I don’t expect any sympathy from this post, but the fact of the matter is, food bores me.

Eating to me is a way to get from Point A to Point B. Sometimes I have to pace myself because I realize that other people are eating slowly.  Leisurely.  Enjoying their food.  To me, it’s a distraction.  I could be doing more important things, like drinking or repeatedly Googling my name.

I remember reading Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes.  She has a line in there--and I’m quoting from memory here--where she remarks that her family “would spend several hours preparing food, and then at least two hours eating it, and then immediately begin discussing what the next meal would be.” I’ve never read a line that made me feel more like I was encountering a way of thinking so strange and foreign that it verged on the extraterrestrial, and that includes the six or seven paragraphs I’ve read by Ann Coulter.

People always talk about what restaurants are good.  That’s like asking what gas station is better.  As long as it provides the fuel, it’s all the same to me. Collectively, over the course of their lives, people might spend days discussing this topic.  Didn’t we stop with the whole hunter/gatherers thing so we didn’t have to waste all this time?

I had dinner with my parents the other month.  My mother wanted a glass of pinot noir even though she was eating fish.  The waiter said, in a tentative, uncomfortable voice, “Well, that might end up being a little more oaky that you might want. Of course, that’s just me.” Whatever, Jeeves. If you care so much about quality of life, why do you spend eight hours a day dressed in that monkey suit?  Good taste is for losers. My rule of thumb is: red wine with anything that requires ketchup and white wine with anything that requires mayonnaise.

This weekend I went hiking with a friend and we had breakfast at a place called “Country Waffles.” She was disappointed that the place was more like a Denny’s than its quaint, upscale exterior seemed to suggest.  Me, I was glad.  I only had to flick my eyes and the waitress appeared at my elbow to refill my coffee cup.  At some hip Yuppie-fied, place, I would have had to ask for it.  And then they would have had to grow the beans.  Then pick them.  Then ship them to the United States.  And several weeks later, I might have gotten a second cup of coffee.

I’m in the habit of putting everything into my slow cooker. I get up for work, stumble around the kitchen, and throw in random ingredients.  I pretty much just hope for the best that something will be edible by the time I return home. Occasionally this method has resulted in the creation of new life. I even put cold cereal in the cooker now; granted, it takes five hours on “High” for it to be ready, and the flakes taste faintly like pot roast. Still, it gets the job done.

I read other people’s blogs and they have all these elaborate, trendy recipes.  And it’s not that I wouldn’t want to eat the food.  I just don’t want to make it.  I want to walk up to a replicator and say “One serving of elaborate trendy blog recipe” and then it shimmers into view. Failing that, forget it.

That’s not to say that I don’t understand some of the subtleties of gourmet cooking.  For example, I do understand that presentation is half the meal.  That’s why I can tell you, almost to the millisecond, how long it takes to nuke something in the microwave without having it explode.  Not only does the food explosion look unsightly, but it takes a long time to clean up. Which means more wasted time in the kitchen.

So anyway--who wants to come over for dinner?

All those who wander may not be lost--but just to be on the safe side, I’m never going to lend money to any of them.

I realize I’m talking to one of the Shes.  My friends called them “Granola Girls” in college, particularly in reference to me: “I don’t think she’s all that, but Greg will like her because she’s a Granola Girl.” But I will not use that term anywhere else in this post because it’s condescending and derogatory.  I’ll call them the Shes simply because I don’t have some catch-all phrase handy.  My friends were right about one thing: I like them. 

They generally dress in earth tones and second hand thrift store clothing, sometimes splashed with turquoise jewelry.  I’ve noticed that when you get closer to the heart of the city, their clothes turn blacker and sleeker. But all the Shes share a similar sensibility: disdain for materialism.  Often vegetarian.  Artistic.

I’m out of practice. I’ve forgotten how they deftly sidestep the usual conversational dead weights and quickly proceed to matters of substance.  Within five minutes of being introduced, I suddenly realize we’re on the topic of family and how it changes your life to live either close to them or far away from them.

She says, “It was a little easier in some respects to live across the country from my family.  I couldn’t feel their disapproval when I quit my Internet company to start my arts and crafts business.”

She’s not just a She; she’s a defector. You don’t meet one of those every day.  I say, “It’s easy to deal with family.  Just carry cloves of garlic, and sometimes holy water.”

She smiles, but only faintly; she understands the line for what it is, a placeholder instead of an actual contribution.  I have to be careful around the Shes.  The usual banter quickly sputters and stalls around them.

Somewhere else in the room, someone is recounting a story about herself and a well-known writer.  She carefully repeats the name of the writer several times, and her voice edges slightly higher every time she does so.  This conversational gambit is the exact opposite of the She mentality. They do not care about famous people or glamour by association.  And, in fact, I never really expect to impress the Shes.  They will ask what I do and I will say that I work for a technology consulting firm and their eyes will dip down.  Sometimes I think about spicing up my answer a bit:

I’m impressed--a few people nailed the question.  A few others I helped out a bit, and the upshot is the CDs are gone.  Thanks for playing.

“Geese Aplenty” was the title of a work by Woody Allen’s fictional playwright, Jorgen Lovborg, in the essay “Lovborg’s Women Considered.” The essay was originally published in The New Yorker, and is available in the Allen compilation Without Feathers, which you should read--along with Side Effects and Getting Even.

Other play titles by Lovborg: “A Mother’s Gums,” “Those Who Squirm,” “I Prefer to Yodel,” “While We Three Hemorrhage,” and “Mellow Pears.”

What kind of playwright was Lovborg?  Allen treats us to an excerpt from “Mellow Pears”:

BERTE: Do say you like the way we furnished the house!  It was so hard on a ventriloquist’s salary.
MRS. SANSTAD: The house is--serviceable.
BERTE: What?  Only serviceable?
MRS. SANSTAD: Whose idea was the red satin elk?
BERTE: Why, your son’s.  Henrick is a born decorator.
MRS. SANSTAD (suddenly): Henrick is a fool!
BERTE: No!
MRS. SANSTAD: Did you know that he did not know what snow was until last week?
BERTE: You’re lying!
MRS. SANSTAD: My precious son.  Yes, Henrick--the same man who went to prison for mispronouncing the word “dipthong.”
BERTE: No!
MRS. SANSTAD: Yes.  And with an Eskimo in the room at the time!
BERTE: I don’t want to hear about it!
MRS. SANSTAD: But you will, my little nightingale!  Isn’t that what Henrick calls you?
BERTE: (crying): He calls me nightingale! Yes, and sometimes thrush!  And hippo!
(Both women weep ashamedly).
MRS. SANSTAD: Berte, dear Berte!...Henrick’s earmuffs are not his own!  They are owned by a corporation.
BERTE: We must help him.  He must be told he can never fly by flapping his arms.
MRS. SANSTAD: Henrick knows everything.  I told him your feelings about his arch supports.
BERTE: So! You tricked me!
MRS. SANSTAD: Call it what you will.  He’s in Oslo now.
BERTE: Oslo!
MRS. SANSTAD: With his geranium…
BERTE: I see.  I...see.  (She wanders through the French doors upstage).

I’m proud to pay tribute to this great, if nonexistent, artist.

Thanks for coming to my new site.  It’s interesting to note that I work in marketing, yet it only took three years for me to realize that it might be convenient for a site called “Geese Aplenty” to reside at GeeseAplenty.com.  Yup.  That’s how I roll.  Mind like a steel trap.  I have “User Friendly” monogramed on all my bath towels.

But it’s nice to be here, and so I’m having a little contest. If you’re one of ten people who tells me where the name “Geese Aplenty” comes from,* I’ll mail you a copy of my Manic Depressive mix--half happy songs and half sad.

A few words about this contest:

Business analysts have estimated that Star Wars-related absenteeism will cost the U.S. economy $627 million in lost productivity, as 20 and 30something workers take the day off to stand in line and watch the movie.

I’m pleased to say that I am not one of the people who contributed to that devastating economic number.

I pretty much slack off all day at work anyway--so I’m pretty sure my company felt no productivity loss of any kind as a result of my absence.

With a person who left my company to move to a small town and be a stay-at-home Mom:

- Well, it was nice seeing you again, Greg.

- Yeah, I guess you got to get back to--what was the name of the place--Pleasantville, right?

- That’s funny. Though it is strange driving in the Bay Area again. Sometimes where I live I’m the only car on the road.

- Well, at least that gives you lots of Northern Exposure.

- Okay, I’ve got to be going now.

- Back to Wisteria Lane, eh?

No posts for a while; I’m finishing migrating this site to Expression Engine.  Be back in a week or so, maybe with a CD mix giveaway contest if I can get around to it.

The Rolling Stones announced a new world tour and performed a mini-concert for fans gathered outside New York’s Juilliard School.

Certain songs have been updated given that Mick Jagger and crew are now in their sixties. The opening song, for example, was a rousing version of “Hey (Hey) You (You) Get Off of My Lawn.”

My neighbors are tired of all racket coming from my place, and with the water being shut off at midday to fix plumbing problems. Every day, they gather around my door. And every day, I have to release black smoke, indicating that the flooring job isn’t finished yet.

Wouldn’t it suck if one of the bishops burned something in the kitchen on the day that they were ready to announce the new pope? Everyone’s waiting in St. Peter’s Square, and they issue a collective groan when they see clouds of black smoke: “Aw, for crying out loud. Okay, whatever, we’ll be back tomorrow.” And Vatican officials go running after them “No, come back! We have a new pope--those are just hash browns.”

I’m really scared that the name of the new pope, Joseph Ratzinger, is a typo and they actually chose John Ratzenberger, who played Cliff on Cheers. That would really suck. He’d get up to the microphone and wheedle “Most people don’t realize that the papacy has a long and complicated history,” and then proceed to rattle off facts for several hours. 

Something that used to be easy for me now takes a ridiculously long time: buying a new pair of jeans. That’s because I like jeans. The blue things that hang down and cover my legs.

But you can’t buy those anymore, at least not the kind I grew up with.  Now they’re all “easy fit” and “low riders.” Listen, there’s nothing “easy fit” about jeans that are designed to barely hang off the edge of your hips, showing everyone your underwear.  There is no Calvin Klein. It’s now Calvin Crack.

The store had a kind of style--and I am not making this up--called “Loose Straight.” What the hell is that, a heterosexual who dances to rhythm and blues?  Also “Low Rise Straight.” But it didn’t come with prescription pills that take care of that kind of thing, so I passed.

When they do have the style of jeans I want, they’re always labeled “Classic Fit"--apparently because it’s completely old fashioned to not want to show the world your ass.  When I was a kid, you could tell the old men because they wore their pants almost up to their neck, as though they expected to be wading in a lake. But I guess the tables have turned.  Kids will be pointing to me and saying “Look, his jeans actually taper to his ankle, rather than acting like little mini blue parachutes, and it closes around his waist.  Nice look, pops!” I’m depleting all my savings to buy every goddamn “classic fit” in my size that I can find. I have a feeling they’ll be gone the next time my jeans cycle forces me to go out hunting for them. 

My friend Rosemary and I are trading mixes. For her, because she’s the thoughtful sort, the act of putting a mix together became the touchstone for a very self-reflective post on her site.  For me, it was more “Wait, how do I do this again?” I was amazed to realize I hadn’t made a mix in months; I used to be able to burn them in my sleep.

I had to remember the rules of mix making.  Many of the important ones can be heard in the movie High Fidelity, recited by Lloyd Dobler or whatever his name is.

1. Kick off with a killer track in order to grab attention.

I usually follow this rule very closely but this time I didn’t.  My assessment of Rosemary is that she likes a lot of mid-tempo music. So I actually began with “Never the Same Girl” by Supreme Beings of Leisure, then segued into Morcheeba, and then Pink Martini.  However, when listening to the CD later, I completely understimated the impact of these three languid, sensual songs played back-to-back; I immediately wanted to have sex.  But I also felt that way before listening to the mix, so this experiment probably needs a control subject.

2. You can’t put the same artist twice on the tape--and if you do they can’t be in a row--and you can’t pair up Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi” with something like GBH’s “City Baby Attacked by Rats.”

Right you are, Lloyd. And there’s additional rules that I’ve developed for myself as well:

3. Don’t overdo artists that you’ve already shared with this person before.

I always used to put Juliana Hatfield on my mixes. Not because I love her so much, but she always had one or two killer songs that sounded great on mixes.  And 2005 is no different, but I resisted.  Back off Juliana.  You’re so very ‘90s.

4. Try to keep the recipient’s tastes in mind.

I really don’t think mixes are to “educate”; they are a gift to a friend.  So I tried to pick tracks that Rosemary might like.  Unfortunately, I lost control of this somewhere around the middle of the mix and ended up with “Fire in the Disco” by the Electric Six, a loud, obnoxious rock/disco hybrid, and also The Donnas.  Oh well.  That’s what fast forward buttons are for.

And the most important rule of all:

5. No matter what you do, keep one, profound, fundamental truth close to your heart.  Just because you get a guilty kick out of the tweener rap classic “Come Get It” by Aaron Carter, in which a 13-year old sings about being grounded after throwing a party when his parents are out of town--a truly powerful and searing look at social issues and responsibilities as seen through an underprivileged demographic--that’s no reason to break down and include the track.

Unfortunately, I didn’t follow rule #5 either.