I had an urge for steakums last night. It had been years since I have had them, probably not since when I was a kid around when they first came out. I am sure the novelty of being about to buy two-dimensional beef that pan-fried within a matter of minutes appealed to mother's everywhere. I was not even sure they still made the stuff, but last night when I was pushing my squeaky cart around the great unwashed at a local Wal-Mart, sure enough a box of steakums shone at me from a frozen food display case like the Holy Grail. Curiously enough, there was only the box of steakum, I did not see any imitation Wal-Mart brand steakums, or even a different variety of steakums, like Teriyaki flavor or something. Just steakums.
I decided to try out my new George foreman grill that was given to my by my friend K. Apparently she got it free with a microwave she had bought. It's a sort of odd shaped George Foreman, it's not a square like the classic ones, but instead it's a bit oblong. I suppose it's for cooking sausages or something. Regardless, the flat rectangles of steakum beef fit perfectly into it. I was amazed at not only how fast the George Forman cooked these things, but at the sheer amount of grease that ran out. It almost flash-fried it. I felt like I was operating one of those old dry-cleaning units where you press the lid down and a bunch of steam hisses out. Except for a clean-pressed shirt I had a tasty flap of highly processed beef. The grease ran out in rivers and almost completely filled the little plastic grease trap. In fact so much grease ran out that I was actually quite surprised that when I lifted the lid that the steakum was not reduced to the size of a postage stamp.
I sprinkled some steak seasoning on them and fitted them into some hoagie rolls with a squirt of ketchup. Tasty indeed.
I got stuck behind a bus this morning at work. I swear this bus has only one stop; at a massive apartment complex that squats next to my morning commute. Sometimes I am amazed by the sheer amount of kids standing in front of the place in the morning. A bus rolls up to it virtually empty and these kids fill the entire thing. It can take several minutes when you are stuck behind it. A huge swarm of knee-high kids with a mild scattering of young moms sporting tramp-stamps (I know because I peered when they bent down to send their kids off) mill about in front, but when the bus rolls up I am actually surprised at how well the kids organize themselves. They all quickly form up into a line leading to a bus. It's like watching a flock of birds in the sky suddenly land on a telephone wire. Say what you want about today's public school systems, they can teach these kids to stand in a line. That's important, because I will be standing in line with these kids when I'm old to get my daily ration of soylent green.
You have to think about the future.
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2026 Update
Stepping out of the time machine into 2007: Ed is chasing childhood steakums and getting stuck behind the world's slowest bus.
Ah, Ed, you sweet time capsule. Nineteen years on, two-dimensional beef still exists, but the frozen case now has twenty-seven varieties, all trying to sound like artisanal protein chips, and the George Foreman is just another landfill fossil, replaced by air fryers that chirp at you like needy familiars. Walmart still has squeaky carts, sure, but the great unwashed now shop with their phones out, comparing prices via apps while the self-checkout machine glares at them for putting an unbagged banana in the wrong spot. You could buy steakums at 2 a.m. from a delivery app if you wanted, which would have melted your 2007 brain. And those school children? They still form lines, but now half of them are carrying phones that could run a small kingdom, and the parents aren't bending down to kiss them goodbye as much as taking photos for the cloud. The bus is still there. The bus is always there. The only thing that has truly changed is you, Ed: you are nineteen years closer to that daily ration of soylent green, and the line is longer.
“2007 Ed, did you actually believe the most vital thing public schools teach is standing in line, or were you just staring at that bus load of kids and realizing you were already rehearsing for your own soylent green future?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2007 Ed: Well, Beelzebubba, I think it's a bit of both, honestly. Watching those kids snap into line like a flock of birds landing on a wire, that was genuinely impressive, and yeah, I did think, 'there's a life skill.' But the soylent green part, that was me being me. I've got this whole dark little future playing in my head where I'm old and gray and shuffling up to get my daily ration of mystery protein, and the kids I'm standing behind are the same ones who learned to queue up outside that apartment complex. So maybe I was rehearsing, a little. I mean, have you seen the price of beef lately? We're all just a few bad years away from eating each other. At least they'll teach the next generation to wait their turn politely. Take that, foul germs.
