My diet has certainly changed over the years. As a kid I always enjoyed getting a chance to eat (among other unhealthy choices) canned pasta products like Campbell's SpaghettiOs (whether the regular version or the ones with meatballs or sliced hot dogs) and the different varieties from Chef Boyardee (stuff like Spaghetti with Meatballs, Beef Ravioli, Lasagna and Beefaroni--which was probably my favorite). Even back then I didn't eat this stuff on a regular basis, and it was always a fun treat to get to have some.
Times have changed and now I find it even more rare that I get a chance to try out this kind of stuff. Thanks to aging and trying to eat a somewhat more healthy diet I generally find that when I decide to splurge (dietetically speaking) on this kind of thing, or stuff like fast food from McDonald's and Burger King, I almost always regret it afterward when I feel all sluggish and greasy because of all the processed and less-than-healthy ingredients. I do still find myself wanting to try out this stuff every once in a while as a bit of a nostalgic taste trip back in time, but am almost always disappointed by the experience.
In the case of Chef Boyardee in particular (and the other stuff in general) I've always figured that the memory of these foods simply doesn't live up to the reality of what's in them and what they taste like. Well as it turns out, there may actually be a difference between the Chef Boyardee foods I ate in my youth and the ones I've eaten as an adult.
Chef Boyardee recently introduced "Throwback Recipes" for it's cans of Beef Ravioli, Lasagna and Beefaroni. Probably at least partly owing to being old, I'm kind of a sucker for most anything in "retro" or "throwback" packaging. I've bought cans of Mountain Dew and bags of Doritos simply because of the fact that they were presented in old-school packaging that harkened back to the snacks I ate as a kid. I've also bought some beers in retro cans and bottles--including the little stubby bottles that Budweiser and Coors have used in recent years, and the "Limited Edition" 1975-style cans that Narragansett has been putting out for the past few years. That can was made famous when it was crushed by Captain Quint in "Jaws". While I wasn't drinking beer as a kid, the throwback cans and bottles still hit my nostalgia nerve and I always enjoy getting that kind of stuff when I can find it.
Quint enjoying his can of Narragansett in "Jaws"...
...and then crushing it!
The funny thing is that, in most cases, the throwback and retro packaging is just that--packaging. Most of the products themselves remain the same, and are simply dressed up with packaging that appeals to earlier generations that enjoyed them in the past. The main exception to this rule that I've seen is the Coke and Fanta products (from Mexico), and the Pepsi Throwbacks that replace their usual high fructose corn syrup with real sugar. This does seem to make a difference in taste that is usually pretty enjoyable.
I'd probably pick up and try out the Chef Boyardee Throwbacks even if the throwback nature only extended to the labels. But they actually have gone a major step further with what they're calling "Throwback Recipes" that are supposedly the same as what was used in an earlier time. I haven't been able to figure out precisely WHEN the recipes are supposed to be from. I appreciate the fact that they're using old recipes, but can't be sure whether these are the recipes I was eating as a child or not. The good news is that this potentially confirms the idea that there's something different (worse?) about the modern Chef Boyardee products and that's what always seems to make them such a disappointment when I try them out now.
So, what IS different about the "Throwback Recipes"? Well, you're still getting a helping of canned pasta products, so obviously it's still going to taste like something from a can--as opposed to the kind of pasta that you would expect from home-cooking or something you might get in a fine Italian restaurant. But there ARE some interesting differences. First off, the cans promise "More Meat, More Cheese, More Goodness" than the regular Chef Boyardee products--although I'm not really sure if the "Goodness" refers to the quality and/or relative healthiness of the ingredients, or just the overall taste.
The first real difference is a welcome one--the standard high fructose corn syrup has been replaced by what's simply being billed as "sugar" (not unlike the sodas I mentioned earlier). I think the reason they say "More Meat" on the label isn't because they have added more meat to the dishes so much as the fact that they're ONLY using meat in the throwbacks. The new recipes include Textured Vegetable Protein. The regular Chef Boyardee meals certainly aren't vegetarian, but I suppose they add TVP as kind of a "filler" and a way to make them seem the same as earlier versions while removing some of the negative aspects of real beef (fats, cholesterol...). There's nothing "healthy" about Chef Boyardee products of course, but I suppose that they're at least trying in some small way. Which brings us to another change in the Throwbacks (and a reason why they are probably doomed to only being around for a limited time). For some years now there has been a big movement to remove trans fats from American foods. It's been a tough haul, but overall it's definitely a good trend. Personally I think we've had to suffer some amount of loss of flavor with this trend, but I certainly support the health benefits. Well, as expected, the current recipes do not have any trans fats (or at least little enough that they can put 0 grams in the Nutritional Facts). But the Throwbacks have actually added some of the trans fats back in. The label indicates that there is 0.5 grams of trans fats per serving. This is one of the food industry's sneaky little tricks though because there are actually "About 2" servings in a can of Chef Boyardee. So while 0.5 grams might not sound all that bad, it's actually 1 gram for the whole can (and who eats only half-a-can of Chef Boyardee in a sitting anyway?). Another refreshing thing to see on the Throwback Recipe label is that it includes "real" sounding items like olive oil, dried garlic, dried onion, beef broth and spice at the end of the ingredient list, where the regular recipe simply lists "flavorings". Possibly the strangest difference was with the cheese that was used (and this will could have the biggest effect on the overall taste). The Throwback Recipe uses Romano cheese (and it appears to be a pretty "real" version of processed Romano too). I don't know when Chef Boyardee made this decision, but the current recipe has replaced the Romano with an "Enzyme Modified Cheese" that features cheddar cheese! This would certainly change the flavor profile and would seem to make the whole dish seem a little bit less "Italian" in nature.
Current recipe label
"Throwback Recipe" label
The bottom line is that there ARE indeed some major differences between these two ingredient lists (recipes). Because of that there are also differences in the Nutritional Facts. Some of these differences look better for the Throwback, while others seem to portray the current recipe as being more "healthy". Of course this is all relative. Either way, we're still talking about Chef Boyardee canned Beefaroni after all! The more "natural" ingredients of the Throwback cause it to have more sodium (180 extra grams!), more calories (only 10 extra though), more fat and more cholesterol. On the other hand, the Throwback does have a bit less sugar in it. Another difference not seen in the ingredient or nutritional lists is the fact that the Throwback Recipe is more expensive than the current one. That seems to make sense, as this is a specially-produced variation that features different (and possibly more expensive) ingredients and a whole new, retro label. My local grocery store currently sells regular cans of Chef Boyardee products for $1.09, while the Throwbacks sell for $1.79.
Okay, so there ARE some differences between the two, but the big questions remain. How does the Throwback Recipe taste? And is it better than what is currently being passed off as Chef Boyardee foods? Well the only way to answer that is to try some out! And that's what I did. While there are three varieties of Throwbacks (Beef Ravioli, Beefaroni and Lasagna) I decided to pick one to do a taste test with. And Beefaroni has always been my favorite of the three, so it was an easy choice. I bought cans of each version, heated them up and tried them both out. It was an interesting enough experiment that I thought it was worth making a video about and posting on my YouTube channel. Please check out the video here to see the results!
Results:
At first glance there was some difference in the looks of the two recipes when poured into pans to heat. The current recipe looks a little more orange and the Throwback has more of a red appearance. The sauce in the Throwback looks a little thicker and seems to have more meat. But it also appears a bit runnier (kind of looks like it has some water (or other fluid) separation.
Current Recipe
Throwback Recipe
After heating them up the smell was pretty similar. The current recipe had a bit more of a sweetness in the aroma, but also seemed a bit less robust overall. But the biggest difference (not too surprisingly) came with the taste test. I tried the current recipe first. It tasted very familiar, and once again left me with the feeling that it simply wasn't as good as I remembered it being when I was a kid. I had always chalked this up to changing tastes and the fact that it's tough for anything to live up to the fond (and sometimes faulty) nostalgic memories of childhood. But now I had a chance to potentially figure the answer out once and for all. The Throwback Recipe thickened up even more upon heating. The water separation seemed to be just that--the natural separation of more "natural" ingredients in the recipe. It all came back together once heated up on the stove. The rich color and thicker sauce really added to the visual, and upon closer inspection you could actually see little pieces of "stuff" in the sauce (my best guess was that it was bits of the Romano cheese and/or the dried onion and garlic). That appearance wasn't found in the paler, thinner sauce of the current recipe. That sauce was very runny and didn't even stay on the pasta when you picked it up with your fork. It just left a light coating of orange on the pasta tubes. The Throwback sauce and meat stuck on the pasta much better. At first I didn't think there was too much of a difference in overall taste. But the more I ate the more I could taste the difference--and it was significant. The more "natural" ingredients of the Throwback actually came through in the taste (and even the texture and feel of the food as you eat it). I think the biggest taste difference most likely comes from the cheese--and the Throwback's use of Romano instead of the cheddar in the current recipe.
Closeup of the more hearty Throwback
An even closer look at the Throwback
In the end the Throwback Recipe was the clear winner. I'm now thinking that all these years of disappointment in my adult Chef Boyardee experiences WAS actually due to the fact that the recipe had been changed over the years. I still don't know for sure if the Throwback Recipe was the one in use when I was a kid myself, but it certainly seems to be a lot closer to what I was eating back then. We're still talking about a processed, canned pasta product, but I do feel that the Throwback Recipe is vastly superior (even if maybe a bit less healthy--if that's possible). While I don't buy this stuff often (and the Little Monsters really haven't had the chance to try out much if any of these canned pastas in their young lives--which is probably for the best), if I DO find myself buying more Chef Boyardee in the future I'll be glad to pay the extra price for the Throwback Recipes. And for a cheapskate like myself to say that, it's really saying something!
I generally don't write about famous people who have recently died. In fact the only time I've done it in the past was when I found myself surprisingly affected by Leonard Nimoy's passing in 2014. No matter how rich and famous they are, one thing we will always have in common with celebrities is that they are human--and therefore mortal. Just like us they grow old and will eventually die. The older I get the more I hear the news of famous people I've admired over the years passing away. Sometimes this news is more surprising and hits harder than other times. This morning I heard the news that Dick Miller died on January 30 at the age of 90. Dick Miller certainly wasn't as big of a name as Leonard Nimoy or David Bowie (two of the celebrity deaths of the past few years that have impacted me the most), but the news hit me hard nonetheless. Despite the fact that there is plenty of media coverage of most celebrity deaths I still feel it's worth writing about Dick Miller. As a result of the kind of career he had there isn't as much out there about his passing as there would be with a bigger name star. You kind of have to look for it. The only reason I even heard the news myself is because I saw a post that a friend wrote on Facebook about the death of someone else. In the comments somebody mentioned the fact that Dick Miller had also passed away. I was surprised to hear the news and went straight to Google to find out more. As an indication of how heavily the news of his death was (or more accurately WASN'T) reported, I didn't see any mention of it on Yahoo!'s home page when I signed out of my email a little earlier in the morning. Here's the top 10 list of "Trending Now" items from that page. Note that among the usual collection of celebrity names the number 10 item is the search term "Cleaning Bathroom Tile". At that moment more people were searching about how to clean bathroom tile than were interested in Dick Miller's passing. Welcome to the world of being a character actor.
Dick Miller probably wasn't what most people would consider to be a household name in the world of entertainment. To me that's all the more reason for me to be writing about his passing. He had a very long and very successful career as a character actor and, even if you don't recognize his name (or even his face), you have probably seen his work in a number of movies and TV shows. I don't know when I first saw Mr. Miller, but it was most likely when I was a kid watching monster movies on the WLVI Channel 56 (Boston) show Creature Double Feature on Saturday afternoons in the 1970s and 80s. While he was never a big name or a big star I definitely would recognize him when he'd pop up on the screen by the time I was a teenager. I probably didn't know exactly WHO he was yet, but I did know him. At some point (even though this was in the days before the Internet and IMDb) I did learn who he was and I became a fan for life.
The first time I saw Dick Miller may very well have been on TV in Roger Corman's "It Conquered the World" (1956)
Character actors are pretty much by definition NOT going to be big stars. You can't really be a versatile character actor if you're particularly well-known for your work. Because of this many of the best character actors generally don't become well-known, but they can become very popular among people who love movies and appreciate the work they do in so many different roles. This is especially true when a character actor does the majority of his/her work in a specific genre (comedy, film noir., sports movies...). Fans of that genre will embrace someone who appears in many of their favorite movies and TV shows. Dick Miller appeared in many different kinds of films, but was mainly associated with the horror/sci-fi genre. And that's probably why I have/had such an appreciation for his work. The roles he played were small, but they always seemed to be very memorable. And he appeared in a lot of my favorites over the years.
Mr. Miller also had the good fortune to be associated with a number of great directors who would use him frequently in their films. At the beginning of his career he was lucky enough to be a part of Roger Corman's stable of actors that he would use in all of his quickly-made, low-budget "B" movies in the mid- to late-1950s. For someone so well known for NOT being a star it's interesting to note that early in his career Dick Miller WAS the star of Corman's cult classic "A Bucket of Blood" (1959). His work in that film, and his association with Roger Corman had a lot to do with him becoming a regular in the films of fellow Corman "graduate" Joe Dante (who made a point of casting him in all of his movies). He also appeared in films by James Cameron, Martin Scorsese and many others. I think it's a testament to Dick Miller's greatness that a lot of people (famous and otherwise) have taken to Twitter to note his passing. Here's just a few:
There's enough love out there for Dick Miller that I don't feel I really need to add any more. He appeared in so many roles over the years that it's not worth chronicling his entire career (a look at his IMDb page will fill in all those details). So I think I'll finish this piece by just listing just a few of my favorite Dick Miller roles--the ones that really mean the most to me personally. Like any good character actor, in most of these roles Dick Miller only appeared in one (or maybe two) scenes. But some combination of his presence and the fact that these films are among my favorites causes me to associate him with them nearly as much as the stars and directors do.
Gremlins (1984). While I'm listing this as one of my favorites, it's probably my "least favorite" of those favorites. But nevertheless the part of Murray Futterman in Joe Dante's "Gremlins" (and 1990's Gremlins 2: The New Batch) remains one of his most well-known roles.
After Hours (1985). "After Hours" is one of Martin Scorsese's lesser-known films, but ever since I first saw it on cable in late 1985 or early 1986 it has remained one of my favorites of his works (probably second only to "Taxi Driver" truth be told). It's very funny, quirky and rather dark, and Dick Miller fits perfectly into the late-night world of the film. While his role is simply listed as "Waiter" I've always thought of him as the owner of the diner rather than simply a waiter. Small quibble sure, but a good example of how "unimportant" a character actor can seem that they don't even need to have an actual name assigned to them, and the role can be called simply "Waiter".
Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983). I'll admit that this was an even smaller role than usual for Dick Miller, but "Twilight Zone: The Movie" was a very important film from my early teen years, so his small role as Walter Paisley in the "It's a Good Life" segment ranks right up there. Walter Paisley was the name of the character Miller played when he starred in "A Bucket of Blood" and was a recurring name that he's been given in many roles for the rest of his career. It's an acknowledgement of what he meant to so many filmmakers that they'd give a subtle nod to him that most people wouldn't even notice in the days before IMDb (myself included). In this case this Walter Paisley is a textbook Dick Miller role. This character could have very easily been the same one who was found in the diner in "After Hours" above, or in any of the other roles I'm listing here.
The Terminator (1984). Simply having a small role in such a great movie and being associated with it has to be a good thing. But Dick Miller really steals his scene with Arnold Schwarzenegger in James Cameron's classic film when he can't offer the Terminator a "phased plasma rifle in the 40 watt range". He responds with "Hey, just what you see, Pal." Again, it's another oddly named character. He actually has no name, but is simply listed as "Pawn Shop Clerk". While again I see him more as the owner of the store rather than simply a clerk (like the issue with the "Waiter" role in "After Hours"), the biggest problem I have with it is that it's clearly a gun store rather than a pawn shop. Maybe it was a pawn shop in the original screenplay or something like that? Whatever, it's another small quibble with a great role--and a great death scene too when Arnold loads up the shotgun and quips "Wrong." after Dick Miller tells him "You can't do that."
The 'Burbs (1989). These films have been listed more or less in order of my favorites (least to most). And "The 'Burbs" does indeed rank pretty high among my all-time favorite films. There are too many "favorite" moments to mention (though I have written about the film before back in 2010, if you'd care to read more about it). But the scene where Dick Miller and Robert Picardo show up is quite hilarious. They are simply billed as being "Garbagemen", though Dick is referred to as Vic by Picardo a couple times in the scene. Most of the film centers around a small group of core characters, so Miller and Picardo are very much outsiders. Dick Miller's best line comes when the tensions rise and Bruce Dern tells him "Who's picks up this mess? Why, you're going to pick up the mess because YOU are a garbageman." He responds with "I pick up garbage in cans, not from the street!" It's a great scene in a great (IMO) film!
Of course my list here is just the tip of the iceberg of a long and fruitful career. I could go on writing about his small roles in movies and on television for hours. But the point is that he was a great character actor who did a lot of great work and will be missed. Here's a trailer for the documentary about Dick Miller from 2014, "That Guy Dick Miller" (which I still haven't seen myself):
And here's one more tweet that I think is the best way to finish up this little tribute to Dick Miller. While he only had a small role in Scorsese's "After Hours", co-star Rosanna Arquette remembered him with this touching tweet referencing a specific scene:
Okay, so when I made my mid-year resolution (as it were) last year to write more on Monster Dad I had a brilliant idea. I knew that even if I could get back into the swing of writing again it was unlikely that I'd be able to generate enough content to satisfy the four-to-five-posts-per-month target that I kinda-sorta set for myself. The problem? I generally only write detailed, long-winded posts that tell a complete story and which tend to take a long time to think out, research and (especially) write. I've noticed that many other blogs tend to be more in line with the current short-attention-span world we're currently living in. Everything today has to be immediate, quick, to-the-point and bite-sized. Blurbs and Tweets are where it's at. My brilliant idea was to expand my horizon (and blog post output) by joining in on the modern world. I've seen other bloggers post a photo with a caption (or sometimes just a photo, without so much as a caption to go along with it) or similar short posts that are insanely quick to generate and post, and at the same time very digestible for an audience looking for quick and instant gratification before moving on to the next thing. I decided that I would start to share things like this on Monster Dad. Any time I saw something that struck my fancy and seemed to fit into the admittedly wide subject area of Monster Dad I would simply create a short post and share it here. This has always been the kind of thing I've done on Facebook (there IS a Share button right below every post on Facebook!), but it always seemed like the opposite of what I wanted to do here--namely to generate new and original content that was actually mine. But content is content, right? I figured that I could still write my usual one, two or three long posts per month and at the same time boost my numbers by adding a bunch of quick and easy posts. It seemed like a good way to be more relevant and even potentially improve my standing in search engine results and such. But a funny thing happened on my way to becoming a "blurb poster"--I simply couldn't bring myself to do it. For whatever reason I just kept generating my own content, even if it was at a snail's pace. I'm happy to say that I'm still committed to writing around eight months after making that commitment, but also kind of disappointed by my total output. So today I'm finally going to publish my first "blurb post"! Ironically enough, since I've also decided to explain in detail why I'm posting something very short and easy-to-digest, this will still end up being a standard, long-winded Monster Dad post by the time it's done. How quaint!
The Huffington Post recently put up the story Generation Xers Have The Most Gen X Response to Being Left Off The List. Interestingly enough this piece is actually based on a Twitter post by Bill Evenson, and most of the body of the story is made up of Tweets and memes responding to that post. Sounds like this is another example of generating content by sharing something someone else did and making it your own. [Confession: I am NOT currently on Twitter. I signed up for it about a decade ago and then realized that it simply wasn't for me. I know that at some point I'm going to have to join in on the fun, but now it's complicated because of having a closed account and all.]
Anyway, the story is about a graphic by CBS meant to define all of the generations from "The Silent Generation" to "Post-Millennials" by birth year. The graphic was supposed to illustrate a story about crises being experienced by the various generations. But that little graphic ended up being a story unto itself thanks to being noticed and pointed out by Mr. Evenson. As can be seen above, CBS simply skipped from Baby Boomers to Millennials with no mention of the people born between 1965 and 1980--a generation known as "Generation X". As a member of that generation (born in 1969) I was curious about why CBS decided to leave us out. It certainly seems like an oversight. I mean, there were definitely people born between 1965 and 1980. I don't think anyone would refute that fact. And it doesn't seem like there's any real reason to dis, dismiss or deny the existence of Gen Xers. Or am I missing something?
I remember when they first started to refer to my generation as Generation X. It was the first new "generation designation" since the Baby Boomers. It seemed like a pretty cool designation too. I mean, it had "X" in it! It was a time of grunge rock, Nintendo and the early days of the Internet as a regular thing that regular people used. It was a pretty cool feeling knowing that I was a member of this newly-named generation. But now we're the old folks. We're the ones seeing the Millennials taking over the world and complaining about them. Perhaps it was a Millennial who created the graphic that started all of this. Perhaps he/she did it on purpose to belittle Generation X via omission. Or perhaps he/she was just being a "lazy Millennial" and was more concerned with where they were going to hang with their friends after work--or wondering why they even HAVE to work in the first place--to check their graphic before submitting it. Who knows?
Whatever the case, we now have this story to ponder, muse about, question, make fun of, laugh at, post Tweets and memes about and share ad nauseam on social media. I wasn't actually planning on writing about this story myself (it's already written about in HuffPost after all). My intention was simply to share the story and link here, let everyone who sees this have access to the original story and count one more post as being "written". But when you get right down to it, I'm still Monster Dad and I still have my own style of writing. Is it a style likely to get me legions of loyal readers clamoring for more and more posts? Probably not. But it IS me, and I AM a Gen Xer.
I grew up in a different time. Which I suppose is my way of admitting that I'm kind of old. We won't get into all the things I didn't have back then or all the problems I have with "kids these days", but it really was kind of different growing up in the 1970s and 80s. I almost feel like some aspects of my childhood were closer in spirit to the 1950s than today. Having said all that, I will also say that I never had my mouth washed out with soap as a form of punishment for the kinds of shenanigans that kids get into. That seems like a good preface for this little story (especially considering the title and the photo above).
I have written about celebrating New Year's Eve as a kid here before. In Happy New Year 1976! I was able to do some detective work to confirm a vague memory of a New Year's Eve party from my childhood. In this post we will explore another ancient New Year's Eve memory from around that time. But this one doesn't need to be confirmed through research--I don't think there would be a way to even attempt to do so. In the recent post Reliving an Embarrassing Moment from My Youth I wrote about something that happened to me as a kid that I found so humiliating that I had always kept it to myself. In reality what had happened was kind of a small thing (I wore two different sneakers to school one day back when I was in middle school) and I don't think anyone other than myself even noticed. I realized that my mind had categorized this as a traumatic event when it really wasn't. It was kind of a minor event that was built up to be something big by my psyche--and the blog post itself. It felt like I was baring my soul and putting something "out there" (airing my dirty laundry as it were) by writing about it all these years later. It almost seemed like a cathartic thing to share (maybe even therapeutic in a strange sort of way?). But I'm sure that readers were left feeling kind of like "that's it?"
Before we get any further it's worth mentioning here that this is another example of an embarrassing moment from my youth. And it's once again a quite minor thing that was more of an embarrassment in my mind than it was in reality. In fact I had never shared this story with ANYONE from the time it happened until probably 10 or 15 years ago or so when I shared it with my best friend and his wife. It was probably during a New Year's celebration of our own and I felt enough time had passed that it was more of an amusing kid story than anything else. Well, my friend's wife has gone on to say that THIS is her favorite story of mine from when I was a kid! So it's probably a good one to share here, now that I seem to be opening up and writing about all the embarrassing moments of my youth.
I was part of a big family. I have eight siblings (seven sisters and one brother). When I was a kid my family had pretty substantial New Year's Eve parties. They kind of petered out before I hit my teenage years, but I do have some fond--if hazy--memories of them from when I was little. One of the most important parts of these parties was the food. My father would go out of his way to put all kinds of interesting and exotic shacks out on our kitchen table. Frequently there would be things you (especially as a kid) had never seen or even heard of before. It was fun, but there was also something kind of mysterious and even intimidating about it. What is this strange stuff? Should I dare to eat it? Will I be made fun of if I DON'T try it? Not everything was exotic and foreign of course. I dimly remember there being standard cocktail party fare like olives, pickles and cheese & crackers on the table next to things like Vienna sausages (with burning Sterno fuel to heat them up) and chocolate covered ants or grasshoppers. Here's a couple photos from one of our New Year's Eve parties (December 31, 1977) that my sister found and put up on Facebook a while back. This is probably a couple years after the events of this blog, but certainly close enough to be a great illustration for the story:
New Year's Eve celebration 1977-78
Me partaking in some New Year's Eve snacks
In "Happy New Year 1976!" I was six years old. While I don't exactly remember when this memory came from I know I was quite young and it seems fair to estimate that if it wasn't December 31, 1975 it was probably within a year or two of that New Year's Eve. Among all the food choices on the table was something that doesn't seem especially odd or exotic. It was a container of cottage cheese. Of all the things spread out on the table that's the ONE item I recall in this memory. I remember seeing this clumpy, white substance that was called "cottage cheese". I knew cheese (especially varieties like American and cheddar) but had never seen something like this lumpy, almost liquid substance that was referred to as being "cheese". It certainly didn't look good, but it seemed like I should at least give it a try. The only problem was that...I couldn't get myself to actually go through with it. It seemed too off-putting for some reason (It looked gross? It seemed like something too "grownup" for me to be eating? It looked more like cheese that someone had already eaten and thrown-up?). Whatever the reason I simply couldn't bring myself to take a little sample of the cottage cheese and try it out for myself.
But it kept bugging me for some reason. I can't imagine that anyone who was there that night could have though back then that forty-plus years later that little container of cottage cheese would be pretty much the ONLY thing I would remember from that night. But it's true. Well, actually it's almost true. There was one other thing that stuck with me, and that's because it was (or seemed) like it was related in some way and would become forever linked to the cottage cheese in my memory.
Here's our kitchen table around 1972
As has already been mentioned, I was pretty young (and thus physically small) at the time. I vaguely remember being one of the smallest people at the party and able to navigate through and around all the bigger people semi-unnoticed. While that strange cottage cheese dilemma (should I eat it or should I not?) played out in my mind I kept seeing it sitting there on the table. But I also spied something else too. This something else wasn't ON the table, but was instead UNDER the table. On the floor under the table nearly against the wall was something white. My size made it pretty easy for me to see it hiding out in the dark. I decided that it was a bit of cottage cheese that had managed to find its way onto the floor. And then I made the decision that this new "floor cottage cheese" was my solution to the problem. I would sneak under the table and try out some of the cottage cheese in private where nobody else could see me. Why I felt that this was necessary when there was a whole container of the stuff sitting on the table available to anyone (including myself) that wanted to try some I can't really say. The fact that I couldn't bring myself to eat the stuff on the table seems to have morphed into the belief that I wasn't SUPPOSED to eat it. It somehow became something that I needed to SNEAK a taste of. It's almost like cottage cheese was an adults-only kind of a thing (like the beer, wine and champagne that the grownups were drinking).
Whatever the reason I suddenly felt a need to sneak under the table and try some of that forbidden cheese! Finding the right moment I ducked under the table--not a terribly difficult thing for a little kid to do. Once I was sure no one was looking I made my way toward the back wall and my prize. There it was--the mysterious and tempting cottage cheese. I reached out and picked it up. My mind didn't seem to notice that the consistency of this particular bit of cottage cheese was quite different from what I had seen on the table. It was solid--more in line with what I had traditionally thought of when I thought of cheese. But it was indeed white. Probably the only thing on the table that was that white was the cottage cheese, so this MUST have been cottage cheese too, right? I brought the object closer to my mouth and I took a bite. Well, it turns out that this thing WASN'T cottage cheese, and I knew it instantly (even having never tasted cottage cheese). No, this out of place object was actually a piece of soap. Why a piece of soap was sitting on the floor under our dining table in the kitchen I have no idea, but there it was. And while I have never had my mouth washed out with soap for doing something "wrong", I suddenly found myself in the odd position of washing my OWN mouth out with soap. There certainly wasn't a "reason" for me to be doing so beyond mistaking one white object for another, but in a way it almost seems like I was unconsciously punishing myself for coveting that forbidden cottage cheese. However one might choose to define my actions I had indeed unwittingly taken a bite of soap. And it wasn't a pleasant experience. Not at all. But it did become one moment of a long-past New Year's Eve celebration that I still recall to this very day more than forty years later. I can't say that anything else from that night was stored in my long-term memory, but that strange cottage cheese/soap incident is forever etched in my mind.
And as a postscript it might be worth mentioning that cottage cheese is STILL something that I don't like. Actually, I don't think that I've ever even tried the stuff to this very day. I don't expect that it will taste like soap or anything, but I DO still find its appearance and consistency to be off-putting. It just looks lumpy and gross! It might seem that the appropriate way to end this post would be by saying that in honor of finally sharing this memory I also finally went ahead and tried out some cottage cheese. That could be a good way to illustrate some form of closure or something, right? But...well...no. Just, no.
Okay, so maybe I shouldn't have started this post off with the photo above. It may have been more effective to instill a bit of a sense of intrigue and build up some mystery about what this "New Tradition" I speak of is all about. But you can't really title a blog "Elf Pants" without showing some elf pants, can you? Anyway, let's get to the point.
This little story about the genesis of a new holiday tradition for our family started back in August while we were at The In-Laws' house. And I should probably mention here that this "Family Tradition" is really probably only considered to be a tradition by me at this point. I'm going to try my best to make it ring true for the rest of the family...but it could prove to be a bit of an uphill battle.
The Tiny Creature is big into tiny things. Pretty much anything that is in miniature form will appeal to her. She has a collection of tiny erasers of all different kinds of foods and animals. She also still plays with her American Girl dolls. At nine years old she might not necessarily be considered "too old" to do so, but she did seem to be losing interest in all things American Girl a year or two ago (American Girl Burnout?). But then she rebounded and found a renewed interest in the stuff. I think the reason for that is the simple fact that American Girl dolls have so many accessories. And said accessories are all tiny versions of real, normal, everyday kinds of things. That's right in her sweet spot.
Some of The Creature's tiny eraser collection
The Creature is also very much into crafts and crafting. She goes to a weekly after-school art program where she makes all kinds of works of art. One of her favorite ways to express her creative side is through duct tape. Her grandmother has a large variety of craft supplies (including many different colors of duct tape) at her house. Whenever we're visit The In-Laws the Creature will almost always enlist Grammie into some sort of craft-making exercise. They have engineered a number of interesting duct tape creations. The most impressive of all was the duct tape dress they made a couple years back. Yes, they made a full-sized dress that the Tiny Creature could actually wear...out of duct tape!
Yep, that dress is made out of...duct tape!
Now that you know of these two interests (tiny things and crafting) that the Creature holds dear it might not come as a huge surprise that she enjoys combining the two interests by making tiny things when she's crafting. She really loved making boxes of miniature doughnuts out of Cheerios and putting them into matchboxes decorated as doughnut boxes. And you can make all sorts of tiny food models with that Sculpey clay stuff! But what does all of this have to do with what may or may not be a new family holiday tradition?
Tiny foods made from Sculpey and glued to a sea shell
Well, as I mentioned earlier, we were visiting The In-Laws back in August. The Tiny Creature spotted a miniature wicker basket that was part of a centerpiece display on the dinner table. It was just a little (1 1/2 or 2 inches across?) empty basket, but she really focused in on it and just HAD to do something with it. She grabbed some trusty duct tape and asked me what colors could be found in a watermelon. Next thing I knew she was putting different colors of tape together and cutting up a storm on a counter top in the kitchen. I looked down and saw what can be seen in the photo below. With no hesitation my mind tried to figure out what it was, and it came to the conclusion that The Creature was fashioning an elf out of duct tape and she had gotten only as far as the (red) pants and (green) shoes. It didn't occur to me that it seemed an odd thing to be making in August, and I also didn't seem to realize that she was actually done with whatever project she was working on. I just told her she did a good job and that I liked her "elf pants" (or something to that effect).
Then she showed me her actual finished project. It was a tiny slice of watermelon (with red fruit and a green rind) that was sitting in the tiny basket that had spurred on this sudden creative outburst in the first place. Suddenly and instantly I realized how ridiculous my "elf pants" conclusion was and I found it to be absolutely hilarious! I couldn't stop laughing, and the Monsters were also quite amused when I was able to get enough air in to be able to explain it to them (or at least laughed along with me to humor me). What I saw as elf pants was of course the remnants of the tape the Creature had used to cut her watermelon out of. But to me it was more than a remnant waiting to be tossed into the trash. To me it was a pair of hilarious elf pants and I now simply couldn't let them get thrown out. I quietly slipped them into my pocket with plans to bring them out once again in a few months.
This brings us to December and our new Christmas tree. We all went to pick it out at a local farm and brought it home on top of our car. Once it was set up I put the lights on it and we all decorated it with our collection of ornaments we've put together over the years. Nearly all of the ornaments have special meaning to us--from some of the earliest examples of ornaments The Wife and I got when we were first dating to multiple "Baby's First Christmas" ornaments for both of the Little Monsters.
Once it seemed like we were pretty much done trimming the tree I announced that there was one special ornament that still had to go up. Everyone wondered what I was talking about as I pulled something out of a box that it had been hidden in for over three months. Yes, it was the infamous Elf Pants! It was greeted with mixed reactions, from amused to confused, but I proceeded to find a choice place on the tree to prop up the "ornament" on the tree (as it didn't have a hook or any other way to properly hang it). And it has just occurred to me now that this "ornament" was actually considered to be the leftover material from an unrelated project--something that should have been thrown away and forgotten about. But now the "Elf Pants" are hanging on our Christmas tree and I have no idea what became of the miniature slice of watermelon that was the actual intended purpose of this combination of red and green duct tape!
We haven't really acquired many new ornaments over the past two or three years, but the Elf Pants "ornament" is now something that should become a regular part of the annual trimming of the tree in our house--at least as far as I'm concerned! Hopefully it will be accepted by the rest of the family as a new annual tradition. I guess we'll see next year...
Okay, so this isn't really about an important date in the history of the world. But it IS about an important date in MY history. If you were around 31 years ago, do you remember what you were doing on December 17, 1987? It seems like a pretty random date to pluck out of the air, and it doesn't seem like there was very much happening in the world that day which was particularly newsworthy. Obviously SOMETHING important happens EVERY day SOMEWHERE in the world, but overall December 17, 1987 seems to have been relatively quiet. Nevertheless it was indeed an important day for me, and one which I still remember, even 31 years later. If you'd care to learn just why it's so memorable for me please read on...
I graduated from high school in June of 1987, so that year itself was pretty important and kind of monumental for me (a bridging from childhood to adulthood). Upon graduation I didn't really have any idea what I wanted to do with my life and I didn't really have a good plan for the future. Most of my classmates were going on to college, but I had fallen under the spell of the Army recruiters who prowl around high schools looking for kids with no plan and no real direction. I enlisted for a two-year hitch through the DEP (Delayed Entry Program), spent "one last summer" with my friends and headed off to Basic Training in September. I had signed up to be an Infantryman (long story behind that decision), so Basic Training would take place at Fort Benning in Georgia. Having never flown before, taking a big plane ride from Boston to Atlanta was a pretty new (and kind of scary) experience for me. Needless to say, the three months of Basic Training were also a pretty new and scary experience too. I had left friends, family (and my girlfriend) behind and gone further away from home than I had ever been before. Three months isn't all that long a period of time of course, but you have to remember that this was all happening to a seventeen-year-old (my parents had to sign something to allow me to join up a few weeks before my 18th birthday) who didn't really have a lot of life experience, and was moving a thousand miles from home to get yelled at 24 hours a day while learning how to kill people and clean bathrooms.
After three long months of training, which included eight weeks of Basic and four more weeks of AIT (Advanced Individual Training), my company of recruits graduated on December 10th. Because of the timing none of us had yet accrued enough leave time to be able to go home and spend Christmas and New Year with our families before reporting to our new posts (I would be heading to Fort Knox in Kentucky). In what seemed an unusual move (but which was probably pretty common for graduates in that awkward window of time right around the holidays) they actually let us stay in Ft. Benning for one more week so we could go home for the holidays. It was a very strange week. We were no longer trainees, but didn't really feel like real soldiers either. We were still living in the same barracks we had been in during our weeks of training, but we weren't yelled at as much or required to do as much PT (physical training). They sent groups of us off to various places around the base to do work details during the days, but otherwise there wasn't much to do. I was able to read pretty much all of Steven King's "IT" during down time.
I also had a brand new Sony Walkman that I had bought during
an ill-advised 24-hour pass that the Drill Sergeants had given to
everyone who didn't have family show up for a mid-cycle "Family Day" in October. A
few of us headed out by taxi to the nearest city (Columbus), blew a chunk of our
first paychecks at a mall, bought some beer and got a hotel room for
the night. When we got back the Drill Sergeants confiscated all our new
gear, including my Walkman and the few tapes I had bought to play in it.
During that last week I listened to those cassettes over and over (I believe I had albums by Yes and Van Halen, as well as The Pretenders' "Learning to Crawl" album).
My parents came down by train to see the graduation ceremonies on December 10th, and they brought my girlfriend with them. It was so great to see them all. Other than that one special day I was able to spend with them I had been away from home in a strange place for three months. I spent most of that last week at Fort Benning thinking of home, friends, family and Christmas--which was only a little over a week away. The Pretenders' "Learning to Crawl" album was a relatively recent release (January 1984). It had a couple huge hits with "Back on the Chain Gang" and "Middle of the Road". Those songs were part of the soundtrack of my high school years. I bought the album mainly because of them, but while listening to it in December of 1987 I discovered the song "2000 Miles". At the time it hadn't yet become the "Christmas Classic" that it is today. Listening to it then almost made me feel like it had been written for me. True, I was closer to 1,000 miles away from home rather than 2,000 miles, but I was still about to travel a long distance to come home, the snow was indeed falling down (we even got some in Georgia that week!) and it was most certainly Christmastime!
Well, December 17th finally came around and it was time to leave Fort Benning. Those of us who had stuck around for the extra week got on buses to head to the Atlanta airport and then scatter to various parts of the country. I had made the expensive decision to fly into the airport in Worcester, Massachusetts (closer to home) rather than Logan airport in Boston. Doing that meant I had to transfer to a little puddle-jumper at JFK in New York. That was quite the adventure. I was such a novice at flying that I didn't realize my checked baggage went directly to the second plane (this was the first time I had ever had a connecting flight). I waited so long at the luggage carousel--thinking my duffel bag was lost--that I nearly missed my second flight. By the time I realized my mistake I had to run through the airport in my dress greens, wait for a shuttle bus and then walk out onto the tarmac to climb aboard the tiny plane that would take me home--in a much less of a smooth fashion than the big jets I had flown on up to that point.
Those are the tangible events that happened on December 17, 1987. I think that in itself makes for a pretty memorable day. But there was something else that happened which only adds to the importance of the day for me. I've mentioned that I was heading home for the holidays. As it turned out, being away from home for three months in such an alien and hostile environment really made me appreciate simply being home with family and friends (and my girlfriend of course). When I left home I was just a seventeen year old kid. It was only a little over three months later, but it seems like I had changed a lot. Up until that point Christmas had always been a special time for me, but it was really mostly all about the commercial side of it more than anything else. The only things that really seemed to matter to me were the gifts and material things that came with the holiday. As corny as it might sound, I really didn't get the "true meaning" of Christmas. But now, as an eighteen year old and only three months removed from home, I had really acquired a greater appreciation of that meaning. I had learned that all of the important people in my life were what really mattered. And the coincidental discovery of the song "2000 Miles" at just the right time really helped me to see that. Thirty-one years later it still remains one of my favorite Christmas songs of all-time.
