outer-jessie's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Near-Death by Pepper It looked like a harmless little tiny bite-sized pumpkin. It was small, smaller than a peperoncini, bright orange, and with a little stem sticking out the top like a beanie with a propeller. Darling, really. But so. Oh so. Very. Deadly. At first, as I chewed it, and chewed it and chewed it, I was thinking, "Hm. This is really motherfucking hot." I was a little teeny bit off-my-rocker drunk at this point. Just a smidge. When I finally sent the pulpy remains of my bite down the chute, the after effects kicked in. HOLY FUCKING SHIT. My mouth was on fire, not in a good way, not in a "ooh, I just burnt my tongue" kind of way, not in a "I'm so brave; I just ate a jalapeno" kind of way, more in a OH MY FUCKING GOD I CAN'T FEEL MY FLESH kind of way. More in a This Pumpkin-Looking Pepper is Going to Send You to Your Grave kind of way. Tears in my eyes: check. Inability to speak: check. Inability to swallow: check. Inability to chew food: check. Sensation of oral pins and needles for twenty minutes after the bite: check and check. Eventually I had to send our waiter off to fetch me a little milk. Twice. I asked Rob, "aren't you even going to try one little seed?" but it was too late for him by then. His face was distorted into a why-the-hell-did-I-just-do-that expression: "I licked it," he said. I wondered if he had mistaken it for a psychedelic frog. It was a pernicious, pathologically potent pumpkin-looking pepper. If you're looking to go on a hardcore diet, eat a lot of these suckers, because I guarantee you they will destroy any desire you have to put food in your mouth. So that was my yesterday night. Other than that, it was enjoyable in every way. This three-day weekend I had would have been much MUCH better if I had had anything planned for it. More on that as it comes up in chronological order. Thursday night the ever-enjoyable Melissa joined me for a hastily concocted dinner date. I had fully intended to clean my apartment top to bottom and have something simmering on the stove by the time she arrived, but unfortunately I was waylaid by the necessity to have cannoli for dessert. Cannoli, I have found, are not as easy to come by in Cambridge as I would have expected. In short, I ended up going on a two-mile wild goose chase for this elusive pastry, arriving home much later than anticipated, to a Melissa at my doorstep. OOPS. The apartment was a shambles, as I'd left it, there was nothing cooking on the stove, and I was a sweaty stinking wildebeest because it was really frickin hot out. But we were starving so it almost didn't matter (which is not to say that it was almost not embarrassing). I piled together a bunch of veggies and some spaghetti and I packed as many vitamins into her as was humanly possible. Never let it be said that I don't support the arts. I've been feeding starving artists, after all. We went to a show that her friend was putting on at the Middle East later on that night, which was amazing and you should all be sorry you missed it. Friday, a quiet day with Rob. Saturday, a quiet day with Rob. A very quiet day. With no plans. And 24 hours to spend together. 12 of which were spent in a huge fight. (sigh) It was a terrible ugh, ugh, ugh fight. I thought he was being an obstinate and childish fuck. He thought I was being an obstinate and childish psycho. It took a while to sort out. Twelve hours. Yeah. Good times! Sunday, a quiet day with Rob. This time we had shopping and a partial work day to distract us, so we weren't starting fights to pass the time. Nice. Which brings us to yesterday, which was a nice long day of sleep interrupted by three power outages between 4 and 11 am, then a day of work, then dinner at the House of Blues, as already described. Now I do believe we're up to date, and that is all I have to say for the present. I have phone calls to make and lunch to eat. Toodles. (besos) 12:34 p.m. - 2002-08-20 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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