Thanks for the shout out secretary. What an odd arc of a day that takes you to local Brooklyn stardom like a cheese-eating contest. We got to the street fair, where the eat-off was going to take take place, nice and early. I had just polished off the Hungry Man breakfast special at Joe's on Court Street. I knew that I wanted a big breakfast to stretch out the stomach, but I needed to work the food through my system before I could attempt to eat the cheese, for which I had done virtually no preparation. the night before I was at a block party, and I took a slice of cheddar and tried to swallow it whole, just to see if it was possible. I thought about my technique, but I certainly had not sat down to a plate full of cheese to see how much I could eat.
By the time the contest was to begin, the streets had filled with spectators at least 6 rows thick, and I was eyeing the belt. They had created a WWF style belt with wheels of cheese on it, upon which the winner's name would be emblazoned. I had specifically asked to go in the second heat of eaters so I could watch the skills of the first round to get some ideas on how I might win the thing. It turned out I was the last person in the first heat, which was a surprise, which forced me to jump in and eat. As I got to the table I asked a bystander to hold my glasses during the contest. The time was called and the eating began.
The first thing I noticed was the warm, saltiness of the cheese, but with all the eating going on around me, I was panicked into biting off big chunks to get some early headway. My technique involved chomping up the cheese into small enough pieces in my mouth and then taking the water to wash the chunks down in big gulps. It was all pretty gross, because your mind is very much inside your mouth - every crumble of cheese you are thinking "Can I swallow that one without choking?" Then you just throw your head back and swallow. Someone halfway down the table asked for a new piece of cheese a few seconds before I had finished mine, so I shoveled the piece left in my hand into my mouth and tapped my plate for a second. In what seemed like a second later, the crowd started counting down the last 10 seconds at which point I started stuffing cheese into my mouth. Big bites to fill the mouth. I have to say, I felt pretty slow, and I think I even slowed a bit at the end, being pretty sure that I hadn't won it. Good learning for next year, don't lose hope.
The leftover pieces were weighed, and it turned out that I had won the first heat by a slight little bit. And in the second heat, not one person even made it into the second piece of cheese. Then Marty Markowitz announced the winner. Then yesterday became the best day in my life. Almost seriously. Or completely seriously.
You may wonder why carpenter is such an infrequent blogger now. Well it's because carpenter is actually working as a carpenter right now. There are no computers in the carpentry world. In fact he worked as a carpenter today. One day, you're king of Brooklyn, the next you're building roof-decks for Kelly Ripa.
Thanks for keeping this alive secretary. I owe you one.
-carpenter
No comments:
Post a Comment