The satay sauce that changes your life.

Hard day at the office? Don't feel like cooking? Been to see a Tennessee Williams play? Well, then, this is the recipe for you. The sauce takes exactly one Peter Gunn theme to prepare.

For zimbly purposes, a 'glob' is about two tablespoons.

1 glob Maggi sweet Thai chili sauce
1 glob tomato sauce
1 heaped glob crunchy peanut butter
2 squirts lemon and or lime juice

Bung all of the above in a small microwave proof bowl. Just cover with hot water. Microwave on 'high' for 1 minute. Allow to stand for thirty seconds then mix with a fork till smooth and creamy.

I like to stir-fry a diced slab of firm tofu with some onion and capsicum and maybe some raw cashews. The satay sauce is added last thing and then the whole lot is served on brown rice.

Notes:

1. I've never tried it but I suppose it would work on the stove if one is really thingy about microwaves.

2. My immunologist brother tells me Maggi Sweet Thai Chili Sauce is a common cause of urticaria (hives).

3. It's important to save at least three pieces of tofu for dipping in the sauce to check the flavour.

4. Tomatoes could be added once they've thought up a decent reason for their existence.

Yabbying

Yabbying (with shoes).

Today, as I wandered the corridors, I came upon my new registrar looking rather dumbfounded. He was a nice fellow who had arrived from Europe only a few days before. (Many of our staff come from distant shores). I asked him what was wrong and he told me about the excessive swearing he had encountered since he arrived. He had just seen a man who was very, very sick, who had told him, “I feel like bl**dy sh*t, mate!” The newly arrived registrar had found this language rather shocking.

I assured him the man was not blaspheming in any malevolent way. He probably just wanted to impress upon the new registrar that he was about to “croak” (as indeed he was) and in the circumstance, “a bit crook,” as would be the normal response to an enquiry about one’s condition, wouldn’t do.

I set out to assess my registrar’s understanding of the local dialect and found he had absolutely no comprehension of essential descriptors such as “up to putty, mate,” or “fit as a mallee bull, mate,” or “mouth’s like the bottom of cocky’s cage, mate,” or “all bunged up, mate.”

As keen as beans, he asked me if there was a good book he could read in order to learn such colloquialisms. Sadly, I couldn’t list any texts on the subject at all but it did get me thinking. The local dialect is one thing but there are other ethnic and gender related issues of expression that the junior storm trooper must learn.

[Out of the whole of the population of 1977 Hollywood, could they not find someone better looking to play Luke Skywalker? (said Zimble with her new millennium anti-roman nose sensibility.)]

For instance, and I expect this may be a world wide phenomenon, young men with appendicitis can be identified as they approach the emergency department because they are doubled over, clutching their right iliac fossa and screaming, “help me, help me!” This happens because they truly believe they are dying and this is because very few young men have ever experienced visceral pain prior to having appendicitis.

In contrast, young women, already well versed in visceral pain, wander into the emergency department with ruptured appendices, four or five days after the event and only then because they have fainted at work a few times and their boss has sent them in. They’ll sit down and tell you it feels a bit like bad period pain and if it was all the same they’d like to go home.

There is also the response to severe illness and recovery from it. When an Australian male of a certain age has a heart attack, the first question on regaining some well-being is not, “when can I get back to work”, “when can I drive” or even, “when can I have sex”. No, the most important determinant is “when can I mow”. It isn’t quite so bad, since the drought, because the grass doesn’t grow very quickly anymore but in days gone by, particularly in the pre-press-starter mower era, if you couldn’t mow, then you just weren’t a man's man.

I tried to reassure my bewildered registrar that he was not alone by telling him of the story of Caroline. Caroline was a terrific, dedicated, intelligent London born 'back-packer' doc who was my registrar when I worked at a seaside hospital, four hours north of Bris.

One day, a man was brought to the coronary care unit. He had been out with his mates, on the tidal mud flats of the local estuary, yabbying. Whilst pumping hard with his yabby pump, he developed chest pain. His mates were a switched on mob and immediately gave him some aspirin, downed with a half stubby of ice cold beer from the esky. They got him back in the tinnie and sped towards the shore, calling the ambulance service on a mobile phone as they went.

Despite their best efforts, the man was a bit flat (ie in cardiogenic shock) when Caroline and I saw him. He needed some resuscitation very quickly. I gave Caroline some instructions and then set about what I needed to do, only to look up a minute later and see Caroline still standing at the foot of the bed staring at the man’s legs.

“What happened to his legs?” she cried.

I looked and saw two perfectly normal legs caked in black mud.

“Caroline, it’s okay. He’s been yabbying.”

“I know. That’s what he said but what happened to his legs?”

“Caroline, relax. I promise to tell you about his legs and about yabbying. His legs are fine but right now I really need you to… move it!”

The poor lass couldn’t conceive that anyone in their right mind would stand barefoot, up to their thighs in black mud for any reason, let alone to procure bait for an evening’s fishing.

Anyway, later in the day I saw my new registrar again and I'm very pleased to say that already he was starting to look a bit less like a stunned mullet.

Enough tissues.

Carol Burns as Amanda Wingfield.

First, a word of warning. Zimbles who have not had enough sleep the night before and have forgotten to have lunch that day and find themselves at a certain time of the month, should not proceed on their own to a Saturday matinee performance of “The Glass Menagerie”.

Well, they can but they should remember to take enough tissues to last the whole of the last act and the whole of the drive home. (The usher and parking station attendant can be told there is a lot of hay fever about).

The Queensland Theatre Company’s performance of this play was an experience I won’t forget in a hurry. I took myself to the theatre on the spur of the moment (gotta love internet ticket purchasing) and came away very moved. ‘Moved’ isn’t quite the right word though. ‘Moved’ is when Gretel shows the finger that got caught in Friedrich’s teeth to the nuns or when Darth wheezes, "Luke, I am your father".

Rather, it was more a case of feeling emotionally bashed up. However melodramatic that sounds, that is how it was at first, and as I said, all the way home. I suppose TW would roll in his grave at this but I was reminded of the moment in the film, "A Chorus Line" when a character says, "different is nice but it sure isn't pretty - pretty is what it's about". With hindsight of a few days, however, the average zimble can expect to find something cathartic about the experience and a new sense of perspective on what it is like to be different.

Everyone knows the power of TW’s writing. I don’t want to try to re-hash any of its interpretation. Rather and truly, it was the the cast that threw this staging of “The Glass Menagerie” into gear and made it fly. From beginning to end I marvelled at the sincerity of the players. Each gut wrenching, soul cringing moment was given its full weight and depth.

I once heard an American actress say that it is a mistake to stage TW plays in a large theatre because the plays are generally about characters with problems and lives too large for the situations in which they are trapped. QTC got it right in this respect too with a tiny stage in the intimate Cremorne theatre. In this setting, the play had the tension of a bottle of ginger beer shaken and then set to warm in the midday sun.

The only drawback and this seems to be a common theme with me lately, was the audience. How to describe them? Greying, slow, persnickety, noisy, unresponsive and unappreciative would be a good start. In the first few minutes, Tom lights a cigarette as he begins his story. Yes, the light herbal smoke reached the audience but the coughing and shifting in seats that it caused was affected and silly.

At intermission there was nearly a full-on barney in the foyer because the barista was slow to heat his espresso machine. Back in the theatre there was nearly a full-on barney over a few spare seats being coveted for the second half because of a perceived improvement in view. (Every seat in the Cremorne has a ‘good view’).

The worst behaviour, however, was yet to come. At the end of the play, the audience was very slow to clap and when they did, it was an embarrassingly half-hearted thanks for what had been an absolutely superb performance. The cast responded with one bow and then were off in the blink of an eye. It was such a shame.

Did my older compatriots in the stalls of the Cremorne that afternoon not see the same play I had? Perhaps their lives are so ordered and happy and perfect that TW has no resonance with them. Perhaps they’re not Zimbles and don’t need tissues.

Dr Maarouf-Hassan

Last year, Dr Maarouf-Hassan was stabbed to death in her surgery by one of her patients. This year, in the February 5th edition of the Australian Medical Association Journal, "Australian Medicine", a tribute was published. Its author was Associate Professor Leanne Rowe, a rural GP and Deputy Chancellor at Monash University.

In her essay, Professor Rowe spoke of Dr Maarouf-Hassan's life.

"She was born in Syria and graduated from medicine in 1978. While completing her training as an ophthalmologist, she also developed a passion for mathematics, Arabic literature and politics. Khulod emigrated from Syria to Australia in 1986 with her husband. Before they could become registered in their respective professions in Australia, the couple worked very long hours for many years in their Hastings bar milk ..."

"When her three young daughters were settled at school in 1999, Khulod excelled in the Australian medical entry exam. She chose the GP training program because she wanted to carry on the proud tradition of her family in Syria, by making a difference to disadvantaged people in Australia.

Khulod was passionate about assisting refugees in her practice. On the weekend before her death, she picked buckets of olives in the rain to bottle for the refugee food bank. On the night before her death, Khulod contributed to a professional development event for doctors on refugee health..."

Professor Rowe also quoted the eulogy given by Dr Maarouf-Hassan's 21 year old daughter.

"My mum had no disguises. She opened her heart fully to everyone. She shared her love and compassion unconditionally with everyone. I have always thought of my mum not as a person, but as a place. She radiated an oasis of calm, tranquility and love and warmth. A place where anything could be healed with a kiss. Any disaster could be solved with a smile. Any sadness could be banished with a laugh."

Remember.