"Food! Glorious Food!"

"So this is Christmas..." - John Lennon

Now the wrapping paper has been tossed and the tamales have been eaten (and any Mexican knows to take food with 3 different types of lard and margarine in it very seriously).
Christmas has come and gone. Might I say it was a great holiday. I woke up dazed and confused and in spite of not waking up until the early afternoon on a normal day, I was the first person to wake up at 8-ish. Except I woke up nauseous. The cause? Tamales.


Mexican food is VERY heavy and tamales are no exception. If made properly, eating 4 tamales feels like nothing but by New Year's (and after an average 80 tamales), everyones' pants don't fit and this is either due to excessive heartburn/bloating or the unfortunate survival heartburn that means solid weight gain. This doesn't include the rest of the excusable eating and epic portion servings (and mysterious amount of leftovers that come even after the holidays are treated as a trip to an all you can eat buffet)
When it comes to gluttony, Mexicans take the cake! The Italians, Greek and French may be renowned for their food-centered culture but when you learn from an early age about manteca, lard, margarine, Crisco, and butter and how many foods all these lovely fats go into, we take the cake in unhealthy massive eating!
VIVA LA RAZA!
Anyways, back to my point. In spite of this heavy eating, being in college has somewhat lightened up my grease intake. Most of the fat in my diet came from my love affair with Pizza Hut and the pizzeria on campus and the campus cafeteria (due to its lack of delectable options) has resulted in me eating mainly sandwiches and salad when I did eat on campus. So when I came back to my parents' house and was greeted by three heavy meals a day, I was so stuffed, I've cut down to 2 meals a day. And on Christmas eve, my mom perfected her tamales recipe which means... TAMALES! (and at LEAST 100 of them in 4 flavors)
I had 4, and went to bed.
On Christmas morning.... BLEH!
I woke up and ran STRAIGHT for the sink. False alarm.
Still the first one to be up, I lied on the couch, feeling my stomach turn on itself. Two anti-acids later, I subdued the beast and woke up my brother. He was dazed and confused as well but nauseous he was not.  My brother made his way to the presents. He has the iron gut and isn't as susceptible to heavy food as I am. My stomach turned on itself AGAIN. Lovely way to spend Christmas morning. I eased myself onto the floor and waited for my brother to wake up everyone. At the ripe age of 18, slowly creeping on the big 19, I'm too old to get my parents out of bed. My brother is 8. He doesn't understand the value of sleep yet so it's his turn to get the fun of waking up my parents.
I slowly saw two adults with bags under their eyes get out of bed.... two adults who left the Christmas lights on all night (and left me to listen to the music synchronized Christmas trees outside my window play a medley of Christmas carols with bright LED flashing all night) watch the wonder in my brother's eyes. Then I saw them reach for tamales. Aside for feeling my gut jump again, I grabbed a tums but not before I grabbed a present.
What did I get? A new iPod! (and 160 GB so I can't bitch about not having enough memory) I also got a framed Marilyn Monroe print for my dorm room, some professional makeup brushes, new makeup in a mass quantity, the Glee, Volume 4 CD, an iPod stereo, a necklace and earring set, a spa bath kit, a subscription to Allure magazine, an IOU for perfume (my mom didn't find one she liked), and to satisfy my mom's OCD nature in my dorm room, a vacuum cleaner. In pink.
With A Christmas Story playing on loop with the sound muted, I watched my brother get excited about his Christmas presents and mentally shuddered at how much my parents spent (considering how as a broke college student, I spent a pittance on Christmas)
and like that, the holiday was done. My dad went to assemble the XBOX 360, I took another Tums and took a nap and my mom enjoyed her new eyeshadow pallete I got her for Christmas.
Later we watched "A Charlie Brown Christmas" on Hulu and after that it was just a normal day.
Except everyone ate tamales. I made myself a sandwich and called it even. Since next week in New Year's day, menudo is next. D:


Cheers to MORE heartburn!
Merry Christmas everyone! ♥