James O'Brien

Since I’ve been working from home, preparing meals has become a much more important part of my life. When I was full-time from the office, I’d mostly pick up some takeaway for lunch. But since I’ve been at home, I’m much more inclined to make something, from a simple salad (my favourite is a simple calad of tomato, cheese and cucumber) to something more complex.

I made a terrific Thai Chicken Curry last week, and in previous years I would have eaten the meal and then frozen the rest. My freezer used to be full of frozen meals. Frozen, but then hardly-ever unfrozen! And so since working from home, I’ve been more inclined to just keep eating the meals until they were finished. I think I set a personal record the other week with that curry – I had it for lunch, dinner, lunch, dinner, and then lunch the next day.

The other thing I’ve done recently is go back to basics wirth bedding.

The first time I had one they were called “continental quilts”. I don’t remember exactly when it was, thoughI suspect it wasn’t until about 1987. Photographs from my day at university, and living in Tarragindi reveal I was still using blankets. It wasn’t until I moved into the house at Taringa that I had a continental quilt, later called a doona.

As part of “growing up”, I think I thought it was time to walk away from blankets, as a thing of “childhood”, and to embrace something a little more”grown up”. And they’ve been with me for the rest of my life.

The one thing I could never do was put on the cover “properly”. It was always a bit of a drama, and once the task was completed, they never really looked “tidy”. Thus, the “organisation” of my childhood gave way to an “unmade bed” look of adulthood.

I was thinking about this the other day when I saw some statistics – I don’t remember where I saw them – about the low percentage of people who make their beds every day. I’m not one of them.

Co-oincidentally, as winter returns, I’ve been thinking of going back to blankets. I’ve been thinking about the environmentalism of the doona. Even though they can appear to be very “natural”, I’ve been wondering about the likely synthetic nature of most doonas. Yes, I use that word now.

The other day I decided it was time to buy a couple of old-style blankets for my bed. I have a couple of lovely “throws” which I use. But I thought maybe a couple of old-style blankets would be something I could use in preference.

And you know what? They’re terrific. They feel warm, they feel good. All I need is for my mum to come into the room to tuck the blankets with an almost-suffocating tightness. Love it!

And in conversations, too, it’s time for back to basics!

I was thinking the other day about the adrenalin rush some people find from having an argument. I was watching a very weird discussion on Facebook about how someone I know who had seen an older man (he was described as being in his 60s) ask a young woman (she was described as being in her 20s) to pick up her newspapers on a crowded train so he could sit down.

By the account of my friend, it was a tense discussion. “Not without a facemask”, she said, to his reply, “I have one, but I don’t need one”. He put the mask on, and that was the end of it. None of the people were there went into overdrive on the Facebook post saying things like “She must have felt threatened”, “He must have been menacing”, and it was about “Women’s right to consent”.

I was a bit surprised about the backlash to the older man, because my response was “If it was me and an older man had asked me to pick up the newspapers, or more than that I would have stood up and offered him my seat. I see this quite a bit on Sydney buses and trains, where younger people will stare are their phones and “pretend” not to see older people. I’ve become the person who says to them, “Get up, there’s an older person who needs a seat, just like the signs say”…