Saturday, March 23, 2013

Do not read this while eating

Can of soup.  My Mom always said the stuff floating at the top is the fat (gross) and I should scoop it out before cooking.  I've been doing this for YEARS, but today, I dunno if I believe it anymore.  Anyone want to weigh in?Seriously. If you are eating, or thinking of eating, or even if you're fine on the food front but are easily grossed out, then stop reading now and come back another day when I have some knitting or pretty spring flowers to show you.

Are you sure? You've been warned!

Ok, then, here we go.

Like lots of work-at-home folks, quite often I'll make myself a nice little lunch and eat it at my desk while catching up on social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Pinterest. Especially on a day where I can't go for a walk because of the weather, it's a good time to catch up with my friends, to see what's going on in their lives.

So last week I'm happily eating my delicious homemade cream of spinach soup, which, unfortunately, had a slightly bilious appearance, when what should appear in my feed but a rather lengthy description of ... dog vomit. Yes, my friend carefully (and colorfully) described the contents, the texture, and even provided the weight and length (because the dog had eaten a blanket and a leash the week before, and the friend had carefully cleaned off the items and gotten their post-stomach acid stats). And wasn't it all rather a miracle, that the blanket and leash had lasted that long inside the poor dog's stomach?

Uh, no, it was disgusting is what it was. My stomach went, "Sorry, Di. Lunch over. I'm outta here." And I was hungry before that!

The "friend" gave me no warning, no "please read with your discretion," nothing.

I pushed my delicious, but now stomach-curdling, soup aside. Did I learn any kind of lesson?

Nope. I continued to read my Facebook feed, my appetite much diminished.

Next up: a friend who says she hopes she works out hard enough so that she "vomits." O-o-o-okay then. Maybe this is a new kind of "going for the burn" I haven't heard about. Next was an update about a baby diaper explosion and that was it. Game over. Time to move over to Ravelry and look at pretty pictures of yarn.

Weirdly enough, all three updates came from writers. Professional writers. People who can wield English with some skill and who are revered for knowing exactly the right words to say at exactly the right moment. I used to think the nerds my husband works with in Cambridge were the most tone-deaf human beings on the planet, but their only crime is they like to talk about stuff like the Higgs particle or what gene sequencing means for the future of healthcare. Sure, they natter on for hours about these subjects, but the only physiological reaction I have to them is the need to go to sleep, not nausea.

Writers have nerds outnumbered. Not only do they pick subjects that are often inappropriate and disgusting, they have zero sense about when and where to share them. My friend Gwen calls it "diarrhea of the mouth." (Gwen's a writer. See?) The vomit-inducing and lovingly described dog vomit story? Not appropriate to post on Facebook, especially at lunch time. This is observational data you share with your dog's veterinarian, who cares. You want to work out so hard you vomit? I still don't get that one, but maybe look for something less hackneyed than "feel the burn" and go for something clever like, "I wan't to work out so hard that I don't remember it afterwards." That's not so clever, but whatever. I've never felt the need to announce on Facebook how hard I'm going to work out at lunch, so there's that.

And the diaper explosion? About the only person who wants to hear that is ... exactly nobody, I'm afraid.

 

 

 

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