http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=NLp1JPQyw9g

If the food is not cooking fast enough (especially the grains, beans, etc.), try to sing to it! Clap your hands if you like.

Sometimes it happens if people argued in the kitchen. Then the food can get "upset", "scared" and "close in itself" So, sing to it, in order "to soften its heart", and you'll see!
(I got it from "Like Water, Like Chocolate" - there was this old Amazonian Indian cook called Nacha, and she had some amazing pre-hispanic recipes! And lots of tips to share, too).

Thanks God nobody argues in my kitchen! But I tried singing to the pots a few times, and I can say, the results are surprising. For example, one friend had to catch a train, and I didn't have a lot of time, and the rice just wouldn't cook. We sang a song to it - and it was probably the tastiest rice I ever had!

Works with fried potatoes, too

We spent ten days in the Pirineys, in a camping of "alta montanya". It is my third year there (Ed's been coming there for ages) and it is a place for rest - yes, for an active rest! But not for relaxation. It is very powerful, it all goes ARRIBA! - a rather narrow valley between almost vertical mountain sides covered with fir trees (which also go Up - they look like sky rockets, don't they), a lake with a stream rushing out of it... Very potent. I got the battery charged for the year to come... and some dreams in that place!

One whole night I was conversing with Freud. I had a depression and Ed took me to a clinic to see a psychologist. Freud came out, we chatted for a couple of minutes in a corridor. Then he told Ed: "Thanks, now we would like to talk alone" and Ed went out. We sat in the waiting room on rather battered chairs and I started yanning: basically, nothing to complain of, and should feel happy, but somehow I don't. There are things that bug me - dependence, for example. I was talking forever, and I noticed that Freud didn't give me any advices. Actually, he hardly spoke at all: it was mostly "Hm... Aha... You say "dependence..." Define "dependence". Aha... and how does it make you feel?" The nurses were rushing to their tasks, some busy doctors walking by, the kids playing, the mothers hushing them. Then I wanted to ask his opinion about something important, but a mother with a baby sat on a chair next to us and I suggested we took a walk around the clinic. So we did, chatting (I mean, me going on) all the while. We stopped by a coffee-machine to have a cup of coffee, and then, slowly, a travel bag came into my sight, from some weird angle, and a wall with a little square on it. I started figuring out, what the bag was doing there, and what was the square about... and then it slooooooooowly dawned on me that I am actually in the tent, looking at my travel bag (where else was it supposed to be?) and the square was a window. And the perspective was weird because I was lying down on the mattrass. So..... has I dreamt it all??? No way! I couldn't believe myself. It was so real, and with such an abundance of details!

Whoosh... well... Well, anyway, it was a good conversation - to verbalize one's worries sometimes is the first step to their solution. Can be a good part of the solution, actually.

BEWARE OF THE DONKEY is a sign on the door of the mountain lodge where this highly dangerous donkey hangs around. (He looks a bit dalmatian, doesn't he? Erm? )
Apparently, he learnt to open backpacks! Then he fishes sandwiches and what not out and gobbles them up, of course. Once he scoffed somebody's GPS.

So if you ever happen to be in the Refugio de Certascan of Certascan Lake (Eastern Pirineys, Catalunya, Spain) - beware of the donkey!

I wouldn't agree with everything, but some things he says... Pearls and diamonds, I have no other words!

http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=otGQqO2TYMI&mode=related&search