Pedigree Dogs Exposed

pug of today

pug of 1800s

Ihave never been an animal lover having never wanted a dog, cat or a horse like the majority of Britons, I just don't get peoples preoccupation with them. I hate slobber, their fur or the smell of them.

But I was disgusted and somewhat distresssed as I watched Pedigree Dogs Exposed on the BBC last night, a documentary that delved into the world of these supposed perfect breeds .
The lengths that breeders go to to ensure their dogs are thoroughbreds is to say the least despicable.

A certain breed of dog (I cannot remember which) are particularly prone to suffer a certain neurological disease in which their skull does not grow beyond a certain age, however their brain still does, leaving them in a state of constant pain as the brain struggles to grow to its full capacity.
Or how about Boxer dogs, now prone to epilipsy. It was utterly sad to watch the poor thing have such a violent seizure.

What also shocked me was the fact that many dogs- pugs and beagles particulary- bare absolutely no resemblace to what they looked like over 100 years ago due to the forced and in my opinion unatural breeding process.

Pugs, ugly little buggers I have always thought. shouldn't even have the flat faces they posses. Supposedly their defining feature, they actually used to be somewhat cute with full nose/snout and no folded skin anywhere. Their 'gorgeous' new look now is due to the breeding processes that have taken place since the 1800s.

The ease in which dogs are abandoned and killed just because they don't look a certain way is actually quite chilling, did Hitler not do the same thing to the Jews because they supposedly were not 'pure'!
But hey its alright to do it to the dogs because they're just animals, seems the attitude.

shockingly these breeders are supposed to be dog lovers, well I find it a funny sort of love.

Mothers+ Entertaining= Nightmare *update*

since I had such a rant over the guests due over for dinner in my last post, I thought it only right to let you all know it actually went very well, although possible disaster was threateningly near when another two guests who had assured us wouldn't be able to make it, suprise, suprise turned up, (grrrr)
Cue momentary food crisis,in which appeared to heading into the "counting potatoes on each plate"phase, however we managed to bypass this dire area for the simple reason myself and my sisters other half just couldn't be bothered to eat after spending far too long having already seen the food in what seems like the aeons it took to prepare.

Mothers + Entertaining= Nightmare

aaaargh! don't parents just rile you up sometimes. I at the moment am ignoring my mother, petty I know but I am just plain fed up and steaming at the ears, so am choosing to vent in my blog.

Here is the situation. Mother has guests coming round tomorrow old, old friends she hasn't seen in years, so is all in a tizz.

I know you can identify with me when I say its all "we have to clean, we have to hoover, what are we going to cook? ooh what if they don't like this? what if they don't like that?,you can't have that out, what will so and so say." My mother is no Hyecinth Bouquet but shes acting as if the bloody Queen is coming round not plain old Fiona* and Charles* et al. Give me a break, myself and my sis don't even want to be here but we're as elbow deep into the preparations as mother.

So whats riled me up.
We had a plan, a plan you hear, conceived last night over dinner we agreed to stick to it.

Now i'm very fussy when it comes to organisation particularly if you have one day only to get through a million tasks.

The plan was to wake early and go to the supermarket with mum to get the food shopping in before the saturday morning crowds hit, therefore allowing for the rest of the day to be left tidying and god knows what else we would have to do. I woke early on saturday morning much earlier than planned, so decided to scoot off to my local B&Q to buy a few plants to pretty up the front garden (another task mummy wanted doing.)

I knew I would be back in 1hr so waved mummy off as she was having her morning tea, "don't forget the plan" I sang out before closing the door.

I got to B&Q and back in record time, totally pleased with myself as I entered our front gate, only 50 minutes had lapsed since I left the house, I was happy we were still on target.

After dumping the plants I head to the kitchen to find mum still in her nightie, "mum! what are you doing still like that? have you bathed yet" I said incredulously, " No not yet, but I managed to clean the kitchen floor, it was dirtier than i thought", looking down it looked clean, just the way it did before I left, "also the doors" she carried on " but what about the plan!" I said a little hysterically, "it's now 10 0'clock, we were supposed to leave early, this is not early, by the time you get ready it'll be 11.00am" "it's ok", she said popping the kettle on for more tea and putting toast into the toaster.

That did it, those 2 slices of toast were the straws that broke the camels back totall miffed I plonked myself in front of the PC. Sensing my mood I must admit she did speed through brekkie and now as I type has had a quick bath and is getting dressed. I love her to bits but dear God

mothers+entertaining=Nightmare.

Dumpling anyone?

"Im going China town, going China town" *sung in the thune of The Jams Going Underground*.

Not having a cooker for over four weeks- a rant for another time-. The Beaumont household has been surviving on a diet of frozen meals and takeaways.

Aah, the latter was so novel at first. Merrily scanning menus ordering up a feast knowing you don't have to get your hands dirty.

I am a creature of habit, not great but it does have its pro's. So when it comes to takeaways (I'm cool with restaurants) I usually order the same thing, In my opinion there is nothing worse than getting a dish that in theory sounded so lush but in reality is barely paletable. Leaving you to spend the rest of the evening staring longingly at your fellow friends food, totally pissed off because:

a)you cannot be bothered to wait for another 50 mins for another delivery

b)you now have to cook something, which totally defeats the purpose of a takeaway evening.

Four weeks down the line lets just say the suggestion of a takeaway was often followed by the words: bo***cks, no way and f***ing hell, in no particular order.

You should have seen the excitement, when our brand new cooker came, I swear even the mythed second coming of Christ wouldn't have gotten such a reception. oohing and ahhing, everyone was talking at once about what they were first going to cook, nevermind the fact that a couple of us actually hated cooking - no doubt forgetten in a severe case of takeaway induced amnesia.

However like Harry Potters scar something remained with me; a new found appreciation of Chinese cooking. I suspect it might be because I didn't have sufficient time to fully get sick of it yet.

A huge fan of Japanese cooking, sushi being my favouite food, I never gave much thought to Chinese, to me it seemed laden with coloured preservatives, and full of god knows how many e-numbers. I found having restaurants everywhere lost its novel appeal. But the humble dumpling, my goodness I didn't predict how yummy they'd; completely addictived. I vowed to make it my first dish to cook.

Braving the horrendous British weather I headed to Soho in search of dumpling skins. Prize firmly in carrier bag I rushed home excited to make my first batch. to cut a long story short the first bite was heaven I couldn't believe I had done it, lil' old me made my very own dumpling and it tasted good, so good I chose to devote a whole blog to it. But I'm not selfish people I have chosen to share my recipe with you, so go, now what are you waiting for go make dumplings.

INGREDIENTS

• dumpling skins
• pork mince (200g)
• fresh ginger (crushed)
• crushed garlic (the lazy one is fine too)
• soy sauce
• toated sesame oil
• spring onions
• fine sea salt
• white pepper

HOW TO:

• Mix all the ingrediants together, decide how much of every ingrediant you wish to put in, its completely up to you.
• place a skin in the palm of your hand
• dip a finger into water and run it around the edges, so they can stick together, when filled.
• place some filling in the centre and close the edgesof the pastry together
• place the dumplings into boiling hot water. they are ready when they float to the surface.
• serve with soy sauce

voila!

The polite pensioner reality or myth?

Things were good in the old days... there wasn’t any trouble...people were so friendly.
Have you ever heard your grandma or granddad utter these words? Chances are you probably have. Of course no one believes them. But today I fell victim to what I now call another perpetuated myth, that of the ‘polite pensioner’.

After a particularly long day at uni I wearily but happily walked towards my campus’ local Greggs bakery in much need of its sugary delights, (iced preferably). Popular and often very busy amongst my fellow students, mainly because of its cheap and cheerful ‘four for the price of’ offers, I was grateful to find no queue, just a lady with two children particularly eager to have the “Biscuit man with smartie eyes” as one put it, and a very dapperly dressed old man reminiscent of the 40’s and 50’s when men wearing suits were de rigour. Distinguished with salt and pepper hair he strongly reminded me of Nelson Mandela.

He probably won’t take two long I thought. Having spent most of the day in the library, I had skipped lunch, which had left me ravenous with a craving only a doughnut could satisfy. Lost in thoughts of pastry, my journey home and assignments, my reverie was shattered by the loud unmistakably rude tone of ‘Mr distinguished’, commanding with a thrusting forefinger what he wanted in the window, don’t you know it is rude to point, I thought! He then went on to command various other goods, in the same manner, his behaviour combined with age i must say left me shocked.

Looks passing between the silent salesgirls lead me to believe I wasn’t alone in thinking his behaviour despicable.
Call me old fashioned but I can’t stand rudeness in anyone. After he was served I ‘accidently’ to loudly commented that some people these days don’t know the meaning of please and thank you.

Well that did it. How could I ever have even compared him to the peace touting Nelson Mandela, a torrent of shouted threats and abuse was volleyed in my direction faster than any Williams sisters could ever serve back. I took the higher moral ground and remained calm throughout. I couldn’t believe here I was being insulted by someone at least 50 years my senior because I berated him on his lack of manners. Surely this was the wrong way round.

The younger generation are always getting stick for, not respecting our elders, acting with enough consideration or being mindful of our p ’s and q ’s. And yes while there are young people who are rude there are many more that are not and it’s the same with the elderly. People have to grow old sometime and unless they have a life transplant or at least decide to adopt a more people friendly persona, won’t they just grow into rude young adults? Just because you have access to an orange bus pass it doesn’t automatically turn you into tea dancing loving, bowls playing old biddy. I tell you I have been shoved hard believe it or not many times on public transport by pensioners who then stare at you as if to taunt there’s nothing you can do about it. Now before you all start coming after me with pitchforks and torches, I do not hate old people far from it I just think Maybe it’s time it’s not just the young but all of society who should watch their manners.

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greetings and welcome to My two cents a blog which will feature my opinions, thoughts and 'two cents on just about anything that touches my world or just plain riles me up.