That Tastes Soooo Good

James L. Davis

I think I must have defective taste buds because I just don’t seem to get the enjoyment out of my food the way other people do. If they aren’t defective then they must be lazy, because they don’t give me near as much excitement as other people’s taste buds must give them when sitting down to a meal.

While I’m not sure whether a taste bud can be lazy or not, I am sure that some people get a whole lot more out of their dining experience than I ever have. I enjoy sitting down to a meal as much as the next person (as long as I’m not the one cooking) and my bulging belly can attest to the fact, but eating is just something I do two or three times a day between events in my life, it is not an event in and of itself.

Which is why I think my taste buds must be defective or lazy, because for some people eating is not only an event, it is The Event of the day.

You know it is The Event because they will spend long hours planning out what they are going to eat next, where they are going to eat it and how much they hope to eat. These are the people that you will never, ever see grabbing a bite to eat from beneath a convenience store warmer. Their taste buds might actually strangle them if they were to put so little thought into their meal.

Another way you can spot people who consider a meal as The Event is by the way they react to eating. They do all kinds of crazy things that well, frankly, leave me a little embarrassed if I happen to be in the same room as they are when they are dining.

My youngest son for instance must have superhuman taste buds because we can eat the same thing and our responses will be totally different. To me it’s a meal, perhaps even a great meal, to him it approaches an almost out of body experience. Just recently we took my parents out to dinner and on our way into town the children asked, because it is their way, where we would be eating. Children ask this question just so they will have something to whine about for the remainder of the trip.

On this trip however, I circumvented the whining by telling my children that we were going out for steak. Suddenly all of their preparation for whining was transformed into praise for the Great and Wise Father, the Father of All Time, the Father Who Was Taking His Children Out for Steak.

When we arrived at the steak house we took our seats, placed our orders for steak and enjoyed each others company while we waited for our food. All was well and good right up until the food arrived and then something strange started to happen to my son.

He started to make noises when he ate. Strange, moaning noises that frightened me.

“What’s wrong with you?” I asked.

“It’s so good,” was his response.

It was a good steak, but I wasn’t ready to get quite that vocal about it. Apparently he was and by the end of the meal his looks and moans of happiness at the meal he had eaten left me equally disturbed and puzzled. Disturbed because of the looks the waiter and other diners were giving our table and puzzled because I have never eaten a meal that gave me as much joy as a steak dinner had given my son.

Upon investigation I discovered that my son is not alone in being a Meal Time Moaner, apparently there are a large number of them living productive lives in society, except of course when they are eating. When they are eating they are a disturbance to society.

In my own family my youngest son is not the only Meal Time Moaner. My middle son suffered from the same ailment, but I am happy to report that he is on the road to recovery.

He would moan whenever he chewed his food, a long, drawn out moan that would stretch from the first to the last chew and sound like either a muffled attempt to communicate or the soft moaning of a dying cow, or both.

In the case of my middle son he was not even aware that he was making any noise at all and was convinced we were hearing things when we asked him to stop. It turns out we were hearing things. The things were coming out of his mouth in the form of moans. Eventually he was able to break himself of the habit without any form of shock therapy, although I had offered to provide it if he thought it might be helpful.

Of course, while he no longer moans he does apparently still possess overactive taste buds. He still has them and not being able to express his pleasure at having overactive taste buds results in a tendency toward violence. I know this because while my middle son no longer moans while eating, he does threaten violence if anyone attempts to steal his food.

Which in the end makes me grateful for my defective taste buds.

Circle of Fire

James L. Davis

As the wild fires of the past several weeks have almost encircled us in a ring of fire it should remind those of us fortunate enough to call Emery County home how lucky we have been...so far.

As wildfires engulf thousands of acres of forest and rangeland we can get a glimpse of what these fires are doing to the state even in Emery County. All we have to do is take a look at the haze on the horizon to know that we are encircled in fire.

For those of us who call Emery County home it is almost second nature to think that the county is somehow detached from the rest of the world. We march to the beat of a different drummer in virtually everything.

So it was that while fires were raging elsewhere in the state we had a prescribed fire here in an effort to eliminate spruce beetle killed trees on Ferron Mountain. The Forest Service has been trying to burn out the trees for some time with limited success.

This year the burn effort met with greater success and then some as the prescribed fire turned to a wildfire itself as high temperatures and low humidity led to the fire getting out of hand.

After a week of burning the fire was mostly under control at press time. Even though the fire spread further than had been planned, it still did what the Forest Service wanted, consuming beetle killed trees on the mountain. The forest service monitored the fire every step of the way and even though it did get out of hand for a time, the fire still did some good on Ferron Mountain.

As wild fires rage to our west and south in a dry and hot season, some might question the wisdom of the Forest Service for starting a prescribed burn this year on Ferron Mountain.

But the mountains in our area, unlike forests elsewhere in the west and the state, are not as prone to fire, evidenced by the Forest Services repeated efforts to burn out the spruce beetle killed trees over the years. They planned carefully for this prescribed burn and worked hard to keep it under control. They did their best to keep the public informed on the status of the fires and their efforts to control it. Reader boards were placed on the highways to inform motorists and daily bulletins were provided to area stores for posting, inviting the public to call the Ferron/Price Ranger District for more information. The consideration for the questions and concerns of the public is commendable.

The men and women fighting the forest fires throughout the state and region show considerable grit, resolve and bravery as they face hellish conditions each day. Their efforts should be appreciated for the heroic acts they are.