Chalk it up to being too much of a good thing.
At this time of year, there are certain phrases that almost seem inevitable, ones that are uttered as a matter of course as summer gives way to fall.
“You might need a jacket,” my wife will say before I begin my walk to the office, an acknowledgment that mornings are a little chillier now than they were just a few weeks ago.
“The leaves are starting to cover the lawn,” I will declare, knowing the first few to drop are a harbinger of what’s still to come.
Another of those late summer phrases reared its head when my wife and I were discussing what to have for dinner the other night. That’s when she said: “We’ve still got some corn in the fridge.”
It might not strike the same fear as the massive tree on Town property that’s ready to shed its leaves in my back yard, but by early September, any mention of corn on the cob is met with a certain level of trepidation. I like corn, I really do, but by this time of year it has become one of those house guests who has a habit of showing up just a little too often.
When the first ears arrive in supermarkets or the roadside stands start to pop up around town, the abundance of corn is a welcome sight. Not only does it scream summer, but it’s a quick, easy, healthy, to say nothing of tasty, side dish that can be paired with just about anything. It’s hard to grill burgers or steaks without thinking of adding an ear of corn to the plate.
But do that a couple dozen times over a relatively short period of time and you hit, at least I do, a saturation point, which is where I found myself when my wife informed me there were still ears in the crisper. Whether it was due to the accumulation over the last couple of months or having eaten a cob just two nights earlier, I had reached my limit.
I didn’t know I was there until the suggestion was made, but the thought of staring at another yellow cylinder of Taber goodness was just too much to bear. Heck, I was even willing to trade it for broccoli, which would have been unheard of a couple months ago, but that’s what happens when the calendar flips to September.
It’s a bit like the week after Thanksgiving when you’re doing all you can to finish off that pumpkin pie that’s the size of a car tire or the week following Christmas when you feel obligated to down the egg nog in the back of the fridge before it reaches its expiration date, but just can’t fathom another glass.
There’s certainly some truth in all those sayings about doing, or eating, in moderation because an excess can lead to unwanted consequences, so I pledge to subscribe to that theory moving forward.
In the meantime, there’s still the matter of those remaining ears in the crisper. They’re not going to eat themselves, you know.