skinny girls & mayonnaise

Sometimes when I’m out at a pub or bar, I’m amazed how much beer I can drink. I’m not some hefty beer guzzling dude or Japanese competitive drinker, a Kobayashi of quaffing. But somehow, against the laws of physics and reason, I can make beer disappear like the most talented illusionist.

Hot dog eating champion Kobayashi

Recently, we went out to Duke’s in Malibu for Taco Tuesday, and I ordered a pint of pale ale. It was gone in about 48 seconds, so I ordered another. That one lasted a little longer, but was still empty well before the food even arrived. So for my third I went the inexpensive route and got the can-of-Modelo beer special. Or two.

There are 128 ounces in a gallon. That translates to eight pints. There is no question that I have drank eight pints before at a sitting — albeit an extended one. Can you imagine drinking a gallon of milk?

The waitress bringing me my beer

*   *   *

I was eating a handful of pistachio nuts the other day, not looking but just cracking them open and popping them in my mouth, when I got a bad one. My mouth puckered up as I sprang for the trash can and spit the offending kernel into the trash.

When I was a kid, I used to eat sunflower seeds in the shells. And it was the same kind of thing — every 40 or 50 seeds, you’d get a bad one, which you would either hastily gag down or spit out. It was until sometime later that I realized that the bad ones were that way because a worm had bored into them. From that time on, I scrutinized every sunflower seed I opened before eating them, a time consuming process that ultimately proved not worth the effort.

The pistachios I was eating were organic, from the farmer’s market. I try to buy organic whenever possible, which is an additional level of work to search for worms or bugs hiding within the leaves of, say, a head of romaine lettuce. My friend Dan once said, “Why would I want to eat anything a bug wouldn’t eat?” I agree, but I don’t particularly want to eat bugs.

They say that the average American unintentionally eats more than a pound of insects a year — mostly processed into dried pasta, breads, cereal, etc. I wonder if that counts the occasional one that flies into your mouth when you’re talking?

*   *   *

We don’t watch much TV at our house, but we do like to tune in to “Jeopardy!” in the evenings. Every night, just before the Final Jeopardy round, there is a commercial for a local business named Kevin Jewelers. There are several variations of the commercial, most ending with Kevin himself issuing an earnest plea to put your trust in him for all your jewelry needs.

One night, just after the commercial, my 8-year-old son, Flynn, said:

“Dad, do you trust Kevin?”

*   *   *

The other night at a party, I noticed Flynn loitering by the food table. I went over to see what he was doing. He had a small, whitish, cruciferous baton in his hand.

“Dad, what is this??”

“That’s jicama.”

“What’s jicama?”

I puzzled for a moment.

“Well, it’s sort of a crunchy, waterlogged tuber thing.”

“Is it good?”

“Find out for yourself.”

He looked it over, thought better of it, set it down and walked away.