That Girl is Poisoned

In honor of Labor Day and my love of pork ribs (but mostly the latter) I decided to grill up some ribs this past Monday. First, I sent Andrew out to get more propane for the grill. Then, I made a delicious rub with ginger, sage, paprika, turmeric, cumin and salt and coated two slabs of ribs. I went outside and turned the gas on and remembered our clicky thing for starting the fire doesn’t work on the grill. So I got some matches and, though I couldn’t see the fire take, I heard it. I put the two slabs on the grill, turned the knobs to medium, shut the lid and went inside to work.

While working, I snacked on my newly discovered treat: bacon jerky (thanks Mary Ann). Andrew and I had bought the package the day before and left it on the kitchen table. It was slightly warm, but delicious.

After about 30 minutes of work I started getting a headache. I laid down on the sofa. 10 more minutes passed and I started getting nauseated. I am not sure if it was the overly warm bacon jerky or if I had not washed my hands well enough handling the pork, but somehow, somewhere in the day  – pig did me in. I had some severe food poisoning. I know this because shortly after feeling horrible I proceeded to, as Andrew said, “Vomit all over the place” (for values of all over the place that equal in the bathroom toilet). I was basically sitting on the bathroom floor reliving my first year and a half in college only without red wine or American Beer (it’s an actual brand that was less than $8.00 for a case when I attended Niagara University).

After I finished de-poisoning myself I went back to the couch and just whined. Suddenly, I remembered the ribs on the grill. I went out to look at them and the grill was swarming with bees and flies. I am allergic to bee stings. The last thing I needed was a bee sting, but I also recognized that for having been cooking for two hours there was a distinct lack of roasting flesh smell in the air. I swatted the bees away with the grill brush and opened the grill to find no fire and uncooked warm ribs.

Apparently when I heard fire take but didn’t see it, that should have been a sign that I had not lit the grill properly. The ribs went straight into the trash. I suppose that was better than sending them down the plumbing which is where they would have, no doubt, ended up.

Today, it took me until about an hour ago to feel myself again. I think my American Beer hangovers didn’t even last that long.