I Have an Eating Problem

I’ve come to the conclusion that I have a serious eating problem. Now to be clear, it’s probably not the kind of eating problem you’re used to hearing about. I’m not anorexic or bulimic, though eating celery does trigger a small gag response. Come on, people, admit it. Celery tastes like dirty water with a peculiar crunch suspiciously similar to that of a grasshopper. I’m also not morbidly obese. Yes, I may be plump in a spot or two, and after the holiday season, I sometimes have to break out the fat pants until I can work off the sugar plums that danced all the way to my waist line, but a handful of extra pounds is not the problem to which I’m referring.

I spill food. There. I said it. Despite having a gigantic mouth, I can’t seem to hit it consistently. Just now, I changed shirts because my Steak-Um sandwich dripped all over the first one. I’m not talking a drop, people. You could fry fish in the grease on that shirt. In fact, if I had eaten fish, it would even already be on the shirt. The problem is bad. Soup runs down my chin faster than a daredevil can ride a barrel down Niagara Falls. Condiments are right out. Sometimes I just turn down food altogether if I’m wearing white.

My wife just shakes her head. My daughter actually pities me, a sweet yet unbelievably pathetic turn of events. Complete strangers can track my day through stains. Breakfast shake on collar, strawberry. Turkey on wheat with cheddar and mayo for lunch, crumbs clearly visible around the mayonnaise ring on my chest. Soup for dinner, still visible in beard. I think NASA is developing an app to help people keep track as a result of the sheer volume of available data. Sherlock Holmes would refuse to deduce my travels out of principle and disgust at the ease of the endeavor.

No, I have an eating problem. Fortunately, I also have lots of shirts.