MR WRONG: Put a candle in my pie
Indignity Vol. 4, No. 163
COLUMN DEP’T.
MR WRONG: Today is the Birthday of the Rest of Your Life
I JUST HAD a birthday the other day and it was great, the whole Observing my Birthday and getting Birthday Wishes and stuff, I am very fortunate. It wasn’t a “milestone” birthday, but it was important for me because I did a buncha Birthday stuff not on my Birthday exactly, and not, like “time shifted,” just several days of birthday stuff, eating, mostly, and I came up with a theory that as much as I enjoy Life, if I live my Life like every day is my Birthday, I will be enjoying Life more, you know?
Think about your Birthday and how it’s all about your Life, and if it stinks, your Life, then your Birthday is the day to get on the path to make the graph of your life go up and to the right, in terms of it getting better, or at least do that goofy yoga thing where you “set an intention,” which always used to kinda irritate me when I used to go to yoga (I hurt my back and stopped going but I didn't hurt my back because of yoga, and I am getting ready to return to yoga because I think I got the Misery in my back all sorted out and under control, thanks for asking), but basically it is all about mentally focusing your brain on a simple something to accomplish, or a way to perceive your reality, in a positive and constructive way. Every day can be your Birthday. Every day is my Birthday, that is my new Self-Help slogo! Furthermore, Every Day Is Your Birthday™, OK? Don’t put numbers on your Every Day of Birthday, though, otherwise you’ll be like a Million Years of Old and it will get confusing.
An important sidebar on the whole Birthday thing, for me, is that I always would rather have Pie for my Birthday as opposed to Cake. I have nothing against Cake, it’s fine, I would eat some right now if you put it in front of me, and coincidentally, my fave flavor of Cake is Birthday, but really I would rather have a Birthday Pie! Blueberry or apple Pie are great, and this morning when I was enjoying a slice of my blueberry Birthday Pie for breakfast, because it’s my Birthday, I thought about how some folks might be weird about Pie for breakfast, but it’s fulla blueberry, so it’s like, healthy, fruit, or more technically berry, right? Blueberries are healthy! Pie is better than Cake! Also, you could put Cake inside of Pie, but I don’t think you can put Pie inside of Cake, I think. You think about it. It’s a theory. Cake Pie. Do your own research.
OK, enough about my Birthday for a minute. This is like, a sidebar to the sidebar, arguably almost possibly just a complete veering off the topic, but stay with me. I have been kinda sick, for like, weeks now, with what I am pretty sure I used to think of in the Before Times as a Common Cold, but after all the Covid shit started, and people started avoiding each other, I don’t think I had one Common Cold for three years, or any Flu at all. I had real-deal Covid three times, though, urgh, and I got as many shots as I could get, vaccination-wise. I mighta missed the last one, but that was because I fucking had Covid.
Anyway, as soon as I got a bad sore throat and cough, I tested myself for Covid a coupla times, and it was Negatory, good buddy, no Covid, just a Common Cold, like the Good Old Days, har! Then my cold did what I used to have done to me all the time back in the days of the Common Cold. It kinda turned into bronchitis, which tacked about a week onto my sentence, illness-wise, and while I was waiting to get over that, I thought, in an unfounded-theory kinda way, “dang, maybe I have some sorta Nu-Covid, the kind that doesn’t even look like Covid when you test it?”
Anyway, that’s just a theory, and in a few days, soon as I get clear of what’s left of my sickness, I am gonna go get a Covid shot, with a beer chaser. Happy Birthday to me!
P.S. BREAKING COLUMN-NEWS: I was putting the Sandwich Recipe into today's INDIGNITY and it's a new book, all about MEATLESS MENUS, and look at this quotable:
New York City consumes, every twenty-four hours, enough pies to cover two acres of ground if they were placed singly, side by side. Every pie is merely a big sandwich.
A Pie is a big Sandwich! A Perfect Food!
The MR. WRONG COLUMN is a general-interest column appearing weekly. No refunds. Write Wrong: wrongcolumn@gmail.com.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
HERE IS TODAY'S Indignity Morning Podcast, now with transcript.
Tom Scocca
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TOM SCOCCA
ADVICE DEP'T.
GOT SOMETHING YOU need to justify to yourself, or to the world at large? Other columnists are here to judge you, but The Sophist is here to tell you why you’re right. Direct your questions to The Sophist, at indignity@indignity.net, and get the answers you want.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS in aid of the assembly of a sandwich selected from 250 Meatless Menus And Recipes To Meet The Requirements Of People Under The Varying Conditions Of Age, Climate And Work, by Eugene Christian and Mollie Griswold Christian, published in 1910, and now in the Public Domain and available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
Sandwiches: THEIR USES AND ABUSES
The sandwich has become such a conspicuous thing in the menu of civilized people that it deserves special mention and a few suggestions gleaned from long experience.
New York City consumes, every twenty-four hours, enough pies to cover two acres of ground if they were placed singly, side by side. Every pie is merely a big sandwich.
The abuse of sandwiches in this form is not so much because they are impure, but because they are consumed mostly at the quick lunch counter, not masticated, and washed down with milk, water, tea, or coffee. There are, however, a great number of good sandwiches that deserve certain mention in this work.
CREAM CHEESE, DATE, AND NUT SANDWICHES
Spread the bread or cracker with Philadelphia brand cream cheese, a layer of thinly sliced date or fig butter, and a dash of grated nuts. Cover the other piece of bread with cheese, and press both firmly together. O. B. Oilman's "wheat crispies or wheat puffs" make a delicious binder for this filling.
If you decide to prepare and attempt to enjoy a sandwich inspired by this offering, be sure to send a picture to indignity@indignity.net.
MARKETING DEP'T.
Supplies are really and truly running low of the second printing of 19 FOLK TALES, still available for gift-giving and personal perusal! Sit in the crushing heat with a breezy collection of stories, each of which is concise enough to read before the thunderstorms start.
ZERO COPIES LEFT: HMM WEEKLY MINI-ZINE, Subject: GAME SHOW, Joe MacLeod’s blah blah blah, etc., of his Total Experience of a Journey Into Television, expanded from the original published account that can still found here at Hmm Daily, but you know what? No more printed, expanded, more fun, tangible, printed-on-paper zine! No more! ALL GONE! Thank you! People like to reminisce about this special MINI ZINE, and how it featured other viewpoints related to an appearance on the teevee game show Who Wants to Be A Millionaire, but now it is just a memory, no longer available for purchase at SHOPULA. However, there are many other fine things to read over there! Go take a look!
