you like tomato, and i like tomahhto!

i have a feeling tomatoes were a point of cultural contention long before the brothers gershwin brought the linguistic dilemma to the world's attention. sure, everyone knows what a tomato is--take for example, a children's picture book, where you get the little picture of the fruit, vegetable, animal, whatever, and the corresponding name. along with the word "tomato," you'll see a red, roundish thing with a little green stem, right? sure. simple. so besides the pronunciation question, what's so controversial about tomatoes??!?!

well, here's where the fun begins. i mean, what are you supposed to _do_ with a tomato?? do you eat it whole, like an apple, and just bite into it? do you slice it? if so, thick slices or thin? or should you quarter it, again like an apple? or maybe dice it up into a thousand little pieces? and what about the rough spot at the top, where the stem was? do you leave it or carve it out? and then there's the whole issue of why it's a fruit and not a vegetable, but we're not even going to get into all of that...

(yeah, now try asking any or all of those questions in a foreign language!!)

confused yet? i mean, there's no _right_ way to eat or slice a tomato, so why does all of this matter?? because there are, however, culturally "correct"--or at least culturally intuitive--ways to cut tomatoes. or so it seems. you're at someone's house getting dinner ready, and, of course, you want to be helpful, but then they say, do you mind cutting the tomatoes? ... and all of a sudden, it's like a test. or maybe more like a pop quiz. i mean, you didn't see it coming, right? the panic sets in. you break out in a cold sweat. breathe, you say, it's just tomatoes. tomatoes. no problem. everyone knows how to cut tomatoes. breathe. oh, shit. how should you cut the tomatoes?!?

exactly. sing it with me...you like tomato, and i like tomahhto...potato, potahhto, tomato, tomahhto...let's call the whole thing off!