Friday, June 10, 2005

6/10/05a

10:17 a.m. I am sitting outside of the "church". It's in a strip mall in a run down part of town and has a hand-painted sign up front. I am about to get out and take a look inside when I get a call from Stinky Jimmy, my boss. He tells me that Corporate has approved my travel request and I'm going to Puerto Rico in a couple of weeks. Hot dog! Palm trees and white sandy beaches. Tropical sunsets. I hope to bring home a souvenir or two. Maybe a shell necklace or a Cabana Boy.

I pick up a bag of pork rinds from the gas station. People in Texas eat pork rinds, so I figure I will explore the local cuisine. I take a bite. Hmm. Tastes like deep fried bacon flavored styrofoam. I like it! But then I look at the ingredients, which consist of pig skins and salt. Pig skins. I look at my pork rind. I envision pig skin, which I am pretty sure doesn't resemble this spongy little thing I'm holding in my hand.

Having a good imagination is sometimes a bad thing. I think of a vat full of boiling water and pig skins. I think of the "rendered" gunk that floats to the top of the vat. I think of some guy skimming it off the top with a swimming pool skimmer. I think if him slapping it on a conveyor belt that takes it to a vat of boiling oil. Rendered pig skin gunk is then deep fried and skimmed off the oil. It is slapped back on a conveyor belt where it is salted and dumped into bags.

I decide that pork rinds are the stuff of horror flicks. Horror flicks for pigs, that is. I spit out the one I'm eating and decide that I will stick to Ding Dongs and Cheetos.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good for you, Polly! Them things is nastay!

And I'm from Texas, so I can say that. No, wait, anyone can say that. Them things is just durn nastay!

Anonymous said...

tamara - ain't neither!

But ... Ding Dong's and Cheetos are just what a groing girl/boy needs anyway.

Anonymous said...

Have you ever seen a Cheetos rendering vat??

Talk about horror. All that orange.

Anonymous said...

Polly, I think you've conjured up a pretty accurate picture of how they're made.

Just think of what eating so many of them has done to your President's brain (such as it is).

Anonymous said...

Sly! OH NO YOU DI'N'T! I KNOW you ain't talkin' smack about CHEETOS!

Mmmmm... Cheeeetoooos...

By the way, they make organic Cheetos now. They're yellow. They're tasty. Ask your local grocer for details.