Thoughts 18 Jan 2008 01:40 pm
Woman’s work
I told Rich I’d write some sort of drivel for his blog when I got around to it. Today he called me on it.
First a basic whine. —I’m at work, and my head is about to explode. The headache makes me want to vomit and the Excedrin is making a mess out of my stomach.
I forced myself to eat some Campbell’s chunky New England Clam Chowder.
You remove the plastic cover, remove the metal top, return the plastic cover, toss a napkin on top in case something pops, and nuke fit or about 2 minutes. Let it sit for a minute, stir and eat.
It doesn’t taste half bad, but it occurred to me that we have become so inured to food that runs from mediocre to nearly inedible, in exchange for speed of preparation, that good food tastes a bit odd.
Have you ever noticed how little canned vegetables taste like fresh vegetables?
I cook at home, and my friends look surprised when I tell them that I made an omelet for breakfast, or that I made chicken soup for my lady when she caught that flu that’s been going around.
To me this is reaction is peculiar at best. I’m single and have nobody to look out for me, but me. So, if I don’t want to cook, I have a couple of choices. I can eat out, or I can live on canned or frozen food? of unknown origin.
Being a guy I am not too particular about what I eat, I can alway cover it with ketchup. But just how many frozen pizzas can you eat before you run screaming from the kitchen? And just how many lines are you willing to stand in to avoid cooking?
I’ve had men I know tell me that cooking and such are “woman’s work.”
Question. What do you do when there’s no woman around? Do you go out for three meals a day? Do you take all your laundry to the dry cleaners? Do you hire a maid or a full time housekeeper?
This is a true story: A friend got a divorce and called me because, no matter how hard he looked, he couldn’t find the on-switch for the washing machine.
Just how the hell is a guy like that going to look out for himself? He can’t cook, he can’t do basic laundry and it’s not like he has the money to hire a housekeeper. Not after that divorce.
(For the record, her attorney chewed him up, spit him out and pissed on the pieces.)
Cooking, laundry, and the like may be woman’s work, but my clothes are clean, my stomach is full and I don’t have to run to my mother every time I lose a button.