Showing posts with label farmers markets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label farmers markets. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Z is for Zingers




Searching for my gym bag led to a shocking revelation: it was gone.  After gutting the car, laundry room and rest of the house, searching in rooms and closets where I never take my gym bag, I recreated the scene of the crime. I had dropped my daughter off at her job at the farmer’s market, went to the gym, came back to retrieve her and get lunch, and in approaching the car noticed that I had inadvertently left the passenger side back seat window down. 

  It was a warm spring day and the car was a crock pot when I got in after the gym, so I drove with the windows down to the market.  I thought, ‘stupid’ when I unlocked the door and loaded the flat of strawberries, chess pie, sun gold tomato plants and bags of produce in the back seat and my daughter climbed in front.


Little Ladybug Pies.  buy them.

It wasn’t until I was loading the car again for school on Monday that I was looking to resupply the gym bag and could not find it. We were running too late to search. Normal Monday. 

It was later that afternoon that I tore the house apart and the cold reality settled in my gut.  Someone had reached in behind the driver seat and somehow managed to pull it out without setting off the alarm.  I did a quick mental inventory: running shoes, stinky sweaty outfit, new North Face fleece, iPod and headphones, toiletry bag of face stuff, toiletry bag of hair stuff.  And the bag itself. Nothing irreplaceable and no cash or credit cards.  But an expensive haul to replace. 

I vented aloud that a karmic pox fall upon the gym bag thief, who probably dumped the whole lot in the trash when they realized there was no cash or credit cards.  I doubt they will appreciate my Rodin perfume or my audible download of The Wind Up Girl.  That  all my lotions and make up are organic.  A pox I say, ‘may your pants always feel tight, may your earbuds always tangle, may your shampoo bottle always be empty.’

Speaking of religious gym attendance, questionable behavior and too snug britches, Zingers will be revived and on shelves again by the end of summer.  Vanilla & Devil’s Food with gummy icing and fake crème filling and the bright fuchsia coconut sprinkled Raspberry met their end along with their more famous sister, the Twinkie,  last year.  Twinkies are the Marcia Brady to Zingers Jan. The American snack cake was made by both Dolly Madison and Hostess, which makes zero sense.
Blue Collar Eclair photo by Zingersfan*


Hostess closed down after it offered a contract that would cut it’s worker’s wages by 8% and benefits by 27 to 32%.  Workers went on strike and the company decided to shut down.  Somewhere this might have to do with people wisely not buying the product for health reasons. But there was a nostalgic public outcry about the disappearance of the classic Twinkie. (Marcia Marcia Marcia!)

Hostess was bought by an investment group and the new boss, Michael Cramer is adamant to avoid working with unions and will reopen with non-union hires to replace the teamsters and Bakery Union employees who were on strike when the company folded last year.  How American. 

*


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Monday, April 1, 2013

A is for Appetite



 A is for Appetite

My oldest son was hungry from the moment he emerged from my body. He weaned himself from the breast when he was first able to hold a spoon and navigate it to his mouth. I was wistful but relieved as he preferred to nurse around the clock. He was a typical red headed firecracker and I was exhausted.

 His brother entered the world and immediately took a nap. He was mildly interested in eating, but his first priority was to watch his brother pinball round the room. He sustained life for years on goldfish crackers.

This patterned continued, with the older inhaling his meals and the younger making a marathon out of a single slice of pizza. When my daughter graced us with her presence, she ate like a normal human, favoring fruit, but with little fuss. As they grew, stocking the fridge and pantry has always been a considered thoughtful endeavor. Price, value, quantities and quality all factor in. Costco bulk for the cheap price. Farmers market for quality. Trader Joes for price, quirkiness and convenient, as it’s nearby.

All this escalated enormously when both my boys were in high school. Giant drums of cream cheese, four gallons of milk. Two dozen bagels. Costco became my weekly market. My kids work at the farmer’s market on Sundays, so I was glad to have vendors load us up with freebies on occasion.

 But when my eldest left for college and the dust settled, I found myself throwing out food. Milk would linger, crowding the fridge. Hummus went bad. I stopped shopping at Costco altogether and let my membership expire. Turns out it was just him eating almost everything, his younger brother just a grazer, and his eleven year old sister eats like an eleven year old girl.

I no longer knew how to grocery shop for my family. It felt odd to only buy a half dozen bagels and a normal brick of cream cheese, a half gallon of milk. With my eldest living out of the house, a muffin can sit on the counter for an hour or two, untouched. My daughter almost never has to leave a ‘Do Not Eat’ note on her plate when she leaves the room for a moment.

 She still needs to hide chips from her other brother, that will never change.


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