Category: Society

Stuff I Learned From Food

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Humans are the only species on this planet (aside from cats) who play with their food.  We mush it, we mix it and we marinate it.  We slice it.  We spice it.  We shape it with our hands.  We do things to food that nymphomaniacs and pyromaniacs only dream about.  At various times in our lives, food is our trusted friend, our relentless lover and our sworn enemy.  Food shares the blame — and the praise — for being both our master and our slave, and we can never quite reconcile that schizophrenic relationship.  Here are just a few things I’ve learned from food.

Fast food is usually neither.

If you can’t pronounce the ingredients listed on the package, they’re probably going to kill you.

Really good soup is actually just very wet salad.

That green stuff in the back of the fridge is never salad.

Red wine hates white carpet.

You can try but you can’t really disguise something disgusting simply by saying it tastes like chicken.

Haute cuisine is a French phrase that means “a bad cut of meat camouflaged with a pretentious sauce.”

Calling Italian cuisine “food” is like calling the Mona Lisa “paint.”

Potato chips (crisps) are free.  You’re actually paying for all that flavoured air trapped inside the bag.

The biggest secret in the world is that the vast majority of consumer honey isn’t honey; it’s some kind of weird, processed corn syrup.  (Sadly, this is true.)

Even though Cheerios™ taste like cardboard, they’re actually good for you.

“Swiss cheese is only cheese now and then.”  – Mitch Hedberg

Broken cookies don’t have calories: the calories escape when the cookies break.  Sounds legit!

You can run British mud through a French kitchen and you’ll end up with something that tastes pretty good, but if you run French food through a British kitchen, you’ll end up with mud.

In North America, barbeque is the last bastion of acceptable male behaviour.

Surprise!  Perrier is just water in a cute, green bottle.

If you microwave leftover pizza and call it “Italian toast,” it tastes better.

And finally:

Forget lingerie, music and candlelight — coffee, red wine and chocolate are the Holy Trinity of a romantic evening.

The Good Old Days

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It’s hard to live in a time when the gods are changing, but it’s loads of fun, too.  This transitional world we live in is so full of cool it’s difficult to sort things out.  So many neat things are going on right now that I’m totally pissed I’m never going to see where they end up in 50 years.  But honestly, I haven’t completely comprehended our world for at least a decade.  Somewhere I lost track, and even though I can still fake it, there are too many holes in my knowledge to ever claim understanding again.  Fortunately, the world has gotten so large that I can just narrow my focus, avoid the stuff I don’t recognize, and keep on moving.  But there are certain things that I miss from the old world; things that were quaint and homey and comfortable.  And sometimes, I’m just a bit sad that young people will never enjoy these things.

Quiet contemplation on the bus.  In the olden days, people on buses used to sit in their own world.  They read books and newspapers.  They decided what to have for dinner.  They mulled over their problems.  Sometimes, they talked to each other in that secret mono-voice reserved for private words in public places.  They looked out the windows and thought about their lovers.  Buses were romantic places.

Cheap restaurants.  Before fast food, restaurants had neon names and vinyl seats and thick noisy plates.  The servers were waitresses and didn’t introduce themselves.  They were places to go for breakfast or meet for lunch.  Places to have conversations.  Places that had pie and the promise of more coffee if you wanted a longer afternoon.

Love affairs.  Relationships are such artificial animals.  They’re built on the premise that the clinching ache in the bottom of your belly has a beginning, a middle and an end.  They take too much thought and are almost corporate in their planning.  I prefer the days when people had love affairs that began by accident — at places like bus stops or cheap restaurants.  They took time to unfold, over longer and longer, long evenings in wood-paneled restaurants with adult only lighting.  And even though they always began as separate adventures, unlike relationships, love affairs got passed back and forth so many times that they became a jungle of intertwisted experience that could never be understood separately again.

And if you did it right:

Love affairs led to newspapers, those big Sunday thumpers that took a half a morning to read.  They had complete sections that you could trade across the breakfast table.  They were big enough to fold, so you could drink your morning coffee.  They were lazy with long stories.  They had movies you wanted to see and places you wanted to go.  They had columnists from faraway Chicago and Frisco who had something to say.  And they had crossword puzzles that might take all day — even with help.

Today might be a brave new world.  It is a brilliant place, with new and exciting things.  But sometimes I just like the feel of yesterday.

Have You Heard “the Voice?”

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It’s been a number of years since I first heard “the voice,” but I remember it quite clearly.  I was going through a grocery store checkout and the little popsicle at the cash register said, “And, how are you today?”  She drew out the “oo” vowel and leaned slightly forward as she said it.  It was at that precise moment I realized I wasn’t a young man anymore.  And I have to admit it annoyed me.

For those of you who are unfamiliar (read “under 50”) “the voice” is the inflection adults add to their speech when they’re talking to children, dogs, foreigners, hospital patients and old people like – uh – me.  It’s a strange combination of empathy and authority.  It suggests that the speaker thinks you might not understand the words, but wants to reassure you that they are in charge and there’s nothing to worry about.  And despite its condescending tone, it’s actually full of goodwill.

Over the years, I’ve gotten used to “the voice,” but, honestly, it still grates on me.  I can’t help it; I just don’t like being talked to on the same level as “Who’s a good boy, then?”  This is especially true when the speaker is a 20-something somebody whose major accomplishment in life is a totally cool Instagram profile.  I know these folks are full of good intentions, but treating grey hair as if it’s a terminal disease is hard to take when you’re on the receiving end.  (Full disclosure: Like everybody else on this planet, I used “the voice” when I was younger and still do, on occasion.)

The problem is, after a while, “the voice” doesn’t quit.  It’s like you’re living in a gigantic daycare centre.  Pretty much everybody who doesn’t know you, uses it.  They start every conversation with a simple question so you’re not stuck for an answer.  They constantly repeat themselves as if you can’t hear, don’t understand or have no attention span.  And they over-explain everything — as though your age and your IQ are somehow connected – adversely.  It’s totally tiresome.  But, the worst thing is “the voice” tells you – in no uncertain terms – that you’re no longer a viable sexual partner and you are not now — nor ever were — a badass.

It’s been a number of years since I first heard “the voice,” but I remember it quite clearly.  I looked at the little popsicle at the cash register, saw her smile, looked into her eyes and thought, “You have no idea who you’re dealing with, little girl — and if I told you even half the story, you wouldn’t believe me.” But, all I could think of to say was, “Not bad — for an old fella!”