Read Online I'm a Stranger Here Myself by Bill Bryson - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Bill Bryson
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snap. She looked at the box and said, “No.”
“I beg your pardon, my sweet?”
“You are not bringing home something called breakfast pizza. I will let you have”—she reached into the cart for some specimen samples—“root beer buttons and toaster strudel and . . .” She lifted out a packet she hadn’t noticed before. “What’s this?”
I looked over her shoulder. “Microwave pancakes,” I said.
“Microwave pancakes,” she repeated, but with less enthusiasm.
“Isn’t science wonderful?”
“You’re going to eat it all,” she said. “Every bit of everything that you don’t put back on the shelves now. You do understand that?”
“Of course,” I said in my sincerest voice.
And do you know she actually made me eat it. I spent weeks working my way through a symphony of junk food, and it was all awful. Every bit of it. I don’t know whether junk food has gotten worse or whether my taste buds have matured, but even the treats I’d grown up with—even, God help me, Hostess Cup Cakes—now seemed disappointingly pallid or sickly.
The most awful of all was the breakfast pizza. I tried it three or four times, baked it in the oven, zapped it with microwaves, and once in desperation served it with a side of marshmallow Fluff. But it never rose beyond a kind of limp, chewy listlessness. Eventually I gave up altogether and hid what was left in the Tupperware graveyard on the bottom shelf of the fridge.
Which is why, when I came across the box again the other day, I regarded it with mixed feelings. I started to toss it out, then hesitated and opened the lid. It didn’t smell bad—I expect it was pumped so full of chemicals that there wasn’t any room in it for bacteria—and I thought about keeping it a while longer as a reminder of my folly, but in the end I discarded it. And then, feeling hungry, I went off to the pantry to see if I couldn’t find a nice plain piece of Swedish crispbread and maybe a stick of celery.
My wife thinks nearly everything about American life is wonderful. She loves having her groceries bagged for her. She adores free iced water and book matches. She thinks home-delivered pizza is a central hallmark of civilization. I haven’t the heart to tell her that waiters and waitresses in the United States urge everyone to have a nice day.
Personally, while I am exceedingly fond of America and grateful for its many conveniences, I am not quite so slavishly accepting. Take the matter of having your groceries bagged for you. I appreciate the gesture and all, but when you come down to it what does it actually get you except the leisure to stand and watch your groceries being bagged? It’s not as if it buys you some quality time.
However, there are certain things that are so wonderful in American life that I can hardly stand it myself. Chief among these, without any doubt, is the garbage disposal. A garbage disposal is everything a labor-saving device should be and so seldom is—noisy, fun, extremely hazardous, and so dazzlingly good at what it does that you cannot imagine how you ever managed without one. If you had asked me eighteen months ago what the prospects were that shortly my chief amusement in life would be placing assorted objects down a hole in the kitchen sink, I believe I would have laughed in your face, but in fact it is so.
I have never had a garbage disposal before, so I have been learning its tolerances through a process of trial and error. Chopsticks give perhaps the liveliest response (this is not recommended, of course, but there comes a time with every piece of machinery when you just
have
to see what it can do), but cantaloupe rinds make the richest, throatiest sound and result in less “down time.” Coffee grounds in quantity are the most likely to provide a satisfying “Vesuvius effect,” though for obvious reasons it is best not to attempt this difficult feat until your wife has gone out for the day and to have a mop and stepladder standing
“I beg your pardon, my sweet?”
“You are not bringing home something called breakfast pizza. I will let you have”—she reached into the cart for some specimen samples—“root beer buttons and toaster strudel and . . .” She lifted out a packet she hadn’t noticed before. “What’s this?”
I looked over her shoulder. “Microwave pancakes,” I said.
“Microwave pancakes,” she repeated, but with less enthusiasm.
“Isn’t science wonderful?”
“You’re going to eat it all,” she said. “Every bit of everything that you don’t put back on the shelves now. You do understand that?”
“Of course,” I said in my sincerest voice.
And do you know she actually made me eat it. I spent weeks working my way through a symphony of junk food, and it was all awful. Every bit of it. I don’t know whether junk food has gotten worse or whether my taste buds have matured, but even the treats I’d grown up with—even, God help me, Hostess Cup Cakes—now seemed disappointingly pallid or sickly.
The most awful of all was the breakfast pizza. I tried it three or four times, baked it in the oven, zapped it with microwaves, and once in desperation served it with a side of marshmallow Fluff. But it never rose beyond a kind of limp, chewy listlessness. Eventually I gave up altogether and hid what was left in the Tupperware graveyard on the bottom shelf of the fridge.
Which is why, when I came across the box again the other day, I regarded it with mixed feelings. I started to toss it out, then hesitated and opened the lid. It didn’t smell bad—I expect it was pumped so full of chemicals that there wasn’t any room in it for bacteria—and I thought about keeping it a while longer as a reminder of my folly, but in the end I discarded it. And then, feeling hungry, I went off to the pantry to see if I couldn’t find a nice plain piece of Swedish crispbread and maybe a stick of celery.
My wife thinks nearly everything about American life is wonderful. She loves having her groceries bagged for her. She adores free iced water and book matches. She thinks home-delivered pizza is a central hallmark of civilization. I haven’t the heart to tell her that waiters and waitresses in the United States urge everyone to have a nice day.
Personally, while I am exceedingly fond of America and grateful for its many conveniences, I am not quite so slavishly accepting. Take the matter of having your groceries bagged for you. I appreciate the gesture and all, but when you come down to it what does it actually get you except the leisure to stand and watch your groceries being bagged? It’s not as if it buys you some quality time.
However, there are certain things that are so wonderful in American life that I can hardly stand it myself. Chief among these, without any doubt, is the garbage disposal. A garbage disposal is everything a labor-saving device should be and so seldom is—noisy, fun, extremely hazardous, and so dazzlingly good at what it does that you cannot imagine how you ever managed without one. If you had asked me eighteen months ago what the prospects were that shortly my chief amusement in life would be placing assorted objects down a hole in the kitchen sink, I believe I would have laughed in your face, but in fact it is so.
I have never had a garbage disposal before, so I have been learning its tolerances through a process of trial and error. Chopsticks give perhaps the liveliest response (this is not recommended, of course, but there comes a time with every piece of machinery when you just
have
to see what it can do), but cantaloupe rinds make the richest, throatiest sound and result in less “down time.” Coffee grounds in quantity are the most likely to provide a satisfying “Vesuvius effect,” though for obvious reasons it is best not to attempt this difficult feat until your wife has gone out for the day and to have a mop and stepladder standing
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