Food Blogger JR!

I could never be a food blogger. I am way too impatient. When food hits the table, my first instinct is not to reach for my camera. I am the kind of kid whose hand gets the parental pre-grace slap back.

But I have taken some foodie photos recently. See?



That's Kelly First whipping Shawn's huevos into the start of some mighty fine scallion pancakes. See how yellow the beaten eggs are from those free-range chicken egg yolks? Those chickens eat everything. We had chickens when I was growing up and they ate everything, too. Since my father was a baker, "everything" included things like stale donuts and old produce from the produce department at the grocery where he worked. Yum, yum.

That is the only photo I got of that fabulous dinner. Oh, no, wait, that's not true. I also have a blurry, underexposed version of that same photo, a photo of the table all set, and about half a dozen blurry, overexposed photos of Lewie, who was sleeping under the table all through dinner until I woke him up with the flash. See?



He's such a good dog. Recently, Lewie became the proud papa of a rubber chicken toy. He carries it around, takes it out in the morning, brings it in and puts it to bed, and shows it off when asked. It's very cute. I think if he proves that he can take care of a rubber chicken, he should be rewarded with a real chicken. It's almost Easter and all the feed stores will have little baby chicks soon if they don't already.

Anyway, here's another reason why I couldn't be a food blogger:



I don't take recognizable pictures of things. You can't tell what you're looking at, no? That is part of my lunch--spring rolls with tofu, basil, bean sprouts, cucumber, rice noodles, cilantro, and lettuce--a D.I.Y. dish at the Vietnamese restaurant that Dave loves loves loves.



This is the spring roll mid-munch, with some chile oil and soy sauce on it. Man, these D.I.Y spring rolls are good. An order makes about six big rolls. In Vietnam, that'd probably be food enough for six people. But it's one American-sized serving as far as I'm concerned.

I did, when Dave and I were traveling in Thailand, meet a young woman who had been born and raised in America but whose family was originally from Vietnam. Most of her extended family still lived in Vietnam and she was on her way there to introduce her new American husband to them. The young woman was Vietnamese-sized, very cute, very thin, teeny tiny, like, the size of a matchstick practically, and she told me that she did want to see her family in Vietnam but that she was kind of wary, too, because they always called her The Fat American Cousin. She was about half my size! I can imagine what they would have thought of someone my size. I don't think they have a category for that. Maybe they'd just call me an American?

Anyway, that was my lunch, six of those giant spring rolls.

The Vietnamese restaurant we frequent is a classy joint. How do I know? Well, there's this clue:



A big ol' gumball machine called Gizmo JR! in the foyer. I've never bought a gumball from this machine, but I am fascinated by the promise of this:



3 WAY ACTION! 3 WAY FUN! From a gumball machine, y'all. I don't know how you get three-way action out of a gumball. But one of these days, I aim to find out.