Smack My Cucumber Bitch Up

As often happens, when I get the idea of something in my head, whether it be a word, an idea, a song, they stay there for days or weeks. Circling around and around until I DO something with them. In this case, I couldn’t take it any longer. The only way to get rid of the ideas was to write about it. So I present to you, for your edification and delight, this following amuse bouche for the mind. Enjoy!

On the road back home, from Virginia to Maryland:
It’s Daddy’s turn to pick the satellite radio station, so we are listening to Lithium XM54, all the greatest of ‘90’s alternative and such. There was a lot of good stuff playing, Wee Lass was quiet, and I was starting to drift off. The volume was up, because Wee Lass frequently asks us to ‘turn a’up louder!’. There had been some U2, some Nirvana. Then a song comes on that I hadn’t heard in a long time. I smiled at the opening chords, couldn’t quite remember the name. I said, sleepily, ‘Haven’t heard this in forever!’

From the back seat: “Daddy, what’s this song?”

I opened my left eye to look at the console. The Spouse was looking at it too. She looked at me, I looked at her. (Dim recollection that Wee Lass is starting to know words) Our hands were a blur trying to reach the channel button. Fortunately, XM Kids is on preset.

“I don’t know, sweet pea. Hey, Imagination Movers!”

Wee Lass smiles, and looks content.

That was close. The song? “Smack My Bitch Up” by Prodigy*:


Lying in bed, at home, a few nights later. In a rare moment of quiet repose, I am reading, really reading a genuine BOOK. This is one of the things that I treasure, I love to read and have ever since I learned how. In recent years, I have developed an obsession with food and cooking. Not just the pretty pictures of things I want other people to make for me, but information and recipes that I want to learn and make for myself. A recent thread I have been following is Chinese cooking. Not American Chinese, but authentic Chinese. The stuff that Chinese people living in China make for themselves. One of the best Western interpreters of the vast array of Chinese food that exists is Fuschia Dunlop, a Londoner who lived in, reported from, and trained in China for many years. She has a number of books published, one a memoir and one called Land of Plenty, which is on Sichuanese cooking. ‘Land of Plenty’ is excellent, I was cooking stuff out of it soon after I finished it. The one I am reading on this particular night is on Hunanese cooking, called The Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook. It is off to a good start, I’m diggin’ it:

Me: ….HA!
The Spouse: (politely ignoring me)
Me: ….HA!
The Spouse: (sighs) What?
Me: This recipe. It’s for something called ‘Smacked Cucumbers’. That sounds cool!
The Spouse: Smacked cucumbers? Ouch.
Me: Yeah, they call it that because before you marinate the cukes, you ‘smack’ them hard with the side of a cleaver, until they split and get all jagged. That way, they absorb the flavors better before you cook them! Awesome!
The Spouse: I ain’t eating any smacked cucumbers. Weirdo.

A day or so later, I had a really bizarre dream. I was standing in a kitchen, chopping up stuff. There was some music playing, and someone turned it up really loud. Guess what song it was? I looked down to find myself smacking the hell out of a big pile of cucumbers, and shouting “Smack my bitch up!” along with the song. The other people in the kitchen just stared at me.

Happy eating, comrades!

*I linked to the ‘nicer’ video clip for this song, because the ‘banned’ version was just scary. And nasty. I don’t rattle that easy, but still…I have enough trouble sleeping as it is. You may want to compare for the sake of curiosity, but you have been warned. ;)