I mean, really. Taiwanese or not, if looking at this doesn’t induce some watering in the mouth, I’m afraid we don’t have anything in common. Just imagine that gelatinous pork belly coated in DARK, CARAMELLY AMBER SAUC… wait. It looks more like blurry, grainy, monotone photo that’s seen too much UV light?
Ooooh… haaa.. ha… you know… Instagram being SO happening and all… ha.. I thought it’d be cool to do a little “retro” look. Just kind of keeping up with the tech world… kind of thing… BUT HEY, not fond of distorted view of the world behind diffused lenses? OK. We’re back.
OK, I sort of bashed it in my previous post (as if it matters), and stripped its right for photos (as if they care). But maybe I didn’t make myself as clear as I should have. What I meant was, the tourist-trappy pre fixe we ordered SUCKED, yes ( “Ma’am, this is Robuchon’s signature this… Robuchon’s signature that…” Pfffffff!!). BUT everything else the local French were eating beside us looked SUBLIIIME!! If only we had another €300 dangling in our pocket, we could have theoretically rewrite our Robuchon memory. Or if only I grew a layer of cowhide thick enough to ask for a picture, “excuse… eh.. moi?… flash, flash oui?”, I could have at least showcase that beautiful morel pasta here.
I assume people meant my ethnicity, not the city I currently live in, but even that has no easy answer. Three decades of my life so far are sort of evenly spent in three different locations. The country I was born in but haven’t lived in for more than 2 decades. The country I spent all my teens therefore granted me a citizenship of. Then there’s the city I feel most at home, where it shaped me into an individual and till this day, still defines me. So which one are they talking about? Oh, and of course this shithole place where I’m currently residing in for the past 3 years, where I don’t even want my name to go anywhere near the close proximity of. I think it’s safe to say that I’m a product of the environment of a shrinking globe.
As much as I would like to apply total professionalism to this little webspace of mine, a chain of unfortunate events have delayed this particular story, which I’m very excited about, for days. But now the demon-like jet lag is slowly but surely departing my body, and my dear boy is on his way to hopefully complete recovery, let me get back to the happier things in life. Like my satellite that comes with complete HD Food Network Channel. I wish I could take total credit for this dish, but it came from a little segment featuring a little Italian restaurant in the Lower East Side. I mean of course, why didn’t I think of this?! It’s the reincarnation of the Cajun dirty rice, reborn as an Italian in pasta form! Of course! It totally makes sense! Their sauce is a combination of liver puree and duck stock that delivers the brownish “dirt-look”. But why not make it even richer with this incredibly comforting and aromatic duck ragu that I make ALL the time.
Then came the effort the correct it. And then, TOTAL insomnia. As I tried pushing through the day without submitting to the brain-paralyzing exhaustion, the nights remained sleepless where I go in-and-out of consciousness and wake up feeling even more tired than the day before. We don’t realize how important sleep is until we don’t get enough of it. Without the recommended amount of hours, being able to function daily becomes a struggle. With this being said, a friend of mine did recommend I tried CBD products, as they are said to help with relaxation and help people get a good night’s sleep. She even mentioned that I used a Cbdistllery discount code to save some money. This may be something worth looking into, especially as the lack of sleep was a struggle for me and I don’t want to experience this again. You shouldn’t be afraid of what people will think when you tell them that you are thinking about trying CBD to help give you the sleep that you deserve. It shouldn’t matter to them; as it’s your body and your health that you making a priority. Who knows, they may decide to try it themselves when they hear that you can take your chosen product through bongs. It will probably be a different story then. But it is one that I’m seriously considering as I’m tired beyond words. The same friend said that I could combine it if I didn’t want to fully go in with just CBD, they suggested yoga as a good starting point. I have heard that it can be great for relaxing the body, plus I can get a 200 hour yoga teacher training online course completed so that I can help others who suffer as I do…paying it forward!
The cherry on my cake was, on top of this build-up of 14 days without proper sleep, that my oldest son, 11-year-old Maltese, Dumpling had to go through a completely unexpected surgery yesterday. If I haven’t properly introduced myself, this IS the top three on my worst-things-that-could-happen list. So all in all, the past week has been… really poor.
I’m going to start this story by making a confession. I have…never been to Rome.
I forged this recipe after the Rome episode from my favorite travel channel host, Anthony Bourdain’s show, “The Layover“. His show is one of the humble luxury I have being here, that I get to pay $20 on iTune which would otherwise be free in the US. No no no, Slingbox doesn’t work here. If the internet in China is personified it would be a 800 year-old granny with walking stick that is broken.
