My labmate Glenna and I usually eat lunch together. Usually this time is spent rehashing dumb things that happened over the weekend, etc., but it has become a time that I (at least) look forward to every day, probably just for the break from the daily monotony of labwork. In any case, we were eating lunch today--she was eating her pad thai that looked absolutely scrumptious, and I was eating my bean soup (pictured at the top) that looks very similar to our kitchen sink contents when the dishes have not been done in a week or so (not that I would know what this look like since both of us are incredibly attentive to household chores). Anyway, the bean soup looked terrible but was not too bad. Accompanying the soup I had a bagel, which was very good. Glenna finished her pad thai and told me that she had more lunch, but that she was a little unsure of whether she really wanted to eat the rest. She told me that last weekend she hosted a party, instructing people to bring either a wine or some food/dish from their land of ancestry. Apparently at her party was a married couple consisting of an Asian-American and an American person from hickville, PA (apparently they were indigenous to this land...?). Anyway, they decided to combine ancestry lines and came up with spam sushi (picture 2). I'm sorry, but that is one of the most repulsive things I have ever seen or heard of. I remember being horrified coming to this country in college and finding out that some people like cream cheese in their sushi, but I have acclimated somewhat to that idea (I still prefer my own sushi to be dairy-free). But SPAM???? The worst part of this whole ordeal is that Glenna went to show Roger (my third-generation Japanese boss) this atrocity and he ate one! Ugh. I am repulsed.