Skip to main content

Stop eating already! I'm trying to have a meal here

I rarely go to restaurants.
That's because I hate the way people eat.
I detest the woman who orders a salad the size of a farming plot who then starts diving bombing her meal with her fork from two feet above the table. Up and down, up and down. It's like watching a performance of Cirque de Soleil.
Or the dowager who gets all gussied up for the high priced bistro, who then proceeds to eat her meal like an anteater. The mouth opens, the tongue slithers out, the left hand shoves the food in while the right hand is poised to catch any rogue morsel.
It's both fascinating and disgusting.
Like watching Miley Cyrus tongue a wrecking ball.
And isn't it fun to watch the couples who go out for dinner and don't say a blessed word to each other. All they can focus on is what is on the plates in front of them. They slather the butter on bread like stone masons building a museum, then shove the bread into their gobs. The salad comes, and there's the dive bombing again. Or the soup, sometimes I pray the servers don't bring soup which is slurped, then sucked between the teeth. Maybe it's hot. Let it cool down!
I love chicken wings, ribs and corn on the cob but I don't order them at a restaurant and you shouldn't either. There are no amount of handy wipes that can give a person back her dignity. There aren't.
My aversion to public dining may be the reason I was never a success.
All the clinking and the clacking, all the slurping and the pillage was too much to take for me.
Mostly, I refused to go to meetings which involved dining. And I did everything I could to avoid going to those "working lunches" in one board room or another. Do you see what the caterers put on those platters, and do you see what people do with that food?
It's monstrous, I tell you.

Conventions are worse. They involve donuts, bagels, squishy little sandwiches that get all over the handouts. Little soups I'm sure the servers spit into. Cardboard desserts filled with cream. What's in that cream? How do you know the person made that cream with real ingredients instead of, you know.
And all the germs from people double dipping the crudités.
But people love to eat at conventions, like ants at a picnic. They attack the plates of smoked salmon and pigs in blankets. They mill around the roast beef table. They scarf down bricks of mystery cheeses like there's no tomorrow.
In essence, convention eating turns people into Pacmen and Pacwomen.
Food was never meant to be eaten while standing up.
You can't eat that shit standing up.
You can't.
But people do. Oh, yes they do.
And they love talking with their mouths stuffed with weinies and egg sannies washed down with cheap wine.
It's like going to a convention of people doing Marlon Brando impressions.

I found office eating just as bad.
My last two bosses were food fanatics. The first one was on the Bernstein diet the entire time I worked for her. That didn't mean she didn't eat. Every ten minutes she was peeling an apple or twirling spaghetti squash with marinara sauce on her fork, with balsamic vinegar from her salad dripping down her face. I had to quit. Had to.
The next boss I had was always shoving Tim Horton donuts in her gob everytime I went into her office. Bite after irritating bite. Her mouth was full but her eyes were glued to her next morsel.
Fuck, I wanted to take her down, open up that gob and shove the phone book down her gullet.
"Stop eating and listen," I would say in my fantasy. "Your omentum is about to explode."
I'm traumatized just thinking about it.
Ah, the horror.

I also hate people walking and eating food.
Mostly, I detest people eating ice cream cones with their big tongues hanging out, slithering around the ice cream like lamprey eels. They're walking and eating, not paying attention to the other Costco shoppers who are trying to avoid them. They don't care. They are so fixated on their cones.
Food trucks have become an abomination in North America. Now you can't walk down the street without nearly being upended and covered in fish tacos or some kind of Thai food porn.
And wouldn't you hate being the person who works in the next cubicle with all the burping and farting going on? There should be a law.

People! We are not cows. We are human beings not Labrador Retrievers!
Put the fork down once in a while.
Engage your lunch partner in conversation.
Don't pick the spinach out of your teeth. Don't dive bomb the salad.
Use a knife to cut that big piece of Romaine.
What's your hurry?
And please, sit down when you eat.
That's what God made your fat ass for.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ashley Simpson: Don't Let Her Die in Vain

  Six years ago, I was combing through my Facebook and I saw post from my cousin Julie Major. Her brother and his wife were frantically looking for their daughter Ashley who just days before had Facetimed her mom saying she was planning to return to her home in Niagara. Ashley never made it home. She was murdered in cold blood in her home in Salmon Arm then buried in a nearby field. It would be five and a half years before her body was located, and her boyfriend was charged with second degree murder.  Today, Ashley's urn has a sacred spot in her parents' home, and Derek Favell is in jail awaiting trial by judge and jury. The trial is expected to go into next year sometime. This has been an agonizing journey for Ashley's friends and family. The pain has never stopped, and the wounds are broken open every time the family has to sit through a series of pre-trial proceedings. Fortunately, this ordeal will end but the pain will never wane for the people, including me, who have b...

Ashley Simpson: A Father Remembers

I have asked Ashley Simpson's family and friends to give us a glimpse into the life she lived before going missing nearly a month ago. Here is how her father John remembers his sweet girl. Ashley was a treat when she came into this world, a smashing 9lbs 8 ounces with a  head full of hair and nails that needed to be clipped. She has made many friends in her journey of life and continues to make them as we speak. She has made this world a better place by her love of mankind and this place we call Earth; unfortunately this life she has lived hasn't been the best for her. She has suffered through unbearable pain and suffering through her menstrual cycles. She has cysts on her ovaries that make those 10 days a living hell. She had one of her ovaries removed when she was just 14; the other they won't take out till she is 40 or older. Years of hell for my Ashley. I so feel her pain every month but she doesn't quit, doesn't give in.   That'...

What Bell isn't telling you about Fibe TV

Update: This week, we switched back to Rogers after spending far too long using Bell's crappy television service. For those with Bell, read and weep. For those considering Bell, think twice even if you hate Rogers. RS I've always been an early technology adapter. I had a Betamax. That tells you everything (if you're over 50 at least). My first computer was a "Portable". It weighed 40 pounds and I had to lug it around town on a gurney. I've been through probably 15 computers in my lifetime. Apple is the best. It's also too expensive so I have a piece of shit HP, the one I'm writing this blog on. I've had cable, internet and now Netflix. American Netflix . That's how far ahead of the curve I am. I get all the newspapers for free. How? I disabled my cookies so they can't track me when I'm on the newspaper sites. Even the New York Times hasn't cottoned on to that trick. Hahaha. That will be a fifty buck consulting fee. Bein...