Flashback....ew....

Here's a story for you.

I like raisins. I think that they are a delicious and healthy treat, eaten either in a bowl of bran flakes, covered in dark chocolate, or simply directly out of the canister. Imagine, then, my dismay at the gift-with-purchase I came across one summer afternoon.

I was hungry, and decided to have some raisins. I took the canister out of the pantry, opened the vacu-seal top, scooped out a handful, and munched happily. Boy, I love raisins, I thought to myself, reaching in to take a second handful. I look in, so I can pick out the really juicy ones. Wait, I think. White raisins? Raisins aren't white. Nor do they move. Why are they moving? What is that? What is THAT? HOLY SHIT! Those can't be...maggots?!!? *gag...gag...gag...gag*

Needless to say that I couldn't eat raisins again for many years after that.

So, today, I was browsing through Consumerist, and boy-oh-boy, did I have a flashback to the raisin episode.

Says the article:
"My wife let out a full-throated scream that I've only really heard in my nightmares when she is being carried off by a giant squid or something and both of my legs have been cut off and I can't help her...she bent over, her trembling hands on her knees and spit out what was in her mouth onto the floor...my wife's box of Goobers was ALIVE and crawling with maggots...I peered inside the box and saw lumpen, misshapen Goobers with maggots or some kind of larvae crawling everywhere. "



I still have nightmares about raisins. Dancing, singing, california raisins, who open their mouths to sing "I heard it through the grape vine", only to havewaves upon waves of wriggling latrine fly larvae pour forth.

Thank gawd I don't eat goobers.

Gag Me with a Spoon

For the BF's birthday today, we went to Gasho Hibachi Steak House on Route 32. We've passed by it several times, and every time we go by, it looks so nice that we want to eat there, and we figured that since his dad was going to pay for his birthday dinner, we'd finally treat ourselves.

So, we go in. It's a beautiful place, by the way. We're seated within about ten minutes. It's a bunch of community tables with cook tops so the chef can cook your dinner right in front of you. We've got one of these tables to ourselves. We order our food.

So far, so good. The chefs at the other tables are a bit obnoxious, and the bottles of beer that the neighboring men are consuming are the size of half-gallon milk jugs, so they're pretty rowdy. Our appetizers come. Ew. Seriously, ew. Salty, sparse, just...ew.

Then, about fifteen minutes later, our chef comes up. "How you dooooinnnn'?" he asks, Joey-style. The three of us just look at him.

He starts cooking, and food goes flying in every direction. I have tilapia, BF has filet mignon and his father has chicken. Both the men have shrimp. Firstly, I notice the shrimp is being cooked WITHOUT BEING DEVEINED. Do you know what the vein is? It's the shrimp's digestive tract. That brown stuff? Shrimp poo. POO! They cooked us poo.

Then the chef did BF's filet mignon. Cooked it ok, I guess. Then, proceeded to chop it into bite-sized pieces. Who, in their right mind, chops up filet mignon? The chicken got a similar treatment, and was quite dry. It was all dowsed in soy sauce. Too salty. My fish...well...it was fish. What can I say. The vegetables were overcooked, the rice was oddly nutty. The diet coke was delicious, though.

It was the first dinner restaurant we ever went to where BF didn't order dessert. That in and of itself testifies to the utter ickiness of this particular establishment.

The best part of the whole experience, though, was an older man who was there for his birthday with his family. The wait staff brought out a quarter of a pineapple, cut lengthwise into a wedge, put a sparkler in it, and proceeded to smack everyone in the party on the head with a toy plastic mallet that squeaked with every smack. It was surreal.

It was, all in all, the WORST MEAL EVER. I've had better meals at trucker stops in the middle of Pennsylvania.