The Pretzel Nazi

The Wife took us to Yankee Candle yesterday. I don’t have the greatest sense of smell, but Yankee Candle makes my olfactory system go bonkers.

But the kids had fun candle dipping. No, that’s not like skinny dipping except in molten wax. Well, I suppose the hand dipping is- as long as you’re not wearing gloves. Anyway, they also made a scented candle.

After the candle and wax stuff, the Wife took her turn shopping and walking. I eventually took a break in the snack area where I picked up a soft-pretzel. The kids found me after I’d finished about half of it. Naturally, they got hungry as well, the power of suggestion and all. Or the power of the pretzel.

Rather than jump up and buy them something to sate their appetite, I let them work it all out: where to order, what to get, etc. That took them longer than I expected, but they figured it all out. So I gave them some cash and they got their pretzels.

And then made what could have been the biggest mistake of their lives, had I not been there to correct them.

They wanted to put ketchup on their pretzels. KETCHUP! Can you imagine? It’s sacrilege!

The kids, for their part, initially thought I was joking. I quickly disabused them of that notion and they reluctantly tossed the ketchup and replaced it with mustard. After the universe had been rebalanced, the boy tried to get a little wise with me:

“So is it, like, a law or something that you have to have mustard on a pretzel?” he asked.

“Yep,” I answered.

“No it’s not. I can put ketchup on my pretzel if I want.”

The insolence. I played for keeps:

“It’s my law. If you want to live in my house, you have to live by my laws. This one’s right up there in the top 10, next to ‘Thou shalt go to bed at 8’ and ‘Thou shalt pee in the toilet, not on it’.” I squinted my eyes, pointed at him and finished “If I catch you using ketchup on a pretzel, you’ll lose that pretzel faster than you can think up a question.” The Wife had been mulling around and was returning at this point. I took advantage of the opportunity, “Hey Mom, do you know what they did? They tried to put ketchup on their pretzel. Can you believe it?”

The Wife backed me up. “You can’t put ketchup on a pretzel!” Both kids giggled. They finished eating their pretzels. With mustard.

Still, I suspect they’ll make a play for the ketchup again.