by Bobby Jinglehorse
Dec. 30, 2006
Let's see now. Ah yes, the produce sprinkler turns on in 5...4...3...2...1...It's quite wonderful to see that Safeway keeps its greens leafy and watered with such regularity. There's something heartening about their outlook on produce that keeps me coming back. Hello berry patch! Hello apple cart. How's it going there, MacIntosh?
Bananas look a little ripe. I think I'll pass. Glad I'm not really feeling in a melon mood. Honeydew, starfruit....it was a bad phase. What's this now? A sight for sore eyes! My old and trusted friend, the pear cart! I know exactly where you are each time I visit, but I just can't squelch the childish glee when I see you. It's like Christmas and Easter rolled up into one.
What do you have for me today? Yes, yes. The trusty Bartlett. Don't mind if I do.
Ah, yes. The ubiquitous green Anjou. Dear friend, how your presence and fidelity has calmed many a long and stormy night after a split shift at Cinnabon. And your red Anjou cousin has always been a holiday treat, a centerpiece for the yearly fruit basket I give to the assistant pastor at my nondenominational church.
The forbidden fruit, as Adam and Eve may have seen it.
And what do we have here? A Bosc? I can scarcely believe the produce sign. A bold gambit indeed! Well played, Safeway. Well played. Keep the surprises coming. Maybe one day I shall see a Forelle variety from that episode of Yan Can Cook, or a Rogue Red. Or even the coveted El Dorado I read about on the internet. Yes, there is a website for pears, and it has enriched my life that much more!
Sometimes when I sit in my apartment, I throw on an Electric Light Orchestra album and weep softly as I ponder the fruit's hold on my soul.
Oh, it is dreadful, the wanderlust of my tastebuds! They cannot be sated by the conventional pear cart, however constant and attainable! How often I imagine myself, traversing the Atlantic in a wooden vessel of yore, reaching Cliffs of Dover and ascending to a solitary pear tree whose tendril branches offer me the rare Vicar of Winkfield, first recorded in France in 1760.
Yes, I suppose one could hop the nearest aeroplane at its tarmac repository and shuttle willy-nilly there and back. And for what? Fool! Nothing so desireable as a European pear can ever be fully appreciated unless one has months to think about it upon the undulating ocean waves!
How I even long for the pear orchards of Washington state oncemore, where I can scurry about the fields and sample its endless varieties! Alas, the statute of limitations on my felonies expires 3 years and 2 months from now. Wait patiently Walla Walla. I will be back soon, and your prodigal son will feast on your bounty oncemore.
And if my insurance scam is successful, I will soon take to the waves for the Vicar, with a fresh new tricorn hat to christen the voyage with luck. I suppose I should search out a Worcester Black and the Pitmaston Duchess while I'm over there.