Warren Buffet Is A Pig

   Every once in a while, a dark moment descends when you realize you’ve inherited one of your parent’s personality traits. And I’m not talking about one of those endearing, make-you-a-saint traits. I’m talking about one of those character quirks you make fun of behind your parent’s back.

   So my dad, Charlie, had a quadruple heart bypass some fifteen years ago. He’d been in the hospital for a week or so, on the verge of being sent home, when he got a roommate. After the roommate came out of surgery and returned to the room, after he finally woke and got some wits about him, the doctor came in to talk to him. The doctor started his speech on what recovery would be like and things the patient should avoid, especially dietary things like eggs.

   The doctor told my dad’s roommate, “Cut things like eggs out of your diet.”

   And these were magic words to send my dad off and running.

   Dad interrupted (loudly) with, “Don’t eat eggs?!” Snort, snuff! “You mean if I eat eggs, they’ll kill me? Eggs!” Snort, snuff! “I eat an egg and it’ll kill me?” 

   You’d have thought the doctor had told him not to breathe air. 

   “No, that’s not--” the doctor started to say.

   “Chris,” my dad said, cutting the doctor off and pointing at my brother, “Go get me an egg. I’m going to eat it right now. Someone videotape this.”

   Everyone in the room, except for my dad, rolled their eyes. 

   The doctor said, “Eating one egg will not kill you.” 

   Ah…more magic words to my dad’s ears. My brother and I already knew -- “one” egg translates into “eat eggs whenever you damn well please”.  And true to form, since that day my dad, still kicking at 76, eats a hard-boiled egg every morning. 

   My brother and I joke around about my dad’s crazy logic all the time. Or used to until I caught myself in the act, and now this quirk is not as funny as it is downright necessary.

   About the time I was seven months pregnant, I had a craving for See’s Chocolates. If you’ve never had See’s Chocolates, I’d tell you to stop everything and go get some, but I can’t, because Warren Buffet bought the company and now See’s Chocolates are almost impossible to find. If you’re the richest man in the world, I guess you can buy whatever you want. So Warren Buffet bought See’s Chocolates. But even he must have known how piggy it looked, because he didn’t yank the chocolate from the world immediately. No, no. He discreetly pulled the company out of sight’s way.

   His first stealth move was to pull all the See’s Chocolate stores from the malls and put little wheelbarrows of the candy in a corner of Rice Grocery Stores, like it was an embarrassment to society.  Then, Warren took the wheelbarrows home. I last heard he drives around in a golf cart, stopping at mini chocolate stations in the office halls and factories of all the other companies he owns to eat a couple of chocolates every ten minutes or so.  If that’s not piggy…I know what is.

   When I was about seven months pregnant and Warren had yet to yank the chocolates from the Rice Groceries, I found a store in a hard to reach area of Houston. Had to drive two hours in clogged traffic, suffer the sweltering heat of summer, and parallel park to get them. Reaching Nirvana, I bought a pound and a half of the some of the best chocolates EVER and toodled home. Later that afternoon and me in a festive mood, I made crawfish etouffee for dinner. Life was prime.

   After dinner though, I didn’t feel so good. As time passed, I felt even worse. By midnight, I felt oh-boy-bad. Next day, still really lousy. So I called my husband at work and asked him how he felt.

   “Fine,” he said. “Why?”

   “I was beginning to wonder if the crawfish was bad. I’ve been sick as a dog since I ate it.”

   “Hmm…I feel fine. Maybe you ate something else that bothered you instead. What else did you eat?”

   “Nothing really. I ate cereal for breakfast, a sandwich for lunch, a pound and a half of See’s Chocolates through-out the course of the day, and then etou--”

   Dave’s laughter vibrated the receiver and cut into my train of thought.

   “What?” I asked.

   “Crawfish, huh? Sure it wasn’t the POUND AND A HALF of chocolate?”

   “Yes, I’m sure,” I said using my haughty tone. “Crawfish doesn’t mix well with pregnancy. It’s that or I’m allergic to it. Either way, I doubt I’ll ever be able to eat it again. Just the thought triggers my gag reflex.”

   And it’s true. I can’t eat crawfish etouffee to this day.

   But I’d still eat See’s Chocolates - if I could - but I can’t because Warren Buffet is a pig.