AlleyGator wrote:

> "Bob (this one)" > wrote:
>
> Snipped a lot of good stuff that I really hated to snip . . .
> This was, I have to tell you, quite an entertaining reply. That
> 80-hour hole in your week must be murder (not!). Sounds like you can
> at least say you've had an "interesting" life, eh?

This is really my fourth "life." Curly-haired folk singer in the late
50's and early 60's who sometimes wasn't stoned; sang with a lot of
Who's Who folks who kept at it and a bunch more like me who were just
playing. Started as a copywriter (degree in English) in the early 60's
and ran up the corporate tree to international marketing management (and
went to culinary school in Europe to amuse myself). Held a few
miscellaneous jobs to make ends meet while trying to figure out what I
want to be when I grow up. Foodservice 70's through 01. And whatever it
is I'm about nowadays. 4 kids along the way with 3 wives of my own and
several others - between wives - that merely borrowed me for their
entertainment. Been all over the world on expense accounts.

It appears that the whole "be something when I grow up" is dreaming the
impossible dream. But in the meantime, I've stood in front of the Mona
Lisa, St. Paul's cathedral, the La Brea tar pits, La Scala, Texas
Schoolbook Depository, Mt. Fuji, the Sidney opera house, the twin towers
(could see them going up from my office near Wall Street), the Kremlin,
the Berlin wall, Mt. Kilimanjaro... A lot of it was luck, but some was
certainly drive. But, yes, a lotta, lotta good luck. And a huge number
of good people along the way

> And here I was all
> excited because I finally got a Santuko-style knife. Made me feel
> like Jacques Pepin on the garlic for a few seconds <G>.

I think that's great. Next, it'll be those perfect onion cuts. Then the
garnish cuts for the sheer hell of it. Buy a book on garnishing with
lots of pictures. Play with that stuff. It's really satisfying to drop a
swan on a tray of veggies for no good reason and watch everyone smile
about it. Or to do that Japanese "whittle" cut with long strips of some
veggie. Radish mice. The kitchen is the source of physical and mental
health. A smile is good for both.

Pastorio