10 days later and Herve This

Went to TO on Tuesday, ostensibly to see Herve This, but also to go out for a bit on my own.

Several problems: as departure loomed, could not see the point of going all that way, leaving my girls. Retreated into full panic attack mode. What is wrong with me? Have I not moved around the world alone, visited foreign countries unaccompanied? And yet leaving my girls for the afternoon - an abyss.

So inserted firecracker, and made it onto the bus. But in TO, once again victim of the 'where the s.s. is this place [Toronto the cosmopolitan]'. I miss the mark so often in TO. Dundas square for example. Where the s.s. is Dundas square?? I've walked loops around down town TO. How have I missed it?

I'm sure TO is a vibrant city crackling with excitment. I always find myself walking down endless streets of office buildings punctuated by pawn shops, drug stores, and restaruants catering to the office workers.

Of course Im too nervous to eat all day long. Scrurry along in the shadows until I find a Starbucks (honestly, without SB I would probably die of thirst or hunger - Im far too nervous to stop anywhere else these days).

However, survived long enough to see the esteemed Prof. This. He was your anti-academic, so of course I loved him. He was funny, he was vain, he was a ham....He inspired me not so much by the results of his labour, but by how he was able to pioneer this somewhat spurrious academic discipline into an international phenomenon, that still retains acceptance from the scientific community. And it all started so simply: refute old wives tales in cooking, invent cool new recipes, bring science to the kitchen.

I think molecular gastronomy is interesting, but it is not me. Fundamentally,he believes that nature can be improved upon. And that, to me, is blasphemy.