Make A Muffin Better

Some people think that if they go too far
They’ll never get back to where the rest of them are
I might be crazy, but there’s one thing I know
You might be surprised at what you find out when you go home.
—Frank Zappa, from A Token Of My Extreme

Home is where the heart is.
—traditional proverb

BREAKFAST DURING ZAPPADAN is special at our home, because we have these.  “These” are fantasy muffins; muffins made from pure imagination. Imaginary muffins, each adorned with a lovely, tiny green rosetta— a small, seemingly insignificant detail, which, I tell you truly, make the muffin better. (For added ambiance, you may want to scroll down now if necessary and start the music.)

The tiny green rosetta is not just a little added visual excitement, nor is it that they contribute a tiny dollop of sugary goodness to exactly one bite of the whole thing.  No, the muffin— and the whole muffin experience which surrounds it— is made better because the seeming insignificance of the one thing added almost as an after-thought, is the very thing that makes the muffin like no other muffin in the world;  like no other muffin in the entire fucking universe.

As astonishing as I think that is, I still hear you:  Well why exactly is that “better”?  Why is an imaginary muffin, even an entirely unique one— better?

Suppose for a moment, we were all muffins.  (No I’m perfectly straight; just hang in there.) We’re all muffins!  If everybody was, say, a maple pecan muffin, as much as I like maple and pecans, life as such would quickly become a colossal f’n bore.  But as persons— personalities— it is our absolute uniqueness of personality that makes each of us cosmically, and eternally valuable— both to our fellows, and to the Infinite Being from whom the gift of an absolutely unique personality is freely bestowed.

As unique personalities— or little pooty muffin-heads if you prefer— our individual contribution to the creative advance of civilization can be singularly unique. Few people have characterized that creative singularity as keenly as Francis Vincent Zappa.  That’s why we still play his music, that’s why Zappadan is celebrated;  and that’s why a little green rosetta will always make a muffin better.

So:  to recap:  Why is an imaginary guitar solo better than no guitar solo?