venta | Generals gather in their masses

Y'see, when someone says "Pork" they will happily include skin, fat, connective tissue and the rest (e.g. crackling, pork belly, spare ribs, pork scratchings). Ham pretty much has to be actual meat - there may well be fat, but it's decorative and you're not necessarily supposed to eat it.

I had to check which way you'd voted to work out whether pork including all the extra bits was a good thing or a bad thing :)

Mmm... crackling.

War pigs! (I prefer the Faith No More version - I hope that isn't considered heretical...)

Edited 2012-09-20 11:48 (UTC)

One kudo to you, sir. I don't believe in religious wars over preferred covers (just pig products, apparently).

Bacon!

To be honest I'm a bit torn on your first question: ham comes in many forms nearly all of which are brilliant (except nasty cheap water-filled supermarket value range). But pork in the form of belly pork or pork pie is sometimes even better. Roast pork done really well can be an absolute joy, but often it's too dry.

Oh and I've tried to be as honest as possible on the second one - I'd definitely be dying of curiosity, but given I wouldn't get it til this evening anyway if it's in today's post I'd probably be willing to wait and open it in the morning. I am a bit of a sucker for following the rules.

Edited 2012-09-20 11:52 (UTC)

Is one of them likely to be of better quality and/or better prepared and/or nicer? Do you like one and not the other?

All other things equal, I'd probably expect pork to be the better option on the grounds that AIUI, you buy ham ready to eat from the supermarket/butcher/similar, so is easy to have whenever at minimal effort, but pork bought from shop needs preparing first. So therefore go for that when eating out, as you can then have it without preparing it. But I have been vegetarian for a long time, so I may be incorrect in this understanding.

I think you may be trying to introduce too much logic and rationality into the question :) Fundamentally, I and the person with whom I was arguing, have a personal preference for the different items. Rather than sensibly agreeing to differ, I am hoping to drum up support for my choice, which will somehow demonstrate that his preference is wrong[*]. Obviously, I haven't told him I'm doing this, so if his comes out top I shall just quietly drop the subject.

I think the best ham tends to be bought and prepared yourself. A lot of supermarket ham is dire, though sometimes the posh-end brands or stuff from the butcher can be pretty good. So it probably is easier to acquire nice ham than nice pork. However, as I say, this was never about producing a sensible piece of reasoning :)

[*] My defence is that he started it on Sunday at the carvery, by telling me I'd ordered the wrong thing and was an idiot.

by telling me I'd ordered the wrong thing and was an idiot.

Well, that's unhelpful of him.

The other option is that so long as you each got food that you thought was the best, I'm sure you get to each be happy that you were right; (or if both of you disliked your selection, you could switch). Oh, no, wait, I've done it wrong again, haven't I? ;-)

Yes, being rational and considered and holding balanced opinions on the internet pretty much is doing it wrong :)

Well, that's unhelpful of him.

He is, however, in general a pleasant and sensible sort of chap so I'm choosing to believe he was joking rather than actually thinking I was an idiot.

So you can't tell us which is right yet so we can come to your aid?

I'm choosing to believe he was joking rather than actually thinking I was an idiot.
That sounds very rational and considered and holding a balanced opinion. Where's the fun in that? I refer you to your other comment being rational and considered and holding balanced opinions on the internet pretty much is doing it wrong .

I've deliberately not filled in my choice on that poll to avoid biasing people :)

I refer you to your other comment

The problem is that people who arbitrarily insist that their opinions are better/more correct than yours are (as a rule) dreadful. Unless they're doing it on purpose, over something completely unimportant, in which case it can be quite funny. I just wanted it to be clear (which it isn't always on the t'interweb) that this was a latter kind rather than someone being a total dick!

(And he was wrong, anyway!)

Ham (assuming you're talking about actual gammon, rather than pasty-looking wet slices of reformed pig) is practically bacon, and bacon is best. Also, ham doesn't mind being over-cooked a bit, whereas pork does, so I go with ham.

Since when have the Royal Mail started dictating when you can open your mail? That's really weird. I'd be torn on opening it; on the one hand, I would suspect that the label may be a joke or something, ad not as official as it looks. On the other hand, what if it is? And it's only one day to wait...

I think that, deep down, I have read too many fairy stories and thus hope that one by following arbitrary dictats in circumstances where the dictator couldn't know whether I had or not, I will be richly rewarded :)

ChrisC's moderately sensible suggestion was that it might contain (eg) an album which isn't released til tomorrow and was intended to arrive tomorrow, but has inexplicably got here early.

But why would the Royal Mail care if you get your album before its official release? I can see a record company wanting to keep it under wraps until the right day, but RM?

So yes, I go with the fairy-tale option; it's a test, and next week an old lady will ask you to help with some menial task. If you keep the parcel closed until tomorrow and do a good turn for a poor stranger, you'll end up being able to make diamonds out of hay or something!

I could believe a situation arises where (a) a shipper cares that its customers get its album on release date, (b) a record label cares that no one gets its album before release date and (c) the Royal Mail can't get its finger out to actually guarantee delivery on the right date. This could then be a rather flaky compromise between the three parties.

I have no evidence that this happens, by the way. And surely no one releases albums on Fridays anyway.

I shall be wary of suspiciously poverty-stricken/elderly/short persons addressing me in the coming week.

You will let us know when you do open it, right?

Providing it doesn't contain a piece of paper saying "do not tell anyone about this", of course I will!

Music and DVDs: Mondays
Comics: Wednesdays
Video games: Fridays
Books: random

Have you preordered a video game or a book?

Me? Preorder video games? Goodness no :)

Oh I was thinking at a carvery the ham would be a big ham joint - which I definitely think of as different from and superior to gammon.

I am hopelessly confused about the words ham and gammon :( Having done a bit of googling, so is everyone else.

I reckon gammon is cured, but uncooked, pork meat. If you cook it, it becomes ham.

So this was a big joint, carved in front of us (rather than ready-sliced ham). I'm confused by your "superior to gammon", as I don't know what you mean by gammon there! A gammon steak?

To me gammon has a erm, shinier texture. But maybe you're right and it is just a difference between cooked and uncooked, in which case I don't really know why I'd think ham is better. Perhaps it is just that if you cook it as a whole joint it's nicer than when cooked as a steak? Gammon steaks often seem to be really salty too - in a way that whole cooked hams don't (whether hot or cold). Hmm. Perhaps I have been foolish to have been put off by whole gammon compared to whole ham!

I have no idea - with a bit of luck someone will informed will come and be authoritative at us!

I've seen one suggestion that gammon is cured as part of a whole side of pig and then cut up, and that ham is cut into lumps first before curing - I can see why that might give them slightly different textures.

As a tiny piece of additional data: In Spain the ham is certainly cured as entire legs.
Intoducing other country's ideas is bound to help clarify things, right?

Not quite as much as if you introduced ideas from the US, but pretty useful, yes :)

I didn't suddenly become vegetarian between the first and second questions of your poll, but I remember liking ham much better than pork before the age of ten or so when I became much more strictly vegetarian (indeed ham and bacon were the two meaty things I occasionally ate between the ages of five and ten), whereas I have never to my knowledge chosen meat at a carvery, due to being vegetarian.

Ah, I did wonder :) Thank you for explaining.

Actually, since it's a pretty arbitrary question I wondered whether you might have chosen ham because it's a nicer colour, or because it's associated with Christmas, or some other non-eating related preference. Slightly like a non-drinking friend of mine who says he likes red wine better than white because he likes tomato sauces better than creamy white ones :)

My question about the parcel would be - is Sept 21st your birthday? If so, I might guess that the Royal Mail had made the label available, but a friend had selected it and stuck it on. But from other comments here it doesn't sound like Sept 21st is your birthday. In which case, I say sod it and open the thing!

Yes, the idea that parcels are labelled "don't open until some-personal-significant-celebration" is quite familiar. But I'm pretty sure I've had my birthday for this year, and baulk at getting another year older already! No anniversaries or anything come to mind.

I'm rather hoping it contains a Device which will record when I open the parcel, and that something lovely will happen if I wait til tomorrow.

Edited 2012-09-20 12:40 (UTC)

Ham vs pork - I tend to occasionally buy really good ham at the local deli, which is great for ham-and-cheese toast or croissants. I haven't learned to properly roast pork with crackling, so if I'm at a carvery I tend to get pork that someone else has roasted well instead.

Royal mail - I try hard to just handle paperwork once, or else it tends to get forgotten about & create more clutter. So I'd just open the letter at the time.

This isn't a letter, it's a parcel! A sizeable box, sitting enticingly next to me on the table. Not likely to be forgotten, I don't think.

(Just to clarify: the parcel is sitting on the table. I am not. I am sitting on a chair at the table.)

Does the parcel rattle when you shake it?

A little.

Possibly it contains a thing that is rather smaller than it, and which is more to one side than the other.

Bacon is of course a vegetable, and a mighty fine one at that!

Tell us what it is when you open it!

I answered 'yes!' to the second mostly because today is the 21st. Not sure what I would have answered yesterday. I suspect what with it being official and all, I would have obeyed the label.

(Although if it had stipulated some much-further-away date, curiosity might have triumphed. A day's not so long to wait to find out.)

Now I'm really wanting to know what was in the parcel.

The answer is "Yes", but then it is the 21st, me being a bit late to the party and everything.

Generals gather in their masses

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject