Air Pudding!

I understand that this economy is rough. We have all had to make sacrifices. Gone are the days of monthly pedicures and trips to Whole Paycheck. (Whole Foods) Even a day trip in the car seems silly with the way the gas prices are. I can fly to Orlando round trip twice in the amount of money it takes to drive there.

I have tried to be a conscientious consumer. We have all been told that we are killing the earth, blah blah blah. We have replaced a real reasonable amount of our household light bulbs with the ones that make us all look like Betty White. I always try to buy things on sale and use the occasional coupon. We are anal about recycling. I always carry my own grocery bags to the store. And when I do use plastic, I recycle it as well. I have not bought a paper towel in four years. (You can purchase lint free washable rags from any linen company for about 13 cents a piece.) If there was a reasonable and sanitary way to free myself from buying toilet paper, I would seriously consider it. Basically, if being green means cheaper for me, I'm on board.

What is frustrating, is that here we all are. Brushing our teeth with the water off, Turning up our thermostats when we leave the house. Doing everything to keep consumer prices down by keeping our usage conservative, and what do we get in return? Air pudding. 

I'm sure that I am not the only one that is realizing that our consumer products that we all know and love and have been using for our entire lives are changing. God forbid the owners/stockholders/CEO's of these companies take a hit like the rest of us. Oh no! They have figured out a way to keep the cost of doing business to a minimum and raise their prices to boot! They are probably making more money than ever!

The "air pudding" effect is a phrase my husband coined to describe something as having substance, when in reality is superfluous. A good example would be Lady Gaga, or replacing actual product with literal air. It started small. The "Campbells" tomato soup that I have been eating for years as my once a month tomato soup and grilled cheese treat, was ruined by air. The soup used to come out of the can much like cranberry sauce. It was dense and expectantly so, since the can says on the label, "condensed soup". You could add a whole can of milk to it and get yummy creamy tomato soup. Now it pours out of the can like the milk your suppose to add to it. They added air, and there is probably all of 1/4 the original product in the can. And as long as we are on "Campbells", my mother has a couple of recipes that call for Cream of Chicken soup. The cream of chicken has not ONE piece of chicken in it. As well as pouring out of the can like something not far away from mucus. It is slimy, not creamy, and I am sure everyone has noticed the air pudding effect when asked to bring the green bean casserole to Thanksgiving. 

Potato chips seems to cost twice the amount of money, and I don't think anyone is fooled by the big puffy bag. It has half the chips it used to. And your lucky if you get one whole actual potato in chip form, and not crumb. Air pudding.

I have used Colgate toothpaste for over a decade easily. The large tube used to last about 6 months and the small about 3. I brush my teeth twice a day, sometimes three. The last small tube of toothpaste I bought less than 5 weeks ago, I am struggling with to get the paste out. It looks like the tube is half full, but its all air pudding.

Not to be redundant, but after making my own tomato soup today out of cans of whole peeled tomatoes, I was putting my grilled cheese together with "Velveeta" (don't judge) and there was a giant hole in the middle of the brick. Air pudding!!

I read somewhere that when Frank Mars founded snickers in 1930 it did really well. In the 1960's however, the company came up with a business plan to make it the $2 billion dollar a year product that it is today. Make the candy bar just a little smaller every year. No one will notice a couple cementers a year. And raise the price versus cost a little every year. Remember when we were kids how big a Snickers bar was? It's easily half the size today! It's not as long, or as wide.

I know we are all suppose to really feel bad about things coming in big sizes since we as Americans can't seems to get off out ass a couple times a week and walk. There are all kinds of perfectly able bodied Americans that raise the prices at the grocery store by asking the shop to accommodate them with electronic scooter carts. Do you know that one year ago, I decided to keep track of how many people I see at the store with those carts that may be on crutches, or are elderly, or have cancer? You know what the percentage of those people is. 0%. I have seen more strong cancer patients rocking echo scarves on their bald heads walking with a basket than in a scooter cart. 

These product companies are making us thin; they are pioneers! Look at us! Our product has less calories! Less saturated fat! Or even the newest bull crap on the nutrition wave "whole grains".  Not that whole grains is crap, but I'll eat it in whole grain form like bread, or cracker. I don't want need or see necessary whole grain ice cream! But guess what, I'm not buying it. You don't care about me or my health. If you did, you would care about the economy and make the margins of profit the same, and not raise the price because your CEO can't afford his monthly hole in the water yacht excursion. And this is for you "Duncan Heins"! If I want whole grains, I will eat my normal salad and Triscuit lunch. Please don't change your bakery style blueberry muffin recipe to include "whole grains" only to disguise that you are now using chemically created sugar. Shame air pudding, shame.

We as the consumer deserve the right to our crappy food! It's comfort food, and hey Americans!, it's not meant to be eaten everyday. We have all seen the documentary "Supersize Me". And we all get it. The scooter folks get it, they just choose to ignore it. We aren't uneducated to the labels, so stop blaming obesity to that. In fact, I would like to see a fat tax. We tax other things that are bad for us. Why stop at cigarettes, and alcohol? We know they are bad for us, but darn it we are as entitled to them as we are our firearms. We are entitled to guns even though they kill people. Tax my potato chips another 30 cents, sure but keep the product the same. With 2 lbs of potatoes!

The rich people of the world are telling us that we the consumer are the problem. With our waste, and our gluttony.  Well it looks like it may just be the opposite. Tell me Campbells folk, if you kept the product the same and sales went down, would that be green? I say yes it would. I think Al Gore would applaud your public school attending children, and your Mercedes trade in for a Prius. 

No one even makes anything in the US anymore, so quit telling me I need to use one square of TP, while you continue to pollute the air with your factories of air pudding. So in closing, my middle finger to the product companies will be this. Tonight I will eat my final batch of blueberry air pudding muffins, and go back to making them from scratch. I will keep the water running while I brush my teeth, and used half a roll of toilet paper while extracting my "whole grain" product. Air pudding...up yours!

15 Seconds of Fame!

There are a few times in my life that I have felt really special. Like really genuinely special. I am usually watching enviously as the guy ignoring the "No shirt, No shoes, No service!" sign in front of me in line at the gas station wins $100 on the scratchers ticket. The passenger in my car with the second order gets the free latte. The person in front of me in line at the airport gets bumped up to first class. Usually, I miss favor by only seconds, but sometimes I catch it!

The day my husband asked me to marry him I was definetly special. The day my wedding reception was moved from the quaint little dining room to the roof top swanky PDiddy palace spot was also a day I lucked out!  All the way into the honeymoon. Where our hotel room was bumped to the top floor with a balcony and a view. I get drunk on favoritism. Now I know what everyone is thinking...Of course you get free stuff and get lucky, life is always easier for pretty tall blondes. (Not that I think that I'm that great, just that people have said to me many times...it's cause your hot. Oh yeah you..(insert special treatment here) happened to you cause your hot.

I will be the first to admit that there have been times in my life where I got favor ( I say "favor" instead of luck, because I believe that God grants favor to those who ask for it. Go Ahead! Judge away, but you may find a cynical attitude toward this theory may find you behind more winning lottery tickets and less parking spaces than those "lucky" people )granted because someone liked the way I looked, but it happens a lot less than you'd think. Then there are the times when I feel like I've just missed favor. I find myself on a movie set with George Clooney, and they pick the only other tall blonde extra right in front of me to be play a ticket agent. I watch her jealously as they put her through hair and makeup, and an adorable little stewertess uniform. I kept thinking.."Come on! I was so close!" moments later I am brought back to reality when I say to myself, "Are you seriously complaining! You are no less than 6 feet from George himself, you've looked him in the eye several times. Everytime they reset the scene he smiles, and your COMPLAAINING! Get a grip girl! This is one of the coolest things you've ever done in your life!"

But there is always a catch. Something really cool happens to me, then something really crappy happens. I got to be on a set with George Clooney, and I lost $200.00. Got a $300 tip from a customer, and my scooter got stolen. Since then the streak has continued. I fall at work and sprain my back, then I meet Brian McKnight. My car gets stolen,  got a promotion. Accidentally burned half my hair off with bleach, bank tells me they made a mistake and have credited my account.  Broke a laptop, my sister buys me one for no reason at all. You see why I was nervous when the following took place.

I have a pretty cool job by all definitions. This year alone I have met, John Legend,(pretty celebrity) Bill Belhemy (douche), Sommore (major douche), Brian McKinght (wonderful!), Bilal (cool and professional) , 88 Keys (WAY cool), a bunch of dudes from Tribe Called Quest, and I know I am forgetting many more. I get to work from home 60% of the time. This is definitively favor!

 I went to my first Elvis Costello show in Chicago a few weeks ago. And it was really fun! He was doing the spinning song book tour, that he hasn't done in many years. They have a vintage giant light up spinning carnival wheel, and he pulls audience members up to spin it. The song it lands on is the one they play. However, the show was at a very nice, older theatre. The crowd was older, and incredibly lame. They only stood for the few really well known songs, "Alison, Veronica, Pump it Up" and they didn't cheer a lot. Very lame.

After the show we waited around to see if we could meet him. And no such luck. He was annoyed after signing only a couple autographs. So as we walked next to his Cadilac beast and I was shouting "Great show Elvis! Please remember this face!" I know I sounded like a crazy person, but I didn't care.

Then sure enough we went to see him 5 weeks later here in St. Louis! It was much more rock show! He came out loud! And the pit was general admission.  This is why I love St. Louis. Rock show front rows are for the determined, not the wealthy.  So when I bought general admission seats, I was prepared to get my "shelbows" (My husbands word for sharp elbows: assume hands on hips and shelbow your way through a crowd...seriously it works!) out and get to the front row! I was dancing and screaming along. After the opening number, Eddie Vedder came out and did Substitute by The Who with him. People were goin nuts! It was a real rock show!

A very tall, very gorgeous women tapped me on the shoulder, and when I saw her I immediately recognised her from Chicago. She was the women whom Elvis instructed to pull people up. She leaned in and said softly in my ear. Mr Costello would like to know if you would like to spin the wheel. I squealed!

"I would love to spin the wheel!" She put her finger up to her puckered lips, and gazed down to her feet. As if to say "shut up before I am mobbed!" Then when the song ended she escorted me to the steps of the stage and Elvis notioned me to join him center stage. I almost threw up. I got that really tight feeling in my stomach you get when you cant tell if you have menstraul cramps or gas. He asked my name in the microphone. And then repeated it back several times. I don't know what it is about hearing one of your heros/crushes say your name, but I felt like Beyonce. "Say my name!"

When I was asked to spin the wheel, I thought to myself. "You got this! How many times did you watch The Price is Right with Nana? Grip. Pull up on your tip toes and give it all you got!...Uh oh, it only moves one way..(Wah wah wah..) The spin was unbearably lame! But the song was great! "Human Hands".

Next thing I know I was seated in the "socitey lounge" and handed a cocktail next to Steve Nieve. My chubby, hairy, favorite keyboard playing British nugget! I was then asked if I would get up and dance in the gogo cage. You can't imagine the feeling of relief that came over me. Before I was a bartender I gogo danced at a 1960s tiki themed bar for 6 years! If there is one thing I can do in my sleep..it's gogo!

By the time the song had ended, the nausea had subsided. I had a blast! I even got to meet him after and he signed my poster. Just as I thought that was the top of the top, the coolest thing that will ever happen to me...my stomach sank. What is in store for me now? Stomach cancer? Mugging?...Ooh I know, anvil!
I felt the nausea return.

Turns out my universal punishment for my awesome night on stage with Elvis Costello was jury duty..And not just called. Oh no.  I served on a criminal trial. Blog to come....still looking out for anvils though!