joe eats

Last year around this time, King Foodie was a newly christened chef. With that came a new style. Joe grew his hair a few inches longer and grew a beard. Ooh, he looked so rough and manly with his new look. That’s why I was a tad bit apprehensive when he told me about his idea for his Halloween costume…

Joe and I were planning to dress-up as vampires. We were not channeling “The Twilight Saga,” or 18th Century Goth. Rather, we were creating our “own” version of these mystic, sexy, creatures. Of course, mine was going to be “hot.” However, leave it to King Foodie to come up with something very dramatic.

“I am going to bleach my hair blonde on Halloween!” King Foodie said. I said, “Why?” Joe replied, “I am going to be a blonde vampire!” I said, “Why can’t you just be a regular vampire… but keep your own hair?” “It’s more dramatic. I want to shock everyone. Yes, I am shaving the beard and bleaching my hair blonde,” Joe enthusiastically declared.

Readers, in case you didn’t know by now, once King Foodie gets an “idea” in his head, it’s very difficult to dissuade him….verging on impossible. Think, changing water to wine… You know? A miracle. Although I admit I loved running my fingers through his baby, soft chestnut locks, I wasn’t in the mood to debate. I thought to myself, “If you want to walk around with platinum hair, I am not going to try to stop you.” So I said, “I don’t think it’s the best idea, but if you want to do it…sure, go for it.”

Halloween night. It must have taken me all of ten minutes to get ready- did my nails earlier that day, threw on a slinky dress, and “painted on” a few appropriately placed bite marks. Voila! There you have it, a “hot” vampire, as well as a low maintenance one.

King Foodie, on the other hand, that was a different story… At 10:00pm I yelled upstairs, “Joe, I’m ready. Let’s go to the party!” Joe yelled back, “Love, my scalp is burning… Can you come upstairs?” I ran to the bathroom and found poor King Foodie hunched over in pain, wrapped in a towel. But yes, his hair was considerably lighter, just couldn’t tell the color yet. “Hey, how long has it been? Why don’t you rinse it out?” I said. Joe jumped in the shower, which seemed to provide his irritated scalp a bit of relief. When he got out, there was a bit of “Hmm…oh…ha?…“ Putting it simply, the boy’s hair was orange! Damage already done, and late for the party, there was nothing we could do about it then. Joe threw on his tuxedo (that he wore to our wedding), put on fake teeth, quickly rubbed white make-up all over his face.

Considering King Foodies’ heroic “costume” efforts, he hardly received a response of shock, awe or excitement from any of the partygoers. In fact, I think I even remember hearing him tell someone that he shaved his beard. Ok, let’s give them the benefit of the doubt. It was dark and they were drunk.

The following day, when Joe rolled into work at 9:00am for Sunday brunch he got his reaction. Summed up, the word, “dude” was used a lot. “Dude…what happened?” “Ouch, dude…your hair… it‘s…orange” “Dude…I’m sorry…” “Dude…you look different…Did you shave your beard?”

Halloween passed, and our newly knighted chef, was now stuck with this carrot-topped mop. However, this new look was not gonna fly with King Foodie’s fab style. Do not fear. Nothing that his lovely wife (moi) along with a bottle of brown hair dye could not fix.

Yup, now we’re back in business…

Savor on,

Marney