Cold, Wet and Almost No Food

This is turning out to be one warped summer. It's been pouring for the whole morning (so much for drizzle...) and it's freezing indoors (fabulous insulation...keeps the cold from last night in....). Under such circumstances....one dreams of a hot plate of this:

RevS cooked up this fantastic King Prawns sautéed in red wine and finely chopped onions with rice and red peppers on a whim...when he found out that the Random XS was visiting late one evening on an empty stomach. "I'll cook when I get home." Random XS said. But RevS would have none of that. "You're not going home on an empty stomach!" he quipped, and whipped up that spicy seafood cuisine. It was the best stuff the Random XS had tasted in ages.
The evening continued with a conversation that inevitatbly led the topic of Schwarzwald, which at this time of the year, is supposed to look like this:

But having witnessed what appears to be a migration of the Monsoon season to Central Europe, one tends to stay indoors and watch DVDs on devices such as this:

And rely on loads of that thick black brew squeezed out of a warehouse load, of these:

So as it continues to pour out there into those misty hills up yonder, let's just sit back, and be thankful, that a giant can of Maggi mozzarella and tomato Penne was ready at hand to help stave off what would almost certainly have turned into another episode of missed lunch.