May 16, 2004 - 7:12 PM

This is a cheese ball.

A ball of cheese.

It is CHEESE in the shape of a BALL.

I got this cheese ball in December. I think it was for Christmas. I think it might've been from my mother-in-law.

She doesn't normally give cheese balls as gifts, but for some reason, she must've thought I looked in need of a ball of cheese. Maybe, while walking through the mall, she saw a Hickory Farms booth and had an epiphanny.

"Tracy needs a cheese ball!"

I don't know.

But here it sits.

In my fridge, for five months.

It's very cool looking as cheese balls go. It's wrapped a shiny, plasticky-acetatey burgundy colored film of some sort. But, at the top, the film doesn't quite cover the entire cheese ball, so you can spy the red wax cheese ball covering.

The red wax coating on cheeses is really one of the most enjoyable things about cheese, in my opinion. Especially when there's a cool little pull tab.

Peeling back the pull tab and exposing the white cheeseness inside of the red waxness is satisfying to me. It's a bit magical really. The pull tab has a specific path it follows. Most of the time it is just a straight path. But it can also go ALL the way AROUND the shaped cheese. I like those the best.

Sometimes, you are left with a really cool red, wax, 3D version of a Pac Man. Wokka Wokka Wokka. (that's the pac man sound....)

In fact, if there was some sort of toy they could develop that entailed pulling cheese pull tabs made of red wax and having the whiteness of cheese beneath create little patterns all over the toy, I might consider purchasing one. (it doesn't need to be made of real cheese, but perhaps something that resembled the overall feel and texture of a semi firm cheese which would be cool in and of itself...)

But I'm getting off the subject.

My cheeseball.

The label is gold and oval shaped. It says, "Gold Edam Cheese Ball".

It is manufactured by Magnolia, Inc.

It has some sort of grocery sticker that says "South P. 158.75".

I don't know what that means.

It says it weighs 500g. (17.6 oz)

I put it on my bathroom scale and it says it weighs 1.5 pounds.

Dat's a lot of cheese!

One and a half pounds of cheese all wrapped up in the shape of a little cannon ball.

Or more like a bocce ball. or croquet ball.

I haven't eaten it yet. is Edam cheese good? Is it a yellow or orange cheese?

I'm not a big cheese eater, hence the uneaten ball of cheese I am describing to you now.

In addition to the bocce ball, croquet ball or mini cannon ball alternative uses, I was thinking it would prove to be an excellent paperweight/conversation piece.

But, it might start to spoil after a while...and there's really nothing more smelly than bad cheese sitting on your desk at work. Now THAT would be a conversation starter. And probably not the conversation starter you'd want to have at work, cuz it would most likely be people starting conversations about what the heck's going on with tracy and that smelly rotting cheeseball that's been sitting on top of her production reports for 3 weeks now. Oh, no..you don't want that type of conversation. Oh no.

And.

My dog has been wanting to get a hold of it ever since he saw me take it out of the fridge. He thinks it's a ball. Well, he would be right in the sense that it IS a ball. So he is pretty smart in that respect, but he doesn't realize it's a ball of CHEESE.

Or does he?

I mean, dogs have a pretty keen sense of smell and all. Maybe this would be his ultimate toy...considering he can run and chase after it AND it makes a tasty snack when he's done playing catch.

but it's one and a half pounds of cheese, he might get sick. There's no way I want to see all that cheese come out of the other end of my bulldog ifyouknowwhatimsayin.

I really, really, really want to throw it away but am having guilt for two reasons:

1. It was a gift.

2. I am not a food waster.

For #1, I doubt there was any option of a gift receipt for this cheese ball, not that I would've asked my mother in law for the receipt so I could return it, because, she might get offended and all, but at least with a gift receipt I could've brought it back to the store so it would go to someone who actually would enjoy a nice cheese ball. Rather than myself who has let it sit in the refrigerator for 5 months...almost six.

For #2, maybe I could just keep it in my car in a little cooler and when passing a homeless man, toss him the ball?? I don't know. It's just an idea. Although at 1.5 pounds, it might take out the poor guy. That would suck if I killed a homeless man with my cheese ball. How ironic. I'd get arrested for murder when all i wanted to do was give the guy something to eat.

I'm having a hard time with this.

I am going to go walk it back to the kitchen and put it back in the fridge. Back to its little home on the bottom shelf in the very back right corner past all of the 3/4 bottles of salad dressings.

It will sit there for a while until I figure out what to do. How long do these things keep anyway? Maybe it's bad now... Maybe it's expired already. But I don't want to open it, cuz I'm not gonna eat it and then it would spoil for sure.

Damn.

If I hadda known this cheese ball would be causing me so much grief I would've regifted it or something.

Hey..maybe I can auction it on Ebay!

Oh, or bring it to work and put it on a plate with some crackers and a knife. Let THEM eat the fucking thing!

I think I just solved my problem!

I'm getting crackers today.

Bye bye cheese ball..it's been fun....well, not really, but, that's typically what you say....so....

nevermind.

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