Saturday, January 27, 2018

Scrambled Eggs

Bert said something terrible to me this morning. He didn't know it was a terrible thing. In fact, I'm sure he that he was just making me a kind offer. This is what he said,

Do you want scrambled eggs?

I said,

No! I don't.

I did not explain. I did not say 'No thanks. I had sourdough toast and brie for breakfast.' I just thought, why not boiled, why not fried, why not poached? Anything but scrambled. Why scrambled when you, my dear husband, have probably cleaned scrambled eggs from a saucepan less than ten times your entire life.

Every time I get this way I am reminded of an awful Jilly Cooper book that I read centuries ago where the romantic lead dismissed an ex as 'one of those girls like scrambled egg, amazingly easy to make, but impossible to get off the pan afterwards.' Such a cruel remark. I never did like any of the characters in Jilly Cooper novels.

I was still feeling discombobulated about Bert's breakfast choice when Hannah got home and told her about what was annoying me and she said that Paulo Coelho had something to say about that. Well, he usually does. She gave me the gist of it and I immediately felt better about the whole thing. I checked it out and it goes like this,

'When you're washing up, pray. Be thankful that there are plates to be washed; that means there was food, that you fed someone, that you've lavished care on one or more people, that you cooked and laid the table. Imagine the millions of people at this moment who have absolutely nothing to wash up and no one for whom to lay the table.” 
― Paulo CoelhoThe Witch Of Portobello

So there you go - if you want a guide to decent living Coelho trumps Cooper every time.

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