House of Subjugation

I thought it was over. I thought I would get my autumns back. I thought I would get my family back. I thought the days of falling victim to the annual hostile takeover of my TV by the National Football League were over.  

You see, as the season was nigh upon us, my husband, with the seemingly gallant charity of a knight in King Arthur's court, announced that finally, mercifully, we could let our cable subscription go and rely solely on the discriminating tastes of Netflix executives for our entertainment. Oh yes, there may be gnashing of teeth. Waiting months for new episodes of anything, adding Amazon Prime just for Downton Abbey, TLC marathon withdrawals, and more disappointments from the makers of Arrested Development.  But the freedom!  Oh, the sweet freedom from the unyielding tentacles of National Football League would be palpable.

And then, like a stranger in a desert who'd been offered a cup of water only to find that the cup was full of sand, I discovered that the Xbox 360 has a free downloadable ESPN app featuring live and on-demand sports coverage.  My husband is an evil genius.

But, as hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, I have thought of something eviler and geniuser. POISON! (with Brussels sprouts). I concocted a scheme to lure my husband into a false sense of bacon security, eventually manifesting itself into his most fearsome vegetable nightmare. ha. ha. ha. ha. hahahahahahahahHAHAHAHAHAH! And then he's dead.  (Not really dead-dead, just maybe a little gassy with a strange aftertaste in his mouth-dead).

When the time was right, I set out on a perilous journey of uncertain fate.

All I had on hand that pivotal day were petite Brussels sprouts from the frozen steamer package. This is as the universe designed, because now I think the larger variety would have given away too much by sticking out on the sides.  

First, I thawed the sprouts, then I started cutting them almost in half to provide space to stuff them with cheese or, as I like to call it, the "make any food taste better-er". I only cut a few because I wasn't sure how long the bacon was going to last since I intended to cover the sprouts--dorsal, ventral, and everywhere in between. And, just to let you know how diabolical I am, the bacon wasn't even regular bacon--nay! Indeed, it was bacon's evil cousin, the dreaded and feared turkey bacon. BWAH HAHAHAHA.

For 6 of the sprouts, I began the bacon wrapping process at this point.  To 6 other sprouts, I added a sliver of avocado.  To yet another 6 sprouts, I added slivers of jalapeno.  Once I had the ingredients that I wanted lining the innards of the sprouts, I encased them all in a bacon straitjacket, secured by a toothpick.  I sliced the bacon in half, both ways, wrapping like ribbon around a box-shaped present.  

Then, I popped them into the oven, and let the convection fans waft the bacon air through the house while I sat at the table, waiting, violent horror rap playing softly in the background.  

My husband came home to the alluring siren smells, and I knew by the hopeful look on his naive face that my plan was about to work.  

At dinnertime, I gave two of the sprouts to my three-year-old who immediately blanched at the sight of them. But I did not let this minor slight discourage me because the real target had just grabbed a plate with a focused, greedy look in his eye.  

I turned to finish feeding the baby and to hide my expecting face, and, after a few minutes, I looked back and found that all 16 of the remaining sprouts had disappeared, consumed by the man who had dedicated (in part) his life to besmirching them.  

But then, his feeding frenzy put to an end only by exhaustion and lack of supply, he turned to survey the disassembled sprout jackets on my daughter's plate.  A look of horror and regret began to creep across his features.  "Was there something healthy in those?"  

Revenge was mine!

If you have occasion to serve up some of your own vegetable revenge, or if you just like tasty food, please feel free to put the following recipe to your own uses:

Brussels Sprouts Roasted in Bacon

Ingredients:

18 Brussels sprouts (I used petite-sized, but any size will do)

4 slices of mozzarella cheese, torn into small pieces

1 lb (1 pkg) of regularly sliced bacon, cut in half lengthwise and widthwise

1 heart of stone

Optional 1 diced jalapeno

Optional ½ c diced avocado

Optional 1 muddied conscience

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.   
2. Carve an X into the stem side of each the Brussels sprouts.  Stuff desired amount of cheese, avocado, and jalapeno into the X. 
3. Lay two slices of the cut bacon on top of each other to create an X shape.   Place one stuffed sprout in the middle, and wrap both slices around the sprout.  Secure with a toothpick.  Continue with the remaining sprouts.
4. Place on a foil-lined baking sheet and roast in the oven for 20-30 minutes.  They are done when the bacon has crisped up a bit and has slightly browned around the edges. 
5. Salivate.  Devour.  Conquer your foes. 

Good luck!  I will leave you with the following transcript of the actual conversation that my husband and I had later that night.

H:    I'm disgusted with myself for eating those Brussels sprouts.

Me:  You should be disgusted with yourself for not having eaten Brussels sprouts up to this point in your life.

H:     I feel like my body's tainted now.

Me:  Maybe it's tainted because of the eleven pounds of ballpark nachos lodged in your colon.

Reason to Pant

One of the things I like to do since having kids is try to stay somewhat in shape.  Just a shade more specific than "vaguely recognizable as a human" shape, which is what I was going for before I had kids.

I really don't like to run unless there's a fleeing ice cream truck involved, but I do it anyway because (1) it's free, (2) it requires virtually no equipment, (3) it is accessible almost anywhere and in almost any condition, and (4) it gets me out of diaper changing duty for 30 minutes to an hour.  

I would forgo (1)-(3), if I could just get (4).  I've tried baths.  Does not work.  

The Couch to 5K program fits the bill for someone who is a beginning runner or an inconsistent runner, like me. You will routinely catch me in Week 1 of the program, having advanced and regressed alternately over the course of several months. I graduated to the Bridge to 10K program once in the last three years, so it doesn't feel completely futile.  I have found that paying a $35 entry fee coupled with some meaty humble-bragging to anyone who will listen that I entered a 10K serves as great motivation to persevere in a training program that I would otherwise scrap for an Always Sunny in Philadelphia marathon.


So, if I can coax myself out of bed before my husband leaves for work, I will run for exercise that morning.

Then, riding on the high of having achieved something any grade school kid accomplishes every day at recess, I will cap off the day with a little body weight floor exercise while watching Downton Abbey.  I'll do some girl push-ups, some triceps dips, some lunges, some squats, a few seconds of a solid plank. Then I will do this floor routine from an old Jane Fonda video that I memorized during that coming of age transition between 8th grade and high school. It consists of outside leg lifts, inside leg lifts, back leg lifts, crunches, a snappy attitude and a hidden agenda.

I do all this while my husband eats chips, reclines in the rocker, and critiques my form.

Not Suitable for Husbands (or anyone with discernible taste buds)

Tonight, I tested the vows of my marriage during our family dinner by substituting turkey for beef and cauliflower for potatoes.  

It all started when I called for my family in a fashion of what I hoped would be regarded as ordinary.  I was aiming somewhere between casual and indifferent.

With his plate protectively guarded against his chest, my husband first examined the counterfeit replacement vegetable like a coroner searching for defensive wounds. Then, with the painstaking precision normally reserved for such endeavors as brain stem surgery or nuclear bomb dismantling, he gingerly sampled a microgram of the substance, which confirmed his suspicions that the mushy white matter was indeed inedible--bordering on fatally poisonous. Then, with no further ceremony, he swiftly and resolutely retracted his fork away from the offending dish and advanced toward the peas.  No apology was offered; none was expected.

My three-year-old, bound by the "make a happy plate" clause of the "so you will grow big and strong" contract, calculated that paying the damages in an early bedtime outweighed the cost of compliance. In the end, she managed to strike a "three more bites" plea which commuted her sentence to time served.

The baby and I finished our portions happily, with disparate degrees of sincerity.  Me, with the maniacal defiance of a cornered pit bull.  Her, with an underdeveloped sense of taste.

Actually, I exaggerate. But I later learned that you have to steam the cauliflower for quite a while before it will be soft enough to mash to the proper consistency. (I had given it somewhere around ten minutes.  Next time, I'll try twenty.)  And then it must be seasoned and creamed to reduce the chances of cauliflower detection, although the more judicious of the vegetable opponent community will not likely be fooled. 

The turkey meatloaf tasted fine, but it isn't as hardy as its bovine cousin, so we were a little thrown by having to use a spoon to scoop our meat.  

The foregoing description, coupled with my limited photographic skills, paint a poignant picture.  But, in all honesty, I had a generous second helping of everything, and the baby ate better than she had in days. 

And yes, I use paper plates for every meal.