Socially accomplished day

The Vault and Gardens

Happy Birthday Astrid

Good things in the mail

This morning, I was delighted to find a package from Meghan Mathieson in my pidge. Along with a letter, she sent me a vegetarian cookbook published by the British Columbia Ministry of Health and a package of that fieriest of snacks: Kasugai Roasted Hot Green Peas. Covered in a layer of dry Wasabi, they can have an exceptional amount of kick to them. They are just the kind of food that is ubiquitous in Vancouver, but quite unheard of here. Many thanks.

The cookbook, called The Vegetarian Edge is liberally sprinkled with exclamation marks and the kind of statements over-excited camp counsellors might make. For instance, it exclaims: “All right! You’ve decided to go vegetarian” before suggesting how to “Get to THE MAX each day!” It promises to be quite useful, though I have my doubts about whether I could consume the recommended 200-300g of tofu a day. I will provide extra protein in lentil form.

Good things in the evening

Spending some time with Nora, Kelly, and Bryn today was both enjoyable and appropriate, seeing as how I have less than a month left of living in the main site at Wadham. The aspect of the move that I regret most is that it risks further detaching me from social life in the college. Hopefully, that will not prove to be the case.

Social happenings later in the day also went very well. Spending three and a half hours talking with Roz tonight was really excellent. It was the kind of conversation in which you could feel the seeds of a great many future conversations – especially in the areas that I know relatively little about. It’s interesting to see how many of the same ideas come up in IR and literary theory, respectively, and how similar perspectives are associated with completely different people. All in all, it was the kind of conversation that strongly reinforces your sense that you were right in thinking a person interesting, as well as worth knowing better.

I hope I have the chance to see her again before she goes to Italy and I go to Malta.


  • It looks like I will be going to Cambridge for a Wadham exchange dinner on April 4th: the day my mother will be leaving the UK.
  • Seems that image posting is still broken. Sorry.
  • Private, to Meghan: I’m sorry we spent so many days eating spicy curry on potatoes…

7 thoughts on “Socially accomplished day”

  1. I looked at that cookbook… where else but in Canada would they list bannock under grains? Not to mention chapattis and roti. They missed nan, though.

    You might want tt check out “Vegan Planet.” It has hundreds of animal-free recipes from all over the world. Amazing stuff.

  2. Thanks.

    I also have the Student’s Vegetarian Cookbook, which Hilary McNaughton sent me a few months ago.

  3. I am willing to bet that nothing time-strapped students cook in a shared kitchen using camping cookware is anyone’s favourite meal.

  4. It’s only when the photos are discontinued by technical fault that you realize how much they add to the site.

    I hope the problem is fixed soon. If not, start hosting them in another way.

  5. Kasugai Roasted Hot Green Peas?

    Why, those are “A HAPPY PRESENT FROM THE EARTH!”

  6. Re: Spicy food

    “U.S. and Japanese researchers have announced results of a study showing that capsaicin, the chemical that makes peppers hot, can cause prostate cancer cells to kill themselves. ‘Capsaicin led 80 percent of human prostate cancer cells growing in mice to commit suicide in a process known as apoptosis, the researchers said.’ This led to tumors one fifth the size of those in untreated mice.”

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