So I came to the conclusion a couple of weeks back that I should probably flex my cranial muscles in the direction of something other than ice hockey just to see if they were still working, or if they’d like, crusted over, like some nasty vat of canteen custard, the beautiful fresh thoughts growing stale and cold beneath the congealed top layer of hockey-induced single-mindedness. So here was a project: write about something else for a while. I wondered what other so-called bloggers wrote about when they just felt the urge to write but didn’t have any pressing issues of the day to philosophise over. I think the ultimate nature of blogging, unless it’s topical or with some sort of purpose (ie reviews, reports, political-based conjecture etc) is the art of exploding the minutiae of daily life into glorious word-based technicolor. It’s the art of venting a spurious 500-word diatribe at a computer screen about the self-checkouts in Marks and Spencers, or why when you run for a bus, it’s invariably delayed, whereas if you’re more than a second behind schedule said bus (plus two of its buddies) will merrily fly past and proceed to quite happily ignore you as you pelt towards the bus stop at infarction-inducing pace. It’s the seemingly insignificant or meaningless things in life that some bloggers seem to cherish, expounding upon mundane follies in such detail you would imagine that simply selecting between a sweet or savoury pretzel could have some bearing on the future of the world as we know it.
So I thought, perhaps it’s time for me to try this. I was idly wondering about what such random whimsy I could spend far too many words over-analysing, and I hadn’t gotten around to wracking my poor neglected brain for more than a few minutes when it came to me, quite organically, upon debating my choice of dinner menu just the other day. I had rejected the more appealing option of an Indian takeaway, despite having craved it for a number of days, on the grounds of both money and detriment to health, but in absence of my urge to cook any elaborate dish (and by elaborate I was even including cooking some pasta and microwaving some frozen Bolognese to pour over it), combined with a lack of key ingredients, I resorted to the basics that were available to me: bread. And tinned pasta in tomato sauce, shaped like letters of the alphabet. I had in the past been an admirer in passing of the ‘O’ shaped variety of such tinned Italian snack, but this was a first. Damn Tesco and their special offers.
And so there it was on my plate. I’m not ashamed to admit it: I had alphabetti spaghetti on toast for my dinner. But it doesn’t end there. I was overly fascinated with the product on my plate and of course, I began to spell out various things with the individual shapes (never has an item of produce been so overtly contradictory to the old parental adage ‘don’t play with your food’). Well, you have to, don’t you? I spelt my name, of course. I indicated my preference of television programme (Dr Who). I marvelled at how readily available all the letters seemed to be. I had expected some letters to be completely missing, perhaps the more complicated ones for example like, I don’t know, say ‘G’ whilst expecting a surplus of ‘I’s, ‘X’s and ‘O’s (they’ve had a lot of practice at the latter, after all). However the spread of letters was fairly uniform. With one very obvious exception. There were loads, and loads, of ‘B’s.
I won’t lie to you, I noticed it when I first poured the can into the microwaveable Tupperware bowl, and all I could see were ‘B’s. I tried to ignore it, imagining that it was just coincidence. But as I moved the letters around the plate the ‘B’s kept catching my eye. Why were there so many of them? What could it all mean?! Because of course, everything means something, as we well know. Nothing at all in life can possibly just be a random event. It started to preoccupy me. B’s, B’s…. What is this tinned Heinz product trying to tell me?! Someone beginning with B could be significant in my life? I shouldn’t hate on Gareth Barry so much? I should support the Boston Bruins in the Stanley Cup play-offs (I had already chosen them over Montreal based mainly on alluring alliteration)? Perhaps Heinz are overly fond of the soulful stylings of the legendary BB King, and are undertaking a stealth advertising campaign on his behalf, trying to subconsciously influence the minds of impressionable young people and encourage them to buy his records. It’s a conspiracy! Of course. Why didn’t I think of it before? Actually maybe they’re just trying to remind us that baked beans would have been a better choice of tomato-based non-perishable to put on our toast.
So I thought, perhaps it’s time for me to try this. I was idly wondering about what such random whimsy I could spend far too many words over-analysing, and I hadn’t gotten around to wracking my poor neglected brain for more than a few minutes when it came to me, quite organically, upon debating my choice of dinner menu just the other day. I had rejected the more appealing option of an Indian takeaway, despite having craved it for a number of days, on the grounds of both money and detriment to health, but in absence of my urge to cook any elaborate dish (and by elaborate I was even including cooking some pasta and microwaving some frozen Bolognese to pour over it), combined with a lack of key ingredients, I resorted to the basics that were available to me: bread. And tinned pasta in tomato sauce, shaped like letters of the alphabet. I had in the past been an admirer in passing of the ‘O’ shaped variety of such tinned Italian snack, but this was a first. Damn Tesco and their special offers.
And so there it was on my plate. I’m not ashamed to admit it: I had alphabetti spaghetti on toast for my dinner. But it doesn’t end there. I was overly fascinated with the product on my plate and of course, I began to spell out various things with the individual shapes (never has an item of produce been so overtly contradictory to the old parental adage ‘don’t play with your food’). Well, you have to, don’t you? I spelt my name, of course. I indicated my preference of television programme (Dr Who). I marvelled at how readily available all the letters seemed to be. I had expected some letters to be completely missing, perhaps the more complicated ones for example like, I don’t know, say ‘G’ whilst expecting a surplus of ‘I’s, ‘X’s and ‘O’s (they’ve had a lot of practice at the latter, after all). However the spread of letters was fairly uniform. With one very obvious exception. There were loads, and loads, of ‘B’s.
I won’t lie to you, I noticed it when I first poured the can into the microwaveable Tupperware bowl, and all I could see were ‘B’s. I tried to ignore it, imagining that it was just coincidence. But as I moved the letters around the plate the ‘B’s kept catching my eye. Why were there so many of them? What could it all mean?! Because of course, everything means something, as we well know. Nothing at all in life can possibly just be a random event. It started to preoccupy me. B’s, B’s…. What is this tinned Heinz product trying to tell me?! Someone beginning with B could be significant in my life? I shouldn’t hate on Gareth Barry so much? I should support the Boston Bruins in the Stanley Cup play-offs (I had already chosen them over Montreal based mainly on alluring alliteration)? Perhaps Heinz are overly fond of the soulful stylings of the legendary BB King, and are undertaking a stealth advertising campaign on his behalf, trying to subconsciously influence the minds of impressionable young people and encourage them to buy his records. It’s a conspiracy! Of course. Why didn’t I think of it before? Actually maybe they’re just trying to remind us that baked beans would have been a better choice of tomato-based non-perishable to put on our toast.
But what does it all MEAN?!!
So there it was. The mystery persists with no discernable solution and I’m left wondering (a) whether my first attempt at this nonsense-blogging has been successful or not and (b) – ooooh, B!! – quite why the obviously vital importance of the letter ‘B’ in my life has not yet been revealed to me. I fear I shall have to indulge in a repeat performance of the alphabetti spaghetti-based drama in order to confirm whether or not my suspicions are correct.
Watch this space, my friends.
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