Spoiled rotten

As I read this post over at La Contra Revolucion, I was reminded of something I thought about – hit me like a brick in the head is more like it – the other day.

For all our bitching and moaning about work and having to pay taxes and high gas prices and how expensive things are becoming, we are unbeliavably spoiled. Completely spoiled rotten. Malcriados.

Case in point:

On Labor day, the Mrs and I decided to use the holiday to recharge the old batteries. No work, no fiddling around the house, no mowing lawns, no vacuuming, no shopping, no nothing. We basically decided to veg out the entire day. Do nothing but watch movies and grow roots on the sofas.

Undoubtedly, when you spend the entire day at home lounging around watching tv you usually end up spending the entire day with a plate of food in front of you. Whether it’s a complete breakfast or burgers and fries or potato chips and dip or popcorn, if youre just hanging out watching movies you tend to get major munchies.

The Mrs and I are no exception and on that day off we ate just about everything in the house. Scambled eggs and ham steaks with waffles. Cheeseburgers and papa fritas. Frozen pizzas. Leftover arroz con pollo. Milk and cookies. Cereal. Fruits. Cheese and crackers with cantimpalo. Tostones with butter and salt. Pan con bisteks. Speical fried rice with roast pork. Ice cream and brownies. You name it, we ate it.

In the early evening of that foord orgy – it must have been 5:30 or 6 or so – I once again felt the “hunger” pangs. Ill admit, it wasnt hunger, perse, but more of a “I havent eaten a thing the past hour. Lord Im starving.” kinda thing.

So I get up from my nice cozy spot on the sofa in front of the 46″ HD LCD tv showing the latest Pay Per View flick and head over to the kitchen. I get there, thinking how hungry I was as I hadnt eaten a thing in a whole hour, and look around.

I opened up the fridge and stood there staring at its contents. Two kinds of milk, homogenized and 2%, orange juice, pineapple orange juice, American cheese, swiss cheese, manchego cheese. Sweet ham, serrano ham. Oscar Meyer bologna, mayonaise, mustard. Pre-packaged salad: American and European. Five different salad dressings. Bacon bits, parmesan cheese, romano cheese. Three cheese mexican shredded cheese. Four cheese Italian shredded cheese. Leftover potaje de frijoles negros. Leftover pork and beans. Leftover chicken. Tomatos, green and red peppers in the crisper. Celery, carrots. Mushrooms. Pasta de bocadito, Philly cheese, cascos de guayaba.

I open the freezer door as well: Frozen pizza, four kinds. chicken leg quarters, chicken breasts, chicken wings. Pork chops, country style pork chops, picadillo. Fritura de bacalo mix, batido de mamey mix, heavenly hash ice cream. Frozen shrimp uncooked, frozen shrimp cooked. Frozen pork chunks, frozen beef chunks. Popsickles.

“Man,” I said to myself as I stood there staring that the fridge and frezzer. “There’s nothing to eat.”

The minute those words rolled from my lips I could not believe Id just said them. We have everything imaginable to eat at our home. Our pantry is chock full of canned soups, canned beans, canned veggie. Chef-Boyardees. We have at least three different kinds of bread, at least four different kinds of crackers. Boxes of cereal. We could probably feed an army with what we have at home. And here I was complaining about there being “nothing to eat.”

While in Cuba, they stand in line for an entire day sometimes for a freaken loaf of freaken bread and God knows when it is the average Cuban last saw a steak.