Cooking with Fire

Being low on cash like I am, I've become very fond of cooking. It's cheaper than going out to eat -- especially here in Magdeburg -- and like always, it's fun. Today, one thing in particular was on the menu: aspargus. The Germans love their aspargus, and it's pretty much sold everywhere you look here. Whether it be a roadside stand or a cafe, the changes are you can get aspargus there. I decided there wasn't a better opportunity to try my hand at making this odd looking vegetable (it's white in Germany) than today.
Unfortunately for me, the dish I prepared was an alarming disaster. Everywhere I looked on the Internet told me to peel the stalks. But because I've never heard of such a thing (Peeling aspargus??! Really?? Is there a peel??) , I decided to do without. Also, I momentarily tried to peel with a potato peeler, and either the peeler agreed with me that aspargus are not meant to be peeled , or it was very dull, and it didn't work. So I threw them into boiling water and let them cook for 15 or so minutes. The result was awful. Chewing on the stalks was similar to chewing on sugar cane. An extremely bland , not-sweet, sugarcane..

At that point, I had to think of something else to eat, and decided on bread with Nutella-- something I probably have had every day since I've been here. I popped two slices into my American toaster I just brought back from Chicago, went to the bathroom for a couple of seconds, and when I came back there were literally flames flaming out of the toaster. Apparently my electric converter I connected the socket to the plug with does not regulate how much electricity the toaster is getting, and it immediately incinerates anything that enters it. So now I'm sitting in my room with all of the windows in the unit open hoping the place clears out before a neighbor calls the fire department..