Eating Miraculous Rice Cakes

On January 8 I ate my first rice cake since the annual holiday eating binge began in mid-December.  Before my first bite, I stared at it in wonder realizing what I needed it to do.  I was expecting this simple rice cake to somehow attack and remove the fat that had magically attached itself to my body.

I wanted it to remove all traces of the Christmas candy, to annihilate the Honey Baked Ham, to neutralize the impact of the holiday cheeses, to unfig the figgy pudding and to de-pie the Christmas pies.  Ah the Christmas pie – Do I want more pie? DO I WANT MORE PIE? Why do you even ask?  Don’t be wasting time asking silly questions and bring me some more pie.  Instead of all this yakking, I could already be tasting that delicious Christmas pie right now.

So I am putting immense faith in this rice cake which has to be the most dishonest food ever invented.  Cake? Are you joking? This is a “cake” in geometric terms only.  You would never serve this so called cake for dessert.  You would not put candles on it and celebrate a birthday. You would never

What the hell even is this stuff?

order it in a restaurant to finish your meal.  No, it is a food to be eaten in shame. In the privacy of your home, with the lights off and the curtains closed.  It is a cake as much as soap is a cake.

And I’m sure it is even made of rice. Can you really tell?  My “cakes” are made by an oats company.  How do we know it does not sweep up all the rotten oats left on the floor, bleach it white, and press it into cakes?  And it doesn’t taste like rice; it tastes like Styrofoam, but not good Styrofoam. No, like stale, dried, Styrofoam that had been left in the sun to rot.

And this so called food is unsatisfying and not filling. You think you are going to lose weight by eating this, but you end eating 10 of them and you are still hungry!

So “rice cakes” are liars, masqueraders, if you will. Rice Cakes would be a better name for a Chinese stripper, although the term “cakes” might be an exaggeration.  I tried to find a photo of a Chinese stripper to post here, but I couldn’t find one.  It seems Rice Cakes the stripper is just as unsatisfying and unfulfilling as rice cakes the food.

And yet, I buy and eat this crap because I am fat. My body has a seemingly endless capacity to expand to accommodate all the fat that wants to take up residence after the holidays.  The annoying relatives at least go home at some point – but not the annoying fat.

It is extremely unfair that while my body readily expands to house the fat, but my clothes do not.  I am now wearing that Spanish line of clothing – Pantalones Splitones.   I look longingly at my skinny jeans hanging in the closet.  They see me staring and mock me.  “Someone had too much pie at Christmas, didn’t he?  Maybe you should eat some rice cakes.” I move towards them and they shriek, “Don’t even think about touching me”. This of course describes my high school dating experience in one sentence.

As I pondered this cylindrical piece of ah, whatever, I came to the realization that I was putting more faith in rice cakes than you would in a communion wafer.  I was hoping it would miraculously transform me back into a previous time, a time when I once again could fit back into my pants.  I wanted this cake to make me a muffin, a stud-muffin.

Yes, this was a type of sacrament for fat people.  In the church of the Hefty, this is the penance for the sin of eating too much pie.  I examined the rice cake carefully looking for an image of some saint or prophet on it, maybe even Jenny Craig, but there was none.

People believe in the power of the rice cake because we are wired to put too much hope in things; whether it is money, new relationships, new jobs, people, or politicians. This false hope always leads to disappointment, so I’m sure I will end up very disappointed in this rice cake.

And marketers understand we are hope-mongers.  They promise us that their products will change our lives for the better. They play us for poor, hopeful, saps. There is even a new yogurt on the market that implies it provides health benefits and makes you popular with the ladies.  Of course I am much too smart to fall for that nonsense.  But I think I may try some because it sounds pretty good.