Shake well and...

Peggy’s Prompt—shake well and…… 45 minutes—011111




Forty-five minutes? For “shake well and….”? Which sounds, at least at first, like the beginning (or maybe the ending) of a recipe for a mixed drink. Or a smoothie, the new “mixed drink.” I’m not a big fan of pureed stuff, except maybe for chocolate milkshakes. I like a little texture to my food. I like to CHEW. In fact, I will chew whether the mouthful needs it or not. I’m like a puppy. I need to get my chew quotient in each day or I’m not happy. Give me some crunchy crackers, some baby carrots, some honey roasted peanuts, and I’m happy. Give me something that you have shaken well and poured, and I’m not as happy.



Also that sounds like a line from a James Bond movie. “Shaken, not stirred..” All to show a precious kind of taste—good taste, excellent taste, exquisite taste. A little pretentious to suit me.



I have some friends for whom going out to eat is a specialized ritual. Extra napkins, please. Dressing on the side. Please, no ice. Can I substitute A for B? Could I please have HOT syrup, not what’s already on the table? Do you have real cream? Real butter? I’m going to need a doggy bag, please. Could you bring it when I’m served my meal? After a while, it gets a little embarrassing. Not that any particular request is so unreasonable, it’s just that there are so many. Then there’s the wiping off of the utensils. The placing of the napkin at the throat. The inspection of the rim of the water glass. The careful squeezing of the lemon into the water, then NOT dropping the squeezed lemon into the water.



How do you decide how much is enough? On the one hand, there are the people who don’t wash their hands after using the bathroom. Ewww. On the other hand, there are those who cover the toilet seat with paper, who turn on the water (if it doesn’t come on automatically) with a paper towel, who use lots of soap from the dispenser, and who open the restroom door with the paper towel they used to dry their hands before tossing it (the paper towel) into the trash can on the way out, careful never to touch the door with their hands.



Herb Zim, who wrote a slew of children’s science books in the 60’s (The Little Golden Book of…..Shells/Seeds/Snakes, etc.) once said that Americans destroy their first line of defense against “germs” by washing their hands (and the rest of their bodies) all the time with germicidal soap. He claimed that the “good microbes” that live on the skin are an army against foreign invader bad microbes, and that we constantly kill them off (the good microbes) by our incessant hand washing. There is, however, a lot of evidence that hands play a big role in the spread of many infectious diseases—the common cold, for one. So what’s a person to do?



Well this is nowhere near 45 minutes, and has little to do with “shake well and….”, but it did remind me, once again, that moderation is probably the best route in all things. Thank you, Plato.