Archive for May, 2015

Anyone who does not want to fly combat missions is sane enough to fly combat missions. That is the ironic narrative of Joseph Heller’s Catch-22, a novel set during the Second World War.

I found it really slow going at first. Funny, but slow moving. It follows the life of Yossarian, as well as a large cast of other characters, as they attempt to survive through the war. As the story goes on it opens up into a dark, satirical and ultimately very funny story. If you have that kind of sense of humour. Which I do.

The impossible but simultaneously inevitable situations that Milo Minderbinder finds himself in, the idea of someone being promoted just so their name would be Major Major and Captain Black’s endless series of loyalty oaths are just absurd enough to be ridiculous and yet somehow plausible in the crazy world we live in.

Breaded fish fillets are a good dish to represent Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage Every Day philosophy – it’s pretty simple and could potentially be done every day. Despite the simplicity, I managed to mess it up.

The breading worked really well. We used brown grouper of the fillet though, which now seems a bit of a waste because it is such a nice fish on its own. I also failed to adjust the cooking time for the fact that we were using a thicker fillet, so they had to go back in the pan for a few more minutes.

Another problem was that the fish had not been de-scaled. I didn’t even think to de-scale it as you would expect it to be done already when you buy a fillet.

All was well in the end though, especially with even more soy sauce mash.

April saw the first game day for the 2015 flag season. We played two games, one of which we won and one of which we lost. The win was particularly good as last year, the first year Leeds Samurai existed, the team didn’t quite manage to win any (though many of them were very close), so a great result for the team.

Also, I think I look very “snazzy” in my new jersey.

This was the first competitive game I’ve attended so it was a bit of a shock to the system. It took probably most of the first half for me to get into it and everything to stop moving so fast. It should be better going forward as I and the other new players adjust.

Wharf Chambers is a new venue located where the Common Place used to be. It’s a members-only club, though membership is just £1 and we just went in. With a good reason of course, we were there for a gig. We got there just in time to see one of the warm-up bands, Secateurs.

They were very good. At first they were just irritatingly loud but as our ears adjusted I began to really enjoy their set.

Cut Out Shapes put on the usual high standard of performance, even doing an encore of a song they claimed they did not know how the play.