I made a paella for a rooftop barbeque the other day that turned out very well. I have video testimony of the quality taken from a true Valenciana. As she says in the video, “ está el arroz super en su punto” (The rice is perfect). If I have learned one thing since moving to Valencia it is how to cook rice. The other thing I have learned is that if Spanish people don't like your cooking they will tell you. Back in the States I cooked the vast majority of the rice I consumed in a rice cooker. I would make an occasional risotto but I generally ate rice as a side dish. Now I make all sorts of dishes using rice as the main ingredient. Getting the rice en su punto is just a matter of using the exact amount of liquid, although this can be tricky at times.
My secret for paella valenciana is using the right amount of meat for whatever size pan I am using.* In this video I used my 46 centimeter paella. For this pan I use half a rabbit and half a chicken and then two extra leg quarters. The leg quarters are the most flavorful part of the bird so the extra meat really helps thicken the broth. You simply fry the meat in the pan with olive oil, browning it well on all sides while being careful not to overcook the pieces that cook faster. I salt the meat during the browning process. Then you add the water and let this simmer for about 30 minutes. I add the saffron at the last ten minutes or so. Taste for salt (It is difficult to add too much salt as far as most Spanish cooks are concerned and I concur). Then you add the vegetables: broad green beans (perolas as they are called in Valenciano), white beans (alubias blancas), and butter beans I think they are called in English garrafó. These are all precooked so they just need to heat up and then you add the rice. Once you have situated everything in the pan correctly you stop stirring the pan although you are allowed to shake it a bit. When the water is gone it is done. You will probably have to adjust the water a bit by adding a bit towards the end as you try the rice.
¡Buen provecho! * I don't just have a paella pan (called a paella), I have paella pans! Plural. If you only have one paella pan you are livig like an animal, at least here in Valencia.
My brother just sent me a new 160 gig iPod and my old heart rate monitor. Totally exasperated with iTunes but thrilled to finally have my heart rate monitor on the same continent as my fat carcass, I’ll be going for some sort of epic bike ride in an hour or so. The weather here in Valencia is cooperating with a cloud-free sky and a thermometer that will reach 23 degrees this afternoon (that’s 73.4 for State-side folks). I had a hell of a time trying to import an audio book for the ride today. I will be listening to the robot version of Travesuras de la Niña Mala which I have just finished reading for the second time. It may seem a bit tedious to listen to a book that I have just finished reading—a book read by a computer at that—but I don’t have a lot of selection when it comes to books in Spanish. Any help in this area would be appreciated greatly.
I just got back from about a two hour ride. The heart rate monitor doesn’t lie: I ain’t exactly in the best shape of my life. Today’s ride certainly pointed me in the right direction. When you are looking at your heart rate display you can’t kid yourself that you are having a good ride when in fact you aren’t. I had a good ride today because I was constantly kicking myself in the ass to keep my heart rate in range. I really know when I have a great workout when after my ride I eat, take a shower, and then fall unconscious for 45 minutes and wake up feeling as good as the day I was born (that was a good day).
I tried to go for a maximum heart rate sprint but I wasn’t feeling it. First of all I need some clip-in pedals for my bike which I plan on buying next week. I don’t even feel safe pedaling all-out without clip-ins. I don’t feel my normal attachment to my bike. I will try again for a max heart rate ride on Monday. From your maximum heart rate you can start really judging your daily workouts. Some days you will try to maintain 80% of your max, other days less, but you need to know your max. It’s not like I’ve ever been too much of a geek about my bike rides by getting overly-technical, at least not in the past. I just rode my ass off. As I get older I realize that if I want to maintain a decent level of performance I need to train a bit smarter. Train smart or train stupid, there is no substitute for miles ridden. Gadgets and training gimmicks are fine but I never really needed a heart rate monitor to tell me I had a great ride (although it does help with motivation). Time to start racking up some hard kilometers.
You may be
asking yourself, “Am I good in bed?” The answer is probably “no.” Actually, in
your case the answer is definitely and unequivocally “no” and possibly even
"hell no" which is why you should keep reading.
To accurately determine your sexual performance you need to break down “Good in
Bed” into its three components and what those individual components mean.
“Good” can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Say
someone had been trapped under earthquake rubble for three weeks without food
or water. If you offered this person a half-eaten microwave burrito you
found under your car seat they would undoubtedly say it was good. It is all in
the perception. If your own sexual technique is the moral equivalent of a
half-eaten burrito found under a car seat then all you have to do is work on
how you are perceived. There is probably an easier way to do this than bury
your partner under a collapsed building for three weeks, but a better method doesn’t
readily come to mind. Make sure to feed his/her cat while they are gone.
Next there is the whole “bed” thing. Maybe you are good in places other than a
bed? Perhaps your prowess can only be appreciated outside the stifling confines
of the sleeping chamber. Probably not but I’m just saying this to be polite. As
you get older you learn the hard way that a nice soft bed is about the only
sane place to wrestle while undressed. Sure, you were a lot more spontaneous in
your youth, but the last time you had sex in the kitchen you fell on the
utensil drawer and then had go to the emergency room to have a melon baller
surgically removed from your lower intestinal track. As the doctor asked how
this happened all you could think was, “I have a melon baller? Cool!” Just
remember to wash it.
Finally there is the word “In.” Let’s be honest here; if you are somehow
expecting a simple preposition to validate your miserable sexual performance
then you are worse off than any of us ever imagined. To be perfectly honest I
think you are doing it all wrong. There is probably a book you can read on the
subject but it's probably too late; any change in your routine would just
frighten your partner. In your case I think the most sensible solution is
to just give up.
Valencia came back from the brink of defeat against Atlético de Madrid last night in Mestalla and settled for a 2-2 draw. I thought that Valencia dominated most of the match even though Atlético led almost the entire game. A loss with Atlético gaining two away goals would have been an almost insurmountable challenge for Valencia as they play the return game next week in Madrid. Valencia can never seem to do anything the easy way. They lost the opener against Brugges in Belgium and then drew at home in the first game against Werder (Valencia advanced after that completely insane 4-4 match in Germany) so I guess you can say that history is on our side this year.
In other games:
Fulham 2-1 Wolfsburg
Benfica 2-1 Liverpool
Hamburg 2-1 Standard de Liège
Can Valencia make it to the final in Hamburg on Wednesday 12 May? If they do you can bet that they will take the difficult route.
So there has been some very exciting football the last three nights. In the Champions League we saw two brilliant games earlier in the week. Bayern Munich beat Manchester 2-1. Franck Ribéry is one of the most competitive players in the game today. On Wednesday Arsenal pulled off a 2-2 with Barça although Cesc Fabrègas broke his foot shooting a penalty kick to tie the game and will be out for the season and will probably also miss the World Cup games for Spain.
I think that city life forces people to be more liberal in their thinking. You have no choice but to accept other people for who they are and you must learn to live and play well with others. You are in direct contact with many people every time you leave your apartment. Cities are a constant reminder of the need for cooperation and compromise, the hallmarks of civilization. Cities teach us that we must balance liberty and order if we are to survive and prosper. The Unabomber suburban lifestyle seems to say that you can have everything your own way if you have enough land around you and are far enough away from any neighbors. Conservatives go on and on about not wanting to give up their “freedoms” but just what are these freedoms?
Most of the teabagger crowd undoubtedly thinks that Europe is less “free” than America. If you ask conservatives to be specific about what rights Europeans have relinquished as they live under more socialist governments you are likely to hear a lot of stuttering. I will grant you that it is a lot more difficult to purchase a firearm in Europe than in America but I just don’t see this as an essential element to my overall level of happiness. Most of these conservatives have never been to Europe, they haven’t taken advantage of a freedom that I do feel is essential: the freedom to travel. Perhaps they would visit Europe if they could drive there from Arkansas or North Dakota.
To many people the automobile is the very symbol of personal freedom. These same people probably couldn’t even imagine a life without a car. Few of the people I know here in Valencia own a car and many have never even learned to drive. I could say the same thing about the people I knew in Seattle. It is difficult to look at the San Diego Freeway in Los Angeles at rush hour, with 18 lanes of backed-up traffic, and think about freedom. But it’s not just LA, there is horrible traffic in some of the smallest suburban areas of America and the more roads we build the more people drive (something traffic planners call “induced traffic”). If you were to gage the mood of every individual stuck in rush hour traffic I think you would probably find it to be angry, resentful, and not particularly accepting of other commuters (AKA citizens). Gage the mood of people walking, biking, or taking mass transit to work and I would wager that the mood is completely different and enormously more positive.
Folks in suburbia spend a good deal of their day locked inside an automobile going from one activity to another. In the weeks after the passage of Obama’s health care reform we have seen outbreaks of incredibly anti-social behavior on the part of many conservatives. I would blame a lot of this anger and frustration on the fact that they probably spend too much time behind the wheel of a car. Automobiles bring out the very worst in people. Just take a look at drivers in heavy traffic, not many of them are enjoying it. Automobiles also isolate individuals so that they don’t have to take direct responsibility for their actions. If you act like an asshole in traffic there usually are no consequences. Act like an idiot while walking down a busy sidewalk and someone will probably sort you out, one way or another. No one would ever give someone the finger while on foot. I would theorize that the entire modern conservative movement in America was hatched among commuters listening to insipid, political talk radio as they angrily drove to work. Pissed-off drivers are a perfect market for the bitter rhetoric of conservative talk radio. There aren’t many people listening to Rush while they take the subway to work.
The sclerotic philosophy of conservatives has been stalled in traffic for the past 30 years, if not longer. There was a time when I thought that the conservative/liberal poles in American politics were essential for balance but I have altered my position on this radically in the wake of conservative opposition to Obama. I don’t know how anyone could view the worst of the conservative behavior as anything less than anti-democratic if not fascist. Obama was elected president by a very wide margin by citizens who wanted him to reform health care. Not that he has implemented these reforms and carried out the will of the people he is being vilified by many on the Right as some sort of pariah. Maybe all of these crazy teabaggers just need a bit of fresh air and exercise. Maybe they should walk to work once in a while.
