My Friend Mike Glick... A Little More...

A little something my friend Mike posted on his face book....

At the local "Whole Foods" market, known by locals as the "Whole Paychecks" market, you can discover the most amazing flours, grains, pastas, nuts(of the leguminous variety, although the hominine is also abundant), herbs, spices, oils, hone

ys, salts, and yes, Rices! 

Most recently my curiosity effected the purchase of some "Forbidden Rice". Appearantly a favorite of Emperors of China's past.

This rice has the size and shape of common Brown rice, but is jet black as the ace of spades. Boils to a perfect wild rice, firm but tender texture in a short 35 minutes. Has a unique to rice, fruity almost grape like flavor. And, once cooked and served, portrays an exact likeness to a half a cup of moist, fresh, steaming in It's scoop sized serving portion on your plate, pile of mouse poop!

Even for myself and my cast iron constitution, it made me take pause before consuming a fork full.

When watching those little, black gems, all uniformly cylindrical and pinched to a fine point at either end, a perfect turd facsimile. Dropping from my fork in pairs and trios, it took my memory back in time to my old Colorado shed row I shared with my horses. Before making camp in my very own stall, I cleaned up numerous five gallon bucket loads of rodent dukie. 

Even after making camp, mouse poop remained a theme of daily existence. From the mornings, waking up to my bedroll being sprinkled with poop from the night's activity of rodentia in the shelving above my bunk. To the evenings constant scurrying and scampering with the hub of the "night life" centered around my chuck box, in the shelves above my bunk area.

I watched the springs crop of young grow into maturity that winter, munching on my stores of bread, crackers, cheese, and chocolate bars.

I worried at first! You know, seeing the miniscule nibble marks at the corners of my cheeses and chocolates. Gnawed right throught the wrappers, bite marks resembling those left from a lilliputian cheese grater.

Finding evidence of their approval in my shopping selections in the form of not yet dried turds on the tops of my sardine and chili bean cans. 

But, after time my concerns waned with the thought that, "really, there's not much the mice could catch from me biting over their nibble marks in cheese and chocolate or bread? They should be fine with sharing." 

And, "this is whole grain bread, those little, black things are some kind of seed kernal..... I think? Well, come on Mike, they have to be, the way they "crunch" is too hard to be a little Fiffel's #2 ?"

After more thought "Awhh, they're tasteless anyway, who cares?" 

Funny how the resemblance of rice to mouse poop could create such a "Deja Vu"? That being the thought, "Is that a mouse turd, or something edible?" 

Concluding with, "Hmm, doesn't taste bad... Couldn't be!?!"