There is a graphic design story that I read about a decade ago that goes something like this: nearly everyone hate the font “comic sans” and turns their noses up whenever it turns up printed across an amature bit of graphic design work. But as much as some might scorn the folks who use that font, the alternative perspective is simply that … as bad as that font might be … people who use comic sans are still thinking about fonts, design, and breaking out of the old standard font library that comes default with their computer.
Even if you don’t care about fonts or design, the moral of the little parable is simply that people who try, even if their attempt is mediocre by professional standards, are still people who try.
Trying is the first step to learning.
I bring this up only because back in university I was a terrible cook… but I tried.
What is something you ate 25 years ago that you’d never eat now?
My wife (who I was merely dating at the time) calls it curry surprise.
Ground beef, curry paste, cooked noodles, cheddar cheese, and … well, serve hot.
Or better, don’t serve… and just eat alone in front of the television before you go back to your bedroom and hit the homework for the evening.
It wasn’t great. It was a student meal.
But I cooked it routinely because it was simple, filling, hit multiple food groups, and (honestly) none of my roomates would steal my leftovers.
We laugh at it now and every so often I offer to cook my wife a helping of curry surprise, but I look back on those days of experimenting with weird (and akward) variations as my cooking-slash-comic-sans moment. Cringe-inducing and not worth considering for anything serious, but yet dabbling and thinking about food, cooking, and those first steps to being better in the kitchen as an adult.
Thirty one topics. Thirty one posts. Not exactly a list… but close. In December I like to look back on the year that was. My daily posts in December-ish are themed-ish and may contain spoilers set against the backdrop of some year-end-ish personal exposition.
