“Let’s Go – While We’re Young!”

Somewhere on the Internet I saw I shirt that read: “I speak fluent movie quotes.”

There are a few variations of this shirt that incorporate “song lyrics” and “sarcasm,” but for me – it is movie quotes. I do this all the time! Here is an example that happened to me today.

I left the house for work without my lunch. I packed it and left it on the counter in the kitchen.

I was already running late, and I debated just coming in and ordering a pizza. Knowing that we seem to have had pizza a lot lately, I decided that I would stop at the Subway down the road from work. They are usually very quick, but today was another story.

Not the Subway I stopped at – but it looks similar….

I stop there every once in a while and the guys who usually work behind the counter are friendly and fast. Tonight, there was an older lady who was working. She must have been the only one there. It was not busy, and there was a guy at the counter ordering when I got there. His order was not especially complicated, but it seemed like it took forever for the 6 inch sub to get made. It took even longer as he checked out.

When she came back to get my order, I looked at her and told her the sub I wanted and on what kind of bread. She brought the bread out and cut it, as they do, and began to talk to me about politics. I stood there looking at her as she was talking … all the while, my sub bun is sitting on the counter awaiting preparation.

She finally moves the bun down to where the meat is and asked me to clarify my order again, which I do. She asks if I want it toasted and I told her no. She puts the meat on the sub, clarifies the type of cheese I want (she had the wrong kind) and begins to put it in the toaster. I remind her that I do not want it toasted. She apologizes and sets the sub down by the veggies and again starts to talk about politics. The entire time, I am watching the clock wondering if I will ever get to work on time.

My veggies are simple: Lettuce, tomato, pickle. She puts the lettuce on, looks at me and begins talking about the government. She grabs for onions, I tell her “No onions, please.” She grabs tomato, looks at me and shifts topics. She begins to tell me that her coworkers say she doesn’t get any work done. I literally look at the clock again and start to mumble under my breath, “Come on, Let’s go! While we’re young!”

I think she has no clue that I need to get going! She grabs for onions again, and I remind her “No onions, please. You just need pickles.” She continues to talk while placing these pickles one by one by one – looking up at me and talking between the placement of each one! I am ready to scream! She again reaches for onions when she has finished with the pickles. I want to look at her and go, “Enough with the onions!!” In all honesty, I was waiting for someone to pop out and tell me I was on some reality prank show!

In the time she began making my sub, put everything on it, wrapped it, bagged it, and rang me up, I heard her talk about politics, work, her neighbor, and the state of the economy! I was in this place for 20 minutes! In that 20 minutes, “Come on, Let’s go! While we’re young!!” kept replaying over and over in my head! The line is from Rodney Dangerfield as he waits for Ted Knight to tee off in a scene from Caddyshack. While it is a very funny line from a very funny movie – I failed to find the humor in it tonight!

Rodney Dangerfield as Al Czervik in Caddyshack

How about you? What are some of your favorite movie lines that you have used in real life situations??

A Peak at Mom’s “Project”

Today would have been my mom’s 71st birthday. I wrote a very emotional blog about her last year and for new followers to this blog, you can read it here:

https://nostalgicitalian.com/2018/04/04/moms-70th/

The Project

Last year, my brother Chris told me that he wanted to create a project that would honor our mom. I have a list of things I am supposed to be doing for this project, and as I sit here remembering her today, I thought I would share one of the things I wrote for our project. I hope my brother doesn’t mind me sharing this here.

“S” Meals

“Just like mom used to make” is a phrase you hear often when someone tries something at a restaurant or when a restaurant is promoting their menu. Maybe YOUR mom cooked like that, but mine did not. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of meals that I would love for her to make for me today. I loved her Impossible Cheeseburger Pie, Meatloaf, and her amazing Tuna Noodle Casserole. I have an old cookbook she had, but I really have no idea how she tweaked those recipes.

Here’s the deal, it wasn’t that mom wasn’t a good cook, the issue was she didn’t change the menu too often. We had a joke in our house – Mom’s menu consisted of “S” meals. What is an “S” meal? Well, it’s just what you think it is – meals that start with the letter “S”. Now, it is a possibility that they were also called “S” meals because they were very simple to make, I don’t know. Here now, is a sampling of mom’s core menu items:

  1. Spaghetti. It was a staple at our house. No surprise, after all, we are Italian. Sadly, her sauce always came out of a jar and was almost always Ragu.
  2. Sausage. She would go to the store and buy one of those rings of Italian sausage and fry it up in one of those square electric fry pans.
  3. Sloppy Joes. Could this meal be any easier to make? Brown up some meat and throw in some Manwich!
  4. Soup and Sandwiches. Two S’s for the price of one! A “combination” “S” meal! This was a frequent meal at our place – usually closer to payday.
  5. Steak. Usually, it was fried up in the square fry pan I mentioned an item or two ago. As kids, we hardly ever ate steak. I’m not sure why we didn’t, maybe it was because a fried steak was almost always tough. Usually when this meal was served, my brother and I opted for the alternate “S” meal, Spaghetti-O’s!
  6. Subs. Let’s be real here – this is really just another form of a sandwich, but served on a roll instead of bread! (Side note: My dad used to make what he called “Flubby’s”, which was a take off of Tubby’s subs. It was ground hamburger, lettuce, tomato, and Italian dressing.)
  7. Swedish Meatballs. Sometimes we called this Sweet and Sour Meatballs or Waikiki Meatballs. As a kid, the taste of these made me want to throw up. As I have grown up, I am actually a big fan of sweet and sour meatballs and chicken. I’d probably like them now. I remember the recipe was on a recipe card, which is sadly long gone.
  8. Salad. Yes. Salad could be a meal at our house. She got a recipe from my great Aunt Lois I think. It was leaf lettuce, vinegar, and grilled bacon. It was actually very good. I may have to see if I can make it sometime.

In a nutshell, those were the meals. We look back on this memory often and laugh. I miss her very much and would give anything to sit and enjoy conversation, food and laughter with her.

One last dinner story

If my mom were still alive, she’d probably kill me for telling this story. This, however, is one of my favorite dinner time stories:

Every now and then, mom would make corned beef and cabbage. Most of the time she’d cook it up in the crockpot, and it would be very tender. There was one time, however, where the corned beef turned out very dry. As we ate it, we were all thinking it, but NO ONE had the courage to speak up and say anything, so naturally, I did. I will say up front that as I look back at it, I regret the way I handled it. It does make a great story, though.

I started by simply saying, “Does this seem a bit dry to anyone else?” This made my dad laugh almost instantly. When he started laughing, I figured this had opened the door for me and allowed me to keep making fun of the meal. I proceeded to do what The Three Stooges would do with something like this. I began to:

  • tug at my throat
  • act like I was choking
  • put one hand on my chin and the other on the top of my head and pretended to force my mouth up and down to make myself chew
  • slam my hands against my chest
  • pound at my shoulder blade like I was choking

All of these things made my dad laugh. They made my brother laugh. My mother, however, was not happy. You could see her getting more and more angry with each of my actions.

She finally threw down her fork and stormed off to her room and slammed the door. My dad, brother, and I all sat in silence at the table for some time. I think my dad went to make peace, but the damage was done. I didn’t understand at the time, and she even laughed about it later (much later). It hurt her very bad that day. I apologized for this more times than I can remember. I still feel bad about it today.

Happy Heavenly Birthday, Mom. I miss you and I love you. I would give anything in the world to have a piece of that dry corned beef with you right about now….