April 15, 2005
JELLO!
This is where I attempt to explain an inside joke because it has crept into my everyday vocabulary. I apologize in advance.
A bajillion Thursday nights ago, when I was still drinking my rum out of a sippy cup, a little ol' lady named Doris wanted to boost the ranks of her church choir, so she started making dinner for the entire choir on Thursday nights before practice. I mean, she cooked for twenty people every week, and they started to call it the Mission Supper.
(In jest, of course. These were affluent suburbanites, none of whom lived in a van down by the river.)
Well, Doris has since gone to that Big Kitchen In the Sky, and choir numbers have dwindled, but the tradition of Mission Supper continues. There are about a dozen of us who meet at the same house every Thursday at 6:30, and we take turns cooking. I like it cuz we can catch up on gossip, and it means that Husband is guaranteed a home-cooked meal once a week.
(I also love saying, "Oh, I can't do dinner tonight; I have Mission Supper." Because then people think I volunteer at a soup kitchen.)
Every Thursday, we discuss who's cooking what the following week. This is a reoccurring theme with us. During dinner, we ask what's for dessert. During dessert, we ask what's for dinner next week. Always looking forward to the next influx of calories!
Once, when it was the host and hostess' turn to cook next, we were all like, "You should do dogs and burgers on the grill! We can picnic! It'll be fun!" So they caved in to peer pressure and agreed.
And then, because we're all obsessed, we started planning next week's menu while we were still eating dinner. I'm telling you, it's a sickness.
"Well, we have to have potato salad."
"German or American?"
"American. We'd never agree on whether to eat the German hot or cold."
"And Jello, of course."
"Oooh! The orange with the carrot shavings?"
"No, the lime with pears and bananas."
"I have this great recipe that uses lime Jello, green peppers, broc--"
"EWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!"
"Dude, that's just nasty."
"What's wrong with just plain, red Jello?"
"Oh, fine!"
"Should we have bratwurst, too?"
"What should we have for dessert?"
"Brownies."
"With ice cream!"
"Naturally."
Meanwhile, the host wasn't saying much. Which isn't unusual for him. He's just a quiet guy, probably because his wife never stops talking. I think she can do that horn-player thing where you breath in through your nose while you're still playing a note. Cuz seriously, she never comes up for air. It's a good thing she's hilarious, or we'd have killed and eaten her long ago.
Anyway, we continued to verbally fantasize about picnic food, when the host looked up and said, "We have to have Jello!"
Pause.
BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!
There was much screeching laughter and doubling over and finger pointing, as you can imagine.
"We talked about Jello five minutes ago! Where have you been?!"
And his defense?
"I lose time!"
What the--? What does that mean?! Was he abducted by aliens without us noticing? Did he fall victim to a rift in the time-space continuum? Should I move my car? SO! RANDOM!
Now whenever someone brings up a topic that we've already discussed during the same dinner, we all yell, "JELLO!" (And with a median age of 50+, it happens more often than we'd care to admit.)
I also like to use "I lose time" as an excuse for... well, just about everything, really.
[You know, having your cocktail in a sippy cup is actually a really good idea, don't you think? I mean, for one, you'd never accidentally drink from someone else's glass, because you'd know that yours is the one with the dinosaurs on it. Also, no matter how drunk you get, you'd never spill your drink. Brilliant.]