Going Bananas

I am not a morning person.  Like, at all.  As I stumble out of the shower, it's all I can do to brush my teeth and deodorize my pits and not the reverse.  So when it comes to breakfast, I need something easy enough for a monkey to manage.

Enter the banana, possibly the most perfect fruit of all.

Earlier today I was caught in a conversation with other people who actually cook.  Like with pans and stuff.  One person made scrambled eggs and chorizo for breakfast.  Another whipped up pumpkin pancakes.  Their breakfasts sounded awesome and I'm sure they tasted great, but I cannot even begin to fathom being coherent enough to operate a stove safely in the morning.  I'm 98.976% sure the smoke detector would be involved.  It's just a bad idea.

As my friends talked about their breakfasts, I began to feel a bit embarrassed that I'd run out the door and scarfed down a lonely banana in the car.  Even more embarrassed that I do this all the time.

Then this afternoon I read another blog and the topic was what people eat for breakfast.  People posted tales of homemade maple syrup drizzled over French toast, steaming bowls of steel cut oats with fresh fruit, and waffles hot from the press.  My banana and I were shamed.  Again.

Well, let me tell you, friends, I love bananas.  And it's not just because they don't require any cooking, although that is a major plus for those of us who are cooking challenged.

Bananas are a wonderful breakfast food no matter what mode of transport I'm taking.  Walking or driving?  I just crack that baby open and toss the peel in field near my house.  Actually, most days I aim for the field and somehow manage to land it in the bushes lining the front of the field.  Riding my bike?  I shove that yellow treat in my jersey pocket and scarf it down at a stop light.  And then throw the peel in the field.  Or the bushes.  Whatever.

Did you know bananas have three sections each with a distinct flavor?  You didn't?  Oh that's right, you have a life.  Anyway, the next time you're eating a banana and nobody else is around, press your tongue down on the tip of a banana.  It will split into thirds and each third has a unique flavor.  One section is sweeter, one section is more bitter, etc.  It's true.  Here's another fun fact.  The scientific name for a bunch of bananas is a "hand" and each fruit is called a "finger".  Cool, right?  No?  Oh well.

The point is, the next time I'm trapped in a conversation about breakfast masterpieces, I'm going to tout the simple beauty of the banana.

Or maybe I'll just get a life.

Potato Soup, Almost

I'm a firm believer that the quaint saying "Practice makes perfect." is complete hogwash.  Hear me out, practice usually helps, in copious amounts, as a matter of fact.  There are three things I practice or have practiced in the past.  Four if you include my job, but that doesn't count because it's my job and I have to practice it.  So, three then.  Writing, cycling, and cooking.  When I write and cycle on a regular basis, they improve.  Not that I become good at either, but there is definitely progress.

Cooking is a whole other story.  A sad, sad story.

No matter what I do, I can't seem to make anything edible.  Yesterday I took a potato soup mix, yes a mix, and put it in the crock pot.  I was careful to add the correct amount of water and even some suggested additions like broccoli and bacon.  My love for broccoli is such that I would morph all other vegetables into broccoli if I could.  Then I tossed in a lonely handful of black beans and plugged it all in.  It smelled delicious.  Finally I'd broken the cooking curse.

After it simmered and bubbled for the appropriate time, I went to pour some of it into a bowl.  (I have the baby crock pot for two, so I can lift out the middle and pour.)  It all came out in one gloppy lump.  It still smelled good, so I cleaned up the mess I'd made and sat down with a bowl of steaming soup.  I scooped the perfect bite; a bit of broccoli, a black bean, and a crumb of bacon.  I blew on it and sucked it off the spoon, ready to revel in my cooking prowess.  Surely they hand out crowns for such soup.

And then I tasted it.  I don't use this word lightly, but it was nefarious.  I couldn't bring myself to take another bite.  I prodded the whole glop of soup down the drain, popped open a can of Progresso and called it a night.

It doesn't seem to matter what I try cooking or how minutely anal I am in following the recipe.  It never works.  I am doomed to a life of canned soup, take and bake pizza and salad (because any idiot can chop stuff and put it in a bowl).  This idiot just seems to become an exponentially worse cook with each try.  Because all that practice is only making me excel in creating the most vile of creations, I've called a cease fire and am hereby retiring from the kitchen.  Everyone I know just breathed a well-earned sigh of relief.

Cake Or Something Like It

After witnessing a particularly awkward/seething with rage wedding ceremony, I found myself thinking "At least the cake will be good.  I could really go for a tasty little slice right about now." The cake was a small three tiered affair with white icing and blue accents.  It wasn't beautiful, nor was it hideous.  It looked like it would hit the spot just fine.

I sat down and took a forkful of cake.  As I lifted it to my mouth, I had my reservations because it was an odd color.  Really there are only three acceptable cake colors: white, yellow, and dark brown.  The only exception to this is Funfetti cake, which is white with happy sprinkles embedded like delicious little treasures.

This cake was sort of beige-ish, almost the color of spice cake.  I don't care for spice cake.  Why would you make spice cake when chocolate cake mix is readily available?  It's a mystery worth pondering another time.  But it's hard to totally mess up cake, so I took a bite.  It tasted like...it tasted like...it didn't taste like any food product I'd ever eaten.  It looked like cake.  It felt like cake.  But that's where the similarities ended.

I couldn't put my finger on what flavor it was and so assuming I'd gotten an off bite, I took a second bite.  It was just as awful, maybe even more so because now I had impostor cake in my belly and my mouth and, let me tell you, neither location was pleased.  Had I been at home or even in a restaurant or anywhere but in the direct line of sight of the cake baker, I would have spit it out right onto the silvery names monogrammed on the napkin.  As this was not an option, I swallowed it and chased it with three cups of strawberry lemonade.

The weird thing was nobody else at the table could identify the cake flavor either.  I looked around the room and saw people pushing cake around on their plates to give the appearance they'd eaten it.  I felt terrible for having handed out such a poor excuse for a cake.  These people didn't do anything to deserve that.  Okay, maybe some of them did, but as a whole this crowd was being severely punished.  With cake.

It reminded me of a scene from Better Off Ted.  Two scientists have created a meatless beef product and it's up to the taste tester to determine exactly what it is.  The scene went something like this:

"It tastes familiar."

"Like beef?"

"No."

"Like chicken?"

"No.  It tastes like...it tastes like...despair.  Yes, that's it.  Despair."

I never did figure out what flavor this wedding cake was supposed to be, but it was a dead ringer for despair.

Death By Chocolate Cake

I haven't ridden my bike in almost two weeks.  I have a litany of excuses related but not limited to a pencil stabbing and birthday cake.

I am exhausted from the first week of school.  This week is usually completely tiring, even when all goes well.  All did not go well.  In the span of one week my precious students dealt me 2 bouts of vomit, 1 rush of pee on the playground, 1 pencil stabbing, 1 punch in the face, and a long string of profanity.  I'm going to have to dig down deep this year.

My body tends to tell me when it's time to rest by getting sick.  I woke up Saturday with a bit of a stomach bug.  I laid on the couch and watched a lot of bad tv.  Sunday I woke up with fever aches, but by Sunday afternoon I was feeling well enough to go to the grocery store.

My step-dad, Chris, has been taking amazing care of my mom as she recovers from eye surgery.  Sunday was his birthday and I wanted to do something nice.  Since I love my step-dad, I didn't bake for him.  No, I bought him a shimmering quadruple chocolate monstrosity of a cake.

As I carried the cake and an armload of groceries from the car to the house, I noticed that the washing machine had leaked all over the garage for the second time that weekend.  I stepped carefully because flip flops do not have the greatest traction.  I'd almost made it to the door when my feet slipped.  I held the cake aloft.  Oh no, oh no, please don't let me ruin the cake.  Wait, please don't let me hit my head or ruin the cake.  No, wait, please don't let me hit my head, rip the seat of my pants or ruin the cake. With a thud and a weird "Oof" of air, I landed squarely on my tailbone.  Pain shot up my back.  I cringed.  What about the cake?  What about the cake?

I peeked in the bag and to my great relief the cake stared back at me in perfect condition.  It's all about priorities, people.  Tailbones heal.  Cake does not.

And so there it is, my list of excuses as to why The Rocket is in the garage, stewing with Frank.  That's never good.  I'll ride soon and I hope that when I do, The Rocket will forgive me without demanding penance for my inactivity or for the divine piece of chocolate cake I inhaled.

The Agony of Grocery Shopping

Grocery shopping is one of the most torturous things I can think of.  I am a college graduate and a teacher for goodness sake, and I can't seem to construct a grocery list that actually contains everything I need.  How is it that the milk in my fridge is always expired and yet I can't seem to remember to add it to the list?  Well, today I made the dreaded pilgrimage to the grocery store, and although I eat a banana every morning and my fruit bowl currently contains exactly zero bananas, I managed to look straight at the mound of bananas at the store and pass right by them.   I swear, my mind is a desert.

I can't stand being in the grocery store.  The florescent lights make my eyes itch.  The muzak oozing from some unseen speaker in the ceiling makes my ears want to curl up inside themselves.  And don't even get me started on the fact that some people think it's perfectly acceptable to grocery shop in pajamas.  It's not.  No, I don't care how cute your pajamas are.  The whole thing makes me want to grind my teeth and pray for Armageddon to come swiftly.

I recognize that this is an irrational response to an otherwise benign life task, so I've developed some coping strategies.  First of all, I take my phone and headphones so I can listen to soothing music.  It's hard to be angry listening to Jack Johnson.  In fact, I think it's impossible.

I'm a big believer in the idea that I reap what I sow, so I smile at everyone.  I smile at the children throwing tantrums in the aisle.  I smile because they are not mine.  I smile at elderly people checking fiber content while their cart blockades all other cart traffic.  I smile because someday I'll be that person searching for the cereal that delivers a colon punching twenty five grams of fiber per serving.  I smile at people catching up with long lost friends directly in front of the ice cream freezer.  I smile because there are a lot of people I'd like to bump into at the store.  Ok, not a lot.  Mostly I'd just like to bump into Taye Diggs.  That is one beeyootiful man.  I digress.

In addition to all the smiling and hunting for Taye Diggs around every corner, I share the gift of tall.  Being a six foot tall woman has it's disadvantages.  I can't ever find pants that are long enough and every dress is a cocktail dress.  However, in the grocery store I am queen.  I can reach the most tippy top boxes on the top shelf without even fully extending my arm.  This means women with the gift of short ask me to reach things on the top shelf.  I am happy to help, but somehow I think if I asked them to reach something for me on the bottom shelf, it wouldn't end well.

The last facet of my grocery store sainthood involves random lost children asking me to help them find their mommies.  About once a month, a little kid wanders over to me, eyes red from crying and asks me for help.  We look up and down a few aisles and I easily spot the frantic mother careening through the store looking for her lost little one.  I don't know how these kids know I'm a safe stranger, but I'm glad they do.  Maybe it's some internal awareness.  Or maybe they can hear Jack Johnson.

Well folks, finally all of my grocery store niceness paid off.  I went to the self check station.  Another coping strategy.  I'm really bad at making small talk with the checkers.  I get nervous and then say something that embarrasses one or both of us.  Plus I'm convinced that they're judging my based on the items in my cart.

Today I enjoyed the blip, blip, blip of scanning my items at the judgement free self check register and loaded my bags into my car.  When I grabbed my big green purse, I realized that I'd accidentally hidden an avocado behind it.  I didn't pay for the avocado.  After calling myself a dirty thief, I marched the avocado back to the check stand.  I explained that I'd accidentally taken it without paying for it.  The manager of the store simply said "Don't worry about it.  Have a nice day."  I thought to myself Look at that, a free avocado.  Maybe grocery shopping isn't so bad after all. Then I took my prize avocado and bolted out the door before the muzak could bleed into my brain.