BE PREPARED.

Last Monday morning I returned from the supermarket at 11.00am and began cooking. By 8pm that evening I had wiped down the cooker top, counters and sweat from my brow and in my freezer were 25 separate meals for 6 people. Shepherds Pies, Curries, Chicken Casseroles, Spaghetti Bolognese etc. Now I don't have to worry about food shopping or preparing and cooking meals for the next month.

Bliss.

It's not that I don't enjoy cooking, I do but now and then I do this when I want to have more time to myself. I've sold three paintings this month and all my other paintings are in galleries and there's nothing left here except the Audrey Hepburn Commission I'm working on so it's time to get busy and rustle up a few more paintings while the kids are in school and not having to worry about what's for dinner gives me that little bit more time to myself.

If my posting is a little slow this month you'll understand why or it might be because I've had a complete nervous breakdown plus episodes of psychotic behavior because with my fractured memory I'll keep forgetting to take the fecking dinner out of the freezer in time and end up standing in in the freezing cold and lashings of rain with four crying kids holding their stomachs in the queue for the chipper down this one street town.

I've left Saturdays and Sundays off the monthly menu because I don't cook on Saturdays, just pizza or takeaways or a meal out for the family and Sundays are always roast chicken and roast poppies kind of days.

The Husband doesn't cook. Full Stop. While shopping today with Sarah in Dundrum Shopping Centre for new school shoes he called me.

"What time will you be home at?" he asks.

"I mightn't come back at all. Might stay here till they shut the place down" I laugh knowing he's thinking of his stomach.

"It's just that I've covered the chicken breasts in bread-crumbs and I've got the roast potatoes prepped and the peas and gravy on standby. So how long do I cook the chicken and potatoes for?"

"Yeah, like you're kidding me, right?"

He wasn't.

"Maybe I've made a mistake" I heard him say quietly as he poured gravy on his meal. "Now I'll be asked to do it again"

FECKING RIGHT MISTER.

New Year.

New Me

New Him?