When He’s Ten Feet Wide

What IS it they put in McDonald’s breakfasts?

I just ate a McMuffin, a greasy biscuit sandwich, and three hash browns, and I’m pretty sure I’m high. I can’t get enough of this stuff. The only breakfast I like better is a big Southern breakfast with country ham and biscuits and gravy. And jelly. And honey. And red eye gravy. And Dr. Pepper.

There has to be a drug in this stuff. It can’t just be grease and flour and eggs.

I look forward to this all week, because I diet every day except Saturday. All week long, it has been oatmeal, oatmeal, oatmeal, OATMEAL. I have breakfast with my dad on Tuesdays, and on those days, I have a tuna sandwich, because eggs are bad for my gall bladder. Once a week, I have to have something I can actually taste.

I stopped losing weight. I guess I manage to eat so much on Saturdays, it kills the rest of the week. I may have to adjust my calories downward. But I’m not giving up Saturdays. I don’t care if the other days go down to three hundred calories each. I have to have decent food on occasion.

Speaking of decent food, I had a magnificent Costco steak this week. I went down there hoping the local Costcos was one of the stores where they had started selling prime beef. Sadly, it was not. But I picked up some choice rib eyes, and beef grading is not an exact science, and what I ended up with was pretty much the same thing as prime. I pan-fried one for dinner, and it made my eyes roll back in my head. I think it pays to study the beef you buy, because you will occasionally find something better than the grade on the label indicates.

Dinner is pretty dull for me these days. Roasted chicken, grilled fish, pork chops, or pan-fried steak, plus a couple of boring vegetables that are low in carbs. The food is good, but there is no imagination in it. And it’s a little monotonous. Lunch is almost always a tuna salad or salmon salad sandwich and a little fruit. If I didn’t break loose on Saturday, I’d go insane.

Imagine eating a gorgeous rib eye with steamed snap peas and Brussels sprouts. This is what I am reduced to.

In my book, I advised people to cook steaks outdoors on a propane-powered griddle, and that gives incredible results, but lately I’ve been using a cast-iron skillet on the stove, right under the vent fan. The smoke has been tolerable. Seems like a piece of cast iron will start imparting a wonderful flavor to steak, if you cook steak in it regularly. Maybe I should dedicate that skillet to rib eyes and CFS.

I believe a Christian has to have self-control, and that means you can’t eat everything you want. Like Jim from SOTW says, it’s irritating to hear a big, fat, sloppy preacher with a 50-inch waist and giant wattles make the ridiculous claim that it’s a sin to drink moderately.

Why are Christians so fat? Is it my imagination? The people at my church look pretty normal, but if you turn on religious TV, you will see some real porkers punishing the pews. I guess we take the energy we can’t channel into other sins and put it into gluttony. If you’re letting your physical urges ruin your life, you’re sinning, aren’t you? How is weighing 300 pounds significantly different from taking drugs or being a drunk? I realize obesity has fewer ill effects on you and your family, but it will still kill you and make everyone around you miserable. Have you ever sat next to a fat person on an airplane? Do you have a fat relative who ruins your meals because of the way he or she eats? Do you have someone who makes it impossible for anyone else in the house to get anything good to eat, because he or she nails it as soon as it comes in the door? Do you have a fat relative who always gets the best seat in the car because he can’t get in the other ones? Fat people hog the bathroom, because they have to. They ruin furniture. Fat women destroy wooden floors with their tiny heels. If you’re huge, you’re probably making your family suffer. You should try to do something about it.

I wrote that silly cookbook, but it wasn’t intended to be a set of rules to guide you through every day of your life. I am fat, and I will never claim it’s okay, and while I will continue cooking good food as often as I can get away with it, I will never stop working on my weight.

Speaking of drinking, I haven’t made beer in ages, and I really need to get back to it. I rarely drink, but it would be a shame to get so good at homebrewing and then throw it all away. When you drink very little, you ought to make it count. Have something really good. I can’t remember my last drink of hard liquor, but I can promise you it was something excellent. I can afford it because one bottle lasts two years.

I wish it were next Saturday already, so I could hit the drive-through again.