Entry tags:

defensiveness ahoy, food, it's not easy wanking green, let them eat cake, otf_wank's thoughts on weight

The Serious Side of Salad
Once upon a time, someone in facebook posted a "Why Geeks Make Better Boyfriends" list. Britney St. Patience felt the need to point out its inaccuracies. She prefaces it with "Sure there are geek guys out there who are great partners. But being a geek does not guarantee that a guy will be a great boyfriend."

It's a pretty standard 'Nice Guy' deconstruction.

The main highlights are:

Myth #3: Geeks are low maintenance
Supposedly geek guys make great boyfriends because they can subsist on pizza, Mt Dew, and your affection. Just wait until you meet one who will ONLY eat pizza and maybe 3-4 other foods, like some sort of overgrown five year old. It took me nearly a decade to get my computer programmer ex husband to eat salad. My Star Wars obsessed ex boyfriend could not be taken to nice restaurants because he refused to wear anything except ripped jeans and nerdy tees and would not eat anything he could not pronounce. LOW MAINTENANCE MY ASS.

and

Myth #6: Geeks appreciate women
This one is, by far, my favorite geek guy myth. The myth of the guy who spent all of high school playing D&D but secretly wanting someone to love and when he finally gets a girl he imprints on her and covers her in puppy-like devotion. OMG WHERE DO PEOPLE GET THIS SHIT? You know what really happens when guys don't get laid in high school or college and spend all their time reading coming books and filling their spank banks with Buffy the Vampire Slayer fanfic? They fill their little nerd brains with unrealistic expectations, waiting around for what one of my gamer friends calls a "magical pixie girl". An unattainably hot woman, who will love the nerd boy not in spite of his nerdiness but because of it and somehow his life will be transformed by her love. And he shall get a job. And he shall move out of his parents basement. And he shall cease to be whatever it is he dislikes about himself because the magical lady doth love him. But woe to any girl who does not live up to his fantasy. She will be treated with the same regard as yesterday's Mt Dew cans.

So, a little harsh, but all in all not a matter for anger, right? Wrong!

It gets posted to Metaquotes, and it starts to get weird.

First, the appetizer of rebuttals that only confirm the post.

The myth of the guy who spent all of high school playing D&D but secretly wanting someone to love and when he finally gets a girl he imprints on her and covers her in puppy-like devotion. OMG WHERE DO PEOPLE GET THIS SHIT?"

They get it from reality. That described me perfectly. It happened. It still happens. She completely ripped out my heart and shit in the hole eventually, and I got over this pattern... but it happens. That's where people get the idea.

The OP is demanding, high maintenance, dissatisfied with all the men out there... and yet continues to put herself into relationships with people SHE DOESN'T LIKE in some misguided attempt to make them into something she does like.

Of course it doesn't work, millions of people can tell you that (and probably did), and now she's bitter as a result of her mistakes, and is shifting the blame onto a large and diverse demographic that, in the aggregate, does NOT actually fit all the stereotypes she is perpetuating about them.

But then Candidgamera shows up and he Does. Not. Like. Salad.

If the girl I was dating was bizarrely fixated on me eating a salad, it wouldn't take me ten years to dump her sorry ass.

Making your husband eat a salad makes you a controlling harpy.

What follows is an extended debate over whether asking your spouse to eat salad is controlling, an act of deepest love for your dearest one, or something in between. Over salad.

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phosfate
2011-10-13 04:10 am UTC (link)

There's stuff I can't eat because the taste is like getting hit in the face with a softball bat (see: vinegar, miso, kale, or any salad dressing ever), or because it triggers instant barfing (I AM LOOKING AT YOU, BEETS, YOU FILTHY LITTLE COCKBITES). Fortunately for me, nothing in this world requires any of them. But I swear, if they made Futurama-type Bachelor Chow, I would be totally down with that stuff.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	iamnotyourmuse 2011-10-13 04:15 am UTC (link)
	My husband has long contended that "dinner cereal" could be a hit if designed/marketed right. (I'm a supertaster, so bitter foods = ick. Couple that with texture issues like pulpy things? That rules out a LOT) (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	phosfate 2011-10-13 05:30 pm UTC (link)
	I have a theory that massive amounts of cereal gets eaten at night, but nobody wants to bother actually marketing it that way. Remember the "Coke in the morning" ads? Didn't change the minds of coffee drinkers, the morning soda people had already caught on long ago, and everybody else thought it was for wake-up cocaine. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	iamnotyourmuse 2011-10-13 06:06 pm UTC (link)
	You're probably right. Nighttime cereal is super common in my house. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Re: Sorry for getting all unfunnybusiness... sandglass 2011-10-13 04:18 am UTC (link)
	I need Bachelor Chow. I have no time, energy, or desire to put work into food, and nutrients are so hard to come by when you're lazy! (Salads: Not that healthy. You need to cook most veggies to get the best stuff out of them.) (Reply to this)(Parent)

	ekaterinv 2011-10-13 04:21 am UTC (link)
	ZOMG I have never met anyone else who had an insta-puke food. It's green peppers for me. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	sandglass 2011-10-13 04:28 am UTC (link)
	Zucchinis for me, and to a lesser degree any grilled vegetables. Parents/potential parents: Forcing your children to eat veggies they really, really don't like may lead them to be physically unable to eat them in adulthood! (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

ekaterinv
2011-10-13 04:34 am UTC (link)

My parents never forced me to eat green peppers, or anything, actually. Green peppers just trigger my gag reflex. I tried them once when I was a kid and barfed at the kitchen table. Restaurants often put them in food without warning, which means I have to disassemble tacos and other things that often have green peppers in them before taking a bite. Otherwise the dining experience could be quite unpleasant for a number of people.

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	sandglass 2011-10-13 04:55 am UTC (link)
	Well, forcing kids to eat certain veggies is still uncool, since I'm sure that's what caused it for me. Admittedly, I don't mean all veggies, but sometimes it goes beyond "Ew yucky!" y'know? (Reply to this)(Parent)

	anthologia 2011-10-13 07:29 pm UTC (link)
	ZUCCHINIS OH GOD. I haven't actually thrown up after eating them, but only just. DDD: (Reply to this)(Parent)

	undomielregina 2011-10-13 11:48 pm UTC (link)
	Raw tomatoes set off my gag reflex, although I've never actually puked. They're just about the only food I've ever had that I'll actively spit out rather than swallow. Fortunately, I'm willing to eat just about anything else, even if I don't like it, and so my family gave me grief at first but didn't actually force me to eat them. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	schrodingerscat 2011-10-16 06:06 am UTC (link)
	oh god raw tomatoes. I love the taste of tomatoes, but I absolutely cannot eat them raw without gagging. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	eiviiaru 2011-10-14 01:40 am UTC (link)
	True dat. For me it was Girl Scout camp "eat at least one bite of everything" policy aggravating an existing dislike, but to this day I can't even smell beans without getting a little nauseated. I know it's psychosomatic in origin, but the physical reactions are very real. /oversharing (Reply to this)(Parent)

	white_tean 2011-10-13 11:29 am UTC (link)
	Apple sauce for me. It's the consistency I think. Which is is sad, because I love the crust on apple crumble. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	puipui 2011-10-13 05:08 pm UTC (link)
	Mayonnaise. And, by extension, most kinds of dressing, on pretty much anything. GAG. EW. PLEH. I've occasionally had to tell restaurant staff that I'm allergic in order to get them to give me something without dressing on it. I feel kind of bad for lying about it, but I figure it's better than puking, generally speaking. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	eljuno 2011-10-13 06:32 pm UTC (link)
	For me it's squash, damn it all to Hell. (Reply to this)(Parent)

eleutheria
2011-10-14 01:43 am UTC (link)

Oranges and eggs for me. I can't handle the smell, either. My old cube-farm job was sheer hell because there was someone who had a fresh orange for lunch almost every day and I had to find somewhere else to be for a half hour or more or else I'd spew all over the place. My boss told me that in no way could I ask him to take his orange elsewhere, I just had to "stop being so sensitive".

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	bemysty 2011-10-14 02:10 pm UTC (link)
	Nearly all vegetables, mostly because my body has by now learned that it'll only end in intestinal misery and I will puke at some point ANYWAY. Which is kinda a pain in the ass when you WANT to go for the grown-up meals and salads etc. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	blackflag 2011-10-18 02:58 pm UTC (link)
	Rhubarb does that to me. To this day, thinking about it makes me feel ill. (Reply to this)(Parent)

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