Free Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan Page A

at the farmers’ market didn’t just buy that stuff at the grocery store? Some con artist probably came up with the idea.
CON ARTIST: Psst! C’mere, kid. This is what we’re gonna do, see? We’re gonna go in that grocery store and buy a bunch of unwashed vegetables. Then we’re gonna sell them on the street for ten times the price.
KID: That will never work!
CON ARTIST: Just tell them they’re from the farm , so they taste better, see?
KID: You’re a genius, Mac. A genius! We’re gonna get RICH!
    It’s hard to eat healthy. It’s too expensive: Should I have this salad for twelve bucks or these five hamburgers for a dime? I resent when I go out to dinner and they try to sell me the healthy food for the same price as the good food. What a rip-off. Even more infuriating is the way the waiter tries to present the healthy choice on the menu as if it tastes as good as real food. “Tonight were having a delicious entrée of steamed spinach and tofu over a bed of vitamins.” Great. And for dessert why don’t we get our teeth cleaned?
    I eat kind of healthy compared to some of the Eskimos up in Alaska. They’re eating blubber up there. Compared to them, I’m practically dieting by eating a Cinnabon. Whale blubber? Isn’t that like eating a fat guy? Actually, it would be healthier to eat a fat guy. I don’t want to appear to insult Eskimos andtheir culture, even though I’m starting to think they don’t even make those Eskimo Pies. I realize the weather is not great in Alaska, but consuming something called blubber is a little insane. They are actually eating something that is the direct result of eating unhealthy. Isn’t blubber like the fattest part of fat? If fat made a noise, it would be blub-ber . You’d think at some point one of the Eskimos would stand up at a meal and say, “Hey, I love blubber. Who doesn’t like blubber? But I was thinking we could mix in some salads or, maybe, less blubber?” Who knows, maybe the blubber eaters think we eat weird stuff: Those poor bastards down there don’t even eat blubber. If you are eating blubber, what do you consider bad for you? I’m pretty sure drinking liquefied lard might be a healthier choice. On the other hand, maybe we got lucky because of the blubber. It’s possibly the reason why Alaska became part of the United States. Maybe the Canadian explorers made it up to Alaska and saw the Eskimos eating blubber and thought, Oh, the Americans already got here.
    I look forward to the day we can walk into health food stores and see organic whale blubber for sale. “Oh look, it’s whole whale blubber. That’s really good for you, right?”

NOBODY REALLY LIKES FRUIT
    Recently I saw an apple and for a moment I didn’t recognize it. Just for a second I was like, What is that, a paperweight? Oh that’s an apple! It’s so weird to not see it in a pie. I’m not proud of this, but let’s be honest. Nobody really wants fruit. We only act like we do. A false desire for fruit is woven into the fabric of our culture. We are told that Adam and Eve were kicked out of paradise for eating an apple. An apple? Would an apple ever really tempt you? I would’ve looked at the serpent, “An apple? Uh, cover it in caramel and come back to me. You got any cake back there?”

    Take this apple. Nobody wants it.
    Sure, people will eat it if there’s nothing else around, but, given the other options, fruit just isn’t that great. Even when people seem excited to see fruit, they are really just relieved it’s not vegetables. Fruit involves too much work. You have to wash it. You have to remove that sticker al-Qaeda put on there. There’s work with fruit. Think about the orange. Has peeling an orange ever really been worth it? I always think, There’s not even chocolate in this thing. Yet people still imagine they like fruit. Some weirdos even convinced everyone that the gathering of a fruit is a fun activity. Once a friend excitedly asked me, “Why don’t we go apple