Making It Up As I Go Along #300

MONDAY...
— Downtown for a little shopping with mom and dad. Over to Wince’s and family for Christmas Eve lunch. Wayne and Sylvia come for a visit in the evening.

TUESDAY...
— Merry Christmas.
— Fine day, presents in the AM with mom and dad. Wince, his family, Wayne and Sylvia all come for supper. Rick and his family pop by for a visit after we eat. Too stuffed... way too stuffed.
— Watch Scrooge to end the night. The 1951 version with Alastair Sim.

WEDNESDAY...
— Some visiting time with Jim, Kristann, Sam and Jen today. A few hours out to Jim’s place.
— Boxing Day Feast at the parent’s place. The Riggs family, Lafosse family, Wayne and Sylvia all come to chow down. Spend some time hanging with Geoff, Rob, and Dave.
— Going blind due to food running up from my stomach, into my sinus cavity, and pressing against my optic nerves. Soon I’ll be bleeding turkey gravy.

THURSDAY...
— More eating to the point of explosion. Lunch with Craig at the Ship Inn is good. It’s not too busy, we eat good fish and chips, and hang out chatting for a couple of hours.
— Off to supper with mom, dad, Wayne and Sylvia tonight. To the Keg. It’s really good but by the end my stomach causes me to take a barrel type shape. It takes minutes to bend over and tie my boots! No food tomorrow!

FRIDAY...
— So there is food today... even though I said I wouldn’t. But still not a lot. A very lazy day though. There was some visiting and shopping planned but a trip home wouldn’t be complete without a storm. All the stores and most businesses are closed today with lots of snow, freezing rain and wind all day.
— Dave (“Fish”) pops by for an evening visit... other than that it’s movies, computer time, and general laziness.

SATURDAY...
— A run around day. Shopping, a trip to Signal Hill, lunch with mom and dad at Bidgoods (some traditional Newfoundland food to be had there).
— Bev visits this evening. See Jim and Kristann for a few minutes as well. Pack and watch some hockey tonight.

SUNDAY...
— Up early. 3:30 NF time is when I woke up and didn’t get back to sleep. Out of bed at 4:30... stormy day for the airport. There for 5:00. In security and ready to go at 6:00 (after a quick sit down with mom and dad... and Del). Plane is supposed to leave at 6:30. We board the plane at about 7:40. Sit in the plane for a while... then go to de-ice... then sit some more for the runway to get cleared. Take off for Ottawa at around 9:15.
— Sheila picks me up and we do lunch. The least I could do for a lift. Laundry, unpacking and some rest follow.


300
From April 7, 2002 to December 31, 2007... that’s how long it takes to write 300 weekly updates.

So what to do for number 300? At 100 (Feb 8, 2004) I did a retrospective. I basically spoke of how I went about doing my weekly updates... the thought process behind them... and some memorable stories and ideas.

Number 200 (Jan. 8, 2006) had me looking back at people and stereotypes... while also looking back at my years of writing.

And at both #100 and #200 I mentioned how I wasn’t sure what to write about. It seems milestone updates have been reflective and unclear in purpose for me.

So for #300, written here on New Years Eve 2007... I’ll change the plan. For the rest of this story will have purpose and will not be retrospective in nature (even though New Years Eve cries out for a look back).

No, on this day I write about... Food!

My trips home for Christmas will no longer be able to continue. I could speak of how the travel at this time of year tires me out. I could speak of unreliable airlines that leave you stranded for days on end in a city that is not of your choosing. And I could speak of the cost of it all.

But a major problem with my Christmas trips home is the eating. It has taken on binge like qualities. On more than one occasion, it has put me in mind of Monty Python’s Meaning of Life... where a waiter serves a massively fat man meal after meal... the fat man vomits all over the restaurant... and, with the coaxing that “it’s just a wafer thin after dinner mint” eats that last morsel which creates a fat man explosion never seen in cinematic history, before or after.

Each of the last four years, when I travel home for Christmas, I become that Monty Python fat man!

This year saw a three day eatfest that left me waddling and groaning. Big lunches of food from the night before. Followed by afternoon snacking on nuts, licorice and chocolate... often washed down with a glass of eggnog. And the evening would bring another round of turkey, or chilli, or ham, or roast with potatoes and gravy and dressing. And the dessert... always the dessert.

On the worst day this year, I had a lunch planned with my friend, Craig... followed by a supper with the family. I thought how lunch will not be large. I can eat nice and light... maybe a stir fry or a wrap. In the end, that translated into fish ‘n’ chips. Even then, I thought maybe the fish would be small and the fries not so plentiful. But the fish was enormous and battered while the fries overflowed the plate.

Washed down with beer, the meal was good, and the time out was fun, but the eating plan was thrown out the window. We left at 3:00 with supper a few hours away... and me stuffed.

So then maybe the cutback could be with supper I thought. Perhaps if lunch goes out of control, I can eat lightly in the evening?

We go to the Keg Steakhouse. You aren’t allowed to eat there without a slab of meat on your plate.

So I plan my attack on the beef with blind optimism. I won’t fill up on the bread! The Keg always throw too much bread at you and it’s a wasted loading of the stomach. Skip the bread. That translates into have one large piece. Plus picking at the dip one of my evil family members decides to order as an appetizer.

Next is the salad. You are lead to believe that salad is your friend when it comes to food. Well not when they bring you a bucket of it! The Keg throws it down at me in a spit-in-your-eye fashion. Didn’t get caught on the bread trap? Here’s your salad... sucker!

So then it’s planning a smaller cut of meat. A sirloin will be smaller I think. Perhaps in length it is... when factoring in thickness (which I did not) out the window flies that theory.

I’m left with the desperate plan of cutting my food into smaller pieces. Maybe I can fit it all in my stomach by breaking it down into smaller chunks? I’m Homer Simpson in a steak eating contest... I just need Bart there to toss the uneaten morsels back into my mouth after it drops down to my shirt while I moan in zombie like despair.

As meat-in-the-sinus blindness comes on, my aunt Sylvia extends the hell. “We’ll go back to our place for dessert!”

Dessert? I’m ready to crawl into a cave and hibernate for the next four months and she’s talking of adding to my layer of fat!

So it’s off to their house for another round of delightful treats. The Python quote rings loudly in my ears... “...Just an after dinner mint.”

My plan of attack on the sweets? The pre-eating trip to the massage chair. I waddle to Wayne and Sylvia’s Lazyboy massage chair, lean back, and hope the vibrations will shift the food into those few remaining empty cavities deep within my soul.

Cookies are brought out... and slices of icinged fruit cake. And I sample a piece of each with the thought “I won’t be able to do this again for an entire year, I better take advantage of it while I have the chance.” That translates into... you’ve guessed it... “... Just an after dinner mint.”

When the eating finally ends, I shuffle back to the chair for another round of vibration. Consciousness comes and goes... and strange visions... delusions, if you will... dance through my head. I’m as I was as a feverish child of years gone by... when I told my mother that my rapid blinking was a result of the trees which surrounded me... there in my bookbag (even though I was laying in bed the whole time). I can not trust that which leaps before my eyes.

That’s why it takes some time to register when mom suggests our departure. Can I rise up from this shaking chair? Can I maneuver myself towards my boots? Can I even feel my legs?

The tying of the boots takes me close to five minutes. I can not bend down to reach my laces, and breathe, at the same time. So I must break for a few gasps before plunging back into the abyss of lace tying.

It is at times of troublesome shoe lace tying that one knows when one has eaten too much. And it is with fears of a repeat of such instances that makes me feel I should have no more Christmas’s at home with family. It is too much of a gamble. One can only role the dice so many times without the end result being permanent. Perhaps next time, the meat will remain stuck in my sinuses... and the blindness will be permanent.