In high school I was one of the three amigos.

Myself.

Derek, my male bestie who we lost to cancer.

And nate.

We grew-up together. We were besties. 

When we all turned 22, Brandi had a falling out with me and Summer. We had some pretty heated disputes and eventually stopped speaking altogether. I haven’t spoken to Brandi, since 2006? Then, when my Mom died, in 2012, I had a MAJOR falling out with Rain. I called her, as my first person,even though we weren’t really speaking to each other. First thing she said? “DAMN! Now I gotta hire a caterer!” She showed up to my mother’s funeral in hooker heels and a short skirt. My Mom had treated her like her own, since we were in second grade. She shows up at her funeral, dressed like a low-class whore. Not to mention, the ENTIRE time, her “fiance” is complaining how this is cutting into his “fishing” time and she’s telling him,”Just a little more. Make sure everyone sees we came.” LeaAnn and her Mom and SIL came. Hugged me. Brought cards and flowers. Even though they ONLY knew me, directly. My BFF Summer, came and sat with me. Brought me food (she knows I eat weird food) and she cried. In 20+ years of being friends, I’ve seen her cry twice in our lives. When her Dad died the year before and at my Mom’s funeral. She told me she was crying because she never wanted me to hurt, like this. 

Summer lives in Austin,TX now. I rarely speak to her but I love her with all my heart. She’s one of the few people I’d drive 6 hrs to bury a body for. LeaAnn and I talk at least once a week. I see her often. She lives about 7 miles from me. 

After cohabitation, one lucky sperm succeeded in mastering the long, hard way towards the fallopian tube where it encounters the egg, penetrates it and creates the beginning of a new human being. But as you can see here many sperms are trying to enter the egg and if they would succeed, it would result in a genetical catastrophe! So how does the egg prevent multiple sperms from entering it? By activating a devastating superpower! As soon as a sperm is docking to the inner hull of the egg cell, the egg shoots an electric potential, covering all its surface for a few seconds. This raises the electric potential of the cell and prevents more sperms from penetrating through the inner hull. In a second reaction, small vesicles inside of the egg release enzymes that harden the zona pellucida (the protection hull), which furthermore disabled the possibility of any other sperm to come in (imagine that the skin gets transformed into stone, so no mosquito can bother you anymore). After the successful sperm-docking against the egg cell, its hull merges with the eggs’ and the sperm’s content gets absorbed in the egg cell. At the same time the egg cell finishes its meioisis, enabling the human development to begin, as it now has the genetic information of mother and father.

Torta Paradiso with Mascarpone and Blueberries

INGREDIENTS

Fresh:

250g mascarpone

200g fresh blueberries

1 unwaxed lemon

190g unsalted butter

From the storecupboard:

190g caster sugar + 1 tablespoon

175g plain flour

1 tablespoon cornflour

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

3 teaspoons baking powder

icing sugar for dusting

EQUIPMENT

20cm cake tin

Baking parchment

2 saucepans

Wooden spoon

Mixing bowl

Bowl

Electric hand mixer

Sieve

METHOD

PRE-HEAT THE OVEN TO 180˚C/160˚C fan/gas 4

1. GREASE Grease a 20cm cake tin with a little butter. Line the bottom with baking parchment.

2. MELT Put the butter into a pan and place on a very low heat. When it starts to melt remove from the heat and beat lightly with a wooden spoon. You want to achieve a very soft almost runny consistency.

3. BEAT Put the butter and 190g caster sugar into a mixing bowl and beat together until creamy.

4. BEAT Break the eggs into a separate bowl. Add the vanilla extract and beat lightly with a fork.

5. BEAT Slowly beat the eggs into the creamed butter and sugar.

6. SIFT Sift together the flours and baking powder. Add to the mixture a third at the time, mixing thoroughly after each addition.

7. BAKE Pour the cake mixture into the tin and bake for 30 minutes until golden and coming away from the sides.

Turn the oven off and leave the cake in the oven for a further 5 minutes.

8. FILLING Meanwhile, rinse the blueberries under running water and place in a pan with 1 tablespoon of sugar and the juice of ½ lemon. Simmer for about 5-8 minutes until the berries start to burst. Stir in the mascarpone and set aside.

9. SPREAD Turn the cake out and leave to cool on a wire rack or plate. Then slice it in half horizontally, spread the filling over one cake layer and top with the other layer. Sprinkle with icing sugar and serve. 

NOTES FROM THE COOK

Anecdotes by medical practitioners 

"A woman came in for a baby check with her 6-month-old and she had what looked like chocolate milk in the baby’s bottle. So he started explaining to her as kindly as he could that she shouldn’t be giving her baby chocolate milk. At which point she interrupts him and says, ‘Oh that isn’t chocolate milk. It’s coffee! He just loves it!”

"I had a patient come in for an STD check. She was very upset and continued to tell me that she only had one partner. Progressing through my assessment, she further divulged that even if he was sleeping with other people it shouldn’t matter ‘because he uses a condom every time and he makes sure to wash it thoroughly after every use’.”

"Had a lady who measured her baby’s temperature by pre-heating the oven and putting one hand in front of it while the other hand was on the baby’s forehead. She told the nurse her baby’s fever was about 250 degrees.”

"Lady has to have foot amputated and is given waiver forms to sign pre-op. Buddy asks if she needs time to think about it. She’s very nonchalant and doesn’t seem to care much what they do. He gets suspicious and probes a bit as to why she’s not more concerned. She says she gets that they have to operate and it’s OK because the foot will grow back.”

"I had a couple who had been trying to conceive for over two years. I asked all the usual questions, how often do you have sex, any previous pregnancy, etc etc. Something seemed off to me during the consult, so I continued to ask questions. Finally I asked if he ejaculated while inserted into the vagina. Both parties looked confused.Turns out the couple was not having insertional sex at all. I had to awkwardly explain to them how insertional sex works. Diagrams were required.”

"Patient comes in, she’s upset. She’s pregnant, and she doesn’t understand why. She’s on the pill. Upon talking to her at great length, I find out that she only takes the pills on the days that she is sexually active – no other time.”

"Patient comes in with her bf. They are indignant, as if somehow I could’ve prevented [the pregnancy]. The problem? Well, the pills were bothering the girl’s stomach, so, being a gallant bf, he decided to start taking them instead.”

“I was explaining the treatment to the husband of a patient about to be discharged. He kept nodding and agreeing with me, but I knew it was flying over his head. Turned out a fundamental problem was that I was describing the drugs as ‘tablets’ and he had no clue what those were.”