Post-Apocalyptic Crisco Saves the Day

Mmm....it's digestible! This is the cover of the January 1955 issue of McCall's magazine. Nothing says "Yummy in the tummy" like the clarification that a product is, indeed, digestible.

In case of nuclear/zombie/biological apocalypse, I want to be slathered in Crisco and, if possible, battered and deep fried. Crisco is indestructible. Buy a can of it, pop that foil seal, and leave it sitting out for a while. Even the metal-lined, cardboard canister they sell it in can’t hold in all of that greasy goodness. You get it within 50-feet of a light bulb, and it starts seeping out like methane after a bad experience at the Wok-n-Roll. It can’t be destroyed, and I can prove it: I’ve got biscuits I ate in 1983 tucked away in these saddle bags.

When I was a kid, I never knew anyone with childhood cancer. I didn’t even know anybody my parents’ age that had cancer. People lived to be older than dirt, and do you know why? It’s because their innards were coated in grease. Cancer couldn’t penetrate this force field of fat. Have you ever tried to wash grease off of your Tupperware? Unless you’ve got a big jug of Dawn and the anointing of the Holy Ghost, it ain’t coming off. 

Why do you think Southern kids love Slip’N’Slides so much?  Well, there’s two reasons. A) Cause we’re all lubed up with Crisco from the inside out and it's the only chance most of us ever get to break the sound barrier, and b) because it’s the only potential Summer Olympic sport where we’ve got a chance in hell of beating the Kenyans and Ethiopians.

Everything was fine until people started trying to eat healthy. I’ll admit that I’ve gotten on those kicks before, where I’d choose quinoa over macaroni, brussel sprouts over pork’n beans, and whole-grain roughage over Sister Schubert’s, but I quickly noted the error of my ways. The quinoa experiment was rough. I’d read all the tips and recipes online, and decided to cook it in chicken broth with some spices and junk to dress it up. The first warning bell was the odor. Quinoa has a distinct aroma, and the best way I can describe it is cat urine with a splash of brown rice. I couldn’t even let it finish cooking. 

There’d been an ant hill in the back yard that had resisted every ant killer offered in the Ace Hardware, but they were no match for the quinoa. I carried this stinkin’ pot of pestilence out back and poured it out in a ring around the ants. Y’all, I felt sorry for them. It looked like a reenactment of the Battle of Gettysburg. The stuff didn’t even touch them, but they flipped over on their backs like Leroy beggin’ for a belly rub. The sight of these critters kickin' the bucket upset me so bad I made the kids come out back and play taps on their kazoos.

Then there was the brussel sprouts incident. For God’s sake, these are so bad that spell check can’t even digest the word ‘brussel’. Dinner that night turned into a bad episode of Fear Factor. “If you can hold a brussel sprout in your mouth for 30-seconds without vomiting, you’ll move on to the next around and a shot at $50,000!”  Now nobody passed go, and nobody collected $50,000, but we did figure out how to pass the trash can so fast the Harlem Globetrotters asked us to do a clinic. 

All of these apocalypse-preparation, survival shows make me giggle. How is an urbanite with seven degrees in Recreation and Leisure Studies supposed to compete against the elements, the lack of resources, and "The Roy", the gentleman from Mobile that wrestles alligators for fun? Some of these shows follow people through the most intimidating landscapes on earth, but then they’ll hole up in the Four Seasons when the cameras shut off. You put that bad boy in Prichard, Alabama for a night with no cell service, and you’ll see just how fuzzy his peaches are. 

In the South, people deal with these scenarios every day. It’s not that we’re smarter down here; we just don’t shy away from opportunities to interact with Mother Nature. If you have a classically trained survival expert from Portland and a dude from South Georgia that’s missing the tips of three fingers and the soles of his shoes, let’s just say that Ray Charles (God rest his soul) will be singing the anthem at the awards ceremony. Bless our Southern hearts. Now you better run and get you a biscuit...you never know when the zombies are coming, and the Summer Games ain't that far away.