Ethnic Grocery Store Experience

Despite the fact that I have lived in my home town for 33 out of the 34 years of my life, I made my first trip to the local ethnic grocery store for some ingredients for a dinner I was going to make that I could not obtain at a “traditional” grocery store.  Now, this store had most of the “regular” stuff you would find at any other store, including a deli/meat counter.  As I perused the fresh meat section I noticed numerous different cuts and types of meat, including some very delicious looking pre-marinated items.  As I made my way to the end of the counter, there, hidden like a dirty secret in the last section of the glass enclosure, was a monstrosity staring back at me.  In all my days I had never been witness to a skinned cow head, eyes in sockets, mouth agape, tongue sticking out to the side and teeth still in the mouth.  Yeah, that’s what I said, the poor bovine’s oral accoutrements were intact, for what horrific purpose, I have no idea.  My head immediately became filled with the score for the Godfather  (Side note necessary: I am now sure there are a bunch of freakish Godfather aficionados out there who are completely offended by the inaccuracy of this joke.  You know the people I am talking about.  The guy who has dresses up as Michael Corleone every single Halloween for the past twelve years, or the guy who incessantly practices his Don Vito impression just hoping for the one glorious moment of his existence when he can mumble, practically incoherently, the phrase “I’m gonna make you an offer you can’t refuse” during an everyday conversation with someone.  I know darn well it was a horse head in the movie, and not a cow, but you people are just going to have to allow a little latitude in the joke telling, and try not to get caught up in quibbling over, and dissecting, every little detail of this blog.  Rant over.  Back to the show).  My logistical mind immediately goes into super-charged pragmatic mode, and I start wondering how the heck do you carry this out of the store?  I look into the produce section and notice the bags one uses for fruits and veggies.  Uhhhh…no…not unless they use the deli slicer machine to cut the head into 100’s of paper thin slices of tendons, muscle, bone and membrane and you stuff it into those bags, I guess.  Maybe they just give it to you in a large, slightly see-through plastic bag that allows someone to make out the barely distinguishable bloody head, and you hope like hell that at the same time the cops are not looking for a deranged serial killer who happens to cut off his victim’s heads and carries them around in a hefty sack.  And of course there are the strange looks you get from people on the street, and the reflex-like defensive attitude you get,  “Yeah, that’s right, I have a cows head in a bag.  What’s it to you?”, not even realizing the absurdity of your statement and that, hey, crazy, you have a flippin’ skinned cow’s head flung over your back in a pack like you’re the love child of Santa Claus and Jimmy Dean. My mind then of course turns to wondering why someone would buy a cow head in the first place, but figured you must be able to use it to make some dish or another that I am unfamiliar with, and was accepting of that fact.  I, of course, do not think I would ever buy a cow head, and despite my awareness of my lack of desire to purchase said item, I began finding myself wondering, “I wonder what a cow head goes for these days?”  I take a gander below the cow head, and see that it is $39.99.  This really does not seem that outrageous to me, although I have no frame of reference for the cost of such an item.  I guess I just expected it to cost more.  Given what I consider to be a more than fair price, I contemplate for the briefest of  moments the lack of interior design I have in my apartment, and what an awesome conversation piece this could be hanging on my wall. That idea is completely obliterated from my mind as I foresee the unavoidable, repeated night terrors my six year-old child would experience having that in the home.  There is also the minor issue of the smell and mass of flies.  I mean come on, there is probably a reason Glade doesn’t make a cow carcass scented plug-in.  

At this point, the sight of the cow head has completely thrown me off and made me forgot what items I am even there to pick up.  I therefore meander aimlessly down the wall into the pre-packaged meat section.  And wouldn’t you know it, I am again locked in a gaze with a poor slaughtered animal.  It is a smaller head this time, and is a profile view in a shrink wrapped package.  I begin to recognize the facial structure, and read the label: Lamb’s Head.  I can hear the haunted words “Oh, the horror, the horror” in the voice of Shari Lewis in the recesses of my brain (yes, that was a reference for you old timers out there.  You kids probably won’t get it).  By this time I am about ready to leave what I can only assume was the location that inspired Stephen King’s Pet Cemetery.  But before I can get away, I hear some crazy local who is by the lamb head as well yell to his wife, “Hey honey, there is mutton wrong with this lamb’s head.”  Seriously, sir?  Did you just, in the presence of a slaughtered animal whose eye portrays the very definition of innocence and gentleness, make a lamb pun?  Well done, sir.  You are sicker than even I am.  What are you doing later?  Gonna go punch an orphan?  Maybe put some super glue mixed with hot sauce on the inside of some old guy‘s dentures? How about giving a homeless person a counterfeit $20 bill and hope they get arrested when they use it to buy something?   Just another stellar example of mankind I suppose.  I guess one thing I learned from this little adventure at the market was there are all kinds of things out there in the world to be experienced, and I haven’t even scratched the surface.  Or maybe the lesson was just shop at Vons next time.