Many writers have shared their thoughts with the public:

"There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they'll take you." - Beatrix Potter

"The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say." - Anaïs Nin

"Sharing your writing, being enlarged by others' writing, is what makes you feel famous." - Gretchen Bernabei

"Writing is not an amusing occupation. It is a combination of ditch-digging, mountain-climbing, treadmill and childbirth." - Edna Ferber

"Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing." - Ben Franklin

"One must be drenched in words, literally soaked in them, to have the right ones to form themselves into the proper pattern at the right moment." - Hart Crane

"There are three rules for writing. Unfortunately, no one can agree what they are." - W. Somerset Maugham

How to Stuff Up a Chicken

This recipe has been handed down from generation to generation. Once you taste it, you’ll see why they’ve been trying so hard to get rid of it.

Nan’s Stuffed Chicken

1 chicken (size 14 for a family or 6 & 7/8 for individual serve)
2 tbs Virgin Olive Oil (oil with a little experience will do equally well)
16 fl. ounces chicken stock (to convert to ml just multiply by 28.4130742)
2½ ounces parmesan cheese (to convert to g multiply by 28.3495231)
Stick of butter (a bit more than a pat and way more than a knob)
2 sprigs rosemary (your guess is as good as mine)
12 basil leaves (throw the rest of the bunch away otherwise it just turns to slime in the bottom of your crisper)
2 brown onions
3 cloves garlic
4 carrots
4 slices Tip Top
Half a lemon
Pinch of salt and a dash of pepper (let’s not start that again)
Wine (any variety as long as it’s red or white)

Preparation

Open the wine to breathe and make sure it tastes OK.

Start by chooping the onions (I actually meant chopping; chooping is an entirely different process). Many people tear up uncontrollably when chopping onions and Beryl next door swears by candles. Beryl thinks candles are the answer to everything. Beryl’s house is like Carols by Candlelight all year round and is basically uninsurable. We don’t have candles but I’ve tried a torch and it makes no difference. Swimming goggles work best for me except I do a tumble turn every time I go to the fridge. Or you could try chooping the onions instead which I believe is less inclined to induce weeping.

Did I say check the wine?

Crumble the bread into a pile except for the bits which have somehow become magnetised to your hands and fingers.

Chiffonade the basil, Julienne the carrots, Romeo the garlic and grate the cheese. Apply Band-Aid to grated finger (a little blood just adds to the flavour). Scoop everything up and stuff it into the chook’s neck cavity then pull the creepy bit of skin back tight and secure. I’m thinking here of a large toothpick or something as opposed to padlocks and an Alsatian.

Make sure the wine’s still breathing.

About now you’ll probably turn the chicken round and find a bigger cavity at the other end which you hadn’t noticed before which may well have been a better hole to stuff but never mind. Push the lemon up as far as it will go followed by the rosemary and anything else you haven’t used so far. I once put in a Wettex by mistake which was a bit on the chewy side and soaked up most of the chicken stock.

Jam the butter in too and wipe your greasy hands all over the outside of the chook. This is called basting and allows you to pick up the wine again without the bottle slipping through your fingers.

Now take a piece of string (which I probably should have mentioned earlier but if you can’t find any try dental floss) and loop it around the parson’s nose, up round the legs, tie a bow and truss like hell it will all hang together.

Reward yourself in the usual way.

Slop the oil into a baking dish and carefully lower your bird into it with any veggies you may have prepared earlier. Then pop it all in the oven which you really should have turned to 180 about twenty minutes ago but I can’t be expected to remember everything.

Pour yourself the rest of the wine and settle in for the duration.

Let everything cook for about an hour and a half or until the smoke alarm goes off. If you can work out how to set the timer better still – I find it usually starts beeping about half an hour after the fire brigade arrives which just sets the dog off and irritates the firemen.