So after T. got her wisdom tooth pulled, she wasn’t in the mood to go to a party at one of D.’s professors’ house. She missed out on quite a bit of good food, and some interesting conversation. D. sat beside the host’s mother-in-law, a delightful little lady from Wales. One thing which stood out, from the evening’s conversation, was his dinner partner gawping at him in amazement. She’d found that he was a vegetarian … and had been raised a vegetarian.
The people here … are small. Wee, even. Yet they persistently believe that they need to eat meat in order to grow tall and strong. Why, just look at the guy in this picture: he’s an actor, at the Inverary Jail … and D. has to duck down and turn sideways, in order to get through that door. We’re betting that this guy eats meat, and believes that one must eat meat to grow tall and strong. Right.
– D & T
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Maybe after meeting you now, she'll have a different view on being a vegetarian?
The past four months, for health reasons, I stopped eating meat, chicken, etc… Only ate fish. But for a whole bunch of reasons, I've fallen off the wagon. *le sigh*
Hope T feels better now after her pulled tooth. Did they let her keep her tooth. Last time I asked to keep my tooth, my dentist said, "No." Not allowed to do that.
Paz
When I got my wisdom teeth pulled a hundred years ago, the dentist dropped the first one in the garbage. "UGgghhhhNNNNNNhhhhh!!!!" I was heard to grunt (having my mouth wide open and stuffed with cotton) "Oh! You don't want to keep it do you?" the dentist asked. "uuhhhhuuun!" I replied with enthuastic nodding. So I have 3 of my 4 wisdom teeth. The 4th was, sadly, used in a painting many years ago and has gone among the missing. Maybe, actually, it is NOT such a bad thing.
Maybe the Welsh are all so short because the tall ones knocked themselves out with the short doors and were unable to procreate?
Aw, I hope T feels better soon–getting wisdom teeth removed is no fun.
I'm sure if I had been there the Welsh woman would have pointed to me (I'm tiny) and said "see, she needs to eat meat." Or calcium…although that didn't work out for me as a kid no matter how often the Milk commercials told me I'd grow big and strong 🙂
Just heard that one of my classmates has to get all four wisdom teeth out this week–I passed along your experience to give her courage.
Read this today:
"Traditional wisdom maintained that this healthy constitutional stoutness and strength were upheld by a hearty apetite, especially for red meat. The Englishman's proverbial love of roast beef was thus not mere patriotism, gluttony or fantasy, but positively therapeutic … the preferred victuals were strong and savoury, and the beef, beer and burgundy diet of hte rich was evidently more invigorating than the insipid gruel and water of the poor. … [Parson Woodforde's] ultimate diary entry before his death culminates with a last supper: 'Very weak this Morning, scarce able to put on my Cloaths and with great difficulty, get down Stairs with help . . . Dinner to day, Rost Beef etc.' "
Roy Porter, Flesh in the Age of Reason, 2003 pp. 234-235.