Paul Schiernecker

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  • A $250 cookie recipe.

    This week I was let in on the secret of the legend of the $250 Neiman Marcus Cookie.
    The story goes that a woman was so impressed with a cookie she had in the cafe of the American department store in Dallas that she asked if it would be possible to purchase it. She was told that it would be “two fifty”. They charged this to her card. When she got her statement through, she noticed the charge for the cookie recipe was $250.00.
    When she queried this with them, they said that this was fee and it was non-refundable. The woman swore revenge and began an email chain (remember those), where she shared the recipe with everyone she could think of. You can find a million different blogs and websites with the recipe; including here, here and here.

    You will be pleased to know that I asked my Iowa mom if I could have a copy of the recipe she used, because I couldn’t stop thinking about those damn cookies, and I’ll share that (in grams) here, now:

    You will need:
    256g softened butter
    256g granulated sugar
    256g brown sugar
    4 eggs
    2 tsp vanilla essence
    512g plain flour
    640g (ground) oatmeal
    1 tsp salt
    2 tsp baking powder
    2 tsp baking soda
    300g chocolate chips
    200g grated chocolate
    200g chopped nuts (optional)

    I blended the oatmeal in a smoothie maker. If you have a blender or food processor then that will probably be easier.

    Method:
    Cream the butter and both sugars.
    Add eggs and vanilla.
    Mix together with flour, blended oatmeal, salt, baking powder and baking soda.
    Add chocolate chips, grated chocolate and nuts.
    Roll into balls and place two inches apart on a baking sheet.
    Bake for 10 – 12 minutes at 190 degrees.

    The recipe says that this makes 112 cookies. I got about seventy, and I also ate a lot of dough in the process.

    My favourite part about this recipe is the story behind it. It doesn’t matter if it’s true, it’s the story that makes it. That and the wonderful deliciousness.

  • Iowa

    Three years ago, I was enduring work when the new American guy on our team, Darren, asked if I would go for a pint and talk about writing. I am always up for conversations about writing but I couldn’t work out what he actually wanted. I was suspicious of his motives. It turned out he was after a little guy I like to call friendship.

    A year and a half ago, Darren made me attend a Super Bowl weekend trip with him and his friends. I spent the whole time wondering why anyone cared about the Super Bowl if it wasn’t to watch Justin Timberlake perform the half time show. We got very drunk and played a lot of board games.

    He then started dating someone and told me I had to meet her. I could tell by the spark in his eyes that this was different and special and as soon as the three of us sat down over gin and tonics I realised that Darren and Laura had something special.

    Last year, when he told me he was going to ask her to marry him, I was so happy. I felt like I had been there since the beginning and it was the most natural thing for them to become husband and wife.

    Being the brilliant, bright and organised couple they are, it wasn’t long before invites were sent out. I was asked not just to attend their wedding in London but also the American leg of their wedding party. As a mutual friend of both of them, they asked if I would come to Iowa.

    Knowing that there was nothing I would enjoy more, and that I would never have a better reason to visit the Corn State, I told them I would be absolutely delighted.

    The three of us flew to Iowa together. I cannot put into words the incredible hospitality that I enjoyed while I was there. I stayed with Darren’s mum, Monica, and stepdad, Craig. They could not have been kinder to me. I felt not only like a friend, but that they saw me as family.

    Monica made fresh cookies from a secret recipe while Craig barbecued steak out on their deck.
    Monica poured litres of cold brew coffee to share with me while Craig loaded a cooler onto the bed of his truck to take out to the lake.
    Monica engaged me in deep and interesting conversations. Craig took me out tubing on the lake and made harsh turns so I flipped off into the water. I had the most incredible time and felt very free.

    I also spent more time with Darren and Laura than I ordinarily would. Aside from our Super Bowl weekends and their visit to Southend, our time together was limited to sneaking out of work for coffee and nights out. Unlimited access to their fun, intelligent, wonderful friendship was a gift in itself.

    I also got to see more of Darren’s brother, Carey, and his girlfriend, Sarah, who are so New York cool that I couldn’t help but talk too much in an effort to impress them.
    I spoke to Darren’s father, Dan, who is the reason Darren is as enchanting as he is.

    It was also a chance to get to know Laura’s parents, Peter and Jane.
    Peter spoke with such affection for their daughter that I couldn’t help but be drawn into their wonderful relationship.
    Jane joined me in bouts of binging on margaritas until we were giggling in the corner and drawing suspicious looks from her only daughter.

    I got to try a keg stand (and fell on my face) and mastered beer pong. I played basketball in their suburban driveway. I ate so well that I started working on a plan to refuse to leave their guest room until they learnt to love me. I fell asleep on the floor of the den. I played shuffleboard with Peter. I lost spectacularly at Harry Potter Dobble, but most of all, I got to witness the love between two of my friends and I felt very lucky the entire time.

  • Drunk And Out in London and Paris (and then London again)

    They say that the definition of insanity is repeating the same steps and expecting a different result. Eight years ago I took an overnight coach to Paris with my friend Lucy. The fallout from that horrific journey meant we didn’t speak to each other for several months. We are fine now.
    Knowing how much that trip had destroyed me, I did it again at the weekend.
    I got loaded at a party on the South Bank before remembering I had a coach to catch and rushing over to Victoria Bus Station. I dozed to Dover and let my head drop on a table aboard the ferry. I did the sleepyhead nod for the three hours to Paris and then I was stood on a bridge over the Seine and it was sunny and beautiful and I was free.

    I’m often asked why I choose to go away on my own. I guarantee that the people who ask have never tried it. For such a small gesture, it’s so calming. I walked from Bercy all the way to Shakespeare & Co in the hopes I could stay for the night. They offer accommodation to aspiring writers in exchange for a few hours work in the shop and an auto-biography for their archive.

    It wasn’t to be but I wandered through and acted bohemian. I walked all the way to Tour Eiffel. It was getting on for thirty degrees centigrade, so I decided to climb the 674 steps to the 2nd stage before getting the lift to the “sommet”. Despite not having anyone to deal with, I found everyone around me annoying. I was at the top for maybe five minutes before I felt penned in and realised it had been a mistake. I came back down and wandered off to find a Starbucks. I sat on the curb, thought about smoking and drank something cold and sugary in the name of being basic.

    I walked to Montparnasse and had lunch in Café du Dome, one of Hemingway’s favourite bars, which offered a three-course meal for €48 in his honour. I asked for it before being told they didn’t offer it as a lunch service. I had some great food, a glass of wine and then a double espresso before searching for the other bars Hemingway had frequented. La Rotonde was just across the road so I stopped for “un demi” before wandering up the road in search of La Closerie des Lilas, which looked like it had ideas so far above its station that I daren’t step a foot in the door. I bought a bottle of wine and sat in Le Jardin du Luxembourg until my legs didn’t work and then I stumbled on to another bar.

    As the sun started to go down, I found my way over to Tour Montparnasse and rode up 56 floors and climbed three sets of stairs to the observation deck where I got a beer and watched the sunset, surrounded by couples in love. Nothing improves a sunset quite like day drinking.

    After the sun had disappeared I realised it was about time I did as well and headed down before others had the same idea. I got the train south to Gentilly where my hostel was based. I spoke to the guy on reception about the origins of my name, my lack of desire to go out anywhere that evening and my plans for the following day. I got up to my shared room and fell down on my bunk, dreaming of beautiful people in Breton stripes.

    I awoke early, showered and got dressed. It felt great to be in clean clothes. I took the train up to Notre Dame and smirked at the tourists trying to get a photo at distance because the grounds were fenced off by police and security following the recent fire. I got a black coffee at the Shakespeare & Co cafe and sat outside, watching groups of tourists stop for photos.

    I headed north of the Seine to meet my friend Mika for brunch. He was coincidentally in Paris for the weekend, staying with his friend Marion. I had the most incredible lazy brunch of bread, yoghurt and honey, a charcuterie board, cheese, salad and a chocolate brownie. If there is one thing that makes you appreciate taking your time, it’s a good brunch.

    I left the pair of them to their hangovers and afternoon plans and walked to Musee du Louvre. Despite my various visits in the last twenty years, I had never been inside. I was told it takes three days to see everything. I’m not surprised. I got lost on so many occasions that I couldn’t be sure what I had and hadn’t seen before. I would wander past a marble statue that had become the equivalent of a tree stump and wonder if I was going round in circles. I saw the Mona Lisa, which was an experience in itself. They snake visitors up two escalators and through two rooms before you’re penned into an area for ninety seconds and have to get your photos in. It’s not that the painting itself was disappointing, just that people tend to be. I got a coffee and did some excellent people-watching and then rolled out and over to the Latin Quarter to get some dinner.

    On my way I passed over Le Pont des Arts, ruminating on an old relationship where the pair of us had attached a padlock with our initials to the mesh of the bridge. It was a thing.

    Over time the bridge was weighed down by the number of padlocks pinned to it so they cut the lot free and chucked it all in the Seine. C’est la vie.

    I have a rule when I’m travelling that I don’t have to be vegetarian if it’s going to be a bother. It doesn’t make sense to be vegetarian in France. I’m not going to eat foie gras, but I can’t ignore the allure of escargot. Those little garlicy boys know what is up. I sat with a beer and some snails and my book and felt like I had found the peace of mind I had been waiting for. I didn’t want to escape myself but the series of situations I always seem to find myself in. I didn’t have to consult with anyone or deal with anything. I could just sit and shut the fuck up for a moment and enjoy being in my body and in my book.

    I hired an electric scooter and tore down the bank of the river until I got back to Buchy where I abandoned the scooter outside a cinema  and caught a screening of Hobbs & Shaw, trying to pass the time before my coach home. It was subtitled in French so I was laughing at a different time to everyone else who read the punchlines before they’d been said out loud.
    I then found the least offensive-looking bar in Buchy Village and sat out by the curb, drinking beer and stuffing chips in my face.

    I got to the bus station with time to spare and found over seventy spots for coaches to pull up. I ran down the line, and found where my coach was supposed to be, but everyone shrugged at me when I asked what was going on. Somehow, the coach wasn’t where it was supposed to be or I wasn’t where I was supposed to be. I turned around and noticed a girl wearing a huge backpack who looked a little lost.
    ‘Are you going to London?’ we asked each other at the same time.

    I spent more time with Kayla than with anyone else over the weekend. We sat in the bus stop waiting for an update until one in the morning when a bus finally arrived. My ticket was for a different bus company so we came up with a cunning plan. I would put Kayla’s oversized bag in the hold while she argued our case with the driver. I then told her about my ridiculous plan. I needed to be back in London the following morning because I had to be at work at 9am. I had walked 50,149 steps in two days. I was half-cut.I had nine hours to get home. She laughed at me.

    Somehow there were still two seats on the coach. The driver let us on having only seen Kayla’s ticket. I promised him a drink when we got to the ferry, which I then realised was a bad move for a coach driver. We sat together on the coach and talked about travelling and family and hostels. Kayla had flown over from Brisbane and spent three months in Europe. She was heading to London to housesit for a family friend and was looking forward to understanding what people were saying to her. It was nice to talk to someone and to remember what it was like to be so young and carefree. She had some great stories.

    We sat in the Food Court on the ferry and talked about cage fighting and shots and kids swearing. We slept on the coach intermittently and I woke up to watch Brockley and Camberwell go by before we crossed the mighty Thames and pulled into Victoria.

    I couldn’t believe the difference in temperature as we stepped down off the coach . We said goodbye and I ran down the steps and into the underground. I got the first Circle Line train I could and pretended to listen to music (because my battery was dead) until I got to my office for 08:56, smelling of garlic and coach stations and a love for a city that was not my own.

  • It’s Already Out There

    Sometimes it isn’t the content of the film itself, but instead the circumstances you watch it in. It is well recorded that I am prone to wild bouts of tears if I watch any film while on an aeroplane (I’m looking at you Amy, Inside Out, Instant Family, Lion, Infinity War, Adaptation).

    I had seen Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind any number of times before I watched it on a roof in Stratford but that will always be my favourite viewing. I had seen Blade Runner a lot because a girl I was dating had to study it when we were at university but it never had a patch on the Secret Cinema screening last year.

    I had never fully appreciated the power, nuance and wonder of Nora Ephron’s work until I saw When Harry Met Sally at the Prince Charles cinema in Leicester Square recently.

    For those of you who are not familiar with what is objectively the greatest romantic comedy of all time, When Harry Met Sally (or WHMS as I sometimes call it for fun) centres around one human male (Harry) and one human female (Sally) and their relationship. It begins with a journey from the University of Chicago to New York where the pair are thrown together for the drive by a mutual friend. Harry has a dark side (which I can relate to) and absolutely nothing bothers Sally (which I envy). On the ride they fall out over Harry’s insistence that Sally has never had great sex and whether they should get a motel together.

     

    I was first introduced to WHMS by my grandfather. He told me that men and women could never really be friends because the sex always got in the way. He told me this when I was fourteen. I rolled my eyes and told him that he was embarrassing and then I spent a decade proving his point.

     

    What makes WHMS so great is the honesty of the relationship onscreen. It isn’t plain-sailing and at no point does it feel like the relationship is being played out by numbers or in a three-act structure. You completely buy into their friendship and then their relationship. I can never work out which of the pair of them I fancy (see also: Before Sunrise, Eternal Sunshine, True Romance, La La Land, Garden State, Star Wars).

     

    I cannot recommend seeing WHMS enough. Go and see it in the cinema if you get the chance, and if you can’t get around to that, then do what I do; watch it once a month on Netflix and proudly partake of some pecan pie.

  • Daring

    Today I celebrate three months at my new job.

    I don’t often mention what I do for work because it removes the veneer that I write for a living. Very few people are afforded that luxury/burden. Like everyone else I work a job and get a wage and spend too much on payday weekend and then struggle through the rest of the month. I’m just like the rest of you lowly mortals.

    The difference I feel in my new role is palpable. I spent ten of my best years working for a company who couldn’t give a single shit about me, a fact made abundantly clear when I handed in my notice and there was no question of why I would give up a career at a well-known and well-established company (even if they are notably of ill repute) to take a chance on a start-up. Fuel was added to the fire when I was hastily given a factually inaccurate leaving speech and booted out the door without an exit interview or any guidance.

    I’ll tell you this much, start-ups know how to treat people. I’m positively fucking glowing with how well I am treated as a person and respected as a member of the workforce. I look forward to going in each day and being around people who believe in what they are doing. The work may be very much the same but the attitude that comes with it couldn’t be more different.

    I would like to point out that most of the people I worked with in my time at this behemoth of a corpse of a company are absolutely incredible. They are beautiful, smart, funny, engaging individuals who are routinely overlooked because they aren’t white enough, male enough or middle-minded enough to make it any further. I miss a number of them and will keep in touch and hope that they are all able to make good on their own plans for their futures.

    For all the good eggs, there will always be some problem children though. It seems a few too many of them were dropped on their heads as kids which left them with this glimmer of self-importance in a world where nothing you actually do has any impact. They love bureaucracy and red tape and swinging their weight around and my god, I’m glad to be clear of their reach.

    So here’s my tip for people wondering if they should change it up; quit your job, shave your head and go to Costa Rica.

  • Never forget that my heart is a husk

    I don’t know if my view will ever change when it comes to the idea of me and marriage. It doesn’t change the fact that sometimes it’s awfully nice to be involved in someone else’s. On Saturday I got to enjoy the experience of seeing two of my good friends living it up in married bliss. I drank at least a bottle of red wine and I may even have shed some tears. Please do not forget that my heart will always be a husk.

    In an age when so much seems to be on the dead-set path to destruction, it’s lovely to experience something loving and uplifting and joyous. I am very happy for the pair of them and know that it is the most exciting future that either of them could ever imagine but it won’t change the fact that my heart is a husk.

  • TaskMaster

    On Wednesday I was lucky enough to visit Pinewood Studios with (my brother from another mother) Benjy to watch TaskMaster being filmed. He had managed to get tickets for both the afternoon and evening shows and having turned up the week before only to be told they oversold on tickets and he wouldn’t be going in, we thought we were prepared. We arrived an hour and a half before doors opened, joined the back of a queue in the heat, had a lovely full-body check and were then placed in the sun in a holding pen for a couple of hours.
    We decided to sunbathe and it was only a matter of time before my head and nose were glowing. We were then told we hadn’t made the cut and would have to be on our way.

    After a quick stop for a pint and some supplies, we were then first in the queue of cars for the evening showing, which also happened to be the series finale. When we were allowed in, Benjy had Lucky 13 and I was 14. We figured we were pretty safe with those numbers and sat people watching in the pen. It’s a strange mixture of people who turn up to watch TV being filmed, ourselves included. It was certainly an odd mix of people who looked like they didn’t know what to do now Jeremy Kyle had been cancelled.

    We were all made to turn off our phones and were then taken through the lot. Bond 25 is currently filming but I didn’t see anything besides signs that they were using real glass inside one of the studios we walked past. If there’s any glass in Bond 25 then I don’t think we can count that as a spoiler.

    We got taken into the studio which was a surreal moment of recognising something so well but not knowing what to do with that information. There were six rows on the studio floor before a fake wall and then tiered seats up to the back of the room. We were the back row of the studio floor, so should be identifiable when it is eventually aired.
    A warm up comedian came out and we all shouted our favourite moments from previous shows (“Tree Wizard”, “James Acaster’s hula hoop”, “Joe Wilkinson’s potato”).

    Greg Davies (possibly the tallest man on Earth) came out to rapturous applause and introduced Alex Horne. They then brought on the guests; David Baddiel, Ed Gamble, Jo Brand, Katy Wix and Rose Matafeo. The show runs to about 45 minutes (without ads) but we were there for over three hours as they hustled their way through comments that are definitely not suitable for TV and jibbed one another on their conduct during the tasks. I won’t say anything further because I promised Greg I wouldn’t spoil it but what a great line up and series this looks to be.

    I’ll have to wait and see if I made the cut, and if so, I can tick that little number off my bucket list.

  • CAMPNANOWRIMO – July 2019

    I have just completed my National Novel Writing Month project for July. It was touch and go on a number of occasions but I am proud to announce that the first draft of The Gift Shop is now complete. It’s one of the most personal stories I’ve ever written and, as tends to be the case, is about death and sex and drugs and time travel.

    I’m gonna go and drink beer until I pass out.

  • My First Pride

    I’ve always thought Pride was important. Pride with a capital P but pride is also important. That’s why I felt very lucky yesterday when I got to take part in the London Pride parade alongside a number of my fabulous new work colleagues.

    It was such an incredible and moving experience and one I wanted to take the time to share. We all met up early. I had to travel up incognito because unfortunately we still live in a world where side-eye all the way up to actual homophobic attacks occur against people just because they are standing up for who they are, who they love or both. I met up with everyone at King’s Cross and we drank gin and tonics and covered one another in glitter.

    We joined the parade at Regent’s Park and impatiently waited our turn, dancing along to every truck that went by, music blasting from exposed speakers. I saw a lot of incredible costumes and many beautiful people enjoying themselves and being themselves. I danced to all the Madonna I heard and I proudly waved my flag, screaming along with the rest of London and having the best goddamn time. I can’t thank my friends enough for making me feel so loved and welcome.

    I cannot emphasise how important Pride is and will continue to be. In the year we commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall Riots it’s important to look at the amazing efforts that have been made towards equality but the bizarre amount more that needs to be done.
    I still saw people protesting. There remain countries where you can be fired for being gay. There remain countries where it is illegal to be gay. There remain countries where you can be killed for being gay. I march for all of those people, everyone that came before me that made this possible and anyone who will ever march. This is us.

  • I’m No Superman

Paul Schiernecker

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