This post is inspired by Z, who wrote a post about food cravings - getting on a kick and eating one food over and over. I know that for Mr. Nancy, that's pretty much standard operating procedure; he not only can eat the same thing meal after meal and not get bored, but seems to prefer it that way. [Nancy, feel free to expound upon this statement!] I tend to get bored eating the same thing over and over at every meal - a dinner and two lunches in a row is pretty much my limit on leftovers, even if it's something I quite like. Alan falls somewhere in between; he's had spaghetti for dinner every night this week but I got bored after two. He also goes on kicks where he eats the same breakfast every day for months before switching to another staple.

I've had a hard time ever since our bout of food poisoning in early October - nothing sounds appealing to me, I can't think of anything I want to eat, even when I do choose something I don't want it once it's in front of me. I still cook, like with the spaghetti, but once it's on the plate before me I'm uninterested. I eat a few bites, because one has to eat and Alan fusses at me, but I don't really want it.

The last two nights while Alan's enjoyed spaghetti (with Pecorino Romano and not Parmesan style cheese-resembling topping, if you read my last post) for dinner, I've eaten a toasted bagel smeared with cream cheese and topped with crispy bacon. I realize there are ALL SORTS of things wrong with that, eating pig meat for one, mixing meat and dairy for another, and doing both on top of a traditional Jewish bread but hey! I'm Catholic! I'll break any dietary laws I like! Ha-HA! Er, Saturday through Thursday anyway. (I'm kidding, I realize that's not even a sin anymore.)

Alan fussed about that, too, saying it wasn't enough for dinner but I didn't want anything, not a thing in the house appealed to me, and at least I knew the aroma of lovely, lovely bacon would be enough to entice me to finish it - because personally, no matter how hungry I am or am not, even if I haven't been thinking of or craving any of them, there are three things I cannot smell without wanting at least a small taste: bacon, coffee, popcorn.

"This is a great dinner! All the food groups are represented!" I argued to Alan.

"Oh really?" he asked. "And what might those be?"

"Well, um, grains and cereals in the bread, and cream cheese for dairy, and bacon is meat."

"I think you left out one or two there."

"FRUIT!" I declared, triumphantly brandishing my glass of wine. "Grapes are fruit."

"Uh-HUH," he said, rather unconvinced. "Well, you're watching Alton Brown and there are vegetables behind him on the television, so I suppose you'll be arguing next about how that TOTALLY counts."

(I think we've been together too long.)

It can work the opposite way, too - besides weeks-long food cravings, food aversions can occur. I'm not referring to foods you always hated and never wanted to eat but you know how if you get sick, even if a virus and not the food itself is responsible, whatever food you last ate you NEVER want again - or at least not for a long time. One example is the Combo, an innocent snack food. A long time ago in a college far, far away (well, actually only 200 miles away but Lucas's version sounded better) Alan and Mr. Nancy drank a wild-weekend-on-Coruscant's-worth of beer between them and Alan subsequently (or maybe simultaneously, I wasn't there - Sandy, were you???) consumed an entire bag of Combos. History is unclear as to whether the Combos were shared with Mr. Nancy, my eyewitness claiming that he has trouble recalling, but it did NOT end well. Alan says, over my shoulder, in LOL-cat speak, "DID NOT WANT!!!" Alan can't stand Combos to this day, and doesn't even like to see/smell them.

In the interest of fairness, I'm no angel either although my worst experience wasn't exactly food. When I was (ahem!) a couple of years under the legal drinking age, I got "to' up from the flo' up" as my friend Bevy would say, on peppermint schnapps. Result: I couldn't brush my teeth with anything but baking soda for, like, the next three weeks because the minty flavor of my toothpaste brought back horrible, horrible memories.

So - I'd love to hear your food tales. Are there things you could never stop eating? Things you ate and wish you never had? Things you not only never want to eat, but never want to see, smell or think of again? And especially, are there hilarious circumstances surrounding any of the above???