Tag Archives: calories

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Sadly Amusing

What is the dumbest thing you’ve ever heard someone say??  The following is a collection of some real gems.

Someone in our group lost a flip-flop in a river.  We all watched it float downstream.
Someone else in the group said just to be patient, because eventually it will do a full loop and come back.

I dated a girl who thought that sea-horses were the size of real horses.
She was so disappointed at the aquarium.

I was solving a Rubik’s Cube.  Some guy asked me how many sides it had, and could I make them all blue.

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA) thought that the island of Guam could tip over if too many people got on one side.

I dated a girl who thought that “the hole in the ozone layer” was where the space shuttle came through to land.

A woman at a neo-natal clinic thought that her baby’s soft spot was what he breathed through, like a whale’s blowhole.

My wife has a friend who honestly believes that you should not go out during a full moon, because you will get moonburn.

“What year did this happen?”
We were watching Lord of the Rings!

I had to break the news to a couple of kids that, when you are grown-up, you don’t get summers off.  I felt bad, but they deserve to know, I guess.  To be fair, they both had mothers who didn’t really have regular jobs, and it didn’t occur to them, because their mothers were home with them all summer.

Years ago, I was watching MTV Street Smarts with a man I had recently met.  The question asked on the show was to put these events in chronological order, from oldest to most recent – the civil war, walking on the moon, and the Ice Age.  I snorted, and joked about what a ridiculous question it was.  He did not seem to be amused, so I asked him, You know this, right?  He replied, “I’m not good with dates.”

If you drink a Coke, and then a diet Coke, the calories cancel out.

You have your facts, and I’ll have my facts.
It’s crazy how many grown adults still don’t understand that opinions are not facts, or worse, that opinions can be facts if spoken loud enough.

I had someone in a college history class, seriously and with a straight face, ask who this Hitler guy was, halfway through a WW II unit.  We all just stared at her for 5 seconds.  Then the professor told her, “Come see me in my office after class.  You’ve got some catching up to do.”  Bless him.  He handled it so well.

I’m allergic to Oxygen.
I asked if they meant Oxycodone, but no, they insisted they were allergic to Oxygen.

Years ago, a guy I worked with said, “Those people in Ireland must not be paying their taxes.  The IRS keeps bombing their homes.”  That’s not the IRS, you idiot!  It’s the IRA!  That’s what I meant, the Internal Revenue Association.

I was microwaving some leftover food.  I hit the 1 for one minute.  My friend asked, “Why did you hit one minute?  I usually just put mine in for 60 seconds.”  I had to explain that they were the same thing.  We were in high school together.
I explained to another friend that 90 seconds was the same as 1:30.  They insisted that 1:30 was more, and called me crazy.

A manager at my old job asked me if Alaska was an island near Hawaii.  That’s what it looked like on the map.  They also asked if they could get an STD from breathing the same air as a person with an STD.  And they were in charge….  🙄

When I worked at Starbucks, it was a common question from customers to explain the difference between a hot drink, and an iced drink.

I don’t have a girlfriend because females are intimidated by my career
He was the Assistant Manager at an Outback Steakhouse.

A guy I worked with told me that he was trying to lose weight by cutting down on pasta.
I haven’t had pasta in three weeks, and I’ve lost 10 pounds.
That’s awesome, but what do you have in your hand there?
Mac and cheese.
I thought you said you haven’t had pasta.
I haven’t.  This is mac and cheese.

How long does it take for the meat to grow back on the cow after you shave it off?

There’s no difference between turkey and ham.  They both come from birds.
I guess pigs really can fly in their world.
A college friend very seriously asked, If beef comes from cows, and pork comes from pigs, what animal does chicken come from?

I knew someone who thought that the sun and the moon were the same thing.  She was 18, and just graduated high school.

“Well, she never got pregnant before.” after his girlfriend got pregnant, and I asked him why he didn’t use protection.

While I was at an orientation for a Masters Program at Yale, I mentioned that I was from New Mexico.  Another person who had got into Yale for a graduate program asked me what the immigration process had been like.  I like to tell this story to anyone who acts as if an Ivy League education is somehow a mark of intelligence.

…. Chicken parm isn’t vegan??

These fireworks got wet.  I’m gonna dry them off in the microwave.

My daughter just tried to tell me that plutonium doesn’t come from Pluto.  Oh well, it’s good she’s cute.

The wife’s older brother argued with her Grade 9 Science textbook, where it said that white is the combination of all colors, and black is the absence of color, because everybody knows that white is no color, and black is all the colors mixed together.

😮

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Flash Fiction # 279

PHOTO PROMPT © David Stewart

A WEIGHTY PROBLEM

Paleo??!  Keto??!  Vegan??!  Ovo-Lacto??!  Why can I not find a diet to help me get rid of this Molson-muscle roof over my tool-shed?  Six-pack?  Looks more like a keg.

Visceral fat??!  Sounds gruesome!  What exactly is a calorie, and why do they want to take up residence around my beltline?

The doctor said to watch my food intake, so I put it right here by the computer – good stuff.  I’m beginning to like this COVID remote, working from home deal.  I don’t even have to walk to the bus stop anymore, or up to the office.  It’s to die for.

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If you’d like to join the Friday Fictioneers fun, go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple site and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

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Bread And Water

AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION

By reading this post, you are sentenced to eat whatever you had at your last meal, for the next 14 days.

What was it?
Ignoring the calories, can you take it for two weeks?
Did you like it?
Do you wish that you had read this yesterday?
Or tomorrow?
Do you regret having lunch at Harry’s Hot-Dog Stand?

I had baked bone-in ham, scalloped potatoes, buttered green beans, broccoli salad, and a warm, deep-dish brownie with coconut-flavored whipped cream on top.  It’s a good thing that I didn’t discover this prompt the day before I did, when we had beef and bean burritos.  I could have put Alberta out of the natural gas business.  😯

It was a delicious meal, I loved it, and I could eat it every day for two weeks, but variety is the spice of life, and I love a variety of well-spiced foods.

“Tomorrow” was a Monday.  We have fallen into the habit of having the same type of food, each separate day of the week.  Monday would have been breakfast for supper – bacon or sausage, and eggs of some sort – oatmeal and toast.  There are a lot of combinations.  I can take it every Monday, but I think that I’d tire of it quickly, 14 consecutive days.  😳

I never regret eating at the hot-dog stand.  I never get a hot-dog.  I could eat good French-fries 14 days in a row, if it weren’t for the wife’s Imperial Edict of ‘only once a week.‘  Damn the cholesterol!  Full fries ahead.  I’m pretty sure I could survive being sentenced to two weeks at Taco Bell, but, while places like Bar Burrito, and Quesada are filling, they’re not fun.

I have to wipe the grease off my fingers, and go visit Rochelle’s site to see if I can write a Flash Fiction while I’m this full.  Stop back Friday to find out.  Oh – and has anyone got some malt vinegar you could spare??   😉

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Get A Grip

I have a gripe with English.  It is said that a man with a watch always knows what time it is.  A man with two watches is never sure.  For a word with one meaning, or even several established meanings, I know what is meant.  For words which keep adding, subtracting, and modifying meanings, I am less and less sure what is meant.

The word ‘grip’ originally meant, a grasp, a grab, a hold, by a person’s hand.  Recently, technology has included machines.  Once upon an archaic, the words ‘grip’ and ‘gripe’ meant the same thing.  (Don’t ask me why.  I can’t get a hold on it.)  Now grip can mean a small suitcase with a handle, which can be grasped and carried by one hand.  Gripe can be a nagging complaint by someone who may not have a firm grip on reality.

At one time, ‘grippe’, which is pronounced grip, but which is neither grip nor gripe, was the word to identify influenza, the ordinary, seasonal, gastro-intestinal ‘flu,’ a kinder, gentler, distant relative to COVID.  “Grippe” could cause abdominal cramps, especially among babies and young children.

To alleviate these symptoms, “Grippe Water” was developed and marketed.  My mother dosed me with it several times.  The original formula contained alcohol and sugar in addition to sodium bicarbonate and dill oil – a couple of stomach calmers, some calories to replace what might have been lost to the illness, and a mild sedative to aid with sleeping.  It was once said that the best remedy for a colicky baby, was a good, thick, oak door.

Then the All-Or-Nothing, Save Us From Ourselves, Snowflakes got a grip on it, and removed all the “bad” ingredients, so present-day products do not contain alcohol or sugar, but may contain fennel, ginger, chamomile, cardamom, licorice, cinnamon, clove, dill, lemon balm or peppermint, depending on the formula.

‘Grippe’ was what caused the cramping, but ‘gripe’ is the term for the actual clutching, grasping intestinal pain.  Since the formula was changed, the name has also been changed.  ‘Grippe Water’ is no more, and the new product is ‘Gripe Water.’  That’s only one of the English terms that I have a gripe about.  😯

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’18 A To Z Challenge – Y

Letter Y

I was desperately pondering what word, beginning with the letter Y, to write about. I had yesteryear, yonder, yardstick, and yield, any one of which may still show up this time next year. I thought about Yule, but it’s long past. The Easter Bunny is already hopping over Santa’s sleigh tracks. I told all my yolks, when I published my E For Eggs post, a couple of years ago.

Suddenly it came to me! I should write a post about

You

Crowd

A few of my fans, awed by the magnificence of my prose.

Yes, you, my regular readers, and faithful fans – who have been with me and my blogging, through thick and thin…. Who am I kidding??! When, during the time that I have been blogging, have I ever been thin? It’s been more like thick, and thicker. I’m a little like comedian Gabriel Iglesias – so well-fed that I’m somewhere between FLUFFY and DAMN!

Fortunately for you (and me), my writings benefit greatly from considerable editing. If it were not for the miracles of the word-processing program, the prose that my over-fed, sausage-like fingers (Mmmm – sausages!) typo out, would look like my Back Up A Sec post.

My readers and online guests are important to me all the time after a meal that would have Santa Claus leading a Weight-Watchers intervention raid, but you’re here now, reading my output, and giving me a warm happy feeling – just like a large serving of French fries and gravy.

Since it’s Lent – even though I’m not a Catholic – I hereby vow to give up excessive calorie intake for 40…. minutes. I promise to be back in a couple of days, with a post that’s sleek and svelte, even if I’m not. Thank you, to the visitors who have come here before, and thank you to the ones who will gratify me by continuing to show up later. 😀

 

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Autoprompt – What’s In Your Fridge?

PROLOGUE

When I saw the above autoprompt, I wondered, “Who would want to know what’s in my fridge?” Then I remembered, if we go to a party at someone else’s house and use the washroom, we always nose through the medicine cabinet. Hmm, Rogaine and hemorrhoid cream – he’s got problems at both ends. So yeah, you know you wanna know.

Refrigerator

It is said that, the poor eat calories, the middle class eat nutrition, and the rich eat presentation.

Even when I worked in offices after we were first married, we were still only one short half-step up from being living-under-a-bridge poor, so calories were important. I always wanted to eat – well. Later, when I took off the shirt and tie, and donned the blue-collar to work in manufacturing plants, calories were important. The wife watched a lot of TV cooking shows, and bought and read a lot of cookbooks.

The wife of a couple down the street often complained about her husband’s food wants – meat and potatoes, meat and potatoes, seven nights a week. At our house, it was homemade pizza, perogies and potato pancakes, soups, stews and spaghetti, Chinese food, tacos, stroganoff, goulash, tourtière, schnitzel. One time we had menus for seven weeks in advance, with no duplicates.

To make this dizzying array of global dishes requires quite a varied supply of raw materials. This need explains the wife’s 36 place spice rack, and the 24 spot herb rack, with more in the cupboard, and a few growing fresh, on the back deck. Almost everything we have, because of personal preference, allergies and cooking options, we have multiple versions of.

Starting above the stove is a cupboard full of cooking alcohol – red wine for pasta sauce, white for chicken and turkey dishes, Chinese cooking wine, sake for a couple of Japanese recipes, and brandy to soak Christmas cake in. The only stuff that I drink is the occasional bit of Crème de Menthe on crushed ice, when I’ve overindulged in rich food.

Come the apocalypse, the basement storeroom will feed us for three months. Aside from cookies, crackers and canned goods, we have 12 sizes and shapes of pasta and noodles, 2 brands of tomato sauce, plus marinara and Alfredo sauce.

There are usually about 36 two-liter(2-quart) bottles of Pepsi, and ten or twelve 710ml(20 oz.) six-packs. We keep a 30-pack of bottled water ahead, to replace the one in use under the cats’ feeding stand upstairs, and one or two gallons of distilled, as well as a dozen cans of ginger ale.

There are 4 types of rice – long grain for plain white rice, Basmati rice for body, Jasmine rice for sticky rice dishes, and instant Minute Rice. We have all-purpose flour, cake & pastry flour, bread flour, specially-fine-ground blending flour for thickening soups, sauces and gravy, rye flour for making pumpernickel rolls, and spelt flour, which like rye, is not wheat-based, and suitable for the allergic grandson.

Currently there are 20 pounds of Superior, white potatoes for boiled and mashed, 20 pounds of Russets, which make great French fries and potato salad, and 5 pounds of new baby whites in the ‘beer fridge’ for suet roasting and skin-on salad.

Onions include, cooking, Spanish, sweet white, occasionally a red onion, a bag of perishable Vidalias in the fridge, shallots, which like leeks aren’t quite onions, and green onions, in the upstairs fridge, which I’ll get to next post, after we’ve had dinner.

Poor overworked, under-appreciated beer fridge! No actual beer in it, so BrainRants better give me at least 24 hours warning of any surprise visit. Instead, it has 4 varieties of soft drinks, several flavors of coffee creamers and salad dressings there’s no room for upstairs, three dozen eggs, two more dozen pickled, extra bags and blocks of cheeses, and sour cream and margarine, so we don’t run out upstairs.

Besides the onions and baby potatoes, there’s a cabbage and a half, a large broccoli, an extra lettuce and a multi-pack of romaine. It contains the son’s individual yogurts and rice puddings for work meals – and leftovers….Yum! Yum!

A Yankee society doyenne imperiously informed her Georgia plantation-owning host that, “Up north, we think breeding is everything.” He replied, “We like it down here too, but we got other hobbies.” I’ve never run into another home which revolves quite as much around food as ours does. It has to. It can’t escape the gravity well. We read – a lot. We watch some television, and we allow computers to suck our time and insult our intelligence.

If we’re not shopping for food, or storing food away, or cooking food, or eating food, we’re concealing evidence tucking leftover food away, often in the fridge upstairs. Come back next time, when I finally get around to describing its interior, and explain why we had to reinforce the kitchen floor.   🙄

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