More food confessions

Today I went to the grocery store to stock up on necessities for the week. I came home with the following:

milk

cheese

Fruit Loops

Tina Fey's new book

water balloons

a discounted chocolate Easter bunny

You may have realized by now that I'm not exactly what you'd call a "healthy eater." My roommate and I chaperoned prom last night (details later) and at one point during the dinner she looked at my plate and said, "Good work, Katie. You ate the broccoli."

I was glad someone had noticed. However, my stomach hurt later that night and I'm pretty sure it was because of the vegetables.

I was thinking about my eating habits today as I warmed up a tamale for lunch. I recalled the first time I had a tamale. I was 22. I tried to eat the corn husk.

Unfortunately, this little mishap happened in the teacher's lounge at my first job. The history department got quite a kick out of it. Later that year, they were not terribly surprised when I learned the hard way that tin foil cannot be put in the microwave. So I caused a tiny kitchen fire. No big deal. No one was hurt.

Here are a few other food confessions:

Age 16. I learned that a "girl" cheese sandwich is actually a GRILLED cheese sandwich. I blame my family and their lack of enunciating all those years. Unfortunately, I learned this lesson when I tried to be funny in the lunch line at my new school and ordered a "boy cheese sandwich."

Age 17. I learned that a mai tai is an alcoholic drink. I was in Hawaii with my friend Stefanie and her parents and after an exhausting afternoon of catching waves on our blow up rafts, Stef and I met her mom by the pool and were both parched.

photo taken straight from the scrapbook we made on the plane ride home

Stef asked for a drink of what her mom was drinking. Then her mom offered me some.

"What is it?"

"A mai tai."

"What's that?"

"It's a bunch of fruit juices combined."

"Cool. Yes please."

I naively took a giant swig and came very close to spewing it all in her face. I made a terrible face that I still make every time I try alcohol.

"That is THEE grossest fruit juice I have EVER tried!"

Once they stopped laughing at my contorting face, they told me about the rum. Not cool, Mrs. Schilling. Not cool.

Age 19. I learned that hot peppers are more than hot; they are crippling. My roommate Jenny dared me to take a bite of a habanero chili in the grocery store. I didn't think it was that big of a deal. It was small and a pretty shade of orange. How bad could it be?

I couldn't feel my tongue for two days.

Age 20. I learned that cabbage looks an awful lot like lettuce but does not taste like it. My dad sent me to the store to get ingredients for the famous Hardeman tacos. I came home with cabbage. I made this same mistake at age 26 while in Mozambique. Both times I ate the cabbage thinking, "Man, this lettuce sure is rubbery."

Age 26. I learned that fish and chips is actually fish and fries. I always thought it was a bit bizarre that people would eat fish with potato chips and I'm not a fan of potato chips in general so I had never ordered this meal. That is until I was on Spring Break in Cape Town and all my friends were ordering fish and chips. Apparently I can be a follower sometimes. I was pleasantly surprised with the massive mound of fries on my plate and then a little pissed that no one had ever told me that chips is code for fries.

I realize that I've now written two posts about food in one week. Don't worry, I'll try to keep it to a one post per week minimum.

Time to eat that sprinkled donut I've been saving and continue reading Bossypants. Speaking of, I have to share my favorite line from the book so far because I relate to it all too much. After listing parts of her body that she is grateful for, Tina writes:

"I would not trade any of these features for anybody else's...I wouldn't even trade the acne scar on my right cheek, because that recurring zit spent more time with me in college than any boy ever did."

Mine's on the left cheek though.