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By Kate, 6 September 2009 8:27 pm

For the past few weeks, Scott and I have been catching up on the 5th season of House. We saw the second episode way back when we were in Australia, and we haven’t seen any more, because it’s on Sky 1 now instead of Channel 5, and we’re too cheap to pay for TV. In any case, if you haven’t seen the full season, stop reading, because I’m about to talk about a pretty damn big spoiler.

Last night, right before we turned on episode 20 (Simple Explanation), I was talking about how Kutner was my favorite character (for various reasons, one of which was his reference to Harry Potter a few episodes previous, confirming his status as a lovable, clever dork. Just my type. I’m not going to lie, I had a little crush on him.) I think the coincedence of timing is probably half the reason I was so affected by what I saw next.

No other character in the show saw the suicide coming, and how could they? The absolute last thing I expected to be watching was Kutner in a pool of his own blood 5 minutes after I was singing his praises. And it REALLY shook me. I’ve been thinking about it ever since. (I’ve had a lot of time to. All I did today was paint the windows.) I even had some weird dreams about it.

I’ve been trying to figure out why it’s affected me much more than I’d ever expect the death of a fictional character to. I mean, yes, I cry when I read pretty much every Harry Potter book from 4 on. Every time. But that’s about an 8 year personal connection to an epic story that I read during a great period of change in my life. I really like House. It’s a great show. Probably my favorite. But I never thought I’d freak out about it like this. And for a character I’ve only known for about a year that hasn’t been nearly as big a part of my life as Harry Potter has.

Maybe it’s the unexpectedness of it. Maybe I’m freaked out that someone I know could easily be suffering without anyone’s knowledge and I don’t want to think they would be capable of such a thing without any prior indication. Maybe it’s that Kutner reminds me of someone I used to know. Maybe it’s just because I liked the guy.

There hasn’t been a lot of death in my life. My grandfather died, but it wasn’t completely unexpected. I miss him, and I wonder what it would be like if he was still around. I wish he could have seen me graduate from college. But he had been having problems for a long time, so it was sad, but it wasn’t really a shock. My dog died last year, and I’m still upset about that, but he was also old for a dog and had the problems that come along with that, so I had been dreading that phone call from my parents silently, in the back of my mind, for a long time. More than anything, I was upset that I wasn’t around to say goodbye.

I’ve been lucky to go over 25 years without any sudden, unexpected loss in my life, and maybe that’s why I’m so shaken. I haven’t been completely unprepared for something like this, and I think last night I got a taste of what it would be like if I was. And it’s scary.

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By Kate, 13 August 2009 11:46 am

Lately, due to the economy’s nosedive, there has been a spate of cooking shows, tips in magazines, and articles on the internet about being a more thrifty cooker/eater/food shopper/etc. This is potentially extremely helpful, and it also often focuses on eating good quality stuff, not cheap crap just because you can’t afford a sirloin steak. So in general, I like the trend. The problem is, it hasn’t been very helpful to me.

Last night, I checked out the BBC’s latest offering on the subject: Economy Gastronomy.

The point of the show is to learn how to decrease your food bill and eat better at the same time. Last night, the show’s presenters took on a family of five who have been spending nearly £400 a week on food. That’s an INSANE amount of money. And to make it worse, they pretty much ate the same two recipes all the time. And bought around 50 pre-made desserts every week. Madness.

Obviously, these people needed the help. The advice they got focused on the age-old ‘make a grocery list and stick to it’. And while some people may need to be told this, I can’t actually imagine NOT shopping with a grocery list, so dedicating a good third of an hour on emphasizing the importance of planning a menu and buying what you need for it seems like time ill-spent.

However, I guess a lot of people must shop without a list if this tip keeps popping up. My mother has never gone to the store without a list, nor have I. Even if it’s a short list in my head (milk, butter, toilet paper), it still exists. I just don’t understand how it’s possible to walk into a grocery store for a big weekly shop with no menu planned and no list of what you need and come out with something that’s going to get you through the next 7 days properly. I can hold a lot in my head at once, but planning a week of meals as I go down the aisles just isn’t going to happen.

The other big tips were also old standards: making one big roast or meat-based meal at the beginning of the week that generated enough leftovers for another two meals, making your own desserts, packing your own lunch, using less popular cheap cuts of meat, buying produce in season. These are all things that I stand behind 100%. These are also all things that I already do.

I’m not trying to be all ‘I’m awesome because I knew that already’ here. If anything, I’m trying to give my mom props for showing me the glory of lists and thrift. But I really want some advice I haven’t heard before. I think this show was great, and I think it will show a lot of people what they’re missing while keeping some of their money from flying out of their wallets on their weekly food-buying excursions. But I want to save more money too.

I do my best, but food is our luxury. We (especially I) really like food. GOOD food. We spend around £35-40 a week on food for the two of us. It’s not bad, but I’m sure we can spend less, even if I don’t mind it being a slightly bigger expense than it probably needs to be. However, I will not buy crap.  I like knowing where my meat came from, and I like knowing those animals had a good life, so I go to a good butcher. I like knowing where my veg comes from, so I get it delivered from a local farm (which is actually far cheaper than buying organic, or even non-organic, at the grocery store. It also supports local business and provides a crap-ton of potatoes, which go pretty far in terms of creating meals).

I like knowing what I put in my body is quality. But I also like spending less money. These things can go hand in hand quite well, but I’m sure there are some things I’m overlooking, and I want a show or an article that gives me a tip that makes me go, ‘Hey! I never thought of that!’