Bad chicken is one of the worst stenches you will ever encounter, I hate the card game 'trips and runs' and certain Wendy's drive thru's are open until 3AM, but I get ahead of myself.
My becky's work has its Christmas party in January, which is kinda odd, but also works pretty good for deflecting flack from my relatives who remain proudly captives of the crusty old codgers from crooklyn in their control tower.
We went to the party last night. It was in a banquet hall connected to and run by a Catholic church. There was an open bar, which by local ordinance necessitated the presence of an armed off duty police officer, we had food, and the entertainment was a local 'casino service' that provides the chips the dealers, and the games; all Becky's work had to provide was the prize table so we could bid on the prizes with our 'points' at the end of the evening.
There was some primo stuff there, Rock Band, Guitar Hero for X-Box 360, a top end espresso machine, tools, I mean some damn good stuff.
So dinner went well, I managed to keep the carb count low, but didn't really get filled up. I was OK, but could have used a little more volume. I kept getting calls from my rather ancient mother whom we were supposed to go see after this party let out around 9PM, but they had just told us it was going to go until 1AM or so, and I could not clearly convey to mom that we were going to be very very late.
So here I am, at a Christmas party, at a catholic church, gambling, with a drink in my hand, and my phone rings.
It's my older sister, Mrs. PO the Uberdub.
I shook my head, just thinking about the situation. I told her that the 'work thing' was gonna run late. Very late.
Meanwhile the background noise is a cacophony of 'hit me' 'Blackjack!' 'I'll stay' and other clearly gambling noise.
She called back a few minutes later on what was clearly a pretext, I am sure she wanted to check out that background noise again to be sure, maybe even let Mr PO give it a listen, and it didn't disappoint.
I had A big ol' Roller grin from ear to ear at the idea of what she must be thinking.
Well, funfun, We managed to hold on to what we were given and even come out a smidgen ahead in spite of our complete and total ignorance of how any of the games work or any of the strategies involved.
I mean I am totally clueless about gambling games, and Beck knew less, but we came out a tad ahead.
Who knew that $8085 in virtual dollars would be so totally inadequate to bid on anything worth having?
I mean it was pointless bidding when it went right up past $9000, $10000, climbed up to the $15K to $17K level in mere moments.
Clearly we were among some folks who both understood the games better, AND weren't afraid of a little risk.
No matter, once all the stuff people wanted and were willing to bid on went, they held a drawing among those of us for what was left.
Luckily, we dodged all of the high-carb candies and chocolates, Sadly we missed out on anything coffee related, I loves my coffee...
We wound up with a doorstop.
Yes, a doorstop.
Its a little stuffed snowman with a weighted bottom that is, for some reason heavily bundled against the cold.
I don't feel bad, he's cute as hell, has no carbs or calories, and looks pretty nice in the front seat of my truck.
Angie named him 'Toasty' because he couldn't be frosty when he's all bundled so. I guess he's my copilot now.
But I digress, Party's over and off to mom's.
See, mom is very nearly deaf and heavily beset by low-grade dementia. Telephones are not terribly effective anymore for getting through to her.
My brother, the Tofu, bought her a thing called a 'mailbug' so we could e-mail her and it's whizbang, but she was having trouble getting the hang of it, I was to go over and try to give her a clue fraction transfusion.
We arrive and the mailbug is plainly interfering with her phone-based security entry system. The carrier signal was a dead giveaway.
We finally get in and mom is joking down the hall with us "are you going to cut a hole in the top of my head and just pour the info in?"
"yeah, mom, that's the way. then we'll install critical thinking skills, a healthy dose of skepticism, and remove the circular reasoning circuits, have you out of that cult in no time"
"What?"
"nothing"
teehee.
She opens the door of her apartment and it hits me like a truck, a stench so unimaginable, so foul, that I referenced it in the first sentace of this post.
Bad chicken.
"Mom, what the hell stinks like hell in here? Oh my god, think I'm gonna barf!"
"Oh, it still smells? well we could open some windows...."
It was like 14 degrees out and she has almost no circulation, I couldn't do that to her for long.
Apparently she had some chicken in her fridge that she 'didn't want to cook, and didn't want to throw away.' What she DID want to do with it, I didn't ask. Eventually it began to inflate itself like sealed plastic containers of bad meat will do if they are neglected by the nasally deficient.
I guess my mother, wanting to dispose of this foul mass, tied it up in a plastic bag and deposited it into her kitchen waste receptacle whereupon it further inflated enough to breach containment and spew a horrendous stench throughout my mother's apartment, perMEATing everything with it's spoiled chicken foulness.
Then my sister Mrs. PO apparently arrived, OMG i bet she totally crapped!
Well, we got it (mostly) aired out and set about looking at the Mailbug. It had more buttons than a marching band and mom was plainly baffled and very fearful that we would be upset or angry with her for her inability. To illustrate her point she brought out her Revelation book and opened it. "see, each of these paragraphs has a question or two"
As if I would not have remembered....
"and I can't find the answers anymore, my mind is just not working"
"Well, for starters you got it upside down...."
Pause for laughter....
So I put my arm around her, and kissed her forehead, and told her it was OK, and that nobody would be mad, and that it wasn't her fault, and that we loved her no matter what.
Then the card playing began. (suffice it to say I hate the game Trips and Runs.)
We sat in the stench and made nice, then we got the hell outta there!
It was then later than hell and we wanted Wendy's, but it closed at 2AM and we were 30 mins late.
We figured we were pretty much screwed until we saw another Wendy's open until 3AM and I finally got my salad, minus croutons...
Carbs, you know.
So, bad chicken stinks, Wendy's... 3AM.....
And I had a hell of a night, but with my Beck next to me, it was still a hellofa great night.
Don't read this upside down, you won't be able to get the meaning of it, and look out for self inflating chicken!
RD