Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Abby's ride home
The other day I went to pick up the kids from school. Everything was fine and I sent the kids on home ahead of me (they ride really slow and it is even hard for me to coast on my bike behind them without running into them eventually). As I am riding home minding my own business and not really paying attention to my surroundings, I see Abby out of the corner of my eye, not on the bike path. I immediately put on my brakes all the while trying to keep Alex on the back of my bike, get my bike off the bike path and find Abby with tears running down her cheeks and two concerned ladies next to her. Of course, I am thinking that she got hurt and am quite worried. The two ladies, seeing that I was someone she knew, let me know what the problem was. It seems that a spider had crawled out of her handle bars and she had freaked out. It was all very fun trying to get her to bring her bike home, seeing as how I could not help her, and then convincing her the next morning that she should ride the bike to school. It seems that riding a bike is not without it's perils here in Holland with all the wind, rain and the killer spiders.
Haggis
On my trip to Scotland I picked upa small Haggis to bring home and share with the family. For those of you who do not know what Haggis is, consider yourself lucky, until now. According to wikipedia.org it is:
"There are many recipes, most of which have in common the following ingredients: sheep's 'pluck' (heart, liver and lungs), minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally boiled in the animal's stomach for approximately three hours."
So Kristal proceded to boil this yummy meal. When I arrived home, Kristal poked her head out of the door and said I should prepare myself for the smell. I walked in the door and could not smell much at first but then it kicked in. I cannot even really descibe the smell. It was not aweful or nasty but definatly not normal or a smell you would expect out of anything you would be willing to put in your mouth. This scared us a bit but we insisted that we would continue and try this great Scottish dish. I have to note that the kids refused to come downstairs due to the smell, they decided they would rather play on the upper 2 floors all evening without dinner.
It came time to finally pull out the Haggis and enjoy our feast. I grabbed 2 forks expecting to grab a roast-type thing out of the boiling water but instead found that the stomach had broken open leaking out the inside substance into the water. Well, that was the end of that. I could not even attept to try water-soaked ground up organs of sheep at this point. We quickly put the garbage on the back deck and dumped the water down the drain. It was an adventure that I promise we will never repeat.
"There are many recipes, most of which have in common the following ingredients: sheep's 'pluck' (heart, liver and lungs), minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally boiled in the animal's stomach for approximately three hours."
So Kristal proceded to boil this yummy meal. When I arrived home, Kristal poked her head out of the door and said I should prepare myself for the smell. I walked in the door and could not smell much at first but then it kicked in. I cannot even really descibe the smell. It was not aweful or nasty but definatly not normal or a smell you would expect out of anything you would be willing to put in your mouth. This scared us a bit but we insisted that we would continue and try this great Scottish dish. I have to note that the kids refused to come downstairs due to the smell, they decided they would rather play on the upper 2 floors all evening without dinner.
It came time to finally pull out the Haggis and enjoy our feast. I grabbed 2 forks expecting to grab a roast-type thing out of the boiling water but instead found that the stomach had broken open leaking out the inside substance into the water. Well, that was the end of that. I could not even attept to try water-soaked ground up organs of sheep at this point. We quickly put the garbage on the back deck and dumped the water down the drain. It was an adventure that I promise we will never repeat.
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