The Eternal Optimist

The device to the left in the photo above is a mango cutter. It was a Christmas present from my mother, because I love mangoes and hate cutting them, even if I'm using the Martha Stewart Method.

On the lower right is a mango that I purchased, oh, about two weeks ago (the reddish one). It has been sitting in a fruit bowl on my kitchen table since then. See the overripe-mango bruise in the flesh? Also present on the flesh, although not visible due to my crappy photography skills, is glitter. Yes, glitter. Why, you ask? Because my fruit bowl doubled as a receptacle for an arrangement of decorative Christmas greenery and ornaments, of course.

Last night, I was out, and Ty was making some inordinately good dinner (portobello mushroom tortelloni with a decadent tomato-and-pancetta-based sauce) when he realized that we were out of onions. He called me and asked me to pick some up.

This is where the trouble begins.

You see, I buy my onions at our local health food store. I buy them there because I believe in the benefits of organic produce and all that, but mostly because the health food store is a bevvy of promising-looking items that a stressed-out woman will all too readily procure.

Therefore, on this trip to the health food store, I bought:

1. several pounds of organic onions;
2. a Stonyfield Farm vanilla truffle yogurt;
3. a bottle of lavender essential oil (for stress reduction during my fertility appointments, but of course I can't wear fragrances to the doctor's office, so there was absolutely no reason for me to buy this);
4. a box of chocolate-chip oatmeal cookies;
5. an organic mango (the green one on the upper right).

And I put back the Dutch waffle cookies at the last minute, because the box said something about how "Instead of the traditional caramel, we put in this healthy substitute..." and I lost interest.

Total cost? Over $21.

You know what's going to happen to the new mango, don't you?

The same thing as the old mango. It will sit there until it gets bruised and rotten, because I, who made time to create a display of decorative greenery and ornaments in our fruit bowl, do not have time to cut up a mango EVEN WHEN I OWN A TOOL EXPRESSLY DESIGNED TO MAKE IT FUN AND EASY TO CUT UP MANGOES.

On the other hand, the chocolate chip oatmeal cookies will be gone by tomorrow.

Why are we humans like this???