Since I live in a rural community where the highlight of the 4th of July is, honestly, watching my vet blow up explosives in his backyard, I did exactly what Hollywood hoped I would this weekend: dragged my man to the movies.

I guess the blowing-stuff-up bug hadn’t left me at the vet’s backyard, because I had a hankering to see Wanted.  I got just what I paid for, too: stuff blew up. There were car chases, dudes-in-peril, knife fights and, best of all, a cubicle take-down. But of all the millions of dollars spent to engrain these scenes in my brain, the image that won’t leave me is Angelina Jolie eating a hamburger.

Here’s the scene: James McAvoy is getting the crap kicked out of him. He’s bleeding heavily through the nose. There are knives. Angelina is in the background, smirking, ostensibly chewing. Damn it! I can’t pay attention to the blood gushing all over the place because I’m waiting to see Angelina swallow her food.

She never does.

Now, I know the movie is supposed to be a bit ridiculous. I mean, an underground network of assassins run windsprints atop a subway car. Clearly it’s a comic book world. I buy that. But in no way can I buy a 5′7″, 95 lb woman pretending to enjoy a gigantic slab of red meat on a bun.

I guess we all have our limits. Mine, I discovered, start–and end–with anorexic chicks. Blood, gore, assassination attempts are all no problem. But when a grown female with the BMI of an adolescent famine victim acts like she’s not starving herself, my hackles go up.

Eat the damn burger, Angelina. Kill the bad guys on screen, not yourself. 

According to local sources, the practice began long before Napoleon Dynamite made tater tots “cool.” (Or as cool as opening credits can make something.) Here’s the sitch: two Mexican eateries in town wrap tater tots inside their burritos. Along with the fake sour cream, no-avocado-in-sight guacamole, lard-y beans, and instant white rice. Tater tots. As in, fried logs of shredded potato. Can they even grow potatoes in Guadalajara?

Somehow I doubt Anthony Bourdain is on board with this. 

The first time I discovered the “magic ingredients” in my burrito, I was surrounded by about a dozen other women who’d gotten roped into judging a local beauty pageant by their mailman. Just like I had. This explains why I didn’t simply open my mouth and let the food fall back out onto my plate. (It doesn’t, however, explain why I agreed to judge a beauty pageant. Suffice it to say, for someone who relies on E-Bay as much as I do, the mailman can be a lifeline.)

At least I didn’t have to pay for the bizarre dining experience.  Our meals came out of the pageant winner’s scholarship fund.

Yesterday, I had very specific dinner cravings, like I usually do, so I called the man to see if he was on board with my pre-menstrual combination of fatty dairy products and farty proteins and about twenty-five different desserts. He told me, like he usually does, the equivalent of “whatever you want is fine by me, dear.” 

And then he told me he doesn’t have food cravings. Ever.

Huh??

I think the explanation I was given had something to do with Buddhism or advanced personality theory or the fact that he’s male but I can’t imagine a world in which the elimination of food cravings is even desirable. I mean, there are days at work where I’m torn between getting-a-running-start-and-leaping-out-my-second-story-window and consuming magenta toner in a water glass and the only thing that keeps me among the living is the handful of medjool dates I’ve hidden in my bottom desk drawer.

In July I come in for the free air conditioning, but that’s another story.

Seriously: I can’t imagine being craving-free. I’ve worked through the more destructive ones, but I’m not sure I would ever want to wake up without an inkling of exactly what I want for breakfast. Coconut pancake mornings are very different from steel-cut oatmeal days, which are, of course, widely disparate from “screw it I’m going straight for pizza.” It would take some serious time in the female equivalent of a Zen monastery to get that kind of food Buddhism to take hold.

Today has been very raisins-and-pecans thus far, heading into chicken enchiladas territory.

We atheists may not be the most serene folks on planet god-is-dead, but we sure know how to plan a menu.