, and further along, near the Anglican Church there was the Aladdin’s Cave grocery store, filled with pyramids of Ritz cracker boxes, Cipster potato snacks and Kinder Sorpresa eggs, just as it always was. A jumble of happy memories returned with a rush as if I’d only left Venice yesterday.

The Guggenheim Collection lives in the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, a squat white palace of one tier only, slightly reminiscent of a half-eaten wedding cake as it looks out at the Grand Canal. For many years it was the home of art collector heiress, Peggy Guggenheim, whose patronage of many of the great artists of the early twentieth century helped build one of the best collections of art from that era. In her lifetime Peggy was a character, to say the least. She had two children with her first husband, Laurence Vail, before divorcing with Olympian acrimony and going on to marry surrealist painter, Max Ernst. That marriage wasn’t destined to last, however, besides which Peggy had affairs with almost every man she ever took a liking to, including Jackson Pollock and the husband of her daughter, Pegeen. Pegeen died young, nurturing the rumour that she’d taken her own life as a result of her mother’s inability to steer clear of her son-in-law. Others say she died mysteriously. Either way, Pegeen’s story is sad. Regarding her mother, whether or not she was the most faithful or amiable of characters as far as people were concerned, she certainly enjoyed her Tibetan terriers, calling them her ‘babies’ and as their respective doggie lives ended, Peggy had each successive dog under interred beneath the paving stones at the back of the Palazzo, before being buried there herself.

Peggy and ‘babies’ in her own, private gondola

As I led Monsieur through the new entrance to the Collection, it was already dark outside and the bright lights of the tickets area made us squint. We bought our tickets and an up-to-date guide, casting a glance at the Guardaroba or wardrobe area. The Guardaroba intern’s face showed misery, pure and simple. In spite of the new entrance and other developments in the gallery’s layout, Guardaroba had obviously not changed that much since I was there. On wet days it used to fill up with umbrellas, dripping backpacks and coats within minutes of opening. Tempers would fray because once the area had reached capacity, we couldn’t take any more belongings from visitors, yet we also couldn’t admit them with bulky day packs or shopping. Arguments were inevitable. Today, Guardaroba certainly looked busy, thanks to the rain outside, but I thought I’d ask anyway. Our coats were drenched through. But before I even opened my mouth to speak, the intern pre-empted my question:

“We’re full already,” he said, with a voice so flat that he might just have been more miserable than he looked.

That settled, we’d just have to try hard not to drip all over the artworks.

To the side of the garden is the gate by Clare Falkenstein that used to be the entrance point for all visitors to the Collection and my way both into and out of work. Made especially for Peggy Guggenheim in 1961, it’s a big, rectangular web of blackened metal, with orbs of glass in different colours appearing at intervals within the web. Then, in the freezing drizzle, we scuttled through the garden and up the stairs into the Palazzo proper. There was the Calder mobile, just where I’d left it, dangling from the ceiling in front of the doors opening onto the terrace. Then we wandered through the room filled with splashy Jackson Pollocks before visiting the old Barchessa, or boat house, which now houses visiting exhibitions. It was crowded down there. We didn’t have much patience for our fellow visitors today, elbowing their way as they were into viewing positions, where they’d take forever ruminating over some technique or muse or artistic attribute, thereby blocking the flow of visitors (including us) behind them. Back in the main palazzo, we found it less oppressive. The fabulous Calder bedhead was still on display in Peggy’s former bedroom and the dressing room was still a shrine to Pegeen and her naive paintings of gondoliers and palazzi. In the past, I’d stare hard at these splashy artworks, trying to imagine Pegeen’s life. The paintings, so bright and child-like, indicate innocence and positivity. Discovering her husband’s affair with her mother must have devastated that part of her personality.

In another room, we considered the use of light in the Magritte canvas of a lit lamppost at dusk, and the whacky imagination present in Max Ernst’s paintings, before stepping through the doors onto the slippery terrace for wicked photos with the Marino Marini bronze of a naked rider with a rather noticeable erection. “People kept pulling it off and it was misplaced,” I explained to Monsieur, “so Peggy finally had the rider’s member soldered on.” From the way he looked at me, I’m sure Monsieur wonders where on earth my next comment is going to come from.

The Marino Marini sculpture, Angel of the City (1948)

Back inside we saw the cubists on display, including works by Picasso and Braques, before braving the garden yet again. We had to. There’s no other way of reaching the New Wing, a separate building at the rear of the property. En route, I showed Monsieur where Peggy lies with her thirteen Tibetan Terrier ‘babies’, and patted Jean Arp’s bronze called ‘Fruit Amphora’, which has always reminded me of a flipperless seal pup.

Shaking off the fresh splattering of rain, I looked hard at New Wing. It had changed completely. Now much larger than when I’d been in residence, it houses a cafe/ restaurant, sizeable boutique and a large exhibition space where a fantastic array of photography was being shown during our visit. But Monsieur and I had places to go and Venetians to meet so back to the ticket counter we went to ask the interns’ advice. “We’re staying on the Fondamenta Nuove,” I explained, “and we’d love to find a good restaurant near there that’s not touristy and not too expensive.” This is just the sort of question that Guggenheim interns love, so we soon had recommendations flying at us. “What about that place near Tre Archi?” proffered one, “oh, yeah. D’you think it’s still open?” asked another. “Sure it is. I was just there the other night.” “Mmm hmmm, you’ll love this place.” Everyone was in agreement, drawing maps and scribbling directions for us on the back of a museum leaflet. “It’s walking distance to your hotel, locals love it, it’s off the beaten track so not that many tourists even find it, and the food’s great.” We were sold. We visit an art collection for the culture and leave with a restaurant recommendation. Well, you can’t get much more Italian than that.

To visit a great site with loads of Venice accommodation options in all price categories, please click here.

A Package for The Planet (a.k.a. The Monkey’s Uncle)

Some while back, My Friend, The Planet (otherwise known as Planet Ross) sent me his blue monkey. He’s a funny little figurine with a pointy hat that probably has some sort of spiritual significance, but the only spiritual influence he’s had so far in London has been scaring one of my colleagues so much just by looking at her that I had to take him to live at home. Prior to that I thought he’d have fun living at work, but that was probably a mistake on my part. Only sad people like living at work. In any case, when Blue Monkey lived with The Planet in Japan, his life was fun. He played with puzzles and predicted the future all day long. Now his days are spent presiding over my shrine, scaring visitors and drinking from my rapidly diminishing bottle of sake when he thinks I’m not looking.

I knew I should send something back to The Planet, but wasn’t sure what to get. Then, one day when Blue Monkey and I were out shopping, we saw the ideal book for this man who loves word play so off it went to Japan for The Planet’s birthday. Here’s the post written by The Planet about his late birthday snail-mail from Blue Monkey and me.  

PS Planet Ross thinks he’s old this year, but as Blue Monkey told him “you’re actuarry very young for a pranet”. (Blue Monkey’s still having problems with the English L sound but we’re working on it. ).

Living in the Casa della Signora – Venice revisited

Reluctantly leaving the toasty interior of Taverna San Trovaso behind, Monsieur and I headed for the Collezione Guggenheim, or Guggenheim Collection. This is where I had served as a museum intern, many a moon ago, in the days before every kid had a mobile phone and when we all wrote snail mail, not e-mail, to our friends and family. Instead of a blog I had notebooks filled with scribbled observations, cameras still used film and notes for the evening lecture series were copied using carbon paper. As I explained all this to Monsieur we realised that we were about to take a trip down Epic’s Venetian Memory Lane.

First we walked up to the gate of the palazzo where I’d once lived. The home belonged to the family of the green grocer who sold his fruit and veg from a barge a bit further north, making an absolute fortune from his humble trade. I’d shared the apartment at the top of the building with two other girls and the rules were strict: no boys allowed, not even brothers. The landlady or ‘Signora’ wore house dresses in busy floral prints, always cut a little too low in the chest region, allowing us to be distracted by her breathless and ample bosom. She did our washing on Tuesdays (this was included in the rent), our telephone calls were measured on a counter and paid for per click, itemising each call in a battered notebook, and the Signora’s husband would always pop some free extras into our bags when we shopped with him, frowning at us as if we were underfed and always encouraging us to eat more. Strangely enough, eating more was never the issue as we were walking all over Venice each day, meaning we could eat what we wanted, including an almost daily gelato, and never gain weight.

Standing outside the palazzo, I remembered the ground floor vestibule, filled with a mess of wet weather gear and footwear in all styles and sizes, from baby shoes to gigantic black wellies. Then there was the climb, past the floors inhabited by the family, the kitchen from where the Signora ruled the roost, with the stairs becoming narrower the higher we rose. By the time we reached our apartment, my fellow tenants and I would be breathless and beyond speech for a good few minutes. No matter how fit we were, those stairs were a killer. We lived at the top of Everest, it seemed.

The bathroom was tiled in sickly olive green and the shower was not partitioned from the rest of the room so when we used it, water went absolutely everywhere. The kitchen was a sink and tiny bench with a skirt around the base, behind which we could store kitchen things, and the gas stove was so fierce that I gave up using it after a while, simply because I valued my eyebrows.

In that apartment, we didn’t need alarm clocks. The church bells woke us early each day, continuing to ring at snooze-type intervals until we were all safely out of bed, and the water buses coming and going from the nearest stop on the Grand Canal made whooshing noises that form part of this musical memory. Whilst remembering the sounds of Venice, I couldn’t possibly leave out the mosquitoes, which buzzed mercilessly around my head each night until I was too tired to fight them, only to wake with a new welt or two the following day. In any case, those Venetian bloodsuckers were always invisible if I turned on the light, and with or without insect repellent they ate at me until my blood’s taste was ruined for them by their own poison.

At the back of the palazzo was a small, walled garden, underused and overgrown with straggles of thriving foliage. We palazzo-dwellers could come and go through a gate in the garden, especially if it was late at night and we needed a quieter way to enter the house (the weighty front door always closed with a bang and a small quake, potentially waking anyone sleeping within). One such evening, I walked back from a gathering in the lively square of Campo di Santa Margarita, where we interns would congregate for birthday drinks and other celebratory occasions. I carefully opened the garden gate and closed it again as quietly as I could. As my eyes adjusted to the dark, I heard a rustling from one of the bushes. I froze. Still not quite able to see what or who was making the rustling, my heart pounded as the bush started to shake. After a few seconds, the shaking stopped and something plopped onto the path in front of me. Off it ambled across the paving stones towards another patch of greenery and as I finally managed to focus on the stalker in the bushes, my breathing returned to normal. I’d just been welcomed home by the family tortoise.

A R-Oily GOOD Night with Braham & Murray

Splendid’s been at it again; this time Splendid people Rax, Chris and Jenny invited me along to a dinner party celebrating GOOD Oil. This is a relatively new concept in cooking oils, being made from hemp seed. As if that wasn’t interesting enough, the creators of GOOD Oil and the off-shoot products of GOOD Seed and GOOD Dressings are none other than Glynis Murray and Henry Braham, probably better known for their combined film credits, including The Golden Compass (Braham was Director of Photography for this Philip Pullman fantasy), Nanny McPhee and Waking Ned (on which they both worked) and many more.

Needless to say, the crew of foodie bloggers, including myself, Chris from the Londonist, Niamh from Trusted Places and Eat Like a Girl, the enviably slim Lizzie of the aptly-named Hollow Legs blog, Mel of Fake Plastic Noodles and Helen of Food Stories were all intrigued to be invited along to a traditional London dinner party at Murray and Braham’s West London home to see GOOD Oil in action.

Tikichris, Eatlikeagirl, Food Stories and Hollow Legs

Prior to arrival I did my research, courtesy of Splendid’s staff and trusty Google. Hemp seed and the resulting oil is incredibly GOOD for you, apparently, containing half the saturated fats of olive oil (of which I’m already a huge fan), and zero trans fats. I was interested to note that a mere 10 ml of GOOD Oil contains the same GLA (Gamma Linolic Acid) dosage of 6 Evening Primrose Oil capsules, therefore enhancing one’s Omega 6 intake with physical effects such as improved skin, hair and nails, and reduced symptoms of PMT. Omegas 3 and 9 are also present, and the overall health benefits can aid arthritis and eczema sufferers, reduce cholesterol and the oil has even been used positively by the RSPCA in helping rescue animals regain condition. The GOOD Oil profile is also beneficial for the maintenance of a healthy heart.

Chef Ben and Splendid Chris

At the Braham and Murray home I was greeted by their right hand Frenchman, Aymeric, and three lovable dogs. Passing through their warm, red-walled drawing room, I was led down the stairs to a buzzy eat-in kitchen, where Glynis greeted me like an old friend as she tossed salad, and her son, Ben, our chef for the evening, stood guard over the Aga. Once the round of greetings and introductions had been made it felt as if I were visiting pals for a reunion dinner party, as opposed to meeting film world icons and revered foodies. Then when Chris and Niamh arrived, they called out ”hey! third time in a week!”, as was certainly the case as our events calendars are quite full right now.

GOOD salad

We all enjoyed some bubbly (as you do) and conversation flowed before sitting down to sample Ben’s examples of how GOOD Oil works in daily cooking. Rax and Henry chatted about New York, Mel talked about how nervous she’d been giving her presentation at the London Bloggers Meetup a couple of nights before and the dogs rolled over for tummy tickles. Then the first GOOD Oil taster was passed around – pea and pecorino crostini. Heaped green upon the crusty bread rounds, the pea and pecorino, blended with GOOD Oil, was simultaneously smooth and chunky (in a guacamole-ish way), not to mention tasty with a certain nutty tang. That was the oil at work. GOOD Oil, which I’ve had a chance to play with myself, has an earthy and nutty flavour; given how good it is for you (see the King’s report on the GOOD Oil website, link below) I was certainly keen to try more.

GOOD Prawn Cakes

At the table, the menu (courtesy of Ben) consisted of a much lauded Venison and Cranberry Casserole, and (as I’m not a big carnivore) specially conceived Prawn Cakes for me and anyone else who cared to try them out. The accompaniments were good, old-fashioned mash, tasting slightly nutty and extra earthy thanks to the oil, and broccoli florets. The conversation was vibrant as we discussed the taste of the oil (different and perceptible without being overpowering), the fantastic atmosphere, Glynis’s and Henry’s film experiences and tried out Splendid Rax’s photographic memory party trick.

Splendid Rax

Following the main we tried GOOD Oil on salad with cheese and slices of rustic bread, served the French way before pudding, and then ploughed through bowls of ice cream and GOOD Oil biscotti, the ice cream being drizzled with GOOD Oil. I know it sounds strange, but it worked surprisingly well and, if that’s the way you want to get your 10ml of cold and beneficial GOOD Oil per day, then it’s to be recommended.

Bad photo of GOOD ice cream

Henry Braham offered an extra helping of pudding to the person who first guessed when balsamic vinegar was first invented. Different eras of the past four centuries were offered before Henry told us that 1976 was the answer, making me think of tiramisu, which was only invented in the 1960s, in spite of being such a firm fixture on traditional Italian menus that it’s easy to understand why people might think it’s generations older. However, in reference to balsamic vinegar, the date of 1976 didn’t feel right. Otherwise, why would Modena sell bottles of its best balsamic aged fifty years, well predating 1976? I’ll come back to you with the answer for that one in another post… It’s not entirely straightforward, yet it’s a fascinating tale.

Glynis, the girls and a dog

Elizabeth David also came to mind as she’d famously first praised the cooking potential of olive oil in the UK, when it was something you bought from the pharmacist to help with certain ailments but would never have dreamed of cooking with, let alone eating. Lard and butter were the preferred fats of David’s time.  Hemp oil has had a similar medicinal history and when attempts were made to launch it as a kitchen ingredient in the past, its strong, untempered taste precluded it from becoming a success. No more. Henry Braham and Glynis Murray have spent more than a decade researching, creating and launching GOOD Oil, based at their Devon hemp farm, and this has included a few wasted visits from the local constabulary who thought they might be growing a different sort of hemp for recreational purposes as opposed to culinary. They’ve worked hard to ensure that the taste is palatable and GOOD for consumers and they’re rightfully proud of introducing something new to the cooking and health-food world. It hasn’t been easy for them; a menagerie of kids, dogs, horses, a donkey, not to mention the demands of ongoing film projects, all combine to mean that one night out from their hectic schedules to educate food writers about their hemp oil passion tells us one thing: they BELIEVE in their product.

Henry and canine companion

GOOD Oil already has fans like Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Jamie Oliver to back up its credentials. At the weekend I tried a Hugh F-W trick of garlic toast with a drizzle of GOOD. It was delicious and alternative research tells me that an old-world method of ‘cleansing the blood’ suggested this very recipe only using oils other than hemp, or a spread of butter. Back in my own kitchen I’ve also been working on adjusting various recipes to try GOOD Oil in all guises. You see, following the magical, ever-replenishing postprandial port (which could easily have featured in The Golden Compass), Henry and Glynis suggested I replace olive oil in my cooking with GOOD Oil for 30 days, in order to see its physical benefits for myself. Never one to turn down a challenge, I accepted. I’m onto day three now and you’ll just have to watch this space to see how it all turns out; hopefully at the end of the month I’ll be a Glowing Goddess of GOOD. It’ll be interesting to see if the predictions are correct. I don’t know about the Goddess bit but I’d certainly settle for Glowing and I also know someone whose premature arthritis might just benefit from a daily dose of all things GOOD. It’s certainly worth a try.

USEFUL LINKS:

• To check out the GOOD Oil website for further information, please click here.
• To go to the GOOD Oil Facebook page, where you can download screensavers and recipes and request free samples, please click here.
• The King’s Report
• Glynis Murray and Henry Braham
• Splendid Communications
• Londonist
• Tiki Chris
• Trusted Places
• Eat Like a Girl
• Hollow Legs
• Fake Plastic Noodles
• Food Stories
• Elizabeth David
• Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
• Jamie Oliver

If you live outside of the UK and you would like further information on the GOOD hemp seed products, please let me know in the comments box and I will try to find out how you might be able to purchase GOOD Oil from abroad. Can’t promise, but I’ll do what I can.

Epic and GOOD dog

Epic Kitchen Accessories: APRON 1

My boss knows I like to cook; he should do since I’ve become a little more curvaceous than usual since I started working for him 4 years ago. When Boss returned from holiday at the end of the summer, he brought me back a gift for holding the fort: an apron with a design by English illustrator, Simon Drew.

Anyone who knows Drew’s work will smile at the illustration of puns, particularly those related to animals. In Shepherd Spy, the pun relates to a spying sheep dog working amongst his flock, the meaning of which has been punned out of ‘Shepherd’s Pie’. Here’s another one:

Drew’s puzzle or ‘SPOT the…’ cards keep everyone guessing for a while: each line of the cover consists of a combination of pictures. You say the word for each picture aloud until you work out the combination, for instance, in his Spot the City cards, you may have Hell+Sink+Key = Helsinki.

If you like this sort of humour, you can buy greetings cards, books and many other gifts with similar punning illustrations from Simon Drew’s website, here.

Are all sniffer dogs DOPEY?

Following on from my recent experience with a sniffer dog who got it wrong, I thought I’d look into the success rates of these working dogs.

In Australia, they’re not convinced. Following research into sniffer dog accuracy a couple of years back, it was found that only one quarter of positive sniffs yield drugs. I don’t know why that should be a surprise, after all, no matter how much positive reinforcement you use to train a dog to recognise drugs on a person, they are still going to be interested in their own favourity doggie smells – food, bodily fluids, insect repellant (apparently). Here are some articles about when the sniffer dogs who bark up the wrong tree:

From Australia…, this report card for Downunder’s sniffies includes a lot of Ds and must sniff harder.

This post is from a chap who was stopped on the way to a legitimate meeting in Camden Town. The comments on this post are almost as good as the article! It would seem I’m not alone…

In Canada, they’re arguing over sniffer dogs and the infringement of civil liberties. Sniffer dogs should not be allowed to search for drugs in schools or public places – a recent ruling has decreed this to be the case – however, as the threat of explosives in airports is a more serious threat, sniffer dogs will still be allowed to operate there. I get it, but it is somewhat confusing. If an airport is a public place but I’m not an explosive, then why search me? It’s like those philosophical exercises: if a pig is pink and Maxine is pink then does that make Maxine a pig? It’s not exactly a yes or no answer. Besides which, in my experience, those bits of material that can be sniffed by a machine seem to be way more accurate than the dog (who’s probably more interested in food and people’s more delicate parts).

Without boring you with the other articles I’ve found, I can summarise by saying that sniffer dogs are far less accurate than we assume, so the next time you see someone being hauled off for further questioning by a customs official and a Sniffy, you should NOT presume they’re transporting illegal drugs. It could just be that the dog hasn’t had dinner yet and wants some of that duty free chocolate in the nice person’s backpack.

Meanwhile, Natasha Cloutier, my friend from Blog08 in Amsterdam, just sent me the link for a song about sniffer dogs. Can you believe it? Get those heads banging and enjoy (if you can). Personally, I think these guys need a spliff or something to calm them down…

The song’s called ‘I wanna be a drug sniffing dog’ (in case you can’t quite make out the lyrics). It’s by LARD.

Epic Meets Sniffy the Customs Dog

At long last, I flew to Amsterdam for Blog08 last week, with the clogs I’d promised to wear packed dutifully in my case. Friday’s conference was packed with interest and Monsieur joined me on Saturday for some Amsterdam sightseeing. We packed five museums and a lot of clog photography into the weekend, and then we flew home. Separately.

As part of my competition prize had included flights, I was taking KLM. Monsieur, meanwhile, had a free flight on BA courtesy of a diligent accrual of points with his favoured airline. His flight left Schiphol an hour before mine but I didn’t get home until three hours after him; instead of racing onto the Heathrow Express homeward-bound, I was instead the subject of a Very Special Greeting by customs officials when KLM landed at Terminal 4.

As we filed off the plane, an official instructed us to walk single-file along one side of the corridor so we could be sniffed by a drugs dog. When it came my turn, I fully expected the dog to take a cursory sniff and move on, but he didn’t. Apparently I smelled GOOOD, so as his nose went all around my nether regions, I wondered what could be so interesting about me. Then he sat at my feet and looked up at his handler. That was the sign. According to the hound I was a problem so I was waved out of the corridor and taken aside.

An official took my passport and asked a number of questions as he worked his way through my previously neatly-arranged carry on bags. Meanwhile, my fellow passengers walked past, casting looks of disdain in my direction. ‘Great. They think I’m one of those people on Airport, with all sorts of illegal substances ferretted away on my person,’ I thought to myself. I already knew that they couldn’t be more wrong;  sauvignon blanc is my substance of choice and unless they considered that to be Class A on a list of drugs (I’d just consumed some on the flight) then I was going to be a complete waste of their time.

The officials separated me from my bags and brought the dog back. He didn’t find anything of interest in my carry-on, so they brought him across to sniff me again. His nose kept finding its way to my crotch in a disturbingly-insistent fashion. Perhaps he thought I’d squirreled some narcotics into a particular orifice? Thoughts of latex gloves started to feature in my mind. Whatever would I tell Monsieur?

The main official overseeing this investigation told me they’d now have to fast-track me through customs and retrieve my suitcase from the conveyor. As we approached a customs desk from a side gate, my seat neighbour, a visiting professional from the Phillipines with whom I’d had a friendly in-flight chat, looked directly at me. She frowned and shook her head before turning away. Oh joy. Now it was confirmed in my fellow passengers’ heads that I was a drug-runner. How little did they know! My face burned.

On the way down to baggage collection, I turned to the official.

“I hope you don’t mind me being graphic for a minute, but I have my period. Could that be a factor in what the dog can smell?”

“No,” he replied, “the dog is trained to sniff out Class A drugs.”

That was the end of that Epicurienne theory. It had only occurred to me because I’ve noticed that when it’s that time of the month, dogs take an extra-special interest in sniffing girls. Apparently we give off a similar smell to a bitch on heat. (Some might say that’s exactly what we are, but I couldn’t possibly agree.)

Wondering now if someone could have planted something in my case when I left it at the hotel after check-out this morning, the officials and I collected my luggage before going to the red “Something to Declare” section of the customs exit. There my case was opened and underwear, nightwear and big, wooden CLOGS bared for all to see, along with a pack of tampax. With two pairs of clogs in my luggage, I certainly can’t have been your usual suspect. I answered questions about what I did for a living, how long I’ve lived in the UK, why I was in Amsterdam (I won a blogging competition) and with whom I’d been travelling. When I explained that my fiancé had been with me but had flown back earlier, faces frowned again. They probably thought Monsieur was the drug baron and I was his mule. Poor Monsieur. I was quite relieved he wasn’t there to see this.

Little pieces of drug-sensitive cloth were rubbed around my suitcase and on my clothes before being put into a sniffer machine. Negative, negative came the machine’s response to the situation. Had I used drugs in the past two weeks, they asked. No, came my reply. Not unless you count ibuprofen. Would I be averse to a urine test to prove that? was the next question. Not at all, I replied whilst thinking ‘Where’s the cup? Just give me the cup. I’d gladly pee into any receptacle if that’s what it takes to get out of here and GO HOME.’

By now I could see that the officials were somewhat perplexed. As they told me, I’m well-spoken, obviously professional and could prove my reason for a visit to Amsterdam (no whacky backy required). Physically, I was on form (apart from blushing with shame at being escorted through the airport by uniformed officials). I wasn’t shaky or red-eyed, didn’t stink of an all-nighter or three like many visitors to the grass-capital of Europe might and was relatively calm considering the massive embarrassment I was currently enduring. Apart from a canine with an interest in my crotch, there was nothing to show that I had any contact with drugs.

Then a female official came up to me.

“Can I ask you a personal question?” she asked,

“Of course,” I replied (still wondering when I was going to be taken away for a more thorough inspection),

“You don’t by any chance have your period?” she ventured,

“Yes I do. Could that be a factor?”

“Yes it could.”

“Really?” asked the male official,

“Yes.” said the woman. I think that’s what you’d call a Homer Simpson moment. DOH.

The male official went off to consult his serious-faced boss. They talked for ages. I looked at the ceiling. I looked at the floor. I looked at my dishevelled belongings and I looked at the door marked with “Authorised Personnel Only”, wondering how long it would be before I was led off to somewhere more ‘private’. Then the male official returned.

“I’ve told my boss that you should be allowed to go. You’re too helpful to be a druggie. We can’t find any evidence of drugs here. We’ll just say that the dog was wrong.”

He continued “You may simply have sat in a seat where someone using drugs had been before you.” God bless the liberality of Amsterdam. Major sarcasm intended.

So with that, I packed up my suitcase, clogs included, and left for home. Home, sweet home. I wouldn’t be in the clink tonight. As Monsieur later told me with a big, comforting hug, “Darling, I just can’t let you travel on your own, can I?” He might just be right.

PS I have debated with myself all morning whether or not to write about this because I don’t usually get so personal. Although the dog was obviously barking up the wrong tree, so to speak, causing a great amount of embarrassment and inconvenience to all concerned, I have to say that the customs officials dealing with me were polite and professional. At the end of the ordeal, they apologised and admitted that an error had occurred. However, because I never realised that something like this could happen, I do think it’s important for Epicurienne readers to take note of my experience, just in case the dog ever gets it wrong with one of you.

 

 

Monkeys at work

You may recently have read my post about the Blue Monkey that Planetross sent me from Japan. Well, here’s a link that all monkey lovers out there should truly appreciate. This is a Japanese restaurant with a different sort of staff, and it’s already on the Epicurienne list of Must Eat There One Day.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7654267.stm

Blue Monkey Oracle Visits London

Planetross has a Blue Monkey Oracle who gives him Life Advice. Blue Monkey got tired of doing that in Japanese and decided to travel to London to stay with me and learn Engris. He got here yesterday. PR had warned me that the packing was plentiful and it was; Blue Monkey arrived intact, although a bit jet-lagged, as he moaned to me last night. Here he is taking a nap in his travel box after he arrived at my workplace.

Blue Monkey’s former life was spent helping Ross, and he will continue to do so from the sights of London. (I promised to take him out at the weekend). If you haven’t seen the oracle posts on PR’s site, click here.

Meanwhile, it would seem that although I love Blue Monkey, he hasn’t made the same impact on a couple of people here. One colleague, Miss Jamaica, says he freaks her out. She implored me to take him home with me, so I did, even thought I really wanted him to stay by my phone at work.

Then, at home, Monsieur asked why I liked Blue Monkey so much. “Because he’s lucky!” I told him. “But you already have lucky things in the flat. Why do you need another one?” he asked me. The answer to that was simple: “Have you read the news today?” Point made. Blue Monkey stays. Watch out for posts from the new London residence of Blue Monkey Oracle. And thank you, Planet Ross, for decorating his travel box with the following slogans:

Real Tape (with an arrow helpfully pointing to a piece of tape)

Air holes so he can breathe (holes in side of box for admission of Oxygen for the Oracle)

Blue Monkey inside! (Kinda guessed that. Not many people send me packages from Japan these days!)

Hey, careful with this! (Kind warning but somewhat unnecessary, given the amount of bubble wrap and plastic foam bits inside)

He is in here (yup, he sure was!)

Caution! Live Oracle! (imagine the surprise of my colleagues when he jumped out of the box and shouted “Konnichiwa!!!”)

But best of all, given that PR had wrapped the box in a certain way so it could only be opened in that certain way, once I had the wrapping open I was greeted with:

Don’t be stupid! No one opens a box this way! Doh. Too late.

Yes, sir. All the marks of Planetross Personality all over the packaging. It was his blog come to life! And the influence is far-reaching…

Note: Thank you, PR, for sending Blue Monkey to London. I promise to take great care of him.

Double note: You might like to know that he has a special shelf, where he lives with a Buddha, a Tiger charm, and some holy water from Lourdes.

Triple note: In return for Blue Monkey, I promised PR to send him something equally eclectic from London, so if you have any inspiration, please send it my way. It has to be worthy of a Blue Monkey, if you know what I mean.