Lary’s Food – by The Fine Mr. R. Michal

Many years ago, Bob Michal and I (current BCBL members) and Lary Wesley (past member) were on a coed volleyball team. At the end of the playing season, the team decided to have an informal party with a pot-luck menu. Some people made their own food items like brownies and cookies, while others like me brought things like store-bought wheels of cheese and crackers.

It's important at this point to explain Lary's extreme chivalry to the feminine of the species. There was a time, as I remember, when he would open doors and pull out chairs for a woman, and probably would travel from Chicago to Cincinnati to deliver a package if she asked (perhaps he still would, but I don't know).

So the party progressed on a late Sunday afternoon, with people talking and snacking on food items. One of the girls on the team had made a cheesecake, and since there were seven of us there we decided to divide it up into seven equal pieces. Bob Michal took the cheesecake into the kitchen (the party was at his apartment) while I brought dirty dishes to the kitchen sink. Bob started cutting up the cheesecake but soon realized his cuts were unequal and the result would be that we'd end up one piece short. Bob and I looked at each other and we knew immediately what our solution would be. Nearby on the kitchen table was one of the cheese wheels I'd brought, and it was basically uneaten because people had tried it and it tasted like crap. Because of what had to be divine intervention, the cheese wheel looked remarkably similar to the cheesecake. So we cut out a piece of the wheel and placed it on a dish and targeted that piece for Lary. We marched back into the living room and distributed the pieces of cheesecake, being careful to give Lary the fake piece. Meanwhile, Lary had been all full of compliments about this cheesecake, saying to the girl who'd made it, "Marsha, I can't wait till I get a bite of your cheesecake, it looks delicious!"

So we all start eating the cheesecake and it really was good and everyone does start complimenting Marsha on its quality. Meanwhile, Bob Michal and I are sneaking sideways glances at Lary, and we see him with huge eagerness shovel in a big mouthful of the fake cheesecake, and then the huge eagerness on his face turns instantly into complete displeasure. I am sure he was thinking, "How could anyone enjoy this horrible stuff?" But chivalrous gentleman that he is, he joins in on complimenting Marsha, saying stuff like "Tastes good" while chewing on and trying to swallow this sour, crappy cheese in his mouth. As this is going on, Bob Michal and I are just about peeing in our pants trying to hold in laughter. Finally, someone sees us and knows something's going on.

When the truth is finally revealed, Lary gets really mad at Bob Michal and starts chasing him around the dining room table. If you've never seen Lary and Bob, they're a mismatched pair, big and little. So it looked like a huge brown bear chasing Mickey Rooney around a campground. Bob was shocked, saying stuff like, "C'mon Lary, it was a joke!" as they ran in a circle.

Lary finally calmed down, and actually the event proved to be to his benefit as all the girls thought it was a cruel prank and they did their best to console the big fella. But the moral of the story is: Don't mess with Lary's food!