Putting the noodles straight into the kettle is not a life hack.

I've always admired the thought of cooking, I think it was mainly thanks to my Gran, I knew if I went there I would get a properly cooked meal that was unlikely to have been sitting in a tin can for a few years first. I always looked forward to it as homelife consisted of the culinary joys of microwaved pizza (and I mean regular pizza not ones meant to be microwaved) and pasta 'n' sauces. Anything that had actually been prepared was a treat.

I thought being able to cook a pasta and sauce made me a culinary genius. It didn't funny enough. I found out when I was drunk and cooking a meal for P,P and M that putting in whole cloves of garlic wasn't actually a thing that was done. Wankers. Anyway though realty dawned on me when I went to uni the second time. Donner kebab, portion of Fries, a can of coke and an extra pot of chilli sauce please... Yes this was my almost nightly diet. It doesn't sound that healthy in retrospect, but at £4.60 it was reasonably priced and it came right to my door. I didn't really know what else to do and I couldn't cope with using the kitchen as other people might come in and try and talk to me, that wasn't something I could deal with, I hated the sound of other people out of their rooms. 

I realised at some point after 2 years that constant takeaway probably isn't the healthiest diet in the world, that and I had absolutely no money, and that I should do something about it. So I started cooking some more. The fact I didn't burn myself, the house, or possibly the city of Leeds down is pretty impressive. A few of my great achievements:

• Putting the noodles straight into the kettle and boiling it. Two for one I thought. Funilly enough the heating element didn't work so well after that. Man I lived off those 8p Tom Yam noodles for another good year. That and some bread, 12p from Morrisons. 
• Guestimating a chip pin, I bunged a load of oil in the chip pan, stuck the heat on it then just through some chips in. Fishing them out when they looked like they were done. I remember they were actually ok on a few occasions but this seems like one of the stupider thing's I've done in retrospect.
• Spaghetti and margarine. A full meal. For about 10p a go. I remember I going to Morrisons and buying the stuff for this quite regularly. I think I got bored of it in the end.
• Chopping garlic; you mean deskinning the cloves surely?

I'm sure there's lots more, there was certainly lots more takeaway wrappers on my floor but man I'm glad i seem to have learned at least how to cook some basic things now!