On not writing about Black Friday

I think that Black Friday is a wonderful monument to hyper-consumerism, and I'll just leave it at that. A day dedicated to buying stuff is truly a dedication to nihilism and egocentrism. When will consumers realize that the joke is on them, and that they will never have enough stuff to make themselves feel good about who they really are: empty, vacuous, superficial. Waited in line at Wally-World to buy some light bulbs because they were cheaper there, but it made me feel dirty. Next year I'll stay home all day on the day after Thanksgiving and let the hoards do their mindless thing of buying a whole bunch of crap that they not only don't need, they have no where to put. Really, this monument to blind consumerism is a completely pointless exercise in mob control: get people to buy a bunch of stuff that they would never buy under normal circumstances. This kind of advertising and mob social activity really lends itself to impulse buying of the worst kind: people who don't have the money to spend are the target of all the advertising. I bought light bulbs. Saved eight dollars, but I also spent twenty minutes in line trying to get out of the store. The new religion of America is buying stuff, and today was our national holiday celebrating that faith. Of course, this is a never-ending desire, an endless need, an itch that can never be scratched because no matter how much stuff you eventually drag home, it will never be enough. The bills will arrive, and you'll wonder why you ever thought you needed a salad shooter, a sham-wow, or a rotisserie chicken roaster, but at least you can put them in the garage next to all the other crap you bought last year.

On doing the dishes

When all is said and eaten, there is still one chore left to do: the dishes. I know, just pile them in the dishwasher and let it run. For the most part, that is what I do, but everyone knows that with even a dishwasher, there is still some stuff you must do by hand. Big bowls, platters, giant frying pans and roasters, knives, plastic ware, cookie sheets, weird baking utensils and the like. I don't really mind doing the dishes, but I hate it when people pile their dishes on the counter near the sink and leave food and garbage on their plates as if that stuff was just going to get up and walk over to the garbage can by itself. I pile all the regular small stuff in the dishwasher--plates, glasses, silverware and smaller cooking items--otherwise I'd be there all day with dishpan hands. And there's always one baking dish that has burned on food that needs soaking. So you start to pile the clean stuff in the drainer. I am a skillful architect and can assemble a very artful stack of drying dishes in the drainer. This is kind of like a kid's game, and I am always worried about stacking one too many frying pans, or one too many bowls before the whole thing comes crashing down around me (this has happened, by the way). I wash in very hot water with a good dose of dish soap. No sense in giving the germs a break. As folks leave the kitchen and venture into the living room to catch the end of the football game, the place grows quieter. I scrub and rinse, scrub and rinse and the pile on the counter starts to disappear. Someone has placed a fresh glass of something within my reach. Now that was thoughtful. In no time at all the dishwasher is loaded and ready to go, the pile of wreckage on the counter has diminished to nothing, and the soap and water are swirling down the drain. Nap time!

On the worst jello salad ever

“We agreed it [the article] must have been fairly widely read in both our congregations, because on one page there’s a recipe for that molded salad of orange gelatin with stuffed green olives and shredded cabbage and anchovies that has dogged my ministerial life these last years, and which appears at his house whenever he so much as catches cold. There should be a law to prevent recipes for molded salad from appearing within twenty pages of any article having to do with religion.” (Marilynne Robinson, Gilead p.145)

Perhaps the only ingredient that could make this particular jello salad worse would be tofu, which makes most anything with which it comes into contact a little worse. The pastor quoted above is about 77 years old and has been plagued by Lutheran jello salad his whole life. Nothing like seeing a jello salad coming your way with shredded carrots and fruit cocktail suspended in the mixture. And little miniature slices of peeled mandarin oranges. Or little shrimp. Does Dante describe a ring in hell for those who prepared this awesomely frightening dish? I'm also fascinated by the colors, none of which is really associated with a flavor: red, yellow, green, purple and blue. I have no idea what flavor blue might be, but I'm also afraid to ask. It isn't, however, that I haven't eaten my share of jello, and red is my favorite color, but for suspended foodstuffs of multiple varieties I prefer green jello, which is totally irrational, but I have a tone to maintain in this note. Blue is too weird, and orange almost tastes like oranges, so that would be a bad choice. The only way to make this salad really nightmarish is to start adding canned tuna, leftover turkey, salmon or Spam. (On second thought, I have seen this dish with Spam, so scratch that, it wasn't so bad--no joke, I'll eat anything if I'm hungry enough.) Adding Crisco to jello is illegal in several states, including Georgia, Utah, and Vermont. Adding Bourbon or vodka to jello actually improves both the taste and its nutritional benefits.

On turkey

It is that time of the year when we drag out the turkeys. It isn't that I despise turkey as a food, I just ate too much of it as a kid. So when I see people buying the forty pounders in the stupid-market, I have to really wonder if anyone is going to eat all of that. On Thanksgiving I will start my feast with a shrimp cocktail (lots of lime and cilantro, onions and avocado, salt, and maybe a dash of tequila...), a couple of really rare (black on the outside, ruby red on the inside) filet mignons, grilled asparagus, a bit of sweet potato/regular potato mash garnished with parsley, butter, and black pepper. Home-made apple pie with a big dollup of real whipped cream. An after-dinner drink over ice--something with mint leaves in it. Turkey will not be on the menu. Some people like the tradition of eating the same thing every year, and I respect that. Branching out and trying new flavors is not a strong suit for many people. Turkey and stuffing are boring. As is jello with little bits of salad suspended in it. As is green bean casserole (or hot dish, as it is correctly called in the Northland). I make cranberries, but I have certain additives that bring up the flavor. My mashed potatoes are orange, and my apple pie may have other fruit mingling with the apples. Pumpkin is out-of-bounds. No dishes with eggs will be served. The wine will be red, the coffee, hot and black. The whipped cream will have just a touch of something that will make it extra special. Flavors are a trip to a place you may have never been before. Experimenting, checking out new ideas, making the most of your holiday cooking experience can be a very rewarding experience. No turducken allowed.

On ten items or less

I made the mistake of going back to the grocery store tonight to get a pizza for supper. The place was packed with frantic shoppers trying to get that last can of pumpkin pie filling because they don't have time to shop before next Thursday. All I wanted was a pizza and the paper. After having picked up a third item, tomatoes, I headed for the check-out, but because people were shopping as if the stores weren't going to be open after today, all of the lines were full of people shopping for the apocalypse. They were out of their minds with carts so full you'd swear they were violating safety regulations, endangering themselves and everyone around them. So I headed for the little cashier man by the door, "ten items or less." I was third in line (you can see where this is going) and the guy getting his stuff has about thirty items. Obviously, he can't count, or more specifically, he can't read. I mention this to the guy in front of me, but I should’ve looked first, he had a ton of crap as well. I wait while the guy fools with his purchases, complicated, coupons, bags and bundles. I am stoic, but he obviously doesn't like my attitude. When I get up to the register with my three things (count'em three, paper, pizza, bag of tomatoes w/ pre-printed bar code), he comes back (to pick a fight?) to show me that he had only bought nine things. Maybe he only bought nine things, but I'll bet he didn't know that when he got up to the counter or when he picked that place to pay. He had to be a jerk and show me his register tape because it was obvious to everyone, including himself, that he had at least violated the spirit of the express lane because there was nothing express about what he was up to. I hope he has a happy Thanksgiving. Maybe someone will teach him to think while they are teaching him to read. Naw, never happen.

On Purple Rain

Okay, I'm from Minnesota and so is Prince Rogers Nelson, but I don't think either of us has ever seen purple rain. So this song he sings about not getting involved with someone who is already involved with somebody else is a little confusing. If the great Purple One, and not Barney either, was lamenting the end of some bad relationship, could the "purple rain" be his tears? Perhaps this is one of those songs that you love, but it makes absolutely no sense, and one must settle for a kind of post-modern lament on contemporary metro-sexual relationships. Though this song does not seem to be describing any kind of "happy place" there is a yearning for some type of utopian, bucolic existence between the two subjects, which you see in lines such as, "I only wanted 2 see u bathing in the purple rain." Or are we talking about a purple "reign"? In that case, are we trying to control people or are we cutting them loose, which seems to be what the song is suggesting all along. Whether you like Prince or not, he was a genius of the music video and much of his early work was on the cutting edge of that genre. If nothing else he combined a certain precociousness with a highly polished pop/rock that really appealed to a lot of people. His rock anthem, "Little Red Corvette" borders on genius, and take the idea of euphemism to a higher level of discourse. "Purple Rain" is both confusing and vague, which are perhaps its most endearing elements. All great rock songs have lyrics which are either unintelligible, vague, confusing, puzzling, baffling, or just plain nonsense. You combine that with his weird version of androgyny, and you have song that is not only unintelligible, it is downright perplexing. By the way, I don’t think it’s about drugs.

On lazy

This may be a subject about which I am over qualified to write. After almost fifty years of research, I think I know a thing or two about this subject. Lazy is a state of mind. Lazy is a meditative zone that displaces Zen with the greatest of ease. To throw oneself on the sofa, close one's eyes, and ignore a mountain of work while you ponder a rerun of Gilligan's Island is the very apogee of laziness. (I would work harder at this note, but I'm, you know, too lazy.) Some people will let the garbage pile up and the bugs invade. Others won't even pile up the newspapers into one pile. The scum on my coffee was from last week already. Do you ever sniff clothing to see if it's clean enough to wear? But I'm not too lazy to eat, but I am too lazy to buy or prepare the food in the first place, so that's a bit of a paradox. I believe the "pile" system of filing. I'm really glad they invented the remote control for televisions because otherwise it would just have to be channel two forever because I'm not getting up. I won't get fat with the ice cream in the freezer and the scoop in the drawer. Ever use a dirty glass because a clean one was too much work? Have you ever slept on the sofa all night because that was easier than getting up and going to bed? Do you drink warm soda because it's too much work to put it in the fridge after you get home from the grocery store? Microwave dinners are manna from Heaven. Does your car had doodle on the back where someone wrote in the dirt, "Wash me"? Does your car sit in the street because your garage is filled with worthless junk? Do you eat over the sink so you don't have to clean the table? Lazy can be sublime, but it is mostly idiotic. I guess it works best when you have nothing to do.