"The soup is cold."

Went to see David Sedaris last week. It was the second time I've seen him in person. He never disappoints. Don't know if I've mentioned this before, but Sedaris is my favorite author. 

I know many would consider him a literary lightweight, but he's my literary lightweight. Unlike many of my friends in the writing world, I'm no devourer of books. Particularly the heavy ones. With run-on sentences. Fancy syntax. And enough allegories and similes to confuse a Mensa. 

I'm simple that way. Moreover, Sedaris is to wit what Trump is to buffoonery. He can also work blue. This was a snippet from his show:

A little kid and his mom are driving to school…

… and as they’re driving, a garbage truck cuts them off.

This rumbling truck is bouncing along in front of them, and the back is slightly open.

Out pops one of the biggest dildos mom’s ever seen, and smacks their windshield with the unmistakable, squelching thud of a giant dildo hitting the windshield.

The kid goes “WHAT WAS THAT?!”

Mom, not wanting to have to answer a million questions, or actually explain what thunked their windshield, she goes, “Oh… it was a bird.”

The kid sits silently for a moment, and says “Wow. I don’t know how the poor little thing got off the ground in the first place with a big ol’ dick like that!"

But don't get the wrong idea, Sedaris is also a keen observer of human nature. And often stops me in my tracks with his keen discoveries. 

Before he even started the show, David brought out an Irishman he met while on tour in Europe. He was also a writer. And being generous in nature, David invited him to come on the tour and onstage to recite some of his poetry. 

He blew the audience away with his soliloquy about being bald. I couldn't understand about 30% of the words delivered as he prowled the stage with great zeal. And perhaps, I'm a little biased on the matter, but it was amazing. 

I'd like to say it was inspiring but I'm too old and cynical to make a claim like that. I don't need inspiration, I need to get off my lazy ass, ease up on my current exercise obsession, and make with the clicking and clacking. 

On the drive home, I told Ms. Muse... 

"I need to do that kind of writing again."

"What kind of writing is that?"

"I just pick a small topic and dive into it."

"Like what?"

"I don't know....like Soup."

Soup, I observed was probably the very first food the cavemen and cavewomen ever cooked over a fire. You get a big pot of water and throw in everything you can find, carrots, pine cones, grass, a dead cat, a lemon, whatever. Mind you I don't have any science to back that up. It's just a pure anecdotal thought that seems to make sense to my lightweight brain. I mean, come on, it would be a good 500-600 years before they invented the non-stick teflon pan.

That night, sure as a Red Hat can come up with a hundred excuses why the 2020 election was rigged, I had a dream about taking a book off a shelf, following a recipe and making soup.

Only, I'm not going to run to the supermarket, gather all the necessary ingredients, carefully measure all the items in the recipe and spend hours in my kitchen over my noisy Wolf stove making soup. The non-stop snapping of the electronic ignition thigamajigs make that impossible.

Maybe soup is not the best way to kickstart my personal writing.

What about salad?