TED WILSON REVIEWS THE WORLD: A FRUIT SALAD

★★☆☆☆

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of the world. Today I am reviewing a fruit salad.

Why is it that a pile of fruit is a fruit salad, but a pile of meat isn’t a meat salad? It’s just a pile of meat. I went to culinary school to find out the answer!

Unfortunately, when I arrived, I was told all the classes were full. That’s when I remembered a movie where a man gets into college by pretending to be black. That gave me an idea! What if I went to butcher school instead? After wandering around for several hours hoping to find one, I got tired and stopped for lunch.

I ordered a fruit salad despite the menu offering only a vague description of what the salad included, saying it contained “seasonal fruits.” What kind of meaningless gibberish is that? I can buy any fruit I want at any time of year. Fruits don’t have seasons!

When the salad arrived I learned why they didn’t get into specifics. There was not a single fruit I could identify and I’ll bet neither could the chef. There was a firm, white fruit the waiter told me he thought might be a “pare.” I’ve never heard of such a thing so I didn’t eat it. I never eat anything new if I can help it because you never know what might give you a tummy ache. Or worse: cancer.

The salad wasn’t very filling so I ordered two more. Then I ordered a third because one fell onto the floor and ants took most of it. If the salad had some meat in it to begin with, I never would have needed additional salads, and then those ants would have starved to death. So many problems would have been fixed.

If the ingredients had been a pare with some type of pig-watermelon hybrid animal, it would have made the difference between a fine salad and a spectacular one. Sadly, neither technology nor God has willed such a thing into existence yet.

There was one thing about this salad I really liked, and that was how it smelled like a smoothie. Like a solid, lumpy smoothie. It reminded me of the odor at a smoothie place I went to once looking for a Slurpee. The worker there had a very nice smile. Eating this salad was like tasting that guy’s smile.

BEST FEATURE: So much mystery! I like mystery. It makes me feel like a detective.
WORST FEATURE: I got a seed stuck in my teeth for three weeks and had to use tweezers to get it out.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing Christmas Eve, 2001.