DINING AT the dumpster. Getting your tea out of the bin. It is a practice I recently recommended as one way of coping with the credit crunch. This was a joke which last week became reality.
Making my way down the wee rambla in the Poblenou barrio of Barcelona, I came upon a group of young people busily investigating the contents of two wheelie bins outside the Dia supermarket. They had found some rich pickings.
Cartons of milk, yoghurt, sausages, beef and various other foodstuffs were being stuffed into rucksacks as the urban survivalists busied themselves with a spot of proletarian shopping.
"So, what's for dinner?" I asked. "Do you like rabbit?" a nice young fellow replied. Having confirmed that these small creatures are no stranger to my dinner table, I was presented with a dead bunny fresh from the bin.
This particular little lapin was safely encased in a stout plastic container. It had been consigned to the refuse because it had, that day, reached its sell-by date.
It would have been a crying shame if Peter Rabbit had died in vain. So I decided to take him home and introduce his carcass to my oven.
There is no such thing as a free lunch. One of the band of scavengers had spotted this guiri as an easy mark. Would I be so kind as to give him a couple of euros?
With so much free stuff about, what did he need money for? To buy tobacco, he said. I declined and gave him a short lecture on the evils of smoking.
I did, however, give him two euros on the strict condition that he spent the money on beer. He was happy to comply with this condition.
It was at this point that one of my neighbours passed by, pausing only to comment that times must tough if I was buying rabbits out of a bin. But when you are living off the land and doing your bit to ensure that valuable food resources do not go to waste, you cannot allow bourgeois prejudices to divert you from your mission.
In a matter of hours, my little friend (the rabbit, not the neighbour) was duly stuffed with a mixture of onion, celery, bread crumbs, ginger, soya sauce and chopped chestnuts. The bunny was slathered in butter and paprika and finished off with a basting of marmalade and HP sauce.
It was shared with another set of neighbours who were unconcerned that the rabbit had come from shop
to dinner table via a short stay in a wheelie bin.
Having a rake through the bins has always been a popular pastime with the canny residents of Barcelona. With times a bit tougher, it is even more popular and the midge-rakers are invariably well-dressed and respectable in appearance.
I am all for this recycling in theory. In practice, I can't bring myself to get down and dirty investigating the basura. But I don't need to, with these very nice and very generous young people to get my menu del dia for me.
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ONE of the best scientific stories of this or any other week is the discovery of the Jennifer Aniston neuron. Neuro scientists at Leicester University carried out tests which concluded that when confronted by an image of said actress, a particular brain cell in the average human anatomy gets all fired up.
Now, I had actually noticed this phenomenon without the benefit of any academic research. I had assumed that the definite tingle induced by the sight of this very tasty, blonde-haired preppie lady was down to good old-fashioned red-blooded lasciviousness.
I am relieved to discover it is not lechery on my part but merely the complex behaviour of my neural coding.
I am also relieved to discover that I have more than one brain cell. In addition to the Aniston neuron, I appear to have the Nigella Lawson molecule, which becomes particularly active when the lady is cooking a suckling pig on the telly.
Also in there is the Angelina Jolie organism which I suspect is a eukaryotic flagellated cell (check that out for yourself on Wikipedia) which is particularly active when she is doing her Lara Croft routine.
But it is not just about sex. The scientists have discovered brain cells which store memories of Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan and even of landmarks and moments in history.
This may explain my James-McFadden-scoring-the-goal-against-the-French neuron which regularly gets fired up. As, unfortunately, does the Chris-Iwelumo-misses-against-Norway brain cell.
There is a serious side to this story as Professor Rodrigo Quiroga, the man in charge, hopes the research has potential for the development of neuro-prosthetic devices, such as robotic arms driven by neural signals to be used by paralysed patients.
The ability to read the mind could one day help treat people with epilepsy, Alzheimer's and schizophrenia.
For such a good cause, I would happily become a guinea pig and get a few electrodes attached to the brain. I have this Jennifer Lopez neuron which could do with some serious investigation.
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The latest ruling from the European Commission appears to indicate that there are a number of EU bureaucrats with little to do with their time.
They have decreed that budget airlines can no longer advertise flights at £1 or 1 when the actual cost, with taxes and charges, is actually much higher. This may come as a surprise to these EU executives but punters already know there is no such thing as a £1 flight and we are quite capable of working out the real cost without the benefit of legislation.
Take the example of a recent Ryanair offer of £20 return flights from Prestwick to Barcelona, which is something of a bargain since fees and charges on this route normally add up to £38.
As you go through the online booking process, the cost rises. If you want to check in a bag at the airport you will pay £24 for the privilege. It's another £6 if you want priority boarding and £9.49 if you forget to untick the box offering travel insurance. There is an £8 charge for paying by credit card.
So your £20 flights actually come in at £67.49. But if you check in online, take carry-on luggage and don't opt for priority boarding and insurance, you can do the round trip for £28.
These chaps in Brussels probably don't know how Ryanair et al operate because they themselves don't have to fly budget. They fly business class at our expense.
The EU seems to have it in for Ryanair in particular.
Maybe they don't like the idea of us poor folk getting away to the Costa Brava for £28.
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