Buffet

Mary and I ate at a buffet place last night. Shouldn’t have but we both got home late, didn’t feel like cooking and it’s not like you HAVE to eat one of everything. And I didn’t. I steadfastly avoided the broccoli, for example. And the kim chi cabbage. Perhaps one or two other items that happened to be out when I slid by with my bucket and trowel.

Admittedly, I did cut something of a swath through the desserts.  And the fried chicken. The steak and mash were good. Could have done without the tilapia.

The real trouble with eating at a buffet is that it’s way too easy to walk in. But then at some point, you have to walk back out. With your newly re-contoured belly in the lead.

The pain starts when you realize you have to somehow overcome inertia. Didn’t seem like such a big deal all those times I swung the legs out and virtually popped to my feet on the way to the next plate-filling excursion. But now, belly full and tight against the table, geometry is not my friend. I stagger to my feet and slog to and through the exit.

I try not to notice the furtive glances at my distended breadbasket as I concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. Not that I can vouch for foot placement, what with a heretofore undiscovered planet intervening in my sight line from eyes to feet.

Mary suggests we walk off the meal. I am bemused at the thought. Walk to where? Tunisia? Turns out, she meant to the other end of the mall. This I can do. I think.

As we head into a store where Mary wants to shop (okay, so what I’m doing has more to do with trundling than walking but I’m moving in a more or less intentional direction), I stumble slightly and I’m suddenly seized with a terrible fear of falling.

Well, it's not so much falling that causes the catch in my throat. It’s fear of landing. I’m not at all sure my already tortured abdomen could remain intact against the combined assaults of gravity and gross tonnage. I can visualize the awful scene that the folks around me would behold.

“Geezer burst on aisle six!” I hear over an imaginary loudspeaker as I imagine Mary shrieking and uncounted strangers joining in an unpracticed but nonetheless perfectly coordinated chorus of “E-e-e-ew!!!”

The horror!

As it happens, I was able to remain upright and unsteadily navigate my way to the car for the trip home.  But I paid for that meal all night and through a good part of today.

What was I thinking? I’m pretty sure it was that last breaded shrimp that did it.

Next time, gotta go lighter on the shrimp.