Monday, October 18, 2010

Not Philosophy, but, hey.

While tilting back a glass of red Bordeaux, an aroma floated up into my awaiting nostrils. It was the rough, somewhat barnyard smell of dark poultry meat, a smell that conjures up visions of grey meat that falls apart at the merest touch, and feathers plastered together lifelessly that resemble nothing more than toothpicks and sticks.

Then, the epiphany - Of course Coq au Vin makes sense. Drowning a cantankerous old capon (tough and bitter, and spiteful to the hilt) in red wine and braising it slowly is brilliant. The aroma of the wine and the taste of the stewed chicken are made for each other. Grape and fowl - disparate items, yet idyllic complementarians.

Friday, October 15, 2010

A Prescription

The Good Life: There is a feeling, a pure intoxication towards life, a joy, revelry, unbridled enthusiasm, and will to meet and overcome any challenge. It comes before sports games, it comes before battles, it comes from any pep talk or speech that brings people to their feet shouting and jumping and gnashing their teeth. It is energy, a frenzy in a sense, that drives those people to accomplish whatsoever they put themselves too. A will to risk all offset by a deep visceral desire to gain it all. This energy, if this energy can be summoned and brought up throughout a daily existence, towards any and every activity, a frenzy towards every act of life - that is a life, that is the life.