Menu Planning

Many years ago, so many, I'm embarrassed to tell you, but it was definitely BGB (before giving birth), hubby and I laughed our way through Jackie Mason's hysterical one-man show on Broadway.  The routine that stayed with us the most concerned Jews and food and how we're always planning our next meal, even while we're eating our current one.  In the home of the SJG, this observation rings 100 percent true.  While hubby eats breakfast, I ask him what he wants for dinner.  His answer is sweet but unhelpful.  "Whatever's easiest for you."  What's easiest is take-out.  Not that I indulge that often.  Maybe once a week.  Maybe twice.  I refuse to be pinned down to an actual number.  Let's just say, at the Italian place I call weekly, they cut me off after hello, and tell me what I'm getting.  "Chopped salad.  Extra garbanzo beans, no meat.  Margarita pizza."  In strange locations throughout my house, I find all sorts of notes I've scribbled, notes that should exhibit a writer's brain at work -- character traits, plot points, story arcs, act breaks, chapter endings, dialogue.  Here's what I scribbled yesterday on a notepad from the Santa Cruz Holiday Inn Express:  "Chinese, Mexican, Italian, Hawaiian BBQ, Cuban."  Menu options for Tim's birthday party.  And in bold lettering:  "No cheese!  No hazelnuts!  No chocolate!"  Tim has allergies. These scribbles explain so much about me.  So I'm a little bit obsessed with food, but only when it comes to breakfast, lunch and dinner, and maybe a snack or two in between.  There are worse things to be obsessed with, like the state of the world, and who wants to think about that?