Care factor I've been in a sort of holding pattern for a few weeks now. Lazy. Careless. Useless. I haven't been bothered to keep the house tidy. Couldn't be arsed to do any shopping for myself, to do the dishes. I have a letter I keep telling myself I should write for at least one of my friends. Bugger it — she can wait. I did a course last year and to graduate I need to complete some final assignments and send them in: not the slightest bit interested right now.

I presume we all get these little spells occasionally and frankly I'm not that fussed about it. Meh. Whatever.

You must be thankful, however, that I don't work in airspace control, say. Or emergency:

Dude In White Coat: “Harpo. The Dalai Lama has a contusion in the thoracic-femoral cuboid. He needs twenty CCs of biothorene, stat!” (that's right, punks: I've seen ER. I know how these people talk)

Harpo In White Coat: “Meh. Whatever.”

Every summer I enjoy playing cricket with my club, the Harpo Massive (not actually the club's real name). My average this season so far has been very poor but thank you for asking. All cricket clubs have their own atmosphere and ours is no different in that it too is a little different (oh man I'm writing really well today. Meh. Whatever). It is traditional at every club that slips fielders spend the afternoon telling the batsman how badly he's playing, what shot is going to get him out, how much better than him the bowlers are and all that sort of thing. We at the Harpo Massive spend the afternoon talking about whether Herbert Van Karajan's Beethoven's cycle is better than Sir Neville Marriner's and we discuss Blake's Innocence and Experience with reference to Shakespeare's sonnets. After the game all cricketers gather in the rooms or out in the sunset with a beer and chat. We at the Harpo Massive have wine tastings and play board games.

Just one box of match balls cost $400 so to raise funds this year we are having a condiment sale. A few of the lads have prepared a magnificent collection that includes tomato chutney, apricot jam, tomato sauce, green bean chutney, and BBQ sauce. Won't that be splendid!

My contribution is my Chennai Sun Chilli Oil. For your chilli oil-quaffing pleasure I might as well post a recipe:

Chennai Sun Chilli Oil

A bottle of some half-decent olive oil
A bottle of some other oil like vegetable or canola if you feel like being cheap. No stress.
A few fresh chillies
A packet or two of crushed dried chilli
A clove or two of garlic
A sprig of rosemary from your or your neighbour's yard.
A bottle of whiskey

Find a pot large enough to comfortably hold the oil. Pour in the oil. Add the dried chillies, roughly chop up all but one of the fresh chillies and throw them in. Slice the garlic and drop that in and put the pot over a low heat and let the oil warm up. This will take a little time and you will be tempted to go and watch Wheel Of Fortune but if you do you will become hypnotised by that spinning wheel and the flashing lights which would be bad because you really do not want the oil to boil. If it does the oil will not keep as well and the garlic will fry and impart an unpleasant tang to your infusion. After anywhere between ten minutes and six hours of some gentle heat turn off your burner and let it all cool. Buy a vowel. Try to complete the famous phrase. Sterilise a bottle (put it in the oven or fill it with boiling water or just breathe some condensation onto it and rub it with a cloth) and pour the concoction into it. Drop in the rosemary and the last of the fresh chillies for prettiness and then top up with a splash of whiskey. Drink the rest of the whiskey and cheer when the wheel lands on top dollar.

This recipe is more involved than it should be (it should just be “put some chillies in a bottle of oil and then go back to what you were doing”) but I wanted to share.

On the weekend I was supposed to put my batch into all the jars that the club has given me to fill. But I didn't get around to it. I spent Sunday lying on the couch. Meh. Whatever.

  ¶ 6:00 pm