Things to Eat

I love pickles.  But pickles are hard to buy:  they are often disappointingly mushy.  Luckily, all the market research I never intended to do was done by my sister, who discovered Strub's Kosher Baby Dills, aka the best pickles you will ever eat in the entire world ever.


I just ate the last two from my jar a few minutes ago.


I am very sad now.


There is a very, very big clove of garlic waiting for me in the bottom of said jar.  I thought it was a pickle and almost speared it but realized my error in time.  Now, I'm wondering whether that was, in fact, an error.  Could it be, instead, a delicacy waiting for me?  Surely a clove of garlic, saturated in the same brine as a pickle, would have lost most of its garlickeyness as a cucumber loses its cucumberyness.  And it is submerged in Strub's brine, the best brine in the world.


I will have to leave the jar open on the kitchen counter while I think about this.


Update.


I tried really hard to get a photo of the clove of garlic, but the lighting is really bad in the kitchen.  Here's a picture of the jar of pickles, as left on the counter for an hour or so.

I know you are wondering.  Yes, there was pickle juice left on the counter, and yes, I put my camera down in a puddle of it.  Why did you even wonder?

The clove of garlic was delicious.  If they ever revise the Bible, they can make that clove of garlic the Third Testament.

I know you`re not wondering.  Of course the jar, lid, and remainder of the clove of garlic attached to a fork is still sitting on the counter.  It will be there until I need to move it when the pizza gets here.

Horror Stories

I had been coveting a pair of earrings from Etsy for quite some time, and my repeated hints to the boyfriend fell on deaf, deaf ears.  Eventually, I bought them for myself.  I wear them most days.  They’re 9 mm green amethyst studs, for crying out loud; they demand to be worn.

Most horror stories don’t start out this way.  But what if, instead of a buxom blonde, our star was sparkling green earrings?

It was a dark and stormy night, and the woman had just finished evacuating her bladder.  She reached for a new roll of toilet paper with one hand, and with the other, dropped the empty cardboard roll like it was the magazine of a gun.  The new cartridge securely in place, it was time to get up and wash up.  But fate had other plans.

Suddenly there was a sproing as loud as a pistol shot, followed as quickly as thunder follows lightning by a pop and the splash of water on the woman’s thigh.  Bewildered, she checked the toilet paper apparatus.  Usually, the sound of a released spring indicated the escape of the axis from the toilet roll holder, but not this time.  This time, following the distinctive metallic sound, the toilet paper was right where it was supposed to be.

Then, realization hit in a wave, a wave of horror so profound the woman had but two options: action, or catatonia.

She chose action.

A quick up with the pants, a quicker hand wash, and a shout, “Shit! my earring is in the toilet, do you have a flashlight?” and the wheels were in motion.

The man, disgusted, perturbed, amazed, but most of all, confused, entered the bathroom with a flashlight as the woman stripped off her vintage Esprit sweatshirt to expose her forearms.  “Do you need me—” he started to say, but the woman was ready for what lay ahead.  She took the flashlight, shone it into the depths, and sighed to steady herself when her earring glinted back at her.  But that glint was not a mischievous “Glad to see you”; it was a warning.

She began to reach in.

“Woman!  Stop!” cried the man.  Something in his tone made her pause (this is a horror story, not an actual movie).

“What is it?”

“If you go too far, you’ll hit the valve, and it will flush!”

The enormity of the situation hit her for the first time.  She wasn’t just rescuing her jewel from a tank of pee.  She, herself, could have flushed it away with her careless eagerness, her maverick desire to save it at all cost.

“Thank you, Man,” she replied, truly grateful, aiming her flashlight with her left hand, plunging her right into the urine.

Strange Things

Today I was shredding eleven-year-old university correspondence and as one page disappeared into the shredder, I noticed it was printed in Comic Sans.  It was official University of Alberta correspondence, on letterhead, on textured paper, using Comic Sans font.


I was very excited.  This was a beautiful piece of disaster, but voomp, gone, into the shredder, never to be seen again.  This probably happens a lot.  The University probably uses Comic Sans on certain occasions to seem approachable, or even cool.  But for me, this opportunity was gone forever, and I was alone in the office on a stat holiday, evidence shredded.


I considered writing out the amazing fake conversation I had with myself about how sweet and amazing it was that people thought it was a good idea to use Comic Sans.  Especially a university!  That's the kicker!  But it was a stupid conversation.  Everyone knows Comic Sans is the punchline.  Why bother telling the joke?