Back In The Saddle

Two beers and half a falafel sandwich later, I'd say my food poisoning gig is just about over. I'm - in the words of Aerosmith - Back In The Saddle Again. And not a day sooner, because I just about had it with my family trying to be nice to me. What with my three-year-old whining that if I don't give him an ice cream sandwich for breakfast now, then he might never get one tomorrow because I might be DEAD. Or my five-year-old storming into my bedroom at 4:15am to see if I'm alive and finally my husband asking how the rest of my plumbing is doing. Enough is enough.

The whole day while I was laid out on my day bed, I had to listen to my stomach gurgling something that could only be described as the synth riff to Elvis Costello's "Pump It Up".  I did everything to avoid thinking about food. But I was starving - I mean Ethiopian starving. Only whenever I thought about what to eat all I could picture was a slimy piece of salmon and then my stomach would start playing Elvis Costello again.

So I diverted my thoughts to the original Elvis and wondered how he could've survived under today's media scrutinizing eye bloating up as he did. I mean Kirstie Ally made a show out of it because every other actress is bordering on anorexia and they don't even pay any respect to the original starlet who made anorexia cool: Miss Karen Carpenter - Helloooowwww?

But it wasn't Karen's fault. That was the seventies fer ya. Back then, everybody smoked and did drugs - nobody ate. Well, except for Elvis. And as far as my memory can gather, nobody fed their kids either. My mother included. That could explain my mother's comments. Not her harping on how to properly prepare salmon for an hour despite the fact that I told her that the word itself actually nauseated me. Not her telling me that my cooking was geared more for bar crawling stragglers and that I'd best stick to meat and potatoes rather than "try my hand" at seafood. Again, nauseating me to no end.

No, it was the remark after all was said and done, the typical Aquarian remark that's soooo left field: Oh, you're looking svelt now. You must try to keep that figure!

Err, thanks, Ma. You always know how to put things in perspective.