It's Sunday night, and while I should be watching The Wonderful World of Disney while my mother sprays Hair-So-New on my tangles and tries to roll up my June hair onto bristle-y rollers, instead I am writing you.
Isn't it funny how some small, stupid thing from your childhood informs the entire rest of your life? I remember that sinking feeling of it being Sunday. I'll bet if you sprayed the scent of any Hair-So-New near me I'd feel it all the more.
Creme rinse. When did we all stop saying "creme rinse"? Probably about the same time we all stopped asking for Seven Seasons Italian Dressing. Green Goddess.
Hey, are we out of Wish Bone?
We are, but we've got some Catalina left.
This is why you shouldn't let me talk to you on Sunday night, when I've got the whole evening in front of me, with nary a man to distract me, and my mind to wander all over yonder.
Speaking of which, I went on a date this weekend. My first since being back on this exciting dating-in-your-50s scene, and probably my last for awhile. I'm just not ready. I had another date with another person scheduled for Monday night, and I've canceled it. There's no point in me even trying to get it up for another man till I'm good and done with thinking about Ned. Whom I miss all the goddamn time. I don't know what's wrong with me. It's like missing the blitz.
Oh, but the reason I'm writing you on Sunday is not only to avoid my mom and her bristle rollers, but also because I have to get up early tomorrow and go to the doctor. Cel-a-brate good times, come on! Sadly, that's like the 86th time I've sung that line that this week, which only tells you how riveting my life has become.
You know how my throat keeps feeling like it's swollen, and it drives me berserk, and I went to the doctor these past two weeks in a row so he could stick scary things down my gizzard? He says maybe part of my problem is I have allergies.
"Do you have allergies, June?"
"No," I said, "I don't think so. I mean, my eyes water when I walk outside, and half the time I think I'm getting a cold but it's just that my throat gets irritated. Oh, and both my parents are deathly allergic to cats and I have three."
"You're going to get tested for allergies," he said, sending me next door, where they probably have some sort of racket going with the EENT place. I'm hoping they'll tell me I'm NOT, in fact, allergic to grapefruit, a thing they told me 10 years ago when I last got allergy tests back in LA. I miss grapefruit. I know my mouth always felt funny after I ate it, but that could have been the weather or muscle or something.
You know how you diet and work out constantly and you lose zero weight and some asswipe always tells you you're building muscle, which weighs more, and you know that can't possibly be true? I was trying that as the excuse for my grapefruit mouth. How's it working?
Anyway, I'm kind of excited to learn about my allergies. Back in LA I was allergic to a bunch of LA-ish trees. And this is the allergy capitol of America, did you know that? Go, me.
Now I'm sort of thinking about '70s food.
"Can we get Wrapples? No, it's NOT just the same to melt caramel in a stupid pan, MOM."
In what way do you mean "MSG in a box"?
This was the sort of shit my mother, who never once let me have any fun, would expressly forbid, so I'd get Gramma to buy it for her house. As I recall, Fruit Float was absolutely fekking delicious.
Yes, God. Oh, I could go for a big glass of this right now. You had to puncture the can, remember?
Once in the 2000s I was craving these, and Marvin found them online and had them shipped to me from Australia. They were just as delicious and non-food-y tasting as I'd recalled.
"Chocolate flavor" is always a good sign.
"Let's take Ding-Dongs and make them offensive!"
I've talked with people about Ding-Dongs before. Not every region had them. They were the WONDERFUL and DID I SAY WONDERFUL YET snacks, above, only not inexplicably Native American. I don't know when they decided to switch over to injun snacks, which were acutely necessary.
Remember when this was the Doritos flavor? Then they came out with nacho cheese flavor, and it just TOOK OVER. Same with how you used to be able to get a Quarter Pounder or a Quarter Pounder with Cheese. It was a choice. Then apparently every chubby American in the world (hey, that made sense, June) ordered it with cheese, because now you have no choice. YOU MUST TAKE CHEESE.
Good gravy, now I'm starving.
I.LOVED.THESE. What's with everything having a baseball card inside it? Maybe that's what's in my throat. A baseball card.
I have to go now, and eat every single thing in my kitchen. Which is not good as I am currently low on funds and did some poor-person grocery shopping this weekend. Things like a tub of popcorn, a thing of rice, a bunch of almonds. All my food is in the beige/off-white category for the week. It's very '70s. And now we've come full circle.
Holy god, I miss the '70s.
Processed-ly,
June
