One of my favorite pet peeves is that separate items of food remain segregated on my plate–I enforce a strict no-contact rule between the the protagonist and its supporting actors. When one is served by an individual who is oblivious to these rules, however, these boundaries are easily breached.

My main qualm, I hypothesize, is my overreaching gluttony. Following the Tray Ban of ’07, transporting great quantities of food became more complicated as the vehicle for these translations were deemed too unsustainable. I suppose a modern parallel would be to compare them to vehicles of less-than-stellar gas mileage, and as the prices of fossil fuel increased, we were all forced into trading them in for sleeker, hybrid creations–in other words, plates.

But, I digress. I could easily have settled for the soggy Salisbury steak, accompanied by mashed potatoes complete with pieces of peel embedded in them (a reassuring addition to enhance the realness of the potatoes), and not looked back, but I was captivated by the vegetarian dish–a momentous occasion in itself.

Foolishly, I helped myself to a healthy serving of fettuccine Alfredo, squeezing it in by shuffling the steak into the mashed potatoes. Unfortunately, the gravy I had doused over said companion piece was rapidly expanding its territories, its mind clearly set on overtaking the vast reaches of the plate.

The fettuccine, then, when introduced to this viscous attacker, quickly sprang into action, its slimy tendrils quickly encroaching on the until-now neutrally aligned Salisbury steak like some Lovecraftian monster. With its tumor-like ally under attack, the gravy was forced to resort to diplomacy, establishing some common rule between the three opposing nations.

The only loser of this peace treaty was–you guessed it–me. When the time came for me to equally consume the three separate entities, I was given a chance to more closely peruse the carefully worded terms of the document: a common decision had been made to ban flavor and originality to settle cultural differences.

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