ever have everything in your world becomes crystal clear?
a series of epiphones? where everything you've struggled with falls into place, and rather than wandering around in a daze of the person you thought you were, and the person you are, and the person you fear most all fades and finally you exist as the best you you can be?
suddenly you awake to see the world as it really is, a sad beautiful place where you can cherish the bitter sweet?

i started a new gig last week. not the fancy restaurant, and not a bullshit money maker, just a gig where i get to interact with the beautiful, wise, the sad, the joyous, the forgetful... a place where i can examine my world without the expectations and the stigmas i hold myself too. that was, afterall why i moved to the island, to reinvent, to rediscover, to change the way i absorb, live, breathe and love.

in a cabin in parksville, 13 days ago, i became the best me i have ever been.
there were no fireworks, no special extenuating circumstances, no chemical enduced euphoria, and no cute male or female that brought this on.
something just changed.
all the pieces fit and everything has been equivocally falling into place perfectly, ever since.

for those of you who have known me throughout my lifetime, and my newer friends,

Hi, I'm Mel, I kick ass, and it's awesome to meet you!

so concept time...
old family recipes accompanied with the story of how i learned to make them, i know, i know, total maya angelou rip off....but one thing i've noticed is totally lacking in cookbooks is canadian cuisine, so unless you're watching michael smith cook, or have the cash to fly to susur and eat his gastronomic perfection and buy his $100 piece of art cookbook, or can afford to eat at sooke harbour house...
you're pretty much SOL when it comes to canada and food. we have little to no cultural food identity.... but ever local has specialties... and an amazing cross section of ethnically diverse foods make up our map, mch like our country.
and my childhood was pretty bunk, bizzare, and non traditional (or maybe a 100 years after it's time, making it too traditional) anyhow, that's idea one

idea two is pretty rad...
seems that the majority of my male acquaintance are at a loss for eating option at home... grocery store challenged, when they attempt to cook, the call me begging to be the saviour to the $30 worth of raw foods they've manged to turn to mush, burn, or can't seem to cook. seeing as the majority of my male acquaintances are upwardly mobile, employed, probable work a holics with no time , the only simple solution to making them eat a consant diet of tim hortons , drive thru, pizzas and subway.... is teaching them all the basics of grocery shopping, menu planning, and the art of creating simple dietary balanced meals that appear to have taken hours to prepare (yes chicks like guys who can cook things other than ramen noodles, kraft dinner and spagetti, and also if you cook, you don't have to do the dishes) and self serving to a point, if i find ya all chicks then i'm not being hounded about "how do i get a coffee stain off my fred perry?", or "where do i go to buy shoes, towels ,sheets", not to mention securing a career for myself, that does not involve kissing peoples asses.... or compromising on my moral fibre.

anyone with the hootzpa to try and steal this idea...i wish you luck, i've already sent my submission for a show to all the appropriate networks.... and honestly unless you're me, it ain't ever gonna work for you.

sign up now for "cooking for the gastronomically challenged"
fees will be decided after the initial interview, and will be determined on a case to case basis.
indivual classes begin in may 2007