Previously: Day 1
When I left my last place of paid employment, I put on my sunglasses and lit the fuse of a stick of dynamite with the end of my cigar, before tossing it (the dynamite, not the cigar) over my shoulder with a cry of "See you in hell, boys!" as I stepped nonchalantly into the street.
But before that — actually for some months before that — I had the presence of mind to stockpile a few boxes of non-perishable groceries. I thought of them as a gift for future me, when times got a bit tricky, financially. I'm still working my way through that stockpile. Thanks, past me!
As you can see it's basically Asian convenience food, mint tea, tinned fruit, and chocolate digestives. Pretty much standard old lady fare.
Breakfast today is the reheated second half of the poha from yesterday, so I didn't bother taking a photo of an identical bowl of rice. So here's some pictures of the kitchen. Yes; this is all of it.
The ambient storage space located at head-whacking height carries on the Asian convenience food theme. A four-litre box of Granny's Old Liver Vanquisher takes centre stage, beside the breakfast cereal. From time to time, the day's first glass of this has likewise been encountered rather close to breakfast.
The cooking facilities are a little basic. The smaller hotplate is rather too small to do anything with, and the larger has a busted thermostat, so the desired temperature is achieved by repeatedly switching it off and on at the appropriate tempo.
As there is no room to actually prepare food there, I've an old Ikea desk against the wall to the right with a couple of boxes of books and CDs on top to elevate the work surface to a non-stooping level.
The fridge is a standard-issue slumlord hotel bar fridge. Not a lot of room, and the freezer doesn't freeze more than the underside of anything other than very thin, individually-wrapped burger patties, so it can really only be considered a somewhat colder bit of fridge.
One of the reasons I lean so heavily into the Asian convenience food is that it serves as a zesty base to a random assortment of whatever happens to be cheap at the moment. Not pictured here is a bag of semi-frozen peas, still in the fridge.
You thought you'd seen the last of the fried chicken, didn't you? The saddest bit in the box, the dry and flavourless end bit of the breast meat remains. The addition of some extra Tom Yum paste to supplement the included seasoning sachets gives it a bit of a lift, and hopefully sees off any pathogens.
To be honest, it's really quite satisfying/shameful (I'm sure there's a German word for this). Something of a treat, in fact. Still, there's a slim chance tomorrow's menu might involve something resembling actual cooking, so let's not dwell on it.