Minstresers, Popcorn and Christmas
I’ll start this post with “Minstresers”…
As you can see, this is a photograph of a Galaxy “Minstrel”, and a “Malteser” (made by Mars, I think).
Individually, they are great. Let’s not forget that fact.
However, together, eaten at the same time, they are amazing! We discovered this at University and decided to call the combined treat, the Minstrel-Malteser.
Obviously, this will never make an official product, but if you can get hold of both, I strongly suggest you eat them together and see if you like it!
OK, so next on my list is popcorn… My Aunt and Uncle gave Sarah and I an instant popcorn maker, which since Christmas we have used twice so far, so thank you for such a great present! 
I have even realised that I actually do like popcorn, after many years of somehow assuming I don’t like it!
There is only one problem with it (which is more user-error than a problem with the machine), which is that it always seems to produce 1 million times more popcorn than you think it will!
The problem is that once you’ve turned it on, and it’s started producing popcorn, it just never stops!
The photo above is from our second attempt and trying to predict the amount of popcorn more accurately than the last, and as you can see, we failed dismally!
I think the problem is partly pasta syndrome*, and partly the fact that you never know how much of the corn will “pop”!
Nevertheless, this is a great present and I’m sure it will get lots of use over the years!
Now onto Christmas… doesn’t it seem like it came and went within minutes this year? It does to me, anyway. Even so, it was still enjoyable, and having 2 weeks off work has certainly helped me to become calmer and more relaxed generally in life!
Seeing all the family together was, of course, good, and among the gifts received were the helmet/bike camera (which I actually started using 2 months ago), a headset mic for my Xbox 360 console (to talk to other online players), a chocolate fondue set, various games, vouchers, cash and the usual selection of chocolates. I should also thank my Grandparents for the rather generous gift I received from them too.
So anyway, this year, despite it seeming like it’s been and gone in an instant has been rather good.
On to 2009!
* “Pasta syndrome”, by the way, is what I call the problem whereby you can never judge the correct amount of pasta to cook – you always end up with not enough or way too much.
