American Madness

So I was reading my usual blogs yesterday and came across one that linked to this article about… You guessed it Eating Lemons.

I am start to feel like there might be some sort of vast conspiracy here. Infact, after reading through and finding out this was a Baltimore thing I spoke with my go to Baltimore person, my wife, who loves Lemon Sticks (apparently the preferred method for eating Lemons).

Anyone else out there have knowledge about eating lemons? Well besides it being a Southern thing, a concern of dentists, remains in the top 3 search terms to get to this site and, according to this new article, popular on the Baltimore regional festival circuit.

(By the way, it was th picture of the 2 kids sucking on lemons that made me click to read the article and discover yet another source of eating lemons)

That my friends is a pickle. Specifically a Kool-Aid Pickle.

I am not fucking with you.

The NY Times had an article yesterday called “A Sweet So Sour- Kool-Aid Dills” about a growing trend amongst students in the South who are eating some intriguingly horrible combinations of food:
Warm Cheetos & Ice Cream
Blow Pops & Pickles
Lemons & Peppermint Straws (which will continue the trend we are developing on this site of discussing Easting Lemons)

But specifically the article focused on these home brewed pickles. They come in every flavor combination imaginable made by the Kool-Aid folks. The recipe listed in the article sounds like it will rot your teeth if you read it too many times let alone eat it. And yet I am intrigued and kind of want to make them (though I know my wife would kill me… though my dentist would probably pleased with the extra cavities I developed). Reading is believing on this one.

Ok, what’s the deal?
I have recently been checking out the stats for the site. Ok, I have actually become a little obsessed with checking them. Some make total sense to me, others confuse the hell out of me, and some scare me a bit, let’s just run through a few:
The 4th most popular search term to find American Madness: “Robert Charles Browne” are there a lot of people interested in serial killers who come to our site and are just disappointed that American Madness is not a site devoted to US serial killers?
Then there is the 3rd most popular search term: “Eating Lemons,” there was an article posted 2 years ago about eating lemons, and the concern of dentists in Texas with this phenomena. This article is so popular that it is our 3rd most viewed posting. Can some one who stumbled upon us while searching for “Eating Lemons”tell me what they are actually looking for? I am genuinely interested.

Also, hello to our international readers, especially the ones from Palam, Taipei, Clontarf, Kiev, Kaisariani, Caracas and Budakeszi (not that I want to leave anyone out like most of our European readers and our US readers, especially the huge showing in NYC where about 10% of our readers subside).

Ever eat a lemon?

Picture a series of lemon-eating, funky-lip faces, a wonderful Andy Warhol montage. I would pay $400 Zlotys to see it at New York’s Whitney Museum. I would pay $280 Zlotys to see it at the San Antonio Museum for the Arts. In Burkina Faso you might have to pay me to see it, as there is no direct flight and the rebels have captured all the artists.

I once read that Texas dentists were trying to get children to stop eating lemons. There is a tradition of Southwest lemon eating that goes back generations: cut a hole in a lemon, shove in some dried, salted piece of fruit called “Chinese candy,” and then squeeze the tangy, salty juice all over your tounge and your fringed rodeo shirt and your alligator boots and everything else you?ve got on.

Well it seems lemon eating plays hell with your tooth enamel, and Texans have been urged by their dentists to cease and desist and watch Lemony Snicket movies instead. Which is not to say that Jim Carey is a favorite of Lone Star dentists either, but at least he doesn?t promote tooth decay. They think.

On the other hand, a chat room poster I know named Green Hell reminds us that ?lemons rock, brilliant when your slamming tequila and you just eat one! Gobble…?

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