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4.2.12 WC: 191694 How a frozen tongue saved me There used to be a deli in New York that named sandwiches after famous people. My sandwich was “tongue on rye,” which I took as flattering, especially since some of my friends had turkey or ham in their named sandwiches. Tongue was not only appropriate because I talk a lot but also because a tongue once helped me beat off a would-be mugger. I was coming from my parent’s house in Brooklyn and heading back to school in New Haven on the New York subway. My mother, as usual, gave me some food to take back to school. It was a solidly frozen, homungous tongue. I didn’t really want to take it, in part because it was so cumbersome to carry in the plastic bag in which my mother had placed it. As I got off the subway and approached the railroad station, a guy grabbed my briefcase and started to kick me. I swung my tongue at his knee, knocked him to the ground, grabbed my briefcase and escaped into the railroad terminal. Had the tongue not been frozen solid, who knows what would have happened? Several years later, I was reminded of this event while watching an episode of , in which a wife kills her husband by hitting him over the head with a frozen leg of lamb. When a policeman comes looking for the weapon, the murderer serves him the leg of lamb, well done, and he eats the evidence. I too ate my weapon. It was delicious. 384 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_017471