Mr. Eat-Your-Vegetables

Once upon a time, when I was a little girl, I had a stuffed broccoli. It was green and had a round nose and two little eyes and a smile and it had arms that were also stalks of broccoli. For companions, it apparently had little plushy peas that could be taken out or put into their pod.

I have no recollection of this broccoli. But I know it existed, because there are pictures of it. And as an adult, I find it rather sad that I lost it somewhere. Especially since it was always such a battle to get me to eat my broccoli, or any other green vegetable that wasn't cucumbers.

(Of course I am much better now. Really. Unless it's lettuce. Or mushrooms - except in chinese food. Or cabbage. Yuck. You think I'm kidding? Really, this is better than I used to be. Ketchup used to be a vegetable.)

I don't know quite what the point of the broccoli was; perhaps it was to make me eat vegetables. It didn't work, though. The only thing that fixed the whole won't-eat-vegetables problem was a lot of stubborn commentary by my parents and other adults, and me getting older.

Regardless, I still think the idea of a stuffed broccoli is neat. And of course, now that I am old enough to appreciate that broccoli that I once had...it cannot be found.

Enter my boyfriend. I explained to him in passing through one of my scrapbooks about how sad I was that I had lost my broccoli, and he made the appropriate noises. And I thought nothing more of it. I don't think he did either, until...

Looney Labs decided to clone their mascot, Tirade, who happens to be a stuffed broccoli. But they made too many clones, and so they had to find the new clones good homes.

Eric knew I would not let bad things happen to a second stalk of broccoli, so now I have my very own stalk. He was number 15 out of the vats...err, sewing machine, and his name is Mr. Eat-Your-Vegetables. He is a happy stalk of broccoli who does a pretty good impression of Godzilla smashing Tokyo.

See?

I have a stuffed broccoli. His name is Mr. Eat-Your-Vegetables.