Saturday, August 04, 2007

Goldilocks, salad day, watering

Whenever we have porridge for breakfast, which is most days, I think of Goldilocks and the three bears. If there is one thing I don't like, it is cold porridge. So I ask myself what sort of condition the porridge, which Goldilocks found in the cottage in the woods, was in when she came upon it? What did the bears expect on their return from their walk, if it wasn't cold porridge? How, in the circumstances, could they have abandoned their cottage for long enough to allow Goldilocks, to enter, try the three bowls of porridge, consume one of them, test out three chairs, go up stairs and try three different beds before falling asleep in the smallest one?
It must be this question or a similar one, which leads to the so called Goldilocks Enigma. This is the subject of a book of that name by Paul Davis, which examines how conditions on earth could be so precariously and miraculously balanced, as to permit the existence of life - a phenomenon, according to physicists, hugely against the odds.

A salad of lightly grilled or sauteed vegetables - courgettes, aubergines, cucumbers, tomatoes, onions etc - dressed with a light lemony mayonnaise on which fresh mint leaves are scattered, is worth preparing again.

What joy to be watering flowers and herbs in pots in the late afternoon sun, after so many days of rain, have made the chore redundant!

1 comment:

Rena said...

I have always wondered about the cold porridge, too. Thanks for the book mention, I'll have to look that up.
We can never have quite what we want, can we. Here, it has been such a long hot dry spell that we would be hugely grateful for some thorough rain showers.