Post-Khristmas kernels


By Evan Redmon

Arby's has cheesecake poppers, for a limited time only. It is occasionally difficult to produce an entire column on one subject.

What do these seemingly incongruent sentences have to do with anything? It's occasionally easier to manufacture an article which focuses acutely on a few topics rather than formulate a coherent, 1,800 word mini thesis.

So think of this column as the cheesecake poppers of the Internet. And yes, I've tried cheesecake poppers. They taste as horrifying as they sound. Hopefully the opinions contained herein will be at least somewhat more appetizing.

Let's start with a quick look back at Christmas.

One of my favorite things about the actual day of December 25th is that it marks the end of two things which could annoy a deaf tree slug; Christmas music, and the "it" person of the season.

Sure, some Christmas songs are beautiful. Others are at least tolerable. However, there are a few that could make the Dali Lama commit random acts of violence. "The Twelve Days of Christmas," one would have to assume, was written for the purpose of torture before water boarding had been invented. The origin of the song's first incarnation is not entirely known, which leads me to the obvious conclusion that it was written by Satan, and then inserted via evil osmosis into the European continent around the late 1700's.

Is it any coincidence that Europeans began immigrating en masse to America around that time? I think not.

First of all, let me say that I'm absolutely delighted that your true love gave you a partridge and a pear tree on the first day of Christmas, but guess what? I can remember that the first time around. That's a fairly unique gift, if not completely useless and unnecessarily high maintenance. It tends to stick in the mind. No need to repeat it 12 fricken times.

Ever wonder why there's a differentiation of cadence and key for the "five golden rings" verse? Because that is the only gift of the bunch worth more than the droppings of three French hens. It's as if the composer is saying "Finally! Something I can pawn."

Ten Lords a' leaping? What the hell? It strikes me as unlikely that one could find ten Lords who would allow themselves to be given as a gift. And while I don't know any Lords, it's doubtful they are a highly leaping lot.

Although ... hmmm ... nine ladies dancing ... eight maids a-milking ... they might have something there, under the right circumstances.

Speaking of ladies milking, is Rachel Ray endorsing enough shit? Young Martha Stewart has not one, not two, but three TV shows, about eleventeen billion cookbooks, and she's on the cover of approximately every third magazine in the world, many of which have no association with food. I'm expecting to see her ever smiling mug-o-perkiness on the cover of Cat Fancy pretty soon, hawking her latest recipe for portly tabbies.

Tom Petty wrote a song a while back called "Jamming Me," which was about his personal insanity caused by the American media machine's ceaseless product parade. Petty singled out three 80's celebs that he felt were in his face a little too often:

Take back Vanessa Redgrave
Take back Joe Piscopo
Take back Eddie Murphy
Give 'em al some place to go
Guess he had something against SNL? Anyway, I once heard an interview with Petty about that song, and he explained that he had nothing against those three; it was that he just got so sick and tired of hearing about them all the time. And that's how I feel about Rachel Ray. Sort of. Listen, I love to see good people have successful careers. But if familiarity breeds contempt, then I'm an overstuffed jelly donut of disdain regarding America's loveable hipster homemaker.

Please, someone take back Rachel Ray.

She's on boxes of Wheat Thins and Triscuits. She deposited her regurgitated face-o-cuteness for a brand of cookies. Her Thai Chicken recipe accompanies astronauts in space shuttle missions (actually true). She has her own line of knives for God's sake! Who the hell has their own line of knives? Truly, she's never seen an endorsement deal she didn't like.

Case in point: RR recently signed a deal with Dunkin' Donuts. Yes, those Dunkin Donuts. Somehow, I don't think that a dozen maple-glazed Crullers are going to help ol' Rachel with her much publicized weight problem. One glazed DD offering contains 15 percent of the daily fat recommended for the average diet, not to mention 2,400 mg of sodium and 12 grams of sugar.

But what's a little fat when your contract is even fatter? Hey kids! It's okay to stuff your piehole with donuts now! If Rachel endorses it, then it's alright. See the welcoming hand gestures! Hear the slightly scratchy, down-to-earth, girl-next-door voice! Friendliness like that means wholesome goodness.

Coming soon to a supermarket near you: Rachel Ray's lard and MSG holiday lick'n brick!

A couple of other quick, unrelated things from out of nowhere:

A prison in Portland, Britain recently introduced pole vaulting as an available exercise activity to their inmates. Now, I'm all for jailbirds getting physically fit, but aren't there enough cross-training alternatives out there which don't involve the ability to run and leap 18 feet ... over walls? Just a thought.

The Big Dig in Boston is finally complete, or at least as complete as it's going to be. It was originally estimated that the total cost of the highway project would be $2.6 billion. The final tally? $14.8 billion. Hey, only $12.2 billion off. Close!

Perhaps some of the folks who are in charge of America's overall fiscal health were in charge of the Big Dig math.

Well that's it for today. I hope everyone had a great Christmas, or whatever other alternative holiday you celebrate, which must obviously be satanic. I'm going to cash in my Dunkin Donuts gift card and get a dozen Chocolate Kreme Filled Donuts (when you see that K in Kreme, you know it's gotta be good), then put on my "Twelve days of Christmas by twelve different artists" CD, and then curl up with Rachel Ray's "30 minutes meals."

Yum-o!

Evan Redmon gets a lot of spam. If you are not spam, please feel free to drop him a line at evanredmon@yahoo.com.


Archive