canned goods

I can't cook. I've tried. Oh yes, I have tried. But it just doesn't do anything for me. Rather I don't do anything for it.

I suppose I can blame Weight Watchers. Whether they admit it or not, they don't encourage you to cook. Or eat. The Weight Watchers way of life essentially says, "Drink plenty of water and eat tree bark, and eventually you'll be skinny as a rail."

If you start doing crazy things like adding butter or gravy or anything else to your tree bark, you'll find yourself getting to eat less tree bark because of the good stuff. And then you'll pass out from frailty and starve. Better to leave off the gravy and eat the tree bark whilst you can. And you can forget about eating anything so tantalizing as, oh, I don't know, chocolate cake. No way, missy. Not gonna happen.

"Let them eat cake," indeed. Which, by the way, roughly translated, is the French equivalent of, "I am a jelly donut." But that's not important now.

What is important is that I can't cook. Not if my life depends on it. Try as I might, it just ain't happenin' for me.

My eldest has made this quite clear to me. I gotta feel for the fella. For eight years now, he's had to put up with whatever I can assemble as a food offering and somehow subsist on a day-to-day basis. After a while, with meal after meal of hapless blue plate specials, a guy tends to become resolved to lifestyles of the bland and tasteless.

Just to prove my point, let me explain to you exactly what it is that I can't cook. No wait. There is too much. Let me sum up. Here are two things--two of the many--that I've tried to make that have gone wrong. Terribly, terribly wrong.

1) Hamburgers. No, I'm not kidding. My hamburgers taste like cardboard with ketchup. 'Tis a pity to kill a cow for such a savorless offering as this. I'm pretty sure ol' Bessie deserved better.

2) Rice Krispy Treats. Now stop laughing. It can be done. And I've done it. But only once because I learn from my mistakes. I screw up and move on. Leaving me dejected. Dejected and hungry.

Though I pale in comparison to my friends and loved ones with their culinary proficiencies, through all this, I can rest assured that there is, in fact, the perfect food just down the next grocery aisle.

Lo and behold, I give you ... Chocolate Chex.

Take a moment if you need it. Drink it in. Know that fulfilling goodness is just within reach.

Do you realize they don't put food preparation instructions on cereal boxes? Maybe they should. They don't know who they're dealing with here.

link: ich bin ein berliner, the princess bride (available on DVD everywhere)