I Ate a Banana

That’s all I did.

Of course, I did have my normal breakfast not long before that -- a bowl of Honey Bunches of Oats with milk, along with a bowl of strawberries and blueberries.

I eat the cereal because I like it. I eat the strawberries and blueberries because I believe they can offset the damage done by decades of Dorito binging. While I wouldn’t say I was the least healthy eater in the world, a steady intake of chicken wings, pizza, Quarter Pounders with Cheese, fries and potato chips doesn’t necessarily qualify as a healthy diet. I’m fairly certain the blueberries are compensating for all of that now.

Oh, I also drank water and took the usual vitamins, if you want a complete breakfast inventory from the morning of the great banana incident.

In fairness to the banana, my skin already was slightly itchy when I woke up that morning, but it was after eating the banana sometime around 10:00AM that my immune system shifted into overdrive. Red bumps formed in my armpits within minutes of discarding the peel and, soon after, that familiar tightness in the throat joined the party.

Trust me when I tell you nothing gets your attention faster than a restricted airway. It doesn’t hurt, but it is most definitively unnerving. One minute you’re fine, and the next you find yourself gagging on your own uvula and wheezing like a ninety-year-old chain-smoking coal miner with a collapsed lung.

Fortunately, I’ve had only one reaction so severe that I seriously considered calling 911 and it was a long time ago. My troubles in recent years have been comparatively mild, resulting in only slight restriction of the trachea and a few hives that hang around just long enough to remind me how uncomfortable hives can be.

I wish I could identify my triggers, which would enable me to avoid those things that set off an allergic reaction. Whenever I’ve broken out, there’s never been an obvious culprit, except for that one time I ate gumbo chock full of crabs and clams. They might not have caused my lips to swell, but they’re nasty and that’s enough reason for me to blame them. Unfortunately, I’m not entirely certain I have identifiable triggers. It is an understood fact that there are times when the immune system, just for poops and giggles, decides to respond to an allergen that isn’t there, flooding the body with mast cells itching for a fight with a foe they can’t find. And that’s the most annoying part of it – not knowing what to avoid, or whether avoiding anything will make any difference anyway.

So, maybe it was the banana.

Maybe it was the combined effect of the banana and the strawberries.

Maybe it was the lethal combination of the 5:45AM cycle class, the healthy cereal and the fruit, with the banana serving as the final nail in the coffin.

Perhaps all that healthiness is the root cause. I’m starting to think I might need to return to the dietary patterns of my unenlightened, halcyon youth. After all, I can’t recall the last time Doritos made my throat close up.

© 2014 Mark Feggeler

The Place Where Wild McNuggets Grow

Our first dog was a Dalmatian, which is kind of like owning a sixty-pound, beatifully decorated, maniacally affectionate garbage disposal on four legs.

Pepper, as we called her, never met an object she wouldn't introduce to her digestive system. A wicker bed, bark from a plum tree, asbestos shingles off our first house, broken Coke bottles, five-dollar bills from my dresser... You name it, that dog ate it.

One day she ate an entire tube of A&D ointment, a vitamin-fortified vaseline. Why somebody found it necessary to develop and market vitamin-fortified vaseline is beyond my comprehension. We had a tube of it to apply to Our Daughter's nether regions during diaper changes, because we were told that's what parents do. Pepper snuck into the room and downed the contents, container and all, resulting in several days of suffering through an excessively greasy coat and extreme sphinctal clenching.

Our second dog, a poodle named Lily, is much less daring in her adventures. There have been a few blips on the radar. Chewed window blind cords, a few strands of carpet pile when she was a puppy, and a candy bowl raid one holiday season are the only blemishes to an otherwise squeaky clean record. Unlike her predecessor, if Lily heads for something she shouldn't eat, she actually obeys if you tell her to stop, which is why her behavior the other night came as such a surprise.

It happened so quickly, I didn't even realize she had found anything in the grass while we took one last stroll before bedtime. We were barely outside long enough for her to squeeze out an ounce of poodle piddle, so I don't know how she managed to track down this particular object and carry it back into the house on the sly, all the while avoiding the urge to wolf it down.

Just inside the door, Our Daughter looked oddly at the dog and asked "What is Lily eating?"

"Nothing," I said.

Yet when I checked the dog's mouth there it was, clenched between teeth locked tightly down like a steel trap on a wild animal: a McDonald's chicken McNugget.

With fingers pinching the protruding poultry, my brain retraced our steps. All we did was cross the street, she peed in the grass, and we walked straight back to the house. How could this dog -- the same dog that takes no notice of squirrels and rabbits darting across the road not ten feet in front of her, the same dog you have to forcibly lead to kitchen scraps that have fallen to the floor -- how could she possibly have managed to root out an errant McNugget like a crazed pig foraging for truffles?

"Drop it," I told her in that deep, trailing, serious tone we all adopt when instructing domesticated animals and children to stop doing whatever it is they shouldn't be doing.

All I got was a sneering sidelong glance from a poodle ready for a fried nuggety game of tug-of-war, but I wasn't letting go. She eventually relinquished her prize and followed me hopefully to the trash can where she spent the remainder of the evening mourning the loss of her splendid catch.

Ever since, even though I tried to make it up to her the following day with a few pieces of chicken Marsala, I still find her lingering when we pass that spot across the street where wild McNuggets grow.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler

Quit Picking on Ronald

I read something the other day on Yahoo:

"550 health professionals and organizations have signed a letter to McDonald's Corp. asking the maker of Happy Meals to stop marketing junk food to kids and retire Ronald McDonald."

Not only did this gaggle of nosy nellies send the letter to McDonald's, they also bought ad space in six major metropolitan newspapers across the country, because nothing shows your willingness to engage in a reasonable and fair dialogue better than buying off the national media to stir up legions of simpletons who believe a single clown mascot is personally responsible for every fat kid waddling the elementary school halls of our country.

Since when is McDonald's responsible for the health and wellness of our children? I've always understood McDonald's to be a for-profit hamburger joint. Not only don't I expect a for-profit hamburger joint to help me maintain a balanced and healthy diet, I fully expect it to be there for me when I wish to accomplish exactly the opposite.

I've never ordered a Quarter Pounder With Cheese -- and I've ordered my share -- with anything other than a full realization that it was a less healthy choice than a spring salad. I've never thought of the rehydrated onions and flacid pickles on my burger as a serving of vegetables. I've never eaten a large order of French fries and expected my shorts to fit better the next morning.

But just because McDonald's isn't the bastion of healthy dining some people obviously want it to be does not mean McDonald's is doing anything morally reprehensible.

It makes yummy food.

It sells yummy food.

Millions of people eat the yummy food.

I don't call that irresponsible, sinister, or devious. I call it a solid business model.

And why pick on Ronald? Ronald never did anything bad to anybody, other than maybe creep out the kids who were scared of clowns anyway. Besides, McDonald's already shelved Mayor McCheese, Grimace, Hamburglar, and the Fry Guys. Cut 'em some slack and leave their clown alone. It isn't like he's standing outside the restaurant playing some magic flute that hypnotizes children into buying Happy Meals.

And are the kids really the ones buying the food? I'm pretty sure I haven't see any 5-year-olds breaking out their wallets at the checkout line. I can understand the happy clown drawing a kid's attention to a Happy Meal, but isn't it the responsibility of the parents to teach moderation by occasionally employing that sweet, simple word "no"?

Some quick online research shows the McDonald's hamburger imparts 250 calories and 9 grams of fat. Feel like a cheeseburger instead? Then make that 300 calories and 12 grams of fat.

Compare that to the Mediterranean Veggie Sandwich at Panera Bread, one of my other favorite restaurant chains. Mediterranean Veggie. Sounds healthy, right? It has red onions, green leaf lettuce, cucumber, peppadew peppers, fresh tomatoes, and hummus. It also has 600 calories and 13 grams of fat. And that pales in comparison to their Sierra Turkey Sandwich, which carries 920 calories and 49 grams of fat.

Now, I don't want the health Nazis targeting Panera Bread, or any other chain restaurant for that matter. And I certainly don't want to see the passage of any more ridiculous legislation, like the trans fat ban implemented by the Baltimore City Health Department. I was under the impression we lived in a free country. If I want to purchase and eat a spoonful of concentrated trans fat that's been twice-breaded and deep-fried in vegetable shortening, isn't it my right as granted to me by our Founding Fathers to clog my arteries with wanton abandon?

That's why I was thrilled to see McDonald's Corp. flip these busybody socialists the bird yesterday at its shareholders' meeting. The company's declaration that both Ronald and the Happy Meal aren't going anywhere has renewed my faith in the Capitalist system.

I've half a mind to drive down to our local McDonald's right now and order a Double Quarter Pounder With Cheese just to cast my vote of support. And I'd do it, too, if I weren't dieting.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler