Those Kraft-y liars...

My roommate told me some shocking news yesterday. In reading a mouth-watering article about Macaroni and Cheese in yesterday's New York Times's Dining & Wine section, she stumbled upon a dirty little secret of the cheese industry.

American cheese is simply cheddar or colby that is ground and emulsified with water, said Bonnie Chlebecek, a test kitchen manager at Land O'Lakes in Arden Hills, Minn.

Who knew this? Why didn't anyone tell me? I feel I've been lied to all these years-that America had produced a lovely unique cheese to call its own. Cheese-making is one of those things, like butter-churning and candle-making that has been done for the past million years or so that was perfected way before America was even born. The fact that we had discovered (so I thought) a new cheese, that we contributed to the old-world way of life in some small part, is a lovely thought. But alas, what I thought was charming innovation in a traditional process was actually a water-downed block of cheddar. Shocked and appalled.

Puppy power...

Courtesy of one of my new favorite websites, Cute Overload.

What better way to start the new year than with an adorable puppy sandwich. Not that I would ever eat such a thing. That would be wrong. But I'm not above snuggling with such a delicacy.

Everybody's waiting for the man with the bag...

This Christmas of the many wonderful gifts I am grateful for I received one that particularly surprised and delighted me. I asked "Santa" (my mother creepily demands we refer to her as Santa in all our holiday gift-receiving transactions) for a new man-bag and I got the most perfect man-bag that ever existed.

I have been a fan of the man-bag for many years now. I have never liked the idea of a wallet in my pants pocket, especially since I prefer to pack as much of my life into one as possible. My wallets are always too heavy and bulging to keep in your pants, not to mention that I enjoy toting all sorts of essential things besides ID and money with me. Not satisfied with the frat-boy look of many backpacks while in college, and fed up with the sexist traditions of allowing only women to walk around with purses, I got myself a bag. A manly bag to store my manly things. Like moisturizers and lip balms and accessories. Messenger bags were only newly in style and man-bags fast became an essential part of life in the city. I've gone through many a man-bag in my time, and even gave hand-me-down bags to friends. It's my own version of gay-it forward.

So this Christmas when I told Mommy-Claus to get me a new man-bag that looked professional, almost briefcasey, I had no idea her gaydar would be so perfectly honed to choose such an ideal bag for my purposes. What makes this bag so wonderful? For starters, it's a beautiful briefcase from Kenneth Cole. Excellent quality. Secondly, it came in a sack. Any man-bag that comes in its own man-bag must be wonderful. But the true campy joy of this bag came only days later when I was switching out of my old bag into this new and improved model. I was removing the tag only to discover the style name. Christina Flappelgate! Can you believe it? My man-bag's name is a ridiculous play on words. It's first name is Christina! AND it sounds like a drag queen. What more can a boy ask for?

Suffice it to say it was a very merry holiday.