Let the Terror Begin....

Trapped in a boring job and living in a tiny apartment in New York, Julie Powell regularly finds herself weeping on the way home from work. Then one night, through mascara-smudged eyes, Julie notices that the first few items she's grabbed from the Korean grocery store are the very ingredients for Potage Parmentier, as described in Julia Child's legendary cookbook, “Mastering the Art of French Cooking,” and the project is born. Julie begins to cook -- everyone of the 524 recipes in the book, in the space of just one year… -- Cover blurb ' Julie and Julia' by Julie Powell.

With love and thanks to my great mate Deb....

One: Potage Shmage

“The road to hell is paved with leeks and potatoes,” writes Julie Powell in her irritating best seller Julie and Julia.
Not for me it isn’t.
Give me leeks and potatoes any day -- and throw in a Beef Bourguignon and a Choux de Bruxelles while you’re at it.
My road to hell isn’t even a road. It’s a leech-infested, rain-sodden, slippery, slimy track that leads into a forest, through a stream and up a fucking hill.
Mastering the art of French cooking may have been Julie Powell’s perdition, but it isn’t mine. My personal purgatory is bushwalking. Yes, bushwalking. I loathe it, as I loathe most things involving pristine, natural environments. Put simply, I lack any sort of aptitude for it.
I’m a big city boy.
Sirens comfort me. I find countryside repellant.
Exhaust fumes and gridlock reassure me. Mountains, hills, birdsong and hiking trails scare the shit out of me.
Unlike Julie Powell I’m not trapped in a boring job, nor do I live in a tiny apartment.
The only times I find myself weeping are when the party drugs start to wear off or when someone shouts “Last Drinks Folks.”
And my mascara never EVER smudges.
But Julie Powell is nothing if not original.
Why couldn’t she have hit the bottle to deal with her depression, you may well ask? Developed a substance abuse problem or maxed out her credit cards and sunk into crippling personal debt like normal people?
You’ve got to hand it to her. One self-indulgent bout of the blues, one year, 524 recipes, a best-selling book and a movie deal later and Voila! Amy Adams is playing her on the big screen and before you can say Bonjour, she’s raking in more cash than you can poke a braised onion at.
But how cynical of me to suggest that fame and fortune were Julie Powell’s motivations.
No, no, no. It was about setting goals, confronting fears, taking on challenges, removing herself from her comfort zone.
My therapist tells me I need to do the same. (He also tells me I have to overcome my “intimacy issues” and stop treating sex as a recreational weekend team activity, but that’s a separate sidesplitting blog in the making).
So, brimming with New Year’s enthusiasm I’ve decided to give it a go: To set myself personal challenges, put myself out there, overcome my fear of the great outdoors and equip myself with some essential skills.
Rest assured, I won’t be reaching for Julia Child’s recipe book.
My salvation has come in the form of a ragged manual I happened upon at a guesthouse in the terrifying tea-plantation terrain of Sri Lanka during a recent holiday.
It’s called “Ray Mears Essential Bushcraft – A Handbook of Survival Skills From Around the World.”
Ray is marvelous, the Julia Child of the bush world in fact.
His knowledge is encyclopedic, his compendium entertaining and comprehensive. I couldn’t put it down.
Among his myriad user-friendly, survival bible guidance:
--How to safely stow an unmasked double-bit axe in the crotch of a tree buttress (It’s not as straightforward as it sounds);
--How to improvise a drinking straw from a grass stalk or another non-poisonous hollow shrub;
--The correct way to strike a match: Preparation is the key to all fire-lighting, notes Ray;
--How to utilize the inner bark from a lime tree, one of the most important sources of “natural cordage”;
--The proper way to dislodge limpets swiftly and firmly with a rock for use as an essential source of nourishment;
--How to fashion a rabbit snare with a pear-shaped noose, and how to design your own eel-trapping bag.
And that’s not all.
“Knowledge is invisible and weighs nothing,” observes Ray, who is no fool.
“Be mindful that in times of crisis you can find shelter in the forest, rub sticks for fire and know which plants around you can be eaten and you will have a home, a hearth and a meal,” he continues, albeit with a disclaimer that “Bushcraft is not necessarily easily learned.”
Godammit Ray, with your help I’m gonna learn it. My days as the laughing stock of the soap-challenged bush fraternity are numbered. By this time next year, I will have mastered all 300 of your practical, useful, vital ‘how to survive in the bush’ tips. Well, some of them at least.
Obviously I won’t be able to do this alone, so I’ve decided to enlist the help of friends, family, work colleagues. My nearest and dearest. The people I love most in this world. They don’t yet know who they are or when they will be called upon, which adds a nice little element of surprise, don’t you think?
My fabulous maid Sanom will also play a crucial role – somebody has to do the legwork and shop for the ingredients -- non-poisonous shrubs and double-bit axes don’t grow on trees you know.
As well as sharing my newly acquired bushcraft knowledge, you may gain an insight into the folk I call upon to assist me. This will be limited and edited as I see fit. At the end of the day this blog is, afterall, mostly about me.
Me and Mr. Mears.
So break out the fire sticks, bring on the limpets and eat your heart out Julie and Julia.
Welcome to CRAIG and RAY. Stay tuned.