Steak Aficionado

The Steak Aficionado
Bovine spongiform encephalopathy

          “I’ll have the Filet Mignon, rare, and some water” the Steak Aficionado stated matter-of-factly. Of course, the waiter had no idea who he was. He thought the Steak Aficionado was just another customer who wanted the signature meal at Al’s Big Steak House. Little did he know that the man he was about to serve was The Steak Aficionado, food critic for the Daily Tribune.
          He whisked off the order, and ten minutes later, the steak was in front of the Aficionado. Already, he had the microphone hooked up to his front coat, hidden inconspicuously within his coat pocket. He had learned long ago that the easiest way to note his marks was to talk quietly to himself about the flavor. He may have looked a little silly to other patrons, but that didn’t matter. They didn’t understand that tasting and analyzing steak was an art, and the Aficionado was Rembrandt.
          The first bite gave him that rush that he always felt when he tasted steak. The bite, which by habit was not analyzed, was a staple of the Aficionado’s life. He thought to himself about what he would do if he couldn’t eat steak. He couldn’t answer the question.
          The next day, the Aficionado was early to work, as he was every day when he felt a steak moved him. Whether he had to write a scalding editorial or a whimsical article, the Aficionado felt the public deserved well written and thought out work. As for last night’s steak, the Aficionado was angry.
          “Al’s Big Steak House- big on giving out crappy steaks.” The title came to him in the night, and for all its stereotypical nature, felt exactly right for the terribly burnt steak he had tasted. The article took only 30 minutes to write, and the Aficionado was already through his second edit when his co-workers started showing up.
          “How was it?” and “I’m shocked!” passed his cubicle as his friends passed by him. Each was interested in hearing about last night’s debacle, and the Aficionado was glad to tell them about it. “The service was atrocious!” he would say to them as they passed, and most would stop and inquire further. Finally, after his story was told many times, he would get back to his article, and take one final look at it. Then, it was off to his editor, who barely skimmed it before placing it on the front page of the weekend section.
          So he lived for many years with this life, eating steak and writing articles about it. Although his life did not change, the world around the Aficionado did. New diets and discoveries had been made, showing that salads contained all the nutrients a body needed, and that meat did not add any nutritional value to the body. Never the less, this did not affect the Aficionado. He still ate steak and wrote articles. However, his audience slimmed out.
          Later, Mad-Cow disease appeared in American livestock. Steak and meat markets took a huge hit, causing many restaurants to stop offering steaks as meals. Many ranchers went bankrupt, and meat became a rare and dangerous delicacy.
          The Steak Aficionado was not fazed. He still ate steak and wrote articles. His audience, however, was now almost non-existent. The editor of the paper took a sharp look at every article, and began placing his articles near the back of the paper. Sometimes, he didn’t place them in the paper at all. The Aficionado was devastated. He took his wrath out on his co-workers, who soon came to dislike him and attempt to avoid him.
          Eventually, the Aficionado was moved to the basement. He grew more and more aggravated at his audience and thought of quitting his writing. He was not too old for another job, but he was too frantically devoted to his articles and his steak to quit.
          The Steak Aficionado continued to search for the best steak, now found wherever restaurants would still serve it. He spent less and less time writing his articles, and more and more time just enjoying his steaks. In fact, he sometimes missed writing his articles because he enjoyed the steak he ate too much to talk through it.
          One day, after eating a particularly good steak at Bill’s Roadside Tavern, the Aficionado felt that this piece of meat would be best recollected by a great masterpiece of culinary analysis. So the Aficionado woke up early, a rare occurrence at this point, and headed to his cubicle located in the basement. He flipped on the one light bulb in the center of the room, and began to write his masterpiece. The typewriter’s keys slapped onto the page, but the message the Aficionado tried to place wasn’t there. He was feeling a little hot. Then, the Aficionado realized that he had begun talking to himself. “That steak…that steak was delicious…” What was this? Now the Aficionado was shedding his jacket. It was just too hot in this basement.
          The hours passed. He simply wrote on and on, as he had once dreamed to do, trying to finish his masterpiece before the paper was sent out. Yet the words were not there! He grew frustrated. “This is ridiculous! The steak was purely…” The adjective he needed wasn’t at hand. He crumpled page after page of typing, as the day turned to dusk turned to darkness.
          He was sweating through his shirt now. His head spun, and his legs felt weak. But he was so close! It was now passed midnight, and he was so close to being done. He just needed that one adjective… immaculate! He had it!!!
          The masterpiece completed, the Aficionado rushed up the stairs of the basement to the editors room, his legs almost failing him. His mind was doing flips inside his head, and he felt like he would pass out at any minute, but somehow he made it to the editors 3rd floor corner desk.
          “Sir!!! I…have my article finished!!” The aficionado tripped over a chair, and his masterpiece flew out of his hands. Papers fluttered everywhere.
          “Calm down” his editor shouted at him. “Besides, the paper already is set. You’ve been working here long enough to know that. It’s 3:10 am. The paper is printed at 3.”
          At that, the Aficionado collapsed down to the carpet of his editor’s room, and sputtered as he tried to speak.
          “I’m…allergic to vegetables…” These were his last words, but in his dimming eyes remained the firm though that he had finished his masterpiece.
          The editor immediately called the police. The ambulance arrived, and announced the Steak Aficionado dead at the scene. His editor asked what he died from, and he learned that the Aficionado died from a mutated form of bovine spongiform encephalopathy- Mad-Cow disease.
          The editor placed a nice article telling the Steak Aficionado’s story in the paper. But the Aficionado’s masterpiece never made it. And the Aficionado’s article space was replaced by another culinary analyzer. He was replaced by the Salad Artist. And everyone read his articles.