Culinary art? I'm good at Art!

So today as I barged into my apartment, I was feeling pretty famished. So I sorted through the freeze stocked full of mother's frozen goodies and I found two servings of spaghetti. Think that I really haven't had any pasta in a while, I'd whip some up. So looked through our pasta. We had shell pasta, linguine, regular spaghetti pasta, and macaroni pasta. I really wanted the regular stuff except that we have three tubes of pasta, each one was full, except the macaroni tube. So instead of grabbing the normal stuff, I used the macaroni and I placed the regular pasta in its tube. Feeling very proud of my pasta decor, I began cooking my macaroni. There must have been only like a cup of the stuff when I put it in. I figured a cup of macaroni pasta must equal the same amount of two spaghetti sauce packets.

Boy was I wrong.

I set the concoction to boil and went to play super smash brothers brawl. I was having a grand old time, checking the boiling pasta every two minutes when I noticed it rising! The pasta expanded way more then I ever though macaroni was able to. It also took a long time to cook so I had to throw some more water in. Even after that it continued to grow till it was about a centimeter from spilling from the pot! Ready for this cooking nightmare too be over with, I tossed in the two packets of spaghetti sauce.

After I stirred it in you couldn't even tell it was spaghetti sauce.
They simply looked like different coloured noddles.

So I had two unfrost two more packets of spaghetti sauce and throw them in as well. This pot was at it's breaking point! A dash of salt more and the whole thing would have erupted in my unculinary face.

I was able to eat my fill of pasta for the night. Plus now with two zip lock containers full of pasta I will be eating my fill of pasta for lunch at noon every day this week.

Why have I strayed from Mac&Cheese?
Now to verse another art, my next stage.


Stage 10


“Zefer I don’t like this.” Gix admitted not truly being able to fit the right grove in his mattress. “It feels like tons of other people have slept in this bed.
“That’s because a ton of other people have slept in that bed…” Zefer mumbled with his eye’s half shut.
“Ew!” Gix exclaimed heaving himself of the bed and throwing his blanket on the floor. It was a little area. Much smaller then their hut used to be. There was a little room where you could wash yourself with buckets of water, another even smaller room for belongings and the like, and finally this one little room with two beds in it with an aisle separating them. Zefer half sat up to see what Gix was doing.
“You do know that they wash these things before customers come and pay to sleep on them right?” Zefer’s question hung in the air as Gix eyed his bed, disbelievingly. Gix had only touched one other person, one other person besides Zefer, yesterday. It felt it was highly inappropriate to sleep in other’s bed. It just didn’t bode well with him. Zefer glanced at Gix who was standing there just looking at the bed.
“You’ll never get any sleep that way!” Zefer said as he shot his arm out, shoving Gix’s lower back, making him fall face first into his bed. Gix’s shriek of surprise was quickly muffled into light rumbling as his mouth met the mattress.
“I said it’s clean. Cleeeeeeeeean. It’s clean so just sleep on it you weirdo. I know for a fact that they tare all the cloth of these things and give them a goof wash before they let anybody else use them. They fluff up the sheep’s wool underneath to make sure it’s comfy.” Gix could tell Zefer was waking up a bit, due to the amount he was talking. Gix’s limbs scurried onto the bed so he could fling his head back, away from the bed, gasping for air. Gix’s hands sunk into the bed, it was very soft indeed. Gix bobbed himself up and down on the bed, testing it’s weight before he concluded that it was safe enough to lie back down on.
Both Zefer and Gix lied there in the moon light from the waxing crescent moon. Both of them were now awake to try sleeping again. Gix hooked his fingers over the bed sheet pulling it up to his nose. Zefer laid there with his hand under his pillow. A strange silence had hung over the room. Zefer broke it.
“Yup I’m pretty used to Inn beds. Heck, I slept in them the past ten years right?” Zefer’s voice faded as he talked. He was about to roll over and try sleeping on his side when a thought dashed into Gix’s mind causing him to speak.
“Zefer… did you find what you wanted to find?”
“Wha--?” Zefer moved his head slightly in Gix’s direction.
“You left our little hut years ago right? I counted the stars every night. You said you wanted to find your fortune.” Gix’s question felt foreign on his lips. “Did you find what you where seeking?” Gix waited for Zefer’s reply. Zefer didn’t speak. Gix thought he wasn’t going to say anything at all.
“Yes,” was all he said for the longest moment. Zefer sunk inside himself as he thought of the past couple years. He couldn’t recall those memories, no, not yet. It wasn’t time for that to surface. Zefer’s face felt hot against his pillow. His stomach turned and he couldn’t help himself from biting his lower lip.
“Yes Gix…” Zefer spoke in a minute defeated voice. “Yes I have. So please…” Zefer glanced at Gix coddled under his blanket. “Please let me enjoy this a little longer…” It felt like something had stung the side of his head. If Zefer would be a person to cry in front of others he supposed he would of done so now. Zefer blinked harshly on his dry eyes. “Don’t ask me about that stuff again… No not yet, just a little longer.”
Gix was completely unsure why, but suddenly he felt his eyes swell up. A tear rolled against his checks. Embarrassed he brushed them away, as he did words found his tongue.
“Alright… a little longer then.” They both drifted off into a pleasant sleep after that.

***’”’***

Zefer woke up so the sun beaming in through his window. It grazed his cheeks like a warm hand. Zefer moaned as he felt the warmth brush up to his forehead. Wait that was a hand! Zefer’s eyes flew open and Gix jerked his hand back. The both waited for a moment frozen in time before Zefer spun a finger pointing at Gix. Gix’s face turned red as an apple. Gix started stammering, he had never been caught in this sort of situation before.
“You weren’t getting up, and the sun was about to reach its highest state in the sky! I sat right here the whole time. I watched the sun warm the room was the light moved along the ground, and well I was…” Gix stopped when Zefer face pushed up into a ‘what are you talking about sort of expression’. “I thought you were sick.” Zefer fell back down to his pillow after that. He groaned, shaking his head making ‘brr’ noises.
“I was just enjoying sleeping.” Zefer mentioned through groggy words. “In an actual bed!” Gix felt silly suddenly. A knock came on the door. Zefer sprung into action grabbing his wooden mask and slapping it on his face. Gix looked at the door thumping a little worried. Zefer began acting like the mute cripple he was suppose to. Gix held his hands to his chest glancing back and forth between Zefer and the sounding door. After a few knocks Gix could hear himself starting to sweet. He leaned over and whispered to Zefer.
“What do I do?” Zefer lifted up his mask to shot Gix a look that implied stupidity.
“Go see who’s knocking on the door!” Zefer whispered back in a harsh whisper. It was too late, for the door began to open. It was a lengthy man.
“Oh” he gasped, quite startled. “You didn’t answer so I thought the room was vacated. Most travelers who stay here are only passing through here, so they leave at day break.” Gix could see a giant sack of cloth strung to his back. He must have been the one who gathers the sheets for washing. “Just to remind you, your term here is finished two cycles after the sun reaches its highest point.” The man had a kind voice. He bowed and then left saying, “Sorry for waking you!” The latch of the door was shifted into place. Gix turned to Zefer who lift the mask off his face
“What’s that mean?”
“It means after the sun reaches its highest point we have a count to four thousand before we have to leave this room.” Zefer tried to explain how most people keep time to Gix. Gix blinked. It seemed silly for him to count all the way to four thousand just to leave a room. Zefer swan his legs over the side of the bed.
“Alright, we have to options.” With his fingers Zefer was making a visual. “One, we find a map or some sort of direction and set out on the road tonight. Or two, we find a way to scrounge up two more pentagons and stay here another night.” Zefer had thought this through as the man was talking, Gix could tell. “It’d suck pretty badly if you left and didn’t make it in time and I was kicked out of the room, so I’m going to follow you again.” Gix nodded. “So since your doing the talking is there anything you’d like to know before we set out? I won’t be able to talk like last time, but I can tell you anything right now.”
Gix moved a slow hand up to his chin looking up. Thinking deeply he squinted his eyes. “Say there is this person, right?” Gix explained. Zefer nodded. “And I want to ask them where to go.” Zefer nodded again, became unsure of the impending question. “What do I say?”
“Alright if you’re addressing someone be sure to say, ‘excuse me miss’. Or is it’s a guy say mister. Then they will respond. Then after that you state your question. They’ll say something else, and you say, thank you for the information.” Zefer’s explanation seemed simple enough.
Last night it was quite the episode, trying to make it to the inn. After the man had placed the two pentagons in Gix’s hand, a man in the crowd spoke up. ‘That’s the right amount for two beds at the inn’ he said. ‘You sure are lucky’ he said, ‘just go straight down that road and look for the sign that has a big bed on it you can’t miss it.’ Gix had done so, and when the nervously squeaked open the door a robust woman had sighed heavily. ‘You’re late for guests’ she took the two pentagons out from Gix’s open hand and replaced it with a key promptly shooing them off to this room. Gix didn’t have to say a word.
They had gathered their things, returned the key and stepped out side. Today seemed much more humble in the town then the day before. Or perhaps like the nice tall man had said, most of the travelers had gone. Gix wondered around the streets a bit with an emotionless woodened face Zefer in tow. There didn’t seem to be much of the city, just the trees around it and the square, and a few surrounding houses. Gix was fairly unimpressed with village; it didn’t seem as exquisite as the town he had first been into. And there were hardly any people. Then a fowl stench brushed his nose.
Gix wondered behind a building down a street he hadn’t been down yet. He dropped Zefer’s hand pushing both palms to this mouth. He had found all of the people. They where digging through piles upon endless pile of rumble. Wood and destroyed stone crumpled together. Gix saw dark red marks splashed indiscriminately. He saw a hand sticking out from a pile of rubble, all sorts of vermin and pests had taken interest in it already. The stench wafted in their and Gix jerked forward, he felt like he was going to vomit.
“It’s pretty disgusting isn’t it?” a female toned voice called to them. Gix didn’t turn around. “Enough to make you wanna vomit.” She stated Gix’s obvious condition. Gix didn’t look up to her, he slammed his eyes shut, trying to regain his senses.
“They say a demon strode through here. Destroying everything in its path, even things that weren’t. They say his fighting is top notch, say he slices arrows in half before they touch him and he can bend swords with a touch of his hand.” Gix wasn’t calming down. He felt dizzy like the destruction was about to rise up and drown him. He bent his knees trying to stabilize himself before the tsunami crashed.
“But that sounds pretty farfetched don’t it?” she said with a strange low voice. She over pronounced ‘farfetched’ and it didn’t do anything to ease his mood. Gix was completely uninterested in what this woman was saying.
“Yeah, nothing could possibly do that. The woman was unrelenting, “Nothing human that’s for sure… wouldn’t you agree Zefer?” The world stopped.
Gix was no longer dizzy, and suddenly very interested in the woman. It all came crashing down on him.

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Jessica's reaction to the story...


'retribution'
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My take on Trish's blog yesterday...