9 Comments

1. 

   Wives helping themselves to “just a taste” of husbands’ desserts is an old joke; usually with a hint the wives are deluding themselves about the calories avoided by not ordering their own. “Angel’s Share” keeps up the fiction that she isn’t the one indulging.

2. 

   Yes, Bill, that really is the whole joke. (I wonder if I should make a macro for that.)

3. 

   Let’s adopt a more inclusive, broader definition of “angel’s share”. In this definition, it encompasses all losses that are incurred inevitably, as part of the production or consumption of something. Some amount of water is lost to evaporation in any irrigation project, for example. Some part of the energy used to move something is lost to friction.
   Now, the labelling of something as “inevitable” doesn’t mean that it can’t be reduced or countered. You can fight irrigation evaporation losses by enclosing more of the system; you can reduce friction by polishing the surfaces and applying lubrication. Or, conversely, you can just accept that losses are inevitable, and decline to expend any effort fighting it. That, finally, brings us to the point Arlo has reached. Arlo has fully accepted that some portion of his snack(s) will never reach his lips.

4. 

   My dad used to say he was collecting a tax. Or a commission (like an agent’s 10%).

5. 

   Or, in more family-centric terms, if you have a family, never count on eating 100% of anything you buy or cook. I had to reduce my cooking amounts after my second son went to college because stuff stopped evaporating from the refrigerator. Some even went bad!

6. 

   not to mention that Arlo see her as his angel

7. 

   Arlo doesn’t want to sleep on the couch tonight. You can enclose more of the system and not have to sleep on the couch. You can polish the surfaces and not have to sleep on the couch. But if Arlo tries to prevent her taking a cracker he’s sleeping on the couch tonight.

8. 

   “Angel’s share” is the whisky that evaporates from the cask during maturation – by extension, as James Pollock said, the inevitable losses due to natural processes. I found this one cute though not laugh worthy, which is mostly where I am with Arlo and Janis.

9. 

   Minor Annoyance – We used to have the opposite situation. After Robert was first diagnosed as Diabetic I stopped eating things he shouldn’t eat – even when I was not cooking and we were eating out. After a year or so he complained to me that I had stopped eating desserts and things such as this (this occurred at bar mitzvah where one dessert after another came by and I didn’t take any). I explained to him that I was trying to be nice to him. His response was that if I had a dessert, he could have a taste. After that when there was a dessert offered, he would pick the one he wanted and I would have it so he could take a taste. Which is probably why I am now Diabetic also. :-)