Ive been thinking about toast lately.  It is very important to our
culture.  We  have special appliances exclusively for toasting.  A kitchen
is incomplete without a working toaster.  Makers have had to adapt to
accommodate changes in cultural bread habits, making models that fit
bagels and the larger sized sandwich bread.  Large families have toasters
with four or more slots.  Two at a time is not quick enough.  The duration
from perfection to cold, overcooked bread is a short one, and these
families want to have their toast experience together.  
     Which brings up the point that toast is not really a singular food,
like, say, potato, or bread.  First there is bread, a food in its own
right, and then there is toast from bread.  Toast, however, gets all the
glory.  Put toast in before people come over for dinner.  The people will
enter, smell the toast, and say, Mmmmmm, smells good!  Toast is more like
fried egg than egg.  Why do we not say, "Toasted bread," anymore?  Toast is
its own food now.  Toast is international.  Every cuisine with bread and
ovens has toast.
     Yet, although toast is the most visible symbol of a rising standard
of living, the word itself, in its native culture, has taken on very
negative meanings.  In popular culture to say something or someone is
"Toast," is to imply that they are finished, are in deep trouble, or are in
some way facing an inescapable dilemma.  When someone you know says, "I'm
toast!" do you imagine them with jam all over their body?  I do.  Amazing
that such a widely enjoyed component to our diets would be saddled with
such an odious meaning.  It would be more understandable if the expression
were, Burnt toast.  Sad and painful memories are conjured up at the mere
mention of burnt toast.  Nobody butters burnt toast.    
     My neighborhood always smells like burnt toast at a certain time in
the morning.  Not just the immediate vicinity, but down for a few blocks.
It disturbs me.  

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Help!  I noticed that this site has been visited more often in the last month 
than at any other time in its three+ year history.  Would someone reading this 
please tell me why you googled, "smell of burnt toast," and whether or not my 
musing on toast helped you in your quest?  Thanks!  

Write to: australopithecus@zworg.com