I can haz....

iqama?

YES I CAN HAZ IQAMA!!!!!

Dubai, my love, Dubai...

Dubai Airport. Looks nice, doesn't it? You could cheerfully spend a couple of hours wandering around, sniffing out stuff, don't you think?

This is where Furry just spent nearly 30 hours.

The gig with Emirates is, that if you have a long layover in Dubai, you get a hotel room.

Which Furry did. Where he had a shower and slept and Skyped me and shook off some jet lag. There was a small issue with his meds, the customs officials weren't keen on letting him out of the airport with 20kgs of cardiac/diabetes medications, so they held them over while he had his layover snooze.

Pretty simple, eh?

Well.. no.

Like EVERYTHING in my husband's life, NOTHING is simple.

He got the the airport 3 hours ahead of his scheduled departure. Was given a bum steer on directions to get his bag of meds,  spent nearly an hour finding and them finally retrieving said meds.

All good so far.

So, on his way from customs to the departure gate for his flight to Riyadh, he asked an airport security guard for directions. And said guard most politely gave those directions, swipe his access card, and let Furry out of the terminal, with the instructions: "Walk up here, around the corner, and through the door on the right"

Again, all good so far....

Until..

He attempted to re-enter the terminal at said "door on the right", to discover, he'd left the security of customs and immigration, and was now OUTSIDE with 20kgs of meds in a bag.

Not cool.

Customs officers took him to a "special" room where, thankfully, all the paperwork in triplicate was in order.

But.... there was still a language barrier that was not that easy to cross.

After repeatedly describing the contents of the case as "medicine" and pointing to his heart and saying "tablets".. tapping his wrist and saying "blood tablets" he uttered the OTHER word to describe the contents of said case:

"drugs"

And that, dear reader, is when things went South.

From here, he was taken to an even more "special" room, where he was strip-searched and drug swabbed.

And all he could think of was that he'd borrowed the suitcase from our darling friend Peakie, who had recently been to Bali.

Apparently his happy-place mantra while he was being "probed" was:

"Please don't have let her walk past some random person smoking a joint, whose smoke got on her t-shirt that was stored in the case"

So, needless to say, he missed his connecting flight to Riyadh, and after (most apologetically) being given drug-free clearance, was told NOT to leave the airport for any reason whatsoever.

Oh, and by the way, the next flight to Riyadh isn't for another 26 hours.

So, I can tell you, Dubai airport is a WONDERFUL place, unless you are a sleep deprived, recently-probed, unfairly accused drug mule who has to spend 24(ish) hours sitting in a plastic hair and eating airport food.

And, in closing, for all you international travelers who may suffer from diabetes,

Januvia, apparently, looks like Ecstasy.

He's gone.

Ok, it's now official. He's moved to Saudi.

For the past three months, we had nothing.. nada.... to hang our hats on. While all this talk of "moving to Saudi" has been the focus for us, the reality has been that nothing's been in writing.. in reality we hadn't actually had a "real" job.

The contract was signed was dependant upon the visa, which was dependant upon the medical which was dependant on the whims and vagaries of the Saudi Consulate... which at one stage rejected the visa..

On the grounds that their own paperwork was out-of-date.

And while he's in the air, winging his way to Dubai, we're still far from home and hosed.

His actual employment.. that thing he does that will earn us money.. will be dependant on FURTHER "requirement" being met once he hits the ground in Riyadh.

The issuing of his iqama.

Everything hinges on that.

So, while I dropped him off at the airport last night, and we're all full of the hope and possibility of this new life.. we do have a small way to go yet before he is officially "employed"

Still, that meant nawt last night when I had to do the kerbside drop, knowing it could be MONTHS before I see him again.

And in true Instant Kharma fashion, I turned on the radio to cover my sobbing on the way home.

Did I get "Bohemian Rhapsody"?

Did I get "Tainted Love"?

Did I "Too Drunk to F**CK", or some other uplifting, quirky and funky mindless 80's one hit wonder to whom I could have sung away my tears?

No.

My drive home playlist consisted of:

Lou Reed's "Dirty Boulevard" ("fly, fly away...")
Hunter's and Collectors "When the Rivers Run Dry" ("You got nothin' but your soul to sell, you got nothin')
Foo Fighters "Next Year" (pretty much the whole damn song")
Nickleback "Far AwaY" ("I keep dreaming that you'll be with me and you'll never go")

I swear I was waiting for REM's "Everybody Hurts" to come on and suck my soul dry.

"Nothing Compares 2U" would have made me punch myself in the throat.

So, today, I sit at work, with eyes like a sad panda with hay fever AND conjunctivitis, counting down the minutes until he lands and we can skype. I'm like a 16 year old waiting for the phone to ring.

If I start doodling  hearts over my i's and writing "Mrs Lee 4 evah" in cursive script on my pencil case, you have my permission to kill me.

More on Furry's learning curve.

I am currently obsessed with dumplings. Gow Gees. Shui Mai. Gyoza. Wrap pretty much anything in a pastry wrapper, and I'll give it a red hot go. Coming off 5 weeks of being sick means that I have to treat my system with kid gloves. Dairy is still out, as is anything fatty. I've been living off Majick Phở and rice dishes for weeks, so I am on a major flava crava jones right now.

Furry.

Hmm. Yes.

Well.

He's back in Melbourne, longer than he expected. A few irons in the fire to get him back to PNG, but nothing set in concrete yet. We've adjusted to sharing living spaces again and I must admit, it's nice to come home and have the house all clean, and dinner cooked. In lieu of rent, I get my gutters cleaned and Furry Balls on demand.

Not such a bad arrangement, actually.

So yesterday, Furry announces he want to improve his repertoire of Furry Ball recipes. So I phaff off to work, leaving him with some $$ for ingredients and my car.

And get home to 90 dumplings, in 4 different flavours.



A quick call to friends up the hill, with an impassioned plea to come and help us eat all of the fruits of his labour, and we've got an instant Furry Ball Feast! It was so SO good, we have decided that while he's in town we'll utilize his skill and we've declared Tuesday "Dumpling Night"

This, from the man I met all those years ago, who thought serving nachos with a paint scraper was the height of his culinary possibilities. ]

Last nights offerings were chicken and ginger, pork and 5 spice, classic Furry Balls, and beef with Schezhuan pepper. The dipping sauces were siracha, red vinegar and sweet chilli, hoi sin, classic light soy and Furry's own concoction of soy, vinegar, sliced birds eye chillies and diced coriander roots.

He is now the proud owner of a mincer (for his up and coming seafood gow gee fest next Tuesday night), and is, as we speak, at home experimenting with xia long bao, or Shanghai soup dumplings.

And in true GREAT home cook style, he is realizing that a repertoire is not about how many recipes you can churn out from cookbooks, but on how you can adapt your knowledge-base to allow for seasonal ingredients, individual palates and plain old cravings.

What the Phở?

image courtesy of androog, via Wiki CC licence

Greetings. My name is pg and I'm a Phở ho. Or a "fur hur" is we're going to be a stickler for pronunciation.

There's been a lurgy going around THOFAPL over the past 10 days. And rather that put you, dear reader, off your food, let me just best describe it as "gastro"... Gastro that lead to me spending 8 hours in Rosebud Base hospital on Goodness Friday. Gastro, that like a bad house guest has sorely overstayed its welcome and is now just pissing me off.

I have, effectively, made myself lactose intolerant. Meaning much my staple menu is now out-of-bounds. I mean, really, spag bog without the Parm Reg, is really NOT worth the effort.

So we've been "dining" (for want of a better word) on rice, white bread and Maggi noodles.

However, Furry has recently been experimenting with home-made Phở and offered to cook us a pot.

Now you must all sing the "Furry's Majick Phở" song.

"Phở, Phở, Magic Phở"

This is, however, only amusing if a) you know the song I've referenced and b) if you get your pronunciation correct.

Furry slow bakes osso bucco until the fat is rendered and the bones are browned. The bones are then scrubbed under running water and placed in a pot of fresh, cold, water and simmered for several hours. He doesn't seem to worry too much about skimming, and the stock turns out pretty clear. He adds a cinnamon quill, some garlic, some ginger, a few Schezhuan peppercorns, cardamon, coriander and a clove.

Once the broth is fragrant, he adds finely sliced steak and diced chicken. A block of silken tofu always gets diced and added, too.

because this was a sickness Phở, he left off the seafood and the fish balls which I usually love. When I dine out for Phở, I love the tendons and the pizzle and the fatty brisket bits, but this is medicinal Phở, and we thought, under the intestinal circumstances, that it would be best to leave them out. We also eschewed the vinegary white onions. and the fried whitebait that I usually love to add.

Vietnamese dishes are meals typically served with lots of greens, herbs, vegetables and various other accompaniments such as dipping sauces, hot and spicy pastes, and flavor enhancements such as a squeeze of lime or lemon. The dish is garnished with ingredients such as green onions, white onions, coriander, Thai basil (húng quế) (should not be confused with sweet basil - Vietnamese: húng chó or húng dổi), fresh Thai chili peppers, lemon or lime wedges, bean sprouts, and cilantro (ngò rí) or culantro (ngò gai). Although cilantro and culantro have similar names and similar flavors, they are completely different plants.

I like my Phở with bean sprouts, basil, mint, coriander, lime and Hoi Sin sauce. (i usually add a fair dollop of siracha, as well.. but under the circumstances.....) The Phở toppings (Phởppings?) are what makes the dish, making every mouthful a different textural and taste experience. Many an heated discussion has been entered into on "traditional" Phở, in both ingredients and pronunciation, but suffice it to say, that while Furry's Majik Phở (furryfur?) may not win any authenticity competitions, it is nourishing and easily digested. Phở is also an awesome excuse to get into growing herbs, coriander and mint pretty much grow on the back of your neck, here in the Melbourne climate. Both Thai and Vietnamese mint grow well also. There is nothing more satisfying than not just making your own Phở, but pottering down the back steps to pick your own herbs for the Phởppings.

The other secret benefit of Phở, is seeing how many puns you can make on the name.. pho shiz, what the pho, Mo Pho, pho king, absolutely ph0-bulous, 9021 pho... oh, the puns just keep on coming!

Hard to be sick, with a bowl of majick pho in front of you, and your punster son making the above cracks!

Dobby, the House Elf

"This, sir?" said Dobby, plucking at the pillowcase. "'Tis a mark of the house-elf's enslavement, sir. Dobby can only be freed if his masters present him with clothes, sir. The family is careful not to pass Dobby even a sock, sir, for then he would be free to leave their house forever."

This morning, as I left The House of Fur and Purple Love, my husband, Furry, was doing the washing up.

In the nude.

For those of you who know him, you may well imagine this. For those of you that don't, imagine a portly, middle aged man, pretty much covered in body hair, standing at our sink, whistling tunelessly.

Now Furry often finds himself nude. He is well known for his streak at the Turrumburry Races, and even poor Auntie Linnie has had her eyes soiled, as she jogs past our house in the early morning, to see Furry standing in our picture window, rubbing his eyes and his "nethers" and farting, but to see him standing at the sink, nekkid bottie wobbling as he scrubbed last nights pots, gave me pause.

When I remarked upon his nude status he replied in best Lancashire accent "T' Missus, she's a dragon. Won't give me clothes to ware, keeps me chained at sink. Nary a stitch t'cover m'arse and work all day long scroobin' it is"

Please, dear reader, I beseech you. PLEASE FIND FURRY A JOB, HE'S DRIVING ME MAD!

In other news, with Furry's unemployment about to hit the 4month mark, and no prospects on the horizon, we're falling back on old frugal recipes to save some dosh. This weekend past, we made Mr Chang's Wombok salad.

Baby Bok Choy Crunchy Noodle Salad

BABY BOK CHOY CRUNCHY NOODLE SALAD

Ingredients:

1 bunch Baby Bok Choy
6 Green onions (spring onions) chopped 10mm lengths
100g packet Changs Crunchy Noodles (flat noodle)
100g chopped roasted cashew nuts

Dressing:

¼ cup white vinegar
2 tablesp soy sauce light
2 tsp Changs sesame oil
2 tsp Changs fish sauce
1/8 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup castor sugar

Remove individual bok choy stalk with leaves and wash well. Shred diagonally in slices 5-8cm wide. Place bok choy in serving bowl, add chopped green onions, and toss. Just before serving, pour over dressing, add nuts and noodles, toss well to combine.

To make dressing, combine all ingredients in bowl and whisk.

From www.changs.com.au.

And I had a bit left over, undressed (much like Furry) and some extra noodles. I quickly stir fried the cabbage/pine nut/spring onions. Added some chicken thigh pieces fried off in sesame oil in another pan. Add the salad dressing and a heaped tablespoon of crunchy peanut butter. Cook over high heat until peanut butter has melted, serve immediately on rice, and top with crunchy noodles.

A most excellent way to use up leftovers that otherwise would have been tossed.

Neo-Classical Batch food.

Regular readers will have heard me allude to Furry's style of cooking BPG (before purple goddess) and APG (afte... oh, FFS, you work it out). His BPG was characterised by "Batch food", meaning anything that could be whipped up whilst hungover, on shore leave, with a random hook up passed out on your couch. It usually involves a can of Stagg beans and a microwave. At its best, batch food can be hearty, uncomplicated and stick-to-yer ribs.

At worst, it ends up leaving you nostalgically longing for the out-of-stomach experience of Bali Belly

Furry's batch (short for "Bachelor") repertoire consists of wraps, rolls, deep-fried things, deep fried things with cheese and bacon.

LOTS of bacon.

He also has his APG repertoire. which has been oft chronicled here.

But it's his neo-batch food I was craving this weekend.

We've done 4 months off the fags. The weight gain has stabilised. We've been exercising a little more and eating a whole lot better. Out alcohol consumption is waaaaaay down, and we're finally feeling the benefits of giving up the coffin nails.

So this Sat night, I had a hankering for nachos. And Furry has combined the best of his BPG and APG skills to make a mean nachos. It is part of his repertoire I like to call is Neo Classical Batch food.

It's batch food that's been pg-ised. Once upon a time, it would have been Doritos, Ole El Paso salsa and Chris' "avocado" dip, but these days he uses organic corn chips (he once did it with the blue corn disks and that was AWESOME!!), makes his own carne mix (mince, red kidney beans, chopped tomatoes, Tabasco, garlic, ginger, onion slow stewed for hours), his own salsa (this time, tiny wee baby tomatoes, halved, with Vietnamese mint and lime juice) and his own guac (avo, sour cream and lime juice)

So a lazy Sat night, down at Chez Fur, with my gorgeous hubbie, some comforting batch food, and a beer.

But here's the thing. Like all wild beasts that have been tamed, his veneer of civility is thin, and lurking beneath that Eastern Suburbs, MCG tie-wearing facade, is the same Furry who fished with det cord, spent 16 years in the wilderness of the Western Suburbs, can fart on command and who once streaked (stroked?) drunk down the front straight at the Turrumburry race meet.

How do I know this?



Dinner was served using a paint scraper.

Just to clear something up.

Furry PostSecret card from 6/20/07. Per PostSecret's copyright, an image may be used with a link to the PostSecret website.

I was recently involved in a conversation where someone intimated that my use of the word "Furry" was "kinky".

I was a little confused about this, as it is simply the nickname, on line and in RL for my husband. I mean everyone.. EVERYONE calls him Furry.

So I was a bit confused about why this was deemed as kinky.

Ahh, but the world has become a more enlightened, if not some how less mystical place, thanks to Wikki and Google.

Imagine my suprise to find that "furry" is a widely used term for people who identify as or with furry animals... They even have a whole Wikki about this sub culture.

The word furry has several meanings, dependent on the context in which it is used. Predominantly, it means "consisting of or resembling fur".^[1] It also pertains to an interest in anthropomorphic animals and/or mythological or imaginary creatures which possess human or superhuman capabilities. The plural form of furry in all its contexts is furs or furries; the subjects of furry interest are also known as furries.

Now, far be it from me to question another person's right to be in touch with their inner fursona, but... and it's a big but.....

Apparently some people within this subculture are sexually gratified/aroused by the wearing of their fur suits.. or have suits specially **ahem** modified to perform..... oh never mind, you get the idea. These people are apparently known within the Furry culture as "furverts"

WikiFur says

"The Furry Dictionary lists furvert as "One who enjoys furry erotica", a defintion provided by Barry Gold in October 2000.

And no, I am not making this up. You read that right.

Furry

Erotica

So, remembering that my mother reads this, I give to you the reason I call my husband Furry.

Because the first time I ran my hands up his back, I stopped and gleefully said "oh, you're furry!!!".. and he stopped, looked at me nervously and said "yes, does it disgust you?".. where by my answer was to drag him into my boudoir and... yes.. that's right Mum, we played Scrabble.

Anyhow.. I happen to like my men with body hair... and he's got it.. in spades.. Thus, he's "Furry".

So for any of you dear readers that thought that somehow my husband either a) likes to dress up as Sly Racoon, and have me paddle him a-la repressed English boarding school styles, while he yells "I've been a naughty little poodle!!

or

b) has a penchant for watching "Basil, the Great Mouse Detective" while wearing his nipple-less latex chicken suit,

I assure you this is not the case. And for further reference, as someone who avoids pop culture, should I make any passing reference to something like this in the future, please fill me in. IN private.

God, please don't tell me that "pg" is a subversive MPRPG leet term for someone who fantasizes about being showered with other people toenail clippings........

OH, and on a final note, while again reiterating my complete respect for anyone who identifies as a member of this or any other sub-group, I offer this advice.

do.

not.

google.

for.

"plushie images".

ever.

Transformation complete in 3...2...1

Yup. Furry's been out shopping again!