Smelly Food is Your Friend

Happy 20^th Anniversary to my wonderful husband Russ.  Ok, our actual anniversary was May 2^nd, but today is the day we are off on our two-week trip to the cool Northwest to celebrate what seems like a blink of an eye.

We chose to go now because Carter is off in Taiwan going to Chinese language school and living with a family who I hope are not practicing their English on her.  One of the tips for kids going on this program was to just smile and nod their head yes when anyone speaks to them, whether they understand or not.  I practiced this with Carter before she left, saying things to her like, “Would you like to eat these smoked ox eyeballs for dinner?” and “I think a dragon tattoo would look nice on your face.”  I don’t know how much nodding she will do.

Since Carter was five foot nine inches tall before she left I hope her Taiwanese family takes advantage of having her live with them and gets her to change any burned out light bulbs or sweep away cobwebs from the ceiling they can not reach.

Today’s dieting tip is less about an exact food, but more an airplane strategy since I am on a plane for six hours today.  I know that I have already blogged about airline travel, but it seems that this summer I have spent more time flying than usual.

The tip I am about to reveal is one I learned from my father when we used to work together in Canada.  For over a year we had an office in Ottawa, which was a two-leg flight for me and a three-leg one for my Dad.  Every Friday we would come home to the US flying together to Baltimore where we usually would part and I would catch a flight to RDU and he would go on to Charlotte and change planes again to get to Pawley’s Island.  It was a long trip so to keep the peace for the whole plane it was necessary to feed my father at some point.

The answer to the no food problem was the Bojangles.  As we deplaned in Baltimore my Dad would make for the fried chicken counter, buy a box of chicken and high-tail it to his next flight.  As soon as he got on the plane and sat in his regular seat in the front row aisle he would open his chicken, which would smell up the entire cabin.  Our co-workers who flew with him described the looks on the faces of the other starving passengers as they boarded, wishing they had gotten chicken for themselves.

One week I flew with my Dad to Pawley’s Island and I partook in the chicken ritual.  Here comes the airline strategy tip… when the other passengers got on the flight as we were eating our chicken, none of them wanted to sit near us.  Perhaps they were afraid we might get some grease on their clothes, or that they did not have the will power to be so close to that delicious chicken without having any of it, whatever the reason we got to fly with empty seats beside us.

I have since tried this experiment with other foods and it works perfectly.  Passengers will chose to make a scene and ask to be reseated just to not have to sit next to someone eating something smelly.

So today Russ and I have the exit row on Southwest, the only one with enough legroom for Russ to fit in, with no one sitting in the middle seat between us.  Our flight stops in Nashville and then goes on to Seattle.  As soon as we land and the new passengers begin to board I am opening up my salad with blue cheese and lots of vinegar just to see if we can keep this middle seat empty.  I am doing everything possible to make sure Russ waits to eat his sandwich at the same time I eat to discourage anyone from thinking about sitting with us.