making a sandwich

It is a spectacularly beautiful day. The sun is out. A sweet sweet breeze is blowing through the house. I've had no electric light on yet. It is also a summer Saturday, which, if i were in the Nashville Biffle House right now, would mean one of three things on the lunch menu:

pimento cheese, tuna salad or egg sandwiches.

I was never a lover of pimento cheese, but alison and several of her friends have sung the praises of my dad's pimento cheese--one person even calling a few years back to ask for the recipe. (one of the secrets i'll let you in on is pickle juice, another one is the cheese: My Dad inadvertantly says some really funny things, but this one might have been the funniest: When i called to ask for the recipe for that friend Daddy vociferously insisted you needed a "Good Quality American Cheese") .

Tuna salad was never really all that good to me, either. I love it nowadays because i put curry in it. Even if my folks knew what curry was i figure they'd think it was un-christian. So no curried tuna salad as a kid.

Egg sandwiches. Now that's what i liked. So that's what i've made today. It isn't faithful to the Biffle version, and it differs in several astounding ways.

First off, let me tell you this: every once in a while i'll be in a conversation with someone and they'll mention something that, inexplicably, i just don't feel right about. I've noticed it's usually some yet-uninvestigated vestige from my very conservative up-bringing. So, like, one time someone mentioned that they were having a dead relative cremated. I remember thinking something like, "oh no. They might go to hell for that." I've checked with Mama and Daddy on it, but they said they didn't teach me that. I'm not sure about, though. I picked it up somewhere.


Anyway, the reason i tell you this is because of all the rule breaking i did to make this sandwich--things that would have never happened in the Biffle household. First off, the ingredients: whole wheat bread, sliced tomato, avocado, fried egg, homegrown sprouts and mayo.

rules followed/broken:

whole wheat bread---good.
avocado-------------ava whato?
egg fried in real butter------who are you, a Rockefeller?
homegrown sprouts-------a sure ticket to hippie hell.
mayo---------sweet nectar of the gods. my family puts mayo on barbeque. an unknown, fourth wise man brought mayo to baby jesus in the manger.

two biggies: i salted the tomato. (and with Old Bay!) and finally--drumroll please---i cut off the bread crust.

horror of horrors.


i've eaten the sandwich now as i've typed. It was delicious. The day is still beautiful, but i can't seem to shake that fancied sound of hellhounds I've let loose upon my trail.

(oh. and one more thing as a jab at Deandre and perhaps Eliza: i cut the tomato on a cutting board from which i didn't first bother to clean off some cheese mold.)