Cinemorphosis

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  • Perkatory

    Perkatory

    Every morning at 6 sharp, like some deranged caffeinated monk, I stagger to the kitchen, where the sacred rite of coffee-making begins. This isn’t just a routine—it’s a holy sacrament that grants me the powers of focus, confidence, and the kind of superhuman alertness that helps me work on one of my best-selling coffee table humor books or grade college essays. The taste of that bitter coffee kissed with a hint of milk and a drop of liquid stevia, is nothing short of ambrosia. By 7 a.m., after downing two 18-ounce cups, I’ve ascended to a higher plane—a realm where I’m not just a man, but a writing, essay-grading, piano-playing, kettlebell-swinging demigod. I go through my day, shower, lunch, nap—rinse and repeat—like a well-oiled machine of productivity, albeit one lugging around a trunkful of neuroses and the social skills of a startled raccoon.

    But there’s this nagging little itch I can’t quite scratch: coffee. It’s more than just a drink at this point; it’s an obsession. Do I love coffee too much? Maybe. Do I worship the ritual a bit too fervently? Definitely. Throughout the day, this thought keeps tiptoeing into my mind like a ninja with a vendetta: “I can’t wait till tomorrow morning when I can make coffee again.” And then, the existential kicker: “Is my life just one endless loop of killing time between coffee sessions?”

    Pat myself on the back: I’ve crossed into a special kind of hell—a hell I’ve christened Perkatory. It’s not quite purgatory, but it’s close. It’s that torturous stretch of time where I’m just existing, dragging myself through the mind-numbing hours between one glorious cup of coffee and the next. It’s a slow-burning obsession that has taken over my life, turning everything else into the dull, gray filler content I’d skip if life had a fast-forward button.

    I remember those bleak, pre-coffee days of my youth—days when Perkatory wasn’t even a thing. Back then, life was simpler, more innocent, and tragically devoid of the caffeinated highs I now chase with the zeal of a junkie trying to recapture that first, glorious hit. But let’s be honest: there’s no going back. Perkatory is here to stay, like that annoying roommate who never does the dishes and steals your leftovers. I’m stuck in this never-ending cycle of waiting, longing, and counting down the hours until I can get my next hit of that sweet, sweet java.

  • Transforming into Mope-a-saurus Rex

    Transforming into Mope-a-saurus Rex

    There’s ongoing debate over whether boomers willingly morph into Mope-a-saurus Rex—the scowling relic pacing his lawn and muttering about “kids these days”—or if the transformation is as unavoidable as hair loss and rising cholesterol. Maybe it’s some grim milestone on the aging checklist, or maybe it sneaks up, the natural side effect of realizing your cultural currency has expired while the youth livestream their way into the future. I’ll leave that existential puzzle for the philosophers to untangle.

    What I do know is that by the time Thanksgiving rolled around, I was still carrying the weight of grief like an overstuffed holiday plate. I’d said goodbye to my mother during the pandemic, standing outside a nursing home window and offering her love through a mesh screen, as if I were visiting someone in solitary confinement. Two years later, I watched my father—a proud infantryman in his day—fade to 130 pounds, his body surrendering to cancer. Since their passing, the world felt quieter, smaller, like someone had dimmed the lights without warning.

    So, when hosting Thanksgiving fell squarely on my plate, it wasn’t some Norman Rockwell fantasy. It was more like getting crushed by a baby grand piano dropped from the second floor. And instead of gracefully stepping aside, I just let it hit me—because honestly, moving felt like too much effort.

    The guest list wasn’t exactly daunting—just my perpetually single brother, whose dating apps seemed better at generating cautionary tales than romantic prospects, and two of my wife’s teacher friends, both middle school band directors still recovering from clarinet-induced PTSD. The conversation was polite, though it had all the flavor of plain oatmeal.

    Stuffed to the gills but somehow still shoveling pie like our lives depended on it, we trudged through the ritual of TV show recommendations. Each suggestion was delivered with the gravitas of a public service announcement—skip this series at your own peril. Apparently, failing to watch that one obscure, eight-part masterpiece would leave me culturally destitute, wandering through a desolate landscape devoid of punchlines and plot twists.

    Honestly, I enjoyed the company. The real villain of Thanksgiving wasn’t the guests—it was the dishes. The endless scrubbing that left my hands raw, the dishwashing marathon that stretched into eternity, the mountain of dirty plates multiplying like gremlins in the sink. That’s where the wheels came off.

    My wife, meanwhile, glided through the chaos like some kind of culinary sorceress, humming softly as she orchestrated the entire meal with the grace of a Michelin-starred maestro. She didn’t grumble. Not a single passive-aggressive sigh escaped her lips. She was the picture of serene competence.

    I, on the other hand, hovered around the kitchen like a useless NPC in a video game—occasionally moving a plate from table to sink and acting as though I’d just conquered Everest. At one point, I genuinely felt winded after rearranging the silverware. My contribution was so meager it felt performative, like a child pretending to be tired after “helping” Dad mow the lawn by pushing a plastic toy mower ten feet behind him.

    Somewhere between rinsing the roasting pan and glaring at the pile of silverware, it hit me—I was teetering on the edge of a Mope-a-saurus moment. The only thing preventing my full transformation was the vague sense of shame that my wife, who had just cooked for hours, wasn’t grumbling about the aftermath. That’s when you know you’re in trouble—when someone else’s superior competence and good cheer makes you feel like a defective appliance, sputtering through life with a flickering power cord and a weak motor.

    I’m such a fragile soul that after surviving the harrowing gauntlet of Thanksgiving dishes and the Herculean task of small talk, I felt entitled to a months-long convalescence—something involving soft blankets, intravenous fluids, and a team of specialists monitoring my vitals like I’d just summited Kilimanjaro in flip-flops. Surely, I had earned the right to collapse melodramatically onto a fainting couch and demand chicken soup by candlelight.

  • Never Insult Your Guests with Mock Apple Pie

    Never Insult Your Guests with Mock Apple Pie

    One fateful evening in 1982, as I was nestled on the couch like a potato after a long day, I tuned into a San Francisco KQED comedy special. Enter Bob Sarlatte, a comedian with a chin so bold it could be used as a paperweight and a grin so snide it seemed to have its own agenda. He took aim at the pièce de résistance of culinary chicanery: the Ritz Crackers recipe for Mock Apple Pie. Sarlatte was on a mission to uncover the absurdity behind Ritz’s audacious claim of making apple pie with, wait for it, crackers instead of apples. He was incredulous, practically frothing at the mouth as he dissected this travesty. “Why on earth,” he demanded, “would Ritz, in all their cracker-clad glory, boast about a recipe that doesn’t even remotely involve apples?” According to Sarlatte, this so-called “apple pie” was like calling a desert a beach because it had sand—except the sand was made of crushed Ritz crackers, and the beach was a figment of your imagination. The comedian was in no mood for Ritz’s grandstanding. To him, this wasn’t a culinary innovation; it was a culinary catastrophe. He took Ritz to task for attempting to pass off a cracker conglomeration as apple pie, as if the lack of fruit was a feature, not a flaw. “Who,” Sarlatte railed, “are you going to serve this Mock Apple Pie to? Your mock friends? People who enjoy mockery served with a side of disappointment?” Sarlatte’s razor-sharp wit wasn’t just about lampooning a recipe—it was about exposing a greater travesty: the shameless elevation of a subpar substitute as a triumph of creativity. This wasn’t a clever culinary trick; it was an insult wrapped in a cracker crust. Bob Sarlatte laid bare the staggering lack of self-awareness and the brazen audacity required to serve such an ersatz “apple” pie with a smug smile. It was a masterclass in how to serve up an insult with a cherry on top, minus the apple, of course.

  • When I Met the SpaghettiOs Overlord

    When I Met the SpaghettiOs Overlord

    In June of 1999, I did what a college professor cannot do: I lost the classroom key. Yes, the sacred, university-issued key that was supposedly worth more than its weight in gold and was meant to be guarded as if it were the last surviving relic of Atlantis. After a frantic week of turning my Redondo Beach condo upside down—searching under couch cushions, rifling through laundry baskets, and even interrogating the houseplants—I had to admit defeat. I was summoned to face the wrath of the university’s ice queen of administration, who greeted me with a glare that could freeze lava. “The one thing a college instructor does not do,” she said, as if reciting an ancient curse, “is lose his key.” She inspected me as if I were a criminal in a bad noir film, and then informed me that I had to make a pilgrimage to the edge of campus, to the mythical and dreaded realm known as Plant Ops, to pay for a key replacement with cash only. I felt like I was being sent to Mordor to drop off a pizza. 

    So, I embarked on this perilous quest, driving east from campus. At first, the road was a decent pavement. But soon, it disintegrated into a wasteland of dirt, rubble, and potholes the size of small craters. My car bucked and jolted over the rocky path, like an old west wagon on a treasure hunt, as I passed ghostly rows of cow skulls and tumbleweeds rolling by in the wind like some grim, dusty parade. Above me, buzzards circled, perhaps in anticipation of a fresh meal or merely to witness my impending doom.

    Just as despair was about to pull me under, a nauseating aroma of glue, pickles, and formaldehyde wafted through the air, signaling the arrival of my destination. I squinted through the gloom to see a structure emerge from the fog—a dilapidated hangar that looked like it had been plucked from a post-apocalyptic movie set. Inside was the world’s most disgruntled handyman, a short, rotund man with glasses thick enough to start a small library, a bushy mustache that looked like it was trying to escape his face, and a head bald enough to use as a landing strip for insects. He was hunched over a workbench, devouring SpaghettiOs straight from the can with the kind of focus usually reserved for nuclear codes. His irritation at being interrupted was palpable, like I’d crashed his private spaghetti party.

    “Twenty dollars cash,” he grunted, extending his hand with the authority of a toll collector in the underworld. I handed him the bill with the reverence of a pilgrim offering gold to a god. He stuffed it into his grease-splattered apron, took another spoonful of his cold, canned meal, and scowled at me like I’d personally betrayed him. With the wind howling through the thin steel walls of the hangar, I half expected the place to take off and join Dorothy’s house in the sky. The handyman delivered his parting words with the gravitas of a crypt keeper: I must never lose a key again, lest I face the incompetence of his replacement, who was, according to him, a veritable nincompoop with the locksmithing skills of a potato. I thanked him, exited the hangar, and raced straight to the nearest hardware store. I bought a keychain made of Kevlar, equipped with a tether reel and a high-density nylon belt loop—basically, a key-keeping apparatus that could survive a nuclear blast. It was clear I’d never let my keys out of my sight again, lest I face another odyssey to the land of a disgruntled Plant-Ops overlord.

  • Before Snack Times

    Before Snack Times

    In the Before Snack Times of the early 70s, we didn’t have helicopter parents hovering over us, micromanaging our every move with a suffocating schedule of dance classes, gymnastics, karate, swim lessons, math tutors, writing coaches, soccer practices, chess clubs, computer coding, mindfulness meditation, and Ashtanga Yoga. We didn’t have smartphones tracking us like we were secret agents with microchips implanted in our necks. For the entire day, our parents had absolutely no clue where we were or what we were up to. We’d saunter off after breakfast, either on foot or aboard our trusty bicycles, and were expected to return only by dinner. During that endless stretch of freedom, we’d navigate through construction sites strewn with lumber, nails, electrical wires, and bottomless ditches, all of which screamed, “Adventure awaits!” We gravitated toward mud, streams, and rivers like moths to a flame, setting up wooden ramps to perform Evel Knievel-level stunts over bodies of water. The messier and more perilous the terrain, the more irresistible it became. These hazardous playgrounds were usually bordered by rusty barbed-wire fences and “Do Not Enter” signs, which not only failed to deter us but ignited our rebellious spirits to trespass with even more gusto. Inside these danger zones, we’d be chased by furious steers, territorial cows, and muscle-bound guard dogs. Occasionally, a disgruntled landowner would fire warning shots at us with a pellet gun, a token gesture that barely fazed us. In the ravines behind our homes, we crafted forts, swung from vines, ignited firecrackers, and leaped into piles of poison oak. We encountered black widows, rattlesnakes, bobcats, coyotes, and even the occasional mountain lion. After a day of flouting every conceivable health and safety code, we’d trudge home at night, our bodies caked in filth, bruises, and scratches. But our parents, bless their oblivious hearts, never inquired about our whereabouts or escapades. As long as we took a bath and cleaned up, they were content to feed us hearty helpings of turkey pot pies, meatloaf, chili, and tacos. They knew we needed the energy to wake up the next morning and dive headfirst into another day of mayhem. Back then, we had little time for snacking. Our days were filled with wilderness adventures, where our imaginations ran wild. This level of playfulness, chaos, and enchantment is as extinct as the dinosaurs in today’s Snack Age, where parents meticulously micromanage their children’s activities and pacify their appetites with chips, juice boxes, chocolate chip granola bars, fruit rolls, and Happy Meals.

  • I Had to Choose to Either be a Thief Or Superman

    I Had to Choose to Either be a Thief Or Superman

    When I was six years old in 1968, I lived for a year with my grandparents in Belmont Shore. One day after school, a distraught neighbor, a 79-year-old widow named Mrs. Davis, said she locked herself out of her house. Could she borrow me to climb through her bedroom window and unlock the front door for her? With my grandmother’s approval, I did just that. I pretended to be a cat burglar, slithered through the ajar window, and walked through her house. With great curiosity, I examined the interior of the living room.  The floor was covered with a plush, floral-patterned rug. The centerpiece of the room was a large, floral-patterned couch. It was flanked by two wingback chairs, upholstered in a velvety red fabric. Each chair had a lace doily draped over the backrest. A coffee table with spindly legs sat in front of the couch, its surface crowded with an assortment of knickknacks: a porcelain figurine of a ballerina, a small crystal bowl filled with wrapped candies, and a couple of framed photos. The walls were adorned with family portraits, framed cross-stitch samplers, and a large, oval mirror with a gold frame. A grandfather clock ticked methodically in the background, its pendulum swinging with a steady rhythm that made me feel lost in time. Something came over me. Being alone, I felt possessed with a transgressive spirit, and I lifted the candy jar’s lid and stuffed a butterscotch candy in my pocket before opening the front door for Mrs. Davis. I felt guilty for my act of theft because Mrs. Davis proclaimed me to be her newly-minted hero and handed me a crisp one-dollar bill, which I would later spend on Baby Ruth and Almond Joy Bars. I had difficulty sleeping that night. I worried that Mrs. Davis might feel inclined to take inventory of her candies and discover that one was missing, prompting her to demote me from hero to villain. My career as a thief had come to a quick end. On the other hand, I had a glimpse of what it was like to be a superhero entering houses and saving people in distress. I convinced myself that my career as Superman was just beginning. 

  • DON’T GET TRAPPED IN A FLINTSTONES BACKGROUND LOOP

    DON’T GET TRAPPED IN A FLINTSTONES BACKGROUND LOOP

    In Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder, Arnold Schwarzenegger observes that bodybuilding is not merely a means toward self-improvement of the body. It opens other doors as well in business and other enterprises. I found that Arnold was right: My teenage years of toiling in the gym and amassing muscles finally paid off in 1979 when, at the tender age of seventeen, I landed the coveted position of bouncer at Maverick’s Disco in San Ramon, California. I was rolling in dough, earning a whopping ten cents over the minimum wage at three dollars an hour, while enjoying the luxurious perks of free soft drinks and peanuts. My nights were spent amidst a sea of polyester pantsuits and hairdos so heavily sprayed they constituted a legitimate fire hazard. I thought I had hit the jackpot, killing two birds with one stone: raking in the cash while strolling around the teenage disco, flexing my lats, and mingling with an endless parade of beautiful women. However, my dreams of disco glory were dashed when I encountered a cruel concept I’d later learn about in my college Abnormal Psychology class: the anhedonic response. This phenomenon numbs the brain to repeated stimulation, leading to a state of anhedonia, where happiness and pleasure are but distant memories. Thinking about anhedonia took me back to the moment when I stopped enjoying my beloved cartoon, The Flintstones. One day, as Fred and Barney drove their caveman car down the highway, I noticed the background—a series of trees, boulders, and buildings—repeating over and over. This revelation shattered the show’s illusion of reality, much like seeing how the sausage is made. Watching The Flintstones was never the same again. Maverick’s Disco was my Flintstones moment. Night after night, I watched customers flood the club with faces lit up with high expectations of excitement, glamour, and romantic connections. By closing time, those same faces were glazed over, tired, and disappointed. Yet, like clockwork, they returned the next weekend, ready to repeat the cycle. My life at the disco had become the monotonous wraparound background of The Flintstones. It was a sign that I needed to quit. Like Arnold Schwarzenegger, I needed to break out of a limited situation, spread my wings, and fly. 

  • WHEN WATCHING PIE BAKING CONTESTS ELEVATES THE SOUL

    WHEN WATCHING PIE BAKING CONTESTS ELEVATES THE SOUL

    Many moons ago, my wife and I watched the 2006 HBO documentary Thin, which chronicles the tragic existence of girls in a Florida rehab clinic for eating disorders. These poor souls were ensnared in a vicious cycle of depression, self-loathing, and lies, their recovery rates abysmally low and fatality rates tragically high. After this emotional gut-punch, we desperately needed a palate cleanser, so we turned to a pie-baking contest featuring Midwestern women in Christmas sweaters, lovingly toiling over pie crusts. These wholesome warriors of the kitchen were a stark contrast to the aforementioned sufferers. It dawned on me that pie baking is the antithesis of anorexia—a condition of solipsism where one disappears into the self, whereas pie baking is a testament to community, love, and selfless devotion to butter and flour.

    Imagine, if you will, a world where the kitchen isn’t just a hub of culinary creation but a sacred temple of love, where pie-baking is the highest form of devotion. In this sanctified realm, every Midwestern woman in a Christmas sweater is a culinary high priestess, her rolling pin a scepter of affection, her pie crust a canvas for heartfelt artistry. The Pie Baking Contest is an epic battleground where these valiant women gather, their aprons fluttering like superhero capes, ready to channel pure, unadulterated love into their pies. The stakes are absurdly high, the competition fierce, but the atmosphere? Pure camaraderie and joy.

    Here, pie baking is not just a quaint pastime; it’s an epic saga of love, community, and unyielding devotion. These heroines approach their craft with the precision of neurosurgeons and the passion of Renaissance artists. Flour fills the air like enchanted snow, butter is blended into dough with the deftness of a master illusionist, and apples are peeled and sliced with the ferocity of a seasoned samurai. Each pie is a labor of love, a tangible expression of their deepest affections. As they sweat and toil over their creations, the kitchen morphs into a bustling hub of warmth and connection.

    Baking pies, slinging spaghetti and garlic bread, or whipping up a dish of hot and sour Tom Yum Goong soup demands a healthy soul, one that’s plugged into the matrix of family and community. We therefore don’t journey solo but soar with a merry band of culinary adventurers, armed with spatulas and mixing bowls, ready to conquer the next great feast. So, skip the guilt and embrace the butter—life’s too short for bland food and empty kitchens.

  • EATING THE UNCLE NORMAN WAY

    EATING THE UNCLE NORMAN WAY

    Every morning during my teenage years, I’d stagger out of bed and make my daily plea to the heavens: “God, please grant me the confidence and self-assuredness to ask a woman on a date without suffering from a full-blown cerebral explosion.” And every morning, God’s response was as subtle as a sledgehammer to the forehead: “You’re essentially a walking emotional landfill, a neurotic mess doomed to wander the planet bereft of charm, romantic grace, and any semblance of healthy relationships. Get used to it, buddy.” And thus commenced my legendary odyssey in the land of perpetual non-dating.

    This was not the grand design I had envisioned. No, the blueprint was to be a suave bachelor, just like my childhood idol, Uncle Norman from The Courtship of Eddie’s Father. At the ripe age of eight, I watched in awe as Uncle Norman demonstrated his revolutionary kitchen hack: why bother with dishes when you can devour an entire head of lettuce while standing over the sink? He proclaimed, “This way, you avoid cleanup, dishes, and the pesky inconvenience of sitting at a table.” In that glorious moment, I was struck with a revelation so profound it reshaped my entire existence. The Uncle Norman Method, as I would grandiosely dub it, became my life’s guiding principle, my personal beacon of satisfaction, and the defining factor of my existence for decades.

    Channeling my inner Uncle Norman, I envisioned a life of unparalleled convenience. My bed would be perpetually unmade because who needs sheets when you have a trusty sleeping bag? I’d never waste time watering plants—plastic ones were far superior. Cooking? Please. Cereal, toast, bananas, and yogurt would sustain me in perpetuity. My job would be conveniently located within a five-mile radius of my house, and my romantic escapades would be strictly zip code-based. Laundry? My washing machine’s drum would double as my hamper, and I’d simply press Start when it reached capacity. Fashion coordination? Not a concern, as all my clothes would be in sleek, omnipresent black. My linen closet would be repurposed to stash protein bars, because who needs linens anyway?

    I’d execute my grocery shopping like a stealthy ninja, hitting Trader Joe’s at the crack of dawn to dodge crowds, while avoiding those colossal supermarkets that felt like traversing a grid of football fields. 

    Embracing the Uncle Norman Way wasn’t just a new approach to dining; it was a radical overhaul of my entire lifestyle. The world would bow before the sheer efficiency and unadulterated convenience of my new existence, and I would remain eternally satisfied, basking in the glory of my splendidly uncomplicated life.

    Of course, it didn’t take long for my delusion to expand into a literary empire—or at least, that was the plan. The world, I was convinced, desperately needed The Uncle Norman Way, my magnum opus on streamlining life’s most tedious inconveniences. It would be part manifesto, part self-help guide, and part fever dream of a man who had spent far too much time contemplating the finer points of lettuce consumption over a sink. Each chapter would tackle a crucial element of existence, from the philosophy of single-pot cooking (aka, eating directly from the saucepan) to the art of strategic sock re-wearing to extend laundry cycles. I even envisioned a deluxe edition featuring tear-out coupons for discounted plastic plants, a fold-out map of the most efficient grocery store layouts, and, for true devotees, a companion workbook to track their progress toward the ultimate goal: Maximum Laziness with Minimum Effort™.

    Naturally, I imagined its meteoric rise to cultural dominance. Talk show hosts would marvel at my ingenuity, college professors would weave my wisdom into philosophy courses, and minimalists would declare me their messiah. Young bachelors, overwhelmed by the burden of societal expectations, would turn to my book in their darkest hour, finding solace in the knowledge that they, too, could abandon the tyranny of dishware and lean fully into sink-based eating. The revolution would be televised, one head of lettuce at a time.

  • The Demise of Danish Go-Rounds Will Never Be Forgiven

    The Demise of Danish Go-Rounds Will Never Be Forgiven

    Introduced by Kellogg’s in 1968, Danish Go-Rounds were like the golden fleece of breakfast pastries. Imagine Pop-Tarts, but with the sophistication of a five-star dessert. The brown sugar-cinnamon Danish Go-Rounds were so addictive, they made crack look like a mere curiosity. At the ungodly hour of 2 a.m., millions of Americans would wake up in cold sweats, their cravings driving them to frenzied searches for the Nectar of the Gods—only to find their precious pastries had vanished into thin air. Then, in a move so baffling it felt like a conspiracy against breakfast enthusiasts everywhere, Kellogg’s pulled the plug on Danish Go-Rounds in the mid-seventies. They kept the Pop-Tarts, those cardboard-like impostors that tasted like they were designed by a committee of flavorless robots. The heartbreak was palpable. It was as if a divine bakery had been shut down and replaced with a factory that churned out glorified toaster insulation. The eradication of Danish Go-Rounds is now remembered as one of the most colossal institutional blunders in history—up there with the fall of Rome and the invention of the Rubik’s Cube. The void they left was so immense, it bored a gaping chasm in my soul. My heart, once full of pastry-filled joy, now echoed with the hollow sound of Pop-Tarts’ lifeless crunch. While Danish Go-Rounds faded into the annals of breakfast history, Pop-Tarts flourished like a tasteless, mass-produced phoenix. This shift symbolized the erosion of artisanal craftsmanship and the triumph of consumer complacency. It heralded the rise of such culinary horrors as Imperial Margarine, Tang, Space Food Sticks, Boone’s Farm Apple Wine, and SlimFast—products so tragic they make a TV dinner look like a gourmet feast. The Gastronomic Time Traveler had to bear witness to this disheartening transition, seeing the demise of pastries that were practically food royalty. In their place, we got a parade of processed atrocities that made the culinary landscape look like a dystopian nightmare. So there I was, left to mourn the loss of Danish Go-Rounds, savoring the bitter taste of what once was, while choking down the unworthy replacements that flooded the market. It was a breakfast apocalypse, and I was living in its soggy aftermath.