On Secrets.

It's that time again...CHEESE TIME!
I had my friend and fellow cheese conoisseur write about his favorite kind of cheese, so here are his thoughts:

Hello everyone- my name is Andrew Van Gorp. I recently discovered that my lover was cheating on me with some harlot named Signe, and they were BLOGGING about their exploits together... I was shattered. I thought that what I had with Cheese was special, but I guess we are all weak for Cheese when it comes down to it. In all seriousness, very recently I had my first encounter with my FAVORITE cheese of all time. I know, that's a big statement. Before said encounter I had always thought that all cheeses were equal in my eyes...how wrong I was. This cheese was called "Goat Gouda". Apparently these farmers were using goat milk to make gouda cheese! Imagine my ecstasy to find out that these cheese scientists had, in effect, merged together some of my favorite kind of cheeses into what would become, unbeknownst to me, the most impressive illegitimate love child ever given to this world! To my chagrin, goats are also considered very sustainable! (See link below). Okay- you're delicious description. The cheese's appearance when first freshly sliced into is common to any other gouda. It has a creamy white color that leans a little closer towards the peach color range than usual gouda coloring. The small crags and breaks in the cheese add to its visual appeal- easily pleasing the eyes of the rock climbers amongst you- it is a mountain face of saborevacity(a spanglish word I just made up). The first bite was the best (as usual for taste tests... after so much cheese the flavor "sinks in" to your taste buds and loses clarity.) When I first placed the cheese into my mouth I was slapped with beddable gouda- I found myself searching for any remnant of goat cheese! Where was the goat in goat gouda?!? I was extremely disappointed...and then...slowly- ever so slowly- what is that?- a small tingling flavor at the back of my tongue appeared. Could it be? Was the prodigal goat found at last? It was it was indeed! The goat cheese half of goat gouda finally found it's way into my salacious mind. The texture of the now flavor-balanced cheese was not to be stood up. As you bight down into it, the cheese crumbles regretfully against your teeth. It isn't just some goat cheese to be mooted into nothingness! It holds to its goudish ancestry in the texture department. The familiar "stones" appear as you wrestle the cheese- tiny bits of cheese that add that almost pear-like grit. These tiny rebel armies keep the cheese interesting as you chew it up. If I had to describe this cheese in a few words to sum up, I would describe it as mollifying, expressive, and balanced. I LOVE THIS CHEESE! I would hope you would all try it. Also, thanks to Signe for letting me add to her magnificent blog! I hope you all keep reading- I know I will!

I love this website called PostSecret, and one of it's messages is compassion towards others, which I thought would fit in nicely with the love part of this blog...

In 2005, Frank Warren created several hundred pre-adressed postcards instructing people to illustrate a secret on the postcard and send it to him.

He left the postcards in coffee shops, libraries, and art museums for people to find. Soon enough, people started sending in their secrets and Frank Warren started a blog on blogspot.com displaying 10 new secrets every sunday. The site has grown since then, and now displays approximately 20 secrets every Sunday. Since the start of the blog, Warren has published  5 books exploding with secrets from several different countries and in several different lanuages, even braille! The secrets range from grotesquely sexual to hilarious and make stops everywhere in between.
It takes a lot for someone to share their secret with the entire world, and the fact that millions have already participated in this movement makes me think that everybody in the world is a lot more connected thatn we could ever imagine. Someone all the way over in France could submit a secret in, then it gets published in a book, and there is at least one person who reads that secret thinking "I know exactly how that feels" or"Yeah, me too." Frank Warren said "Every single person has at least one secret that could break your heart. If we could just remember this, I think there would be a lot more compassion and tolerance in the world." I believe this, too and try to live this mission.
www.postsecret.com is a good read and I would highly recommend giving it a visit sometime. The secrets will definitely pique your interest, and you might even find one that you identify with!

Enjoy the website and some good cheese this week!
Much  Love,
Sig.