What can you answer if a child asks 'Is Santa

What can you answer if a child asks 'Is Santa Claus real?' You can tell him the truth and destroy his hope and trust. But what if that person is an adult? What would you say then?

You tell the adult, "Certainly, Santa is a real cultural phenomenon loosely based off an old historical religious figure." But then you realize the adult expects SANTA to be REAL.

So you baffle them with bullshit. Something like "Of course Santa's real. Realer than what? This calculator - stardust. This paperclip - electrons, protons & neutrons. But Santa,

with his bowlful of jelly, is as real as you or I." With that little nugget of holiday reassurance, I disappeared before their very eyes, inavertedly adding to their doubts. Could

the point of *me* be to live counterexamples? I was white, had dreadlocks, and said "go with the flow", yet had never smoked pot. Now, to eat tofu instead of meat just for taste

-deprivation is really important if you truly want to understand the Kung Fu of Blandness. I started eating melba toast, then switch to sailor bread. Everything I ate was white and

crispy. What a strange diet that was. After it was over, I binged on spicy food for a week. Now that I've come to fully appreciate the Kung Fu of Blandness,

I want to go to an Indian restaurant. There is one around the corner. I crave curried goat.

Goat curry with just a hint of that secret sauce always made me do something in my ...

mind. Just what was in that sauce? I had to find out.