I have been blessed by yet another safe return from Texas, made all the more enjoyable by my noticing during the return flight that the fine print on my Honey French Dressing container included a wealth of information that kept me entertained for about half of New Mexico. In the first place, “Naturally Fresh” and “Pour It On” were tagged with little Registered Trademark bugs. I hadn’t realized that one could register such commonplace phrases, and frankly, I’m going to miss using them. My depression over this discovery, however, was completely alleviated when I got to the very last line, where I discovered that the dressing had been “processed” by “E. F. I.”
Unfortunately, what this processing consisted of and who actually made the stuff remained unclear. What was very, very clear, though, was E. F. I’s address: “1000 Naturally Fresh Blvd., Atlanta, GA 30349.” The folks at 999 Naturally Fresh Blvd. are doing some natural processing on spent fuel rods, but that’s way across the street.
Other observations on the trip:
Texas was true to its name, maybe even truer than usual. After all, one doesn’t have the opportunity of all that many redneck weddings in his own family, even considering that we rednecks tend to marry with uncommon frequency.
This one was made especial by the miscegenation factor, the bride being Latina. The ceremony was bilingual… and thus made vastly more interesting as I strained with only partial success to determine whether the Spanish and English parts were pure, direct translations of each other or whether different spins were being spun. Yes, Eternal Vigilance must be maintained. It seems like only yesterday that during Die Zauberflöte I lifted up my eyes to the new supertitles only to catch them glossing over the racism in Monostatos’ aria “Weiße ist schön, ich muß sie küssen”, most particularly the line, “Eine Weiße nahm mich ein.” You can rest assured that afterwards I sent a sharp note to the management. “If it was good enough for Mozart”, etc. etc.
The reception was bilingual, bicultural, and biculinary, and damn me, I ran out of steam and had to go off to bed just as they were hauling in the speakers and setting up for the Gran Baile. Anglo informants the following day reported strange folk rituals during this part of the nuptials, which ran on until two in the morning.
Other notes: Mother is thinking that with time off for good behavior, she’ll be out by Christmas.