All I really want is....

How many times have your heard someone utter the words “all I really want is....?” It's a phrase we all have used at one time or another. Mostly when we have reached a point of absolute exasperation or just to end a conversation that you know is not going in your direction.

If you ask someone what they really want you will get a range responses from “all I really want is world peace” (well who doesn't want that) or “all I really want is to be happy.” I like that one but believe that I am generally happy and wouldn't want to waste a good “all I really want” on something that I could probably make happen on your my own.

Nope, all I really want is a pair of X-Ray glasses. Yes, X-ray glasses. Now for those of you who have begun to curl your lips and are choking on the word pervert, let me explain. Yes, when I was growing up my pre-teen and early teen years were torture. My sister was four years ahead of me in school and had many friends. Many beautiful friends, friends who looked like they belonged on the covers of magazines. So yes, in my youth, as a pimply young boy who had trouble getting the word hello out of his mouth whenever any of these friends happened by, X-Ray glasses were tantamount to buying your first car or at that point getting your first kiss.

I never got my X-ray glasses, (lucky for my sisters friends) it's not the kind of thing you put on your Christmas list because if I did I'm sure there would have been an exorcism performed the moment that list landed in my mothers hands. So years later, never having gotten them, I still want them.

Again, let me explain.

Last week I went to the doctor for my annual physical. I arrived on time and sat in the waiting room for several minutes. I'm OK with that, its a waiting room and that's what I did, I waited. Then I waited a little longer and began to wonder why they actually make appointment times if you aren't going to see the doctor at the time you were given. But things happen and I continued to wait. After what seemed like four days of waiting my name was called and I was taken to the examination room. The nurse took my blood pressure, temperature and asked me to remove my clothing down to my underwear and “put this on and sit up there.”

“This” is gown made out of paper towel. Not the good paper towel like Bounty, but the Shop-Rite brand paper towel that feels more like sandpaper, and “up there” is on the examination table. I'm good with most of this but I have an issue with the examination table. When I'm sitting on it, my feet don't reach the little box they pull out for you to step on to get up on the table. I don't know why it bothers me, but it does, I sit there looking at my feet swinging in the breeze and it just feels and looks ridiculous, and because my feet don't reach the box I keep sliding off of the table because the damn paper they make you sit on is to slippery. Oh yeah, the black socks don't help either. So there I sit, wrapped in paper, sliding around feeling and looking silly, waiting for the doctor who is now at least 30 minutes past the scheduled appointment time to arrive.

That is when I begin to want the X-Ray glasses again. I want to know what she could possibly be doing that could keep me waiting this long. Now I could just slide down off of the table open the door and ask the nurse where the doctor is but the thought of having to make the climb back to the top of mount table is more than I can stand. So I sit and wait. If I had my E-Ray glasses I could see that the doctor is actually sitting back in her chair, chatting it up with the nurses and probably ordering a pizza. That of course would happen in a normal persons world who had E-Ray glasses.

In my X-Ray glasses world, my doctor would be performing a proctological exam gone bad, I would see this through the examination room wall and immediately go blind, slide off the table, miss the little box, fall and probably break a black socked foot.

And continue to wait for the doctor to come in. Where are my sisters friends when I need them.

It's Gravy, Not Sauce

There has been for as long as I can remember an ongoing debate amongst people of italian heritage and even non-italians about whether the pot of red molten tomoatoes we prepare on most Sundays is called gravy or sauce.

Please, let me put an end to this argument once and for all. It's freakin' gravy!

Yes, it's gravy. I'm basing this determination on what my grandparents who came to this country over 100 years ago called it and the Urban Dictionary definition of the word Gravy which is as follows;

• the fat and juices exuding from meat during cooking.
  
• a sauce made from cooked meat juices together with stock and other ingredients.

Now for those of you who will continue to be non-believers and continue to call it sauce I offer you the following instructions on how to make “the gravy.”

1. Firsta you gotta maka the meataballa. Ifa you usa the breadacrumb in your meataballa stopa right here and madonna mia, go buy the jar of the Ragu because you noa real italian.
   
2. After you maka the meataballa you fry them in the olive oil. You don't usa the canola oil, you wanna be healthy you go eata the fish.
   
3. Takea the oil from the fried meetaballa and put it in a pot. Now you takea the sauseeege and put it in the pot. You cooka the sauseege and poka the hole in them so the fat shootsa out. Ayy, this is an italian recipe, you gotta shoota something right?
   
4. Remova the sauseege froma the pot and taka you bacciole (pronounce bra-joel) and maka the meat brown on alla the sides. Now you gotta watcha the braciole because you burna, you gotta starta over.
   
5. Puta the meataballas, sauseege and braciole ona the plate and let them sita. You gotta maka coupla extra meataballas and puta on the side for Antnee otherwise you gonna have no meataballas left for the gravy.
   
6. Now you taka the onion and choppa nice. Nota too much. Puta the onion in the pot with the oil that hada the meataballas, sauseege and baciole and you mixa up. Choppa the garlic nicea nice and do the sama thing. Santa Maria, you can never have too mucha the garlic. Enougha so you go to work ona Monaday they know you had the gravy on Sunday.
   
7. Next isa the tomato paste and mixa up, reda wine and mixa up, tomato sauce and mixa up, you puree the whole tomatoes ina the blender and then mixa up. Mama mia you gonna do soma mixa upa. Usa the wooden spoon to do the mixa and smaka Antnee's hands ifa he puts them in the meatablallas again.
   
8. Taka the basil, oregano, salt, pepper, cheese and soma sugar and mixa up again ina the pot with the tomatoes. NO CARROTS, who the hella putsa carrot in the gravy. We're a cooka for the people not a bugsa bunny.
   
9. Eh, and now you wait and watcha the gravy. You don't watcha the gravy you gonna enda up with the soup. Now you gotta soma time so you can call your mother and tell her you maka the gravy. You can call you sister too, but you know you gravy isa better than hers so you don't wanta to maka her jealous. Why she puts the veal and pork ina the meataballas I don't know. Wherea she get that from? Who isa this a woman? I'ma thinka maybe she's the milkaman baby.
   
10. After a while, donta ask how long, itsa while you gonna be patient now, you taka the meataballas, sauseege and baciole and puta them ina the pot. Eh, again now you gotta wait and mixa up. Uffa, Wait and mixa up.
    
11. Ay, you know the gravy isa done when the neighbor knocks on the door and asks “My word, my dear neighbor, what is that glorious smell coming from your kitchen?”
    
12. “I'ma maka the gravy, here taka the bread and dip. You tell me whata you think.”
    

Itsa gooda thing you made the extra meataballas.