Suburgatory (17 page)

Waitress Wages Anti-Foodie
Jihad on Chowhound

Suburgatory, USA—A local woman, fed up with the high-end restaurant where she waitresses and the people who eat there, has launched an anonymous online jihad on the foodie website Chowhound.

“OK, [head chef] Graydon would be
horror-fied
that you are calling it ‘high-end.' Because that sounds fancy and contrived, which, of course, Ploughshare isn't at all. It's just farm-to-table pure authenticity on a plate! This shit will set you back two hundred bucks for one dinner; the most expensive food in suburbia within a hundred miles, but it doesn't matter. It's still ‘rustic comfort food,' isn't it? Whatever that means.”

The woman spoke to this reporter at the Elm Street Applebee's. She asked to remain anonymous, and would like to be referred to by the Internet name she uses while terrorizing the unsuspecting foodies on the section of Chowhound devoted to the region. Her Internet name is EatMyShit.

EatMyShit feels like it is her responsibility to puncture the illusions and pretensions of the foodies who make her job torture.

“So go to Ploughshare and look at the communal tables with that tiny hint of dust. That is
not
naturally occurring dust. It's
artfully dusted every morning.
Do you know that the maple used for those tables is recovered wood from a 1950s bowling alley? Because you know what foodies also like when they're not eating food that's farm-to-table? Irony! Mmmmm mmmm yummy yummy, gobble gobble, gimme my lobster gruyere mac and cheese and a Pabst Blue Ribbon, please!”

EatMyShit realized she could take out her many frustrations on the foodie website Chowhound, and away she went.

“Loco-More” asked if anyone knew where he could find regionally sourced wild ramps. EatMyShit responded: “You mean you need a bag of onions? Yes, Wal-Mart has started selling produce. Local enough for you? And does every fucking ingredient have to have a zip code attached to it?”

“Chowdah-hound” was in search of the perfect Tunisian Mahdjouba Djazairia sandwich with “round, flat griddled bread.” EatMyShit wrote, “Did you hear that a poor Tunisian man selling vegetables from a pushcart set himself on fire and touched off a revolution that swept the Middle East? No? Oh right, you're too busy chasing down your super-special-ethnic-I'm-the-coolest-sandwich.”

EatMyShit's favorite guerrilla tactic is searching for people who use the words “famished” or “starved” or “dying” for something like, say, white truffle oil or nettle soup, and then posting pictures of emaciated Somali children in response.

Just where did this seemingly bottomless pit of anger come from? “You know, it's not really that fun serving food you yourself can't afford. I'd almost rather work in a place that actually screams out that it's high-end, instead of pretending to be so simple and virtuous. Then you see these people trying to seem so casual snapping pictures of their precious dinners and putting it on Facebook like they just won the fucking Nobel Peace Prize for Eating.”

So when “Gordough” asked on Chowhound about the ambiance at Ploughshare, EatMyShit was eager to respond: “Douchebag with a side of Hipster. Oh, and you know the only thing worse than a hipster? An old, gray-haired
suburban
hipster. Give it the fuck up already.”

“Yeah, so I guess I have a really strong position on this topic and . . . and . . .” EatMyShit unexpectedly started tearing up. “Well, to be really honest, my boyfriend Graydon—he's the chef at Ploughshare. He broke up with me last month. Maybe it's made me a little crazy. . . . Love sucks, doesn't it? Miss?” she said to the Applebee's waitress. “Can I get the Bloomin' Onion?”

SHOUT OUT

The House that Ate My Husband

Carla Baker is a wife and mother who lives on Linden Street.

I take to the Shout Out section today to deliver a cautionary tale to my fellow wives out there.

It was July 16, 2007. Yes I remember the exact date, how could I not? How can a loving wife and mother erase from her mind that horrible day when her family was ripped away from her without warning? The day I signed my name on all those dotted lines, page after page, thinking I was forging a bright future for my son, my husband, and me, too, in our new suburban town. But that wasn't how it all worked out. No, no it did not.

It was the moment Steve was stolen from me by a mistress who consumes his heart, his time, his very soul. She is unrelenting in her demands, and her steely grip on him is complete. To add insult to injury, while I can still rock a size 8 on a thin day, she is built like a brick house. Because she is a brick house. Our house. And I curse the day I let that fat bitch into my life.

As soon as he saw her, when that old-hag broker pimped her out to us, he had to have her. His hand ran gently across her mantle. He traced the curves of her countertops. It was only then that I realized that I hadn't seen Steve look like this in years: He looked happy. I could tell that this was it, it was her or nothing. I thought she was borderline white trash, I mean, her kitchen? Those tacky cabinets? Steve insisted we could class her up. She just needed our help. Steve really meant
his
help, his tender, knowing touch. And within weeks of that day we closed, as the tools piled up and the projects got their own Excel spreadsheet, I knew he was hooked. He was already out the door emotionally, and he was taking my preschool son with him.

She makes Steve feel needed in ways I never could. “Steeeve, my gutters are so clogged. Can you clean them out? Pleeeeze?” And he's out there in a flash. Sometimes he'll try to duck out and I'll catch him and demand to know where he's going. He can't look me in the eye or say it, but I know where he's headed: Home Depot. Because she loves sending him out on a whim, hoping he'll come back with some bauble to make her prettier. Whore-red paint for her shutters. A gaudy spotlight to show off her shapely front door. Anything to tart her up, to keep him coming back for more. And when he's not hanging off some part of her, I can see him drift, get that glazed look. I know he's thinking about her, what he wants to do with her next and how fast he can start. Then there was that time she called during dinner.

“Steeeve, the acid rain is falling on me. I'm burning! Can you come and power wash me? It's stinging me! Ow!” I told him if she ever called during dinner again, I was out of there. He shot back at me, “You know, every guy in town is just like me. You act like I'm some criminal or something!” I said, “They are
not
just like you. They bring in plumbers, landscapers, and handymen so they don't get too attached. But you couldn't resist, could you?”

There's always drama with her. I've always been sensible, reliable, predictable, easy-peasy; now I see what Steve has always wanted: a train wreck. He can't get enough of the excitement, the challenge. “Oh, no! How did this happen? Steve, helllp! My basement just flooded and you need to clean me up
now!
The mold, it's coming!” Then, “I don't know how this could have happened but my furnace shut down and I'm getting soooo cold, Steve!”

You know, I think I could accept this betrayal from Steve; I get it, relationships change, mature, grow old, grow tired. We're both adults. But she's sucked our little boy into her sickening web, too. He follows Steve around with his little play toolbox, anxious to see what Dad's all hot and bothered about. When I ask him to make muffins with me, Jackson will say “No Mommy, I have to help Daddy wee-gwout the tiles in the baff-woom!” And I see Steve's example imprinting itself on my little boy. It's what Steve's dad did to him. And I look ahead at Jackson's future and think, it's what Jackson will do to his wife, too. We all know it's a cycle.

She's taken everything dear from me. But I'm trapped. I can't leave because then that cunt would win. And we're underwater on our mortgage. Because of her. That filthy, good-for nothing homewrecker.

Parents Called “Bad Jews” for
Rejecting Sleepaway Camp

Suburgatory, USA—An area Jewish family has been harassed online and in person by those in their community who are flabbergasted by the parents' decision not to send their seven-year-old son to sleepaway camp.

“I want my boy home this summer. These people will have to pry him from my cold, dead hands,” said Lori Metzner.

“How do you like that,” said Bari Weiss, whose daughter attends Hebrew school with Metzner's son, Josh.

“There she is, quoting Charlton Heston. People thought he was a Jew, too. Well, he wasn't. I'm starting to think Lori is less of a Jew than he was! Ben Hur would have sent his kid to sleepaway camp, you can be damn sure of that.”

At first, friends and acquaintances of Lori and Jeremy Metzner were gentle with the couple, as they tried to process the idea of a Jewish child just aimlessly kicking a ball around at home all summer, completely bereft of other young Jews. Some asked them, delicately, “Is there something wrong with Josh—is he sick?”

But once word got out that Josh was
not
sick, the gloves came off. It was decided among the Highland Street Jews that an intervention was needed. Two parents, Roni Sussman and Lisa Scher, banged hard on the door without warning one night and barreled in, giving the Metzners no chance to keep them out.

Roni:
Lori, we are really, really concerned about Josh.

Lori:
Why?

Lisa
:
How is he going to learn about his Jewish identity if he doesn't go to sleepaway camp?

Jeremy:
Considering I never see either of you at temple even on high holidays, I'm starting to think your Jewish identity
is
sleepaway camp.

Roni:
Think of our terrible past. Our people died in the Holocaust and would have
wanted
our kids to go to sleepaway camp.

Jeremy:
They had sleepaway camp in Nazi Germany?

Lori:
Wait, are you saying you think Holocaust victims would want me to put my child on a bus to be sent away to a camp out in the woods a hundred miles away?

Roni:
Lori, that's not funny.

Jeremy:
Good one, Lor!

Lisa:
You two are letting Hitler win!

Undeterred, Lisa and Roni put up a Facebook page called “Save Joshy's Summer” in hopes of putting pressure on the Metzners. The page encouraged people to post their favorite camp stories and it attracted a few thousand camp-crazed Jewish adults from all over the world.

It remained generally positive, that is, until the Metzners decided to have some fun with it. First, Lori posted this. “All I learned at Camp Shalom was how to give a blow job.” Then Jeremy said they had changed their minds and decided to send Josh to camp, which got dozens of “Likes” within minutes. Then he posted which camp—it was Sunnyvale—a well-known high-end camp that caters exclusively to WASPs. A few minutes later, as those dozens of people “Unliked” the post, Jeremy added “Psych!” One response to the Metzner's ruse was this: “Why don't you send him to the Gaza Strip Hamas training camp, because that's the only place that'd want you.”