For years, DH has had this habit. He peeks over my shoulder while I am cooking and I can anticipate his question well in advance, "Is that going to be enough?" Never mind if I was cooking for just the two of us in our younger days, or for a party of ten or daily meals for the four of us now - it has been always the same question, "Is that going to be enough?" The ONE single time there hadn't been enough was when I had slightly underestimated the amount of rice required for an Onam meal in Minneapolis way back in 2006 and that was soon remedied by a second pressure cookerful which was ready by the time we needed it. Nevertheless, the question has continued down the years and never fails to elicit an eye-roll reaction from me and this comment:
"Your eyes are way bigger than your tummy!"
Well, things have a way of coming back at one. Last Wednesday, we went to the DC Books International Book Festival here (I got a personal invitation over the phone on account of my being a VIP member! :)). It also happened to be the day we took my MIL for a cardiac checkup for which we had to wait about half a day. So the book fair was a treat for us. That is, until we got to the venue, found it extremely crowded on account of the Gandhi Jayanti holiday and our younger son threw a tantrum after he was woken up from his nap in the car. Suffice to say, I just grabbed a few books from here and there, spent more time pushing through the crowds than browsing and came out with my purchases in record time.
Yes, I got my long-awaited Completed Works of Bashir! Those two tomes are enough to build serious muscles! :) But the aftertaste of an unsatisfactory book fair attendance lingered on... So, on the way back I decided that I would make a trip to the fair on a working day morning, all alone and have my fill of books. Until I started putting away my purchases in their appropriate shelves that night...
What was this? Markus Zusak's The Book Thief? Did I finish this? Then I saw a dog-eared copy of The Story of My Experiments with Truth (how appropriate for the day!). I opened it to find that it had been purchased back when I was 14 years of age. When had I last read this? What did I remember of it? Just two or three episodes probably - the beef tea episode, the toilet-cleaning episode or did I remember them more from the movie Gandhi? Hmm...
Then I went over my favorite reading spots around the house and found five half-finished books and brought them back to my den. I threw open my bookshelf doors and took a detailed survey of the books there...
Three years ago when I was putting my book collection in those shelves, I had promised myself that I would keep only those books that I enjoyed reading several times over (I either donate or sell the others at used book stalls) and I would try to keep my collection within that bookshelf. What I forgot to do is to keep track of my reading. So I opened up a notebook and started writing down the titles of those books that I had not read, not finished or did not remember the contents of and then counted...
SIXTY NINE!!!!
Sixty nine books that are still strangers to me! Residing in my own bookshelf. Oh, how could I? Gaah! NOW look whose eyes are bigger than their tummy!!!
So now I'm going on a book diet. No more new books till I finish the ones in my shelf and get rid of those unwanted. That also means no treating myself to a solitary second visit to the book fair this year :(. Oh why, oh why did I have to count????
Come to think of it, it's been a while since DH has made that "Is that enough?" comment on food - not since his annual PSC test last year (no not Public Service Commission; Pressure, Sugar & Cholesterol, of course). And come to think of it, I think I'm missing it a teeny little bit. Yep, I am!
My dad used to ask the same question to my mom whenever she makes anything. Well, instead of asking "is that going to be enough", he would ask "Am I the only person eating today?" :-)
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