Ode To Mrs. Grass’ Chicken Noodle Soup
An original sketch about a beatnik soup junkie.
Written by “the great Luke Ski”
© Luke Sienkowski 2001

(A trumpet player riffs, and a bongo player bongos as the beatnik reads)

It has been said that “Soup is good food”, but I don’t think that quite covers it.  So cats and cat-ettes, check this out…  It’s a little something I like to call…  Ode to Mrs. Grass’ Chicken Noodle Soup.

The time has come once again when my unnatural cravings take over, and I enter the kitchen and go through those few magic steps that I have repeated so many times before, like the proverbial episode of “Three’s Company” in syndication.  But it ain’t no couch that this ‘Jack’ is trippin’ on.  No, it’s a bisected blue box of instant liquid goodness that goes by the code of Mrs. Grass’ Chicken Noodle Soup.

Grab that metal pot by the handle, spin it around in my hand three times and slam it down on the stove.  Measuring cup one, two, three, four cups of H-2-O.  Turn the heat on high… and then I walk away.  That’s right.  You got to walk away.  You know a watched pot never boils.  You got to walk away, but don’t stray too far, or the laws of science will laugh in your face as your base ingredient numero uno steams away, dwindling down to nothing, and you have to start all over again.  Many a time has the endless banal minutia of life distracted me from tending to my potential meal.  Was I placed on this plane of existence to humidify the world?  I think not!

Once I got that high rollin’ boil, that high rollin’ boil, that high rollin’ boil…  Well now it’s time to reach for that light blue box.  The marketing yo-yos in the soulless suits decided recently to change your chassy to a dark blue hue.  For this I have no explanation, and no speculation.  Just know that deep in my heart Mrs. G, you will forever be light blue to me.  But I digress, back to the preparation of the snack.  Crack, that double serving box in half, and save the other half for another day.  Punch my finger in the side, and pull off that flap back to liberate the manufactured trilogy of ingredients contained within.  First off, the noodles.  May I be the first to say, duh.  Into the pot.  Second, the package of powdered poultry providing my pudgy palate a paradise of pure platinum pleasure.  Or to put it another way…  It tastes like chicken.  A quick slice of the knife and into the bubbling cauldron it goes.  Next comes the most famous, the most “in”, the most infamous portion of them all… the egg!  THE EGG!  The egg!  THE EGG!  The egg!  THE EGG!  The golden nugget in which the sweet mystery of life can be found, dropped into the mix releases it’s magic potion bringing it all together in a way that is oh, so brothy.

And a few short minutes later, there it sits, the task completed, now it’s time to eat it.  Tossing the periodic handfuls of Mama’s Brand Oyster Crackers, I grab my tablespoon, drop it to the bottom of my special soup bowl, and proceed to shovel it all down.  Mmm, mmm, the sublime chicken-y, noodle-y, soup-y nirvana cradles my soul, and suddenly for a few brief moments of this never ending façade that passes for a lame excuse for a life, don’t seem all that bad no more.

Sometimes the nagging voice of universal hypocrisy cries out in the darkness, “HEY!  The sodium’s gonna kill ya!”  All I gotta say is, “Bring it on”, and as bourgeoisie as that may seem, they can’t keep me from my fluid dream.  There’s absolutely no manufactured food product in this great land of ours that is greater than Mrs. Grass’ Chicken Noodle Soup.  Well, with the possible exception of… Tombstone Pepperoni Pizza.