Jewish Foot in Mouth Disease

Traditionally, on Christmas Eve, my parents invite the entire extended family down to their house to celebrate the near completion of yet another ravenously successful year of purchasing. And traditionally my culinary capabilities are called upon to prepare that timeless of all Christmas treats: 5 alarm texas Chili. This I love to do because it is the one time of year that I actually make a half assed effort in selecting the ingredient as opposed to opening up the refrigerator and blindly reaching for anything resembling meat. This year I returned from the butcher shop with no less that 5 species of meat; 2 from the flying kingdom and 3 from the petting zoo phylum. All of these, including various beans and spices were heaped into a ten gallon cauldron. It was a masterpiece. The house soon took on the aroma of a nasty Tijuana street fight and quickly my mother came drifting into the kitchen to check on my progress. "Ummm, that smells good," she said stirring the meaty mix. "What's in there?" "Well," I started, proudly and then went on to name every ingredient. When I was cruising through the "petting zoo department" she got this really concerned look on her face. "Did you say sausage?" "yep," I said "100% USDA approved pink squealer." "Ummm, you do realize that your cousins are Jewish don't you and they are not allowed to eat pork." It was at that point that every reservation I had ever had about being an atheist were washed away. I had just made a pot of chili that would have buckled Willie fucking Nelson's knees and now I was being told that the guests couldn't eat it. I was furious and with fury often comes "La Dance du Foot in Mouth." Oh, everyone knows this dance; you open your mouth to bolster your case but instead end up saying something so far beyond stupid that you are required to wear your penny loafers next to your tonsils while your bravely continue to rebuild your reputation. So, without thinking, I said "Sooooo, we don't have to tell them...do we?" An eerie silence filled the room...but only for a moment. Then, much like when southern white trash tries to describe the moments before their trailer parks "done flewed up into the sky" the scene got ugly....derned quick! In the next twenty minutes or so I was brought up to speed on compassion, respect, understanding and deception....with a little morality thrown in as a sweetener. By the time my mother was done raking me over the coals for my slip I was just a puddle of piss on the kitchen floor ready to be left on the steps of the Simon Wiesenthal Center for adoption. Well, to make a long story short I returned to the butcher shop and prepared the best "pork-free" chili I have ever made. As for my shoe, well, I still have one lace wrapped around my tongue according to my mother.