Matthew Dicks

The future is apparently now. Ice cream, however, remains a problem.

Last week I declared that the greatest failing of the modern world is our inability to invent a Jetsons-like push-button food machine.

I was wrong.

Apparently we are a lot closer to a Jetsons-like food machine than I thought:

As part of a project at Cornell University, a group of scientists and students built a 3D printer and began testing it out with food. The device attaches to a computer, which works as the "brain" behind the technology.

It doesn't look like a traditional printer; it's more like an industrial fabrication machine. Users load up the printer's syringes with raw food -- anything with a liquid consistency, like soft chocolate, will work. The ingredient-filled syringes will then "print" icing on a cupcake. Or it'll print something more novel (i.e., terrifying) -- like domes of turkey on a cutting board.

"You hand [the computer] three bits of info: a shape that you want, a description of how that shape can be made, and a description of how that material that you want to print with works," says Jeff Lipton, a Cornell grad student working on the project. Lipton is pursuing a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering.

This is great news. Push button food could be just around the corner.

As a result, I’d like to revise my opinion regarding to the greatest failing of the modern world (though it is still food related):

The greatest failing of the modern world is our inability to produce calorie-free ice cream. 

Just imagine how much happier the world would be if we could as much ice cream as we wanted.

I defy you to come up with a better idea.

Another Starbucks zombie reject

A few readers were kind enough to send me this clip of another man, albeit fictional, refusing to be a Starbucks zombie.

He pulls it off considerably better than I ever could. 

A true man after my own heart.

Look. Someone ruined lollipops.

I am not a Starbucks zombie.

I recently read in the Harvard Business Review that Starbucks seeks to train its customers at nearly the same level as its employees. This is why a Starbucks cashier will convert my request for a medium coffee into a grande when passing the order onto the barista.

It’s not for the barista’s benefit (since everyone knows what a medium is). It’s to teach the customer to use the word grande next time. Starbucks hopes that engraining its culture into customers will increase brand loyalty. Use of the special Starbucks language is just one of the ways of doing this.

 

According to Starbucks, this type of training works on 95% of its customers. Only the most oppositional 5% of customers will reject this training entirely.

I am only a Starbucks customer in that I frequently purchase coffee for my wife and an occasional blueberry cake for myself.

But I am most assuredly in the oppositional 5%.

I can’t help it. I’m just jerky that way.

Shopping and cooking take too much damn time.

The greatest failing of the modern world is our inability to invent a Jetsons-like push-button food machine.

Gratitude journal: The Cadbury Crème Egg

Tonight I am grateful for the Cadbury Crème Egg. It is a perfect piece of candy in terms of its components, composition, and seasonality.

And I take the consumption of a Cadbury Crème Egg seriously. There is a right and a wrong way to eat one of these confectionary perfections. Please review these instructions before eating. 

Gratitude journal (with a sprinkle of spite): Fountain soda and NOT COFFEE

Tonight I am grateful for the joy of the unexpected Diet Coke that was delivered to me this afternoon.

It was having an especially challenging day at school, mostly the result of an unexpected deadline and significantly reduced timeframe in order to meet the demand, when my colleague surprised me with a large, plastic cup of fountain soda from Burger King.

There’s something about a fountain soda that makes it far superior to any Diet Coke found in a can or bottle.

It was just what I needed.  My mood improved almost immediately and I found myself better able to power through the rest of the day, easily meeting my unexpected deadline and teaching the hell out of the rest of my day.

Sometimes it’s the little things that make all the difference.  

Perhaps this is how most people feel about about coffee, except I have never spoken ad nauseum about my love for, need for or addiction to fountain soda.  This is the first time I have ever written about the subject, and it was not expressed by something like this:

Need. Fountain. Soda. Now.

Or this:

If I don’t get a fountain soda soon, look out!

Or this:

This is what I call a two cup, 64-ounce fountain soda day.   

So yeah, I was grateful for that fountain soda surprise today. 

But more importantly, I’m also grateful that I’ve never spoken about coffee or any other beverage as if it is a legitimately interesting subject for discussion or something that anyone wants to hear.

Sick of your date asking to split a dessert? I have the solution that will change your life forever. Seriously.

It’s a truth universally known that no man actually wants to share a dessert with his date. 

When it comes time to order dessert, it is quite common for a woman to suggest that the couple split a dessert. 

My wife does this all the time.  And I agree to the arrangement, as do most men, even though in our heart of hearts, we are screaming, “I want my own dessert, damn it!  Get your own slice of pie and keep your mitts off mine!”

When it comes to ordering dessert, women are their mothers and men are the six-year old versions of themselves.

But now I have a solution, and it shames me to think that it’s taken this long to figure this out:

If the lady asks to split a dessert, happily agree to the division and then order a dessert of your own as well. 

It’s perfect. 

The six-year old inside a man’s body gets his own dessert plus a half of another while the lady’s request is adequately granted as well.

It’s actually a better scenario than if both parties simply ordered their own dessert.

In fact, it’s not even a solution to the problem.

It’s an upgrade on life. 

The greatest sacrifice of all

I gave my daughter the last black and white cookie tonight after dinner.  She began eating but then spit out the partially chewed cookie onto her plate, saying, “No!  This is Mommy’s cookie!  She loves black and white cookies.  She can eat it when she gets home!”

It was too late to save the cookie for Elysha.  Even the un-chewed portion had been mangled by her little hands.

But damn it was sweet.  A little disgusting, too.  But very sweet.

Four tiny bites of carrot ruined my night.

I’m annoyed with my daughter tonight.  Had she eaten four tiny pieces of carrot, she could ended dinner with a delicious black and white cookie, straight from William Greenberg Desserts on Madison Avenue, makers of the best black and white cookies on the planet. 

But no.  She refused, rather vehemently I may add, and therefore she gets no dessert.

It wasn’t the whining or the crying or the overly aggressive shoving aside of the plate or even the lack of vegetables in her diet that bothered me.

It was the inability to see the pure joy that she experiences while eating a cookie.  I love a black and white cookie, too, but I love watching my daughter eat one even more.

The smiles. The laughs. The chocolaty fingers. The extreme focus on the cookie itself. The repeated declarations of love for the cookie. 

Bearing witness to this display of sheer happiness is better than any dessert that I could consume myself (except maybe ice cream cake).  Yet I was denied that pleasure tonight because she refused to eat four stupid little carrots. 

As soon as she is in bed, I’m going to go downstairs and eat a black and white cookie. 

And it’s going to taste even better than usual because it’s going to be served with a heaping side dish of spite.