I have always considered myself a fair cook. 

I am no chef, but I’ve always been pretty proud of my home cooking. In my near ten years of cooking home style dishes, I have never once had any complaints that it wasn’t good enough, and usually, my guests gobble everything up. 

At least, until now.

After living together with Mr. Worm (a die-hard carnivore) for about three months, I’ve noticed (amongst many other things) that not only is our living style and habits completely different, our tastebuds seemingly operating on polar ends, our cooking methods are also completely different. I am pretty sure that he’s not too fond of my cooking, and often times when I’m preparing something, he will stand nearby and give little remarks like, “that’s not how it’s done” or “you have to do this first” or “otherwise it will turn out bland”. 

WTF!!

And the worse of the worse: “I hate vegetarians. I used to promise myself I would never date one.” 

Well, as they say, never say never.

So anyway, as I was saying. I have never (damn! I said that word again!!) had anyone said to me my cooking was not good. Well, Mr. Worm didn’t exactly say it, but I can sense that he’s not dying for the dinners I prepare. I’m not quite sure what the precise reason is, but I guess it might have to do with the central fact that he likes meat, and I’m a good vegetarian cook. But many of my meat-eating friends have no problem with my vegetarian cooking. Or maybe it’s because I don’t do a whole lot of vegetarian cooking at home because I’m trying to use meat ingredients for him? I must admit, my meat dishes really aren’t that good — and how can I be blamed? I haven’t cooked a meat dish in such a long time! Now that I think about it, it hasn’t been too long. Last time I made something with meat was when I was still with my ex, which was roughly 6-7 years ago. 

Okay, fine. So maybe that was a real long time ago. 

Mr. Worm cooks (a lot of meat) quite well, but I must say his vegetables not very creative. And I’ve noticed that he doesn’t eat a variety of greens, in fact, I can count them all using my fingers. You can imagine what kind of pressure I’m under when we go grocery shopping. I don’t get to buy a lot of veggies that I can cook with. For example, today when we went to the Japanese grocery store, we purchased *five* different kinds of meat, no greens, and one package of natto (Japanese fermented beans). 

He also uses a different brand of soy sauce – which, as you Asian cookers should know, makes the greatest amount of difference in the final product.

I’ve also sensed a bit of frustration on his part with my limited eating choices. Well, he eats so many things I don’t eat and I don’t (not really) have a problem with him. 

I don’t know what to do with myself. Maybe I should just stop trying to be the cook he wants me to be, and just be the vegetarian cook that I am.  

 

Lately, I’ve had this curiously empty and unsatisfying sensation in my stomach. Mr. Worm won’t let me buy and eat many things I would have bought and eaten otherwise. He says that I already have a lot of finger/junk food at home, and that I should finish it all before I buy more. He said this when I told him I wanted to go buy some Camembert to go with the Sauvignon Blanc. 

Disappointment!

And today when we went to Uwajimaya, I saw so many yummy things I wanted to buy, but because he was standing there, I was almost scared to pick those things off the shelf! Imagine that! I would have never imagined that I, J.L., would one day be afraid to buy food!!

Sad.

Law & Philosophy

Academic [insider]  joke:

What happens when philosophers turn bad?

                -They become lawyers and politicians.

 

So it is quite true that in professional, practical disciplines, such as (and not limited to) law, business, medicine, and of course politics, as a prerequisite for theory you must learn rhetoric/argument so as to give a foundation for communicating certain elements. But now, more than ever, theory is insufficient. Rhetoric seems to lack an ethical dimension, as it only teaches you how to dress up, so to speak, your argument, allowing you to say something in many different ways (in some instances, warping the entire meaning). So now in addition to learning the basics of say, marketing strategies, business schools now offer a a required course of so-called “business ethics”. I do not mean (at least, not directly) to poo-poo the marketing industry, but really that’s just BS. There is no such things as “ethics” in marketing. When all else narrows down, monetary profit is what really drives the industry. 

Anyways. So what I was trying to get at, is really that when students of philosophy get tired of the seemingly endless formulations and reformulations of life and its phenomena, they drop out and go into law. Really, what law is, is a more practical form diverged from philosophical theory. This can be traced back to Ancient Athens and the establishment of the city-states. Socrates was the paradoxical epitome of this division between the philosopher and the political arena. 

It is interesting to note that students of law and politics all read the same basics as those in philosophy: they have to read Plato’s Republic where Socrates discusses what constitutes the perfect state, and Aristotle’s Rhetoric of how to formulate a good argument. This is not an accident. 

I dare to venture that it is philosophers that know how to make a better, more well-rounded argument than lawyers. At the same time, there is a great difference between them. That is, I truly believe that philosophy has intrinsically an ethical dimension to it. That is not to say that lawyers do not, but because they have to argue for both sides of the case, there is bound to be something lacking of truth–it is more flowery rhetoric than genuine understanding.