i've got a lovely bunch of coconuts

I was a picky eater when I was a kid. My father would often accuse me of only limiting my food intake to pizza. (To be honest, he wasn't that far off.) My mother would regularly accompany meals with all sorts of vegetables. With the exception of corn and potatoes, I would not eat the vegetables my mother tried to push on me. Potatoes, in any form, were just mere steps away from French fries... and I loved French fries. Corn... well, corn was corn and as that young man in the latest You Tube viral video has confirmed "It's corn!" But, those others....? Yeesh! I wouldn't touch 'em with a ten-foot fork. No amount of butter or salt or anything would get me to like string beans.

As I got older, my eating habits changed. Considerably. I ate salad, something I would customarily slide over to my mother's side of the table when dining in a restaurant. I ate broccoli, granted it had to be mixed in a spicy sauce and served with a plate full of other chopped up ingredients within the cozy and mysterious confines of a Chinese restaurant. I still pick sliced tomatoes off of a hoagie, but I will happily consume the lettuce and onion, an act unheard of when I was a child. My wife often marvels at my evolved eating habits, commenting, "Your mother would be so proud of you!" I'm pretty sure she would.

Almost a decade ago, I wrote a pretty disparaging piece about raisins and my dislike of them. I was convinced that there was a universal conspiracy to get people to eat raisins. Not to necessarily like raisins, just to eat them. I observed that raisins were covertly snuck into various foods in a effort to get them eaten. They had to be hidden in bread and noodle casseroles and cakes. The name of a particular dish could not include the actual word "raisin," for fear no one would eat it. So, things like "cinnamon rolls" were never identified as "raisin cinnamon roils." "Coffee cake" was similarly ambiguous about all of its components. Even for the tiniest amount of raisins, they'll say: "You can't even taste the raisins!" It's like the people who say: "I know it's a Jim Carrey movie, but you'll like it." It's still has Jim Carrey in it! Only "raisin bread" appears ballsy enough to put its most reviled ingredient first in its name. Obviously, that was for those other people. You know, the ones proliferating the whole "raisin agenda." But, I hereby rescind my stance on raisins. I like them. I eat them. I concede that they are not among my favorite foods, but I no longer gag when I discover one in a bite of baked good, nor to I make a little pile of them on the side of my plate when politely eating something that contains them.

However, there is one food I will never ever ever happily eat. They say " never say never." Well, I'm saying never. And I'm talking about you, coconut. Coconut is horrible! Just horrible. I know, I know. All you coconut lovers will disagree with me. Look, I've had coconut. I believe I am still chewing coconut I ate when I was nine. It is a taste and mouth sensation on the same level as root canal. No, I take that back. I've had several root canal procedures. Eating coconut is worse. I have become so highly sensitive to coconut that I can tell if someone said the word "coconut" while they were preparing a dish I am eating. When I was a kid and would return from a night of Halloween trick-or-treating, I would pull out all of the coconut based candy from my bag and try to make trades with my brother (he actually liked coconut - eeech!) If a trade could not be agreed upon — fuck it! — I'd just give him the goddamn coconut rather that have it mixed in with my nominal candy haul. When I took my son out for Halloween, I taught him to say "trick or treat" and "nothing with coconut." When he got a little older and developed an actual fondness for coconut (whose kid are you?), my days of ransacking his Halloween spoils had ended.

Not a cow.

A few years ago, based on the advice of a doctor, I began eating breakfast on a daily basis. This was a meal that I skipped for most of my adult life. But after a series of vasovagal syncopes, my doctor recommended that I eat breakfast every morning to combat the feeling of hunger during the day, thereby preventing future fainting episodes. So, every morning, before I leave for work, I pour myself a bowl of cereal and a cup of coffee. Nothing extravagant and no actual cooking is involved. I always make sure there is milk in the house, a regular requirement that lapsed after my son moved out on his own. One day, a year or so ago, my son suggested that I switch to almond milk, citing its health benefits. He explained that dairy-based milk is passé. I was hesitant at first, but, once I tasted almond milk, I was hooked. The "unsweetened" variety has no discernable taste and, I believe, is lower in calories than the stuff that comes from mistreated cows. So almond milk it is... and has been for some time now.

Last week, after seeing that the current supply of almond milk was running low, I added it to our running shopping list. During the day, Mrs Pincus went to the supermarket and purchased everything on said list. The next morning, I began my daily ritual of turning on the Keurig, getting a bowl from the kitchen cabinet, getting cereal from a different kitchen cabinet and grabbing the carton of almond milk from the refrigerator. I grabbed the newly purchased almond milk, removed the safety seal and poured an amount over the waiting Honey Nut Cheerios in my bowl — just like I've done on countless mornings. I picked up the bowl and mug and headed upstairs for some classic TV reruns before I left for work. I plopped myself down on the sofa, flicked on the TV and put the first heaping spoonful of cereal in my mouth.

Something was..... off.

I looked in the bowl. Was the cereal stale? Had something gotten into it? Was this the same cereal I had yesterday... because it tasted okay then. Was the milk bad? Was it past its printed expiration date? I sniffed the bowl. I'm not sure was result I was expecting. I sure looked okay. I tasted it again. Yep. Still tasted... off.  I went downstairs to the kitchen to check the carton of almond milk. I bounded down the stairs. I opened refrigerator, removed the new carton of almond milk and examined the label. just under the word "almond" was the phrase "coconut blend." It was mocking me. I could vaguely hear that phrase laughing at me with the maniacal fervor of Cesar Romero's "Joker" from the classic Batman TV series. "HA! HA! HA! YOU CONSUMED COCONUT, YOU UNSUSPECTING FOOL!," it said, as I pictured Romero's lavender-gloved hands clapping with glee and his pancaked face grinning with malevolent accomplishment. And like a dejected Batman, whose arch-villain had just gotten the best of me, I silently fumed. I went back upstairs to — reluctantly — finish my breakfast.

That vile almond-coconut milk blend lasted about ten days. I was determined to use it up. Throwing it away would have been childish. I toughed it out. I hated it. Every minute of it. But I poured it over my cereal every day until the carton was empty. Every day, its repulsive taste of coconut ruined my cereal, filled my mouth and laughed like the Joker. But I was going to show coconut that I was the better man. And when the final drop of almond-coconut milk blend fell from the plastic spout into my bowl, I had won. It didn't kill me. It made me stronger.

And a little nauseous.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

living in the past

When my son was little, he loved to go to the supermarket and check out what was new. If any product had a bright "NEW" banner splashed across the front of the package, my son wanted it. He fancied himself the unofficial taste-tester on behalf of the food-consuming public. Whether it was a cereal one week (or even a new variety of a favorite cereal) or a snack or drink the next, he wanted to be the first to sample it. His testing often yielded different results. The more common outcome was that the product was deemed "yucky" and was never to darken our kitchen again. Sometimes, the product in question would receive a favorable rating by my son. He would request a subsequent purchase, even before the initial supply had been depleted. This was often tricky. An immediate return trip to the supermarket to purchase the product would be made... only to be met with a rethinking of the test conclusion, leaving a surplus of said product to go uneaten, then stale, then trashed. Or.... if we delayed our next trip to the market to buy more, the particular item was no longer being manufactured, because of the opinions of other self-appointed taste-testers across the country. Some foods, like the recently reintroduced Dunakroos were winners from the start. A self-contained serving of cookies and frosting in which to dip them...how could you go wrong? But, purple ketchup? What on earth was Heinz thinking?

This ritual was not new to me. I was guilty of putting my mother through the same consumer demands when I was a kid. And the products were just as weird.

In the late 60s through early 70s, I was enrolled in a Philadelphia public school. The student body was culled from surrounding neighborhoods filled with middle-class families who couldn't afford to live in the "ritzier" suburbs. The classroom sizes averaged an overcrowded thirty-five students and each grade was made up of two or three classrooms. Lunchtime was an unruly free-for-all, with exasperated adult "lunchroom monitors" trying their best to wrangle students and maintain something that resembled order. The lunchroom could have easily been mistaken for a rodeo by an unaccustomed visitor. There was an area of the lunchroom where food could be purchased. Each month, a mimeographed menu was sent home, listing the upcoming menu choices. The food prepared by the cranky, hair-netted women who comprised the lunchroom staff, as I recall, was horrible. There were offerings like pizza made from hamburger buns, pre-formed Salisbury steak and something passed off as "shepherd's pie," that presented itself as a pre-digested bolus with stray peas, carrots and mashed potatoes as the only identifiable food components, and those were, at best, iffy. I, along with most of my classmates, brought my lunch, so as not to be subjected to that slop.... and that's being nice.

There were several components of my school lunches that I remember distinctly. There were trendy products that, like my son's enticement in later years, were very irresistible to me. My lunches would usually include a sandwich and two snack-type foods. The sandwich alternated between bologna (usually that assembly-line Oscar Mayer stuff from the yellow plastic "easy seal" package that was never easy to seal) or peanut butter and jelly. When I was 10, the standard, everyday peanut butter was replaced by a new product called Koogle. After being assaulted by commercials between Saturday morning showings of The Funky Phantom and Archie's TV Funnies, I asked — no demanded — my mother to buy Koogle, Kraft's take on peanut butter. It was like regular peanut butter, but it was flavored! How did nobody think of this before? Koogle came in banana, cinnamon, chocolate and vanilla varieties. It was available in jars that were smaller than other peanut butter packages that, I'm sure, was a nightmare for grocery clerks trying to stock shelves. Koogle, if I remember correctly, was awful. But, I ate it because I begged my mother to buy it and television told me it was delicious. I ate it just to hold up my end of the "being a kid" bargain. My lunch would also include a foil-wrapped Drake's Yodel, a chocolate covered cake roll similar to Little Debbie's Swiss Rolls. Yodels were great, but the best part was trying to see who could flatten the foil wrapping the cleanest and bring it back to its most original pristine state, getting out all of the folds and wrinkles, until it looked as though it just came off the roll at the factory. (Hey, we didn't have cellphones or Nintendo Switch.) If I was lucky, my lunch would also include a foil packet of Shake-A-Pudd'n and a plastic cup in which to "shake-a" it. With the simple instruction to "just add water," kids were promised an envy-inducing treat in just a few shakes. Plus, the actual activity of shaking was somehow perceived as fun itself! Again, I remember that no amount of agitation would allow Shake-A-Pudd'n to achieve the consistency of the pudding you'd get to cap off your meal at a diner or off the kid's menu at that fancy restaurant your parents took you to. However, at any given time, there would be a dozen small children scattered throughout the lunchroom, performing their closest approximation of the hula in hopes of creating a restaurant-quality dessert. The real goal — I believe — was to make the pudding-less children jealous.

The new product appeal was not limited to school lunches. Oh no! My mornings would start with a big bowl of Sir Grapefellow or some other unnaturally-flavored, overly-sweetened breakfast cereal that couldn't possibly have been good for me. When I got home from school, I would plop down in front of the television with a box of Tid-Bits and shovel those cheese-flavored choking hazards into my mouth until dinnertime. If my mom wasn't cooking that night, my evening meal would be one of a selection of Libbyland frozen dinners specifically formulated for kids. That meant I could choose from the "Pirate Picnic," which featured a foil pan that held a mini hot dog in a mini bun, a small serving of dog food that claimed to be "sloppy Joe," French fries, corn and chocolate pudding or a "Safari Supper," offering the main course of fried chicken and a side of spaghetti and mini-meatballs, along with the standard-issue corn, fries and pudding. The problems with these meals were numerous. The hot dog bun became rock hard under the same oven conditions needed to heat the corn and fries. The pudding, which, theoretically, should have been served chilled, was also subjected to the same heat as the rest of the meal's components. Plus, the decision to include corn, potatoes and pasta in the same meal was questionable — both by the Libby Corporation and by responsible parents. The actual appeal of the Libbyland menu wasn't the food (surprise!). It was the activities that were printed on the box that, with a little creative cutting as instructed by directions on a tiny section of the packaging, created a colorful holder for the foil pan once it was removed from the oven. The food was secondary to the minutes of fun provided by that box. Nevertheless, I still forced that pudding down my throat.

Now, I am less discerning about my grocery purchases. We buy what's cheap. We buy store-band equivalents of national brands... except for ketchup. That's still Heinz... although current, healthier-leaning eating habits preclude any food that requires ketchup. But, cereal, crackers, salad dressing.... all store brand. And my "advanced palate" doesn't know the difference, where my wallet does.

Only now do I appreciate and understand my son's interest and excitement in new products. He was just carrying on a family tradition.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com

rude boy

After work, I stopped at Walmart to pick up a few things in their grocery department. I have a love/hate relationship with Walmart. I love their prices on groceries. However, I hate going to Walmart. Nearly every Walmart I have visited is exactly the same. Scummy, dirty, inconsistently stocked and filled with the absolute dregs of society — both shoppers and employees. I've been to a lot of different Walmarts and it's uncanny how you see the same people in all of them. (The first Walmart I was ever in was in St. Catherines in Ontario. Who knew there were scummy Canadians?) Everyone in Walmart looks as though they'd rather be somewhere else ...and I can't say I blame them. But their prices on groceries are so unbelievably low that I feel silly shopping anywhere else. (Last week, I bought a package of eight hamburger roils for 67 cents. Now, come on!)

There's a Walmart just a few blocks from my job and I stop there often on my way home from work. I usually prepare a list of items I need before I enter the store to make sure I am in and out in ten minutes or less....and I usually am. Today, my list consisted of just three items — milk, a loaf of bread, and butter. This should take under five minutes. 

Today's selections

I pulled into the parking lot and drove up towards the building to find a parking space. I saw a prime spot right next to the row of reserved handicapped spaces. As I flicked my turn signal and began to swing my car into the space, I saw a man pushing a shopping cart in my direction. He was a tall thin man, probably in his mid-seventies. He was one of those guys that has a permanent scowl on his face, as though he is coming to the end of a life that done him wrong time and time again. His mouth was curved into a frown that betrayed years of disdain and contempt. He tightly gripped the handle of the cart with thin bony fingers, but he also may have been using it for support under the weight of that enormous chip on his shoulder. As I slowly guided my car into the space, he frowned harder, made a sweeping gesture with his arm towards the front of my car and mouthed some words that I could not make out. I threw the shift lever into "PARK," pulled up my parking brake, unlatched my seat belt and slowly opened my door... just enough to get out but not so wide as to bump the adjacent car.... which I would soon understand to be the older man's vehicle.

The man stopped briefly right in front of my car, right by the pylons holding the "handicapped" designation signs, and then he pushed his cart to the passenger side of my car and grumbled something under his breath. I managed to get "didn't leave me no room" before he trailed off. He was about a foot away from me and the situation was becoming crystal clear. I dared park next to his car in his parking lot. My selfish act of parking was now forcing him to put his two small bags of purchases in his car by way of the door on the other side. He was tense and fuming.

I looked at my parked car. I was well within the yellow guide lines painted on the asphalt. I was not crooked nor did I overshoot the front of the designated space. I may not have stopped my car equidistant from either side of the space, but I was absolutely within the boundaries. Absolutely.

I spoke up — something I don't normally do. "I can move my car.," I offered, but I followed that proposal with a stern, "You don't have to be rude." 

The old man frowned even harder. "You're the one being rude!," he spat and he pointed in the direction of my car, "Parking like that!"

I raised my voice a bit."I said I'd move my car. All you had to do was ask!" I climbed back into my car, started the engine and backed up into a space on the other side of the parking aisle. This took all of two seconds. I repeated the standard series of "parking the car" formalities and headed to the store. The old man watched me park and exit my car. As I passed him, he managed to choke out a strained "Thank you," but I wasn't convinced. 

I did my shopping (five minutes worth, like I figured) and returned to my car. Considering how slowly the old man moved, I was surprised that he was gone from the lot. But as I approached my car, I saw something under my wiper blade. I gulped and thought the old man left me some kind of nasty note. As I drew closer, I saw every car around mine had the same thing shoved under their windshield wipers. It was an announcement for a restaurant opening in the area. I was relieved.

A lot a people have misunderstood me. I have been pegged as angry and sullen — even a curmudgeon. I am not. I am actually a pretty nice guy. I hold doors open for people. I gladly allow people to enter traffic from a parking lot or an adjacent lane. I say "please" and "thank you" and I do my best to be courteous and polite. I am not aggressive... until crossed. I am a reactor, not an instigator.

But, I'll be damned if being nice doesn't get tougher and tougher every day.

www.joshpincusiscrying.com