Before beginning this post, you should know that I write this with bemused fondness, not the sarcasm it probably reads as.

So before I left, I mentioned to Dad that I wanted some Wisconsin cheese to take back with me (mostly because the cheese selection around here isn't fantastic). Now, in answer to this he passes along a package of "sharp cheddar cold pack cheese food" that he had around. Now, this isn't even a debate about whether or not cheese spread is actually cheese (which it's not). The point of this story comes when he packs it up for me to take with.

He took the spread out of its bag so it could go in the cooler—-this particular spread, being "genuine," needed to be kept cold. He looked at the little gift bag (with cows on it and red handkerchief-patterned tissue) from The Cheese Box, a local-ish shop (from the town on the other end of our ten-mile-long lake) and apparently decided the crackers would be lonely. He picked up a can of tuna and a can of salmon that he had sitting on the counter, and asked me if I ate tuna. I said yes, and emphasized how much of it I usually kept handy. He then proceeded to put both cans in the gift bag, next to the crackers, despite protests that I've got plenty.

Because you know, I can't go buy a couple dollars worth of canned fish if I ran out. Which I won't anytime soon, of course.

Despite this brouhaha, I sit here in front of my computer, eating cheese food and crackers because I'm hungry, but the food selection at this house presently is slim, and that which you can eat without utensils even slimmer (and going out of the house would make me feel like I was shirking on my thesis work, even though I'm doing so presently by typing this). So, you know, maybe Dad wasn't so far off.

Except I've got no can opener for the tuna out either. Smart me.

But you know, for "cheese food," it's not bad.