How much are you willing to pay to whine?

I’ve gotta start charging for it, now that I’m in a relationship. 

Until now, I’ve been giving it away for free; my attention and understanding, I mean. I do this nearly every night, shortly after Lori arrives home from the office.

“How was work?” I ask. I don’t really care, of course, any more than she cares about the quality of my workday. But that doesn’t stop her from telling me A) who acted like a jerk, B) who called in sick even though everyone knows he or she was really just hung over, C) how much unfinished work was piled on her desk at the end of the day and will be waiting for her there in the morning.

She gripes for a few minutes and then it’s all over and it’s time to uncork the wine and start supper. This is a scenario played out nightly in virtually every household in America, yet — until now — nobody’s figured out a way to make a buck from it.

It took the Chinese — the same people who can somehow manufacture an iPhone case and sell it on Amazon for .38 cents — to monetize bellyaching. 

In China, for about five bucks a day, you can dial a number and whine to a person of the opposite sex (or the same sex, if that’s what blows you hair back) about your boss’ bad breath or the overdue Murphy contract that that young kid from the fourth floor is trying to steal away from you.

The person on the other end of the line will provide plenty of commiserating feedback like 可怜的宝宝 (poor baby), 这就是这么不公平 (that’s so unfair!) and 你是如此的权利生活太臭 (you are so right; life stinks!).

Basically, the same things I listen to Lori say every night for free, or used to before I found out I could entice her to open her wallet.

The quality and type of sympathy depends upon choices made while signing up for the service. Guys can choose a virtual girlfriend (that’s what they call ‘em) with personalities  like “mature women”, “doll-like girls” and “girl next door.” Women can choose from “men in uniform”, “handsome men”, and “comforting men.”

Nowhere do they offer a “bitter ex-wife” model, which — if I know anything about ex-wives and I should since I have more than my share — would spit out remarks like “get over it!” and “grow up already!” But apparently nobody wants to pay five bills for that.

According to Zhang Xiaoli, head of the China Association of Mental Health and a man with far too many odd letters in his name, most clients are trying the service out of plain old curiosity.

I’m not so sure; I think there may be a real market for this sort of thing. I’ll know for sure tonight when Lori gets home. 

If I wake up five bucks richer tomorrow morning, I may have to invest in a toll-free phone line and Paypal account.

Cockroaches are the key to my early retirement

I wonder if Americans seem as bizarre to the Chinese as they sometimes seem to us. Probably. After all, we gave the world Miley Cyrus, genetically “enhanced” crops and corporate-owned government; I guess I don’t really wonder after all.

We Americans are weird. But not as weird as the Chinese.

The Chinese have had centuries to fine-tune their weirdness. Their civilization is older by far. The Chinese developed a lunar calendar and fireworks thousands of years before our ancestors crossed the ocean, stole this country from its rightful owners, and then enacted strict immigration laws to keep everybody else out.

Change comes only slowly to China and traditions from ancient times linger, like the smell of last night’s pan-fried calamari.

So it’s little wonder the Chinese — at least some of them — believe cockroaches slow down the aging process. Keep in mind, these are the same folks who believe powdered rhino horn makes them irresistible to the fairer sex and produces Spiderman-like powers in the sack.

I’m not trying to make fun of Chinese culture here; we Americans have our own cultural crosses to bear (see Miley Cyrus, above). I’m just pointing out they are at least as weird as we are.

And the cockroach thing … I mean, really? Sure, after the next Big Nuclear War, only cockroaches and personal injury attorneys (kind of redundant, really) will still be here. But will eating one (a cockroach, not an attorney) prolong life? And even if it will, are those extra few years worth dining regularly on filet of bug?

The Chinese think so. In China, roaches are big business.

“Prepared” cockroaches in China sell for $89 per pound. By prepared, I mean crushed into cockroach powder. I don’t know if the Chinese sprinkle this on breakfast cereal, snort it, or toss it into the air like fairy dust at birthday parties; regardless, it’s yucky.

Cockroaches are, after all … well … cockroaches! Eek! Ick! Like that. They’re worse than “American Idol,” worse than Miley Cyrus. Not worse than personal injury attorneys, but still, pretty bad.

Yet in China, actual farms have been constructed — cockroach farms! They’re breeding cockroaches on purpose!

It would probably be cheaper to import them from New Jersey or Detroit, where free-roaming cockroaches may be found in abundance, but the Chinese like doing things themselves. So they have formed the Sichuan Treasure Cockroach Farming Cooperative, and no, I am not making this up. Cockroach. Farm. Two words I never thought I would see together.

I suspect the “science” behind cockroach ingestion and its alleged affects on human longevity is much like the science behind astrology, racism and Fox news; it’s just something people too lazy to think for themselves accept as true.

Seems silly to me, but who am I to judge? And it has me wondering: Is the downtown Detroit apartment I lived in back in my college days still available? If so, I could rent it, set up a few roach traps and — selling to the Chinese at $89 per pound — I could retire comfortably within a few years.

It’s all about understanding the global market, folks, and being willing to squish a few bugs.

More Reality Check online at mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com. Email Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.

Diplomacy happens one noodle at a time

Ramen figures prominently in my diet. I’m a single guy, so this is in keeping with the established order of things.

It’s not that I’m particularly poor (though I am) or uncreative in the kitchen. I was raised in the restaurant business and have been cooking for decades. I can make a quiche that’s lighter than air, stir fry Szechuan that’ll bring tears to your eyes, create an awesome venison stew, all without cracking a cook book.

But I don’t.

Because I’m single, the kids are grown and moved out, and ramen noodles are ready in three minutes. I usually toss in whatever leftover bits of vegetables and/or meat products I have in the refrigerator — the ones that have yet to sprout green hair — and voila! Dinner is served and I can go fishing.

I assume the nutritional value of ramen is roughly the same as the packaging it comes in, but I don’t care. I take a vitamin every day (purchased from the same dollar store at which I buy the ramen) so I’m all set with regard to health issues.

The taste of Ramen is OK; nothing to write home about, but I never wrote home about food anyway, or anything else, now that I think about it. 

The different flavors concern me, though. I mean, the chicken flavor is (supposedly) flavored with real chicken; the beef and shrimp flavors with real beef or shrimp. Which leaves one to wonder what they use to season the Chinese flavor. Real Chinese? I hope not, but things are different there; there is no FDA and China’s population tops 1.350 billion. Who really knows what sort of Soylent Green stratagem noodle manufacturers have come up with to turn a buck?

Most Americans think ramen tastes pretty much the same from brand to brand, from flavor to flavor. This is because it does. The Asian palate, however, is far more discriminating, at least when it comes to noodles.

Toshio Yamamoto, a computer hardware engineer from Japan, recently announced he has spent the past 15 years cataloguing all the Japanese ramen he could find. His noodle database offers information on texture, price, flavor and ingredients for over 4,300 different brands and types of noodles.

From this we may discern that Yamamoto is a) an idiot, b) likely to remain single for life, and c) a man in need of a real hobby.

Because of his diligent work, however, we can now check to see, conclusively, if Chinese people are actually an ingredient in any ramen noodles. Or rather we could, if we could read Japanese, which we cannot. (And when I say “we” I mean “me.”)

To me, Japanese writing looks like beautiful, elegant, squiggly lines. When I hit the Google “translate” button, some of the squiggly lines change shape slightly, but remain unintelligible to my round, western eyes.

I have a couple Japanese friends in Detroit who could probably help me with this, but I haven’t seen them in a while. Besides, asking them if there are Chinese people in their noodles might be perceived as racist. Being a liberal Gaijin (basically, the Japanese word for “honky”), I can’t let that happen.

So for now, I think I’ll just stick with the chicken flavor and avoid an international incident.

Mike Taylor’s book, “Looking at the Pint Half Full,” is available in paperback at Robbins Book List in Greenville and in eBook format from Amazon.com. More Reality Check online at mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com.