I went outside, pulled weeds with my naked hands, now my back aches and my hands are like sandpaper. Are you happy now? I came in for ice tea and in bending down to find the slice of lemon left in the veggie bin I got a good whiff of the inner depths of my fridge. It was not pleasant. I pasted up a sign on the front that labeled my fridge "Denmark" and opened the freezer to get some ice. It was a jumble of haphazardly thrown in portions of everything freezable. Little single servings of one bone-in pork chop, one skin-on ribs-in chicken breast. Two unopened bags of peas, frozen pineapple, blueberries, raspberries, vodka, old ice cream that got tossed right away since who wants ice cream with an inch of frost? So I moved from the mess in the garden, that still doesn't look any different, to the refrigerator which I can't remember cleaning in the past year.One of the neurosis I caught from my mother was the always packed fridge, as if she were cooking for a family of four even when she lived alone. Crammed with every condiment known to man, exotic oils, bitters, capers, gibson onions, three kinds of pickles, four varieties of jelly and jam, beer, vermouth, soft drinks, milk, mayonnaise (which I consider a food group) mixed greens, green pepper, sliced portobello mushrooms, wilting celery, green onions, one limp jalepeno pepper, a small wad of liquifying cilantro, and so on. The cupboards are similarly stocked. I could feed unexpected guests though there will never be unexpected guests. Anyone unexpected will never get through the gate without having the dogs let out to greet them. No, there will be no unexpected guests.
Well now the fridge is clean, I discovered a collection of small containers of some kind of left-over way at the back of the second or third shelf, and they were completely unrecognizable, so covered in furry mold were they. Out damn spot! Yes, I can hear you making that universal sound of disgust. I will pretend I didn't hear that, but I did.
The freezer is now clean too. I feel ever so well provisioned now that everything that's in there is actually edible and not reeking either.
But I cleaned the whole thing without using gloves. I used water with a little soap and enough bleach to chap my hands further. Now there are little cracks at the end of a couple of fingers. And my back aches. I did fix myself the most delicious dinner. Pure comfort food. Milk soaked breast of chicken, breaded with flour and cornmeal, seasonings, fried in peanut oil and butter, mashed potatoes, chicken gravy, and peas with dill and butter. Uummm. It was great.
I'll take one of my 800mg ibuprofen, a 5mg diazipam, and stretch out for an evening of channel surfing and chain smoking.
I did not visit the blogs today. If I could drag my computer into my bed, I'd be reading and commenting up a storm. But the tips of two of my typing fingers have little red fissures and my computer is not a lap top. It hurts to type. Can you hear the whine in my voice? The fingers will get the hydrogen peroxide and bag balm treatment. A good night's sleep and I'll be right as rain tomorrow. Then I'm going to talk a bit about therapy. I've been mulling it over.
19 comments:
A productive day and hopefully a happy one. Sleep well.
You too.
I always feel better after i have done shit..but feel even more better if i whine about doing shit..haha..i tossed out something in my refer the other day and i think i should have sent it to some lab as im pretty sure it had the cure from some desease growing on it..
That's one of the reasons I have moved 53 times. Yes, 53 times since 1971. (Check out the average math fans). The stuff in the fridge gets thrown out when we move and we start over. That is the ONLY reason we don't have problems with moldy furry old jars of unidentifiable stuff.
What worries me more, is what about the stuff that's been in there for a freakin' year and a half and has NO mold or fur on it? What in the world is in that jar?!?
You sound like you accomplished a lot. Also sounds like you deserve the couch time. That's what I did. Watched mindless sports until I fell asleep. Glad you used them peas!
Peace.
Yes, I finally cleaned my cabinets 2 years ago. The funny fact was that I was throwing away food with expiration dates that was older than my kids. Rest yourself, slather up the hands with cream and enjoy your day.
I'm so sorry for your pain and chapped hands. the upside is the accomplishment. When it comes to the refrigerator - we are talking another continent sometimes. when the some comes home (rare) he always shops for exotic type foods. He is only here briefly, yet the jars of Yeti's ears has been opened and left for....us?!?! That is when I bring the trash can over and EVERYTHING goes! I don't even open lids - too scary. I'm so glad you had a good day - I have to take the little one to shop for his present to his mother for tomorrow. Chat later lovely lady.
sorry - I meant "when the SON comes home". damn fingers.
Well, if it makes ya feel any better, I always have something furry leftover in the fridge that was long ago forgotten.... And I throw out the entire container cuz it is too far gone to bother trying to clean out all the green furry stuff.... You are not alone.
Hope you had a restful and restorative night...
I never told you to go pull weeds with your naked hands. That's what backhoes are for. Ah, containers hiding in the shadows, I hate them, for we have a rule that whoever discovers them, has to scrub them, and I'm usually the one who uncovers them from beneath the cheese and heads of lettuce.
Backhoes merely slap at the problem, Randal...Jellied gasoline solves it.
;>)
My Mum is such a wack job about refridgerators that she keeps fresh flowers .. in a vase in hers. Says she loves to open up her fridge and see beautiful things. (and you thought your Mom was crazy didn't you?)
Sorry about your poor little fingers! Sounds terrible. Take care of yourself.
((Big Hugs))
Laura
Spadoman, that's a very radical solution to rather prosaic problem.
YDG, When I first read your comment I thought you said you threw out some refer because it was growing something exotic. This was an alarming thought. I've smoked ten year old refer without a second thought. Now I realize you're referring to the fridge as the refer. Whew!
NHNT, I threw away yogurt that was probably older than your kids. It was the brand that's supposed to cure constipation. Thank you Jamie Lee! The constipation must have gone away, so to speak, and I never bothered to either eat the yogurt or toss it.
Mom, your son is one very adventurous lad. Yeti ears. Yikes!
Giggles, I bought those containers and I'll be damned if a little 3 inch fuzz is going to make me toss them even though the only thing in the world that I am truly allergic to is mold. This mold allergy also makes working in the spring garden a challenge for my antihistamine/allergy meds.
Randal, I think my youngest informally adopted daughter who lives in the main house and tends the yard in front of the house. She hates all the ground-cover, since she says she can hear mice and other vermin running through the ground cover. But in what is essentially a desert landscape, anything that will hold water in the soil and require very little water over the summer is to be cultivated. Ms M says, but the debris under the ground cover is rotting. And I say, yes, dear, that's where top soil comes from. This way I don't have to buy mulch or top soil. Kids, what the hell do they know.
Darkblack, don't you love the smell of napalm in the morning?
Sunshine, you're mum must be a hot babe that she's still getting cut flowers. Sadly nobody brings me flowers anymore.
And my pinkies have lived to see another day of some kind of labor even if it's only typing.
I encourage you to do whatever you feel will make you healthy and happy.
The beginning of this post reminds me of being back in DC. There was a fellow patient on the unit who hoarded food. Anything that needed to be refrigerator she would stuff into the refrigerator, meaning that it didn't leave much room for the other nine of us who used it. Anything that didn't need refrigeration was taken to her room, which scattered with wrappers, cellophane wrapped packages, and the like.
We referred to the collection in the refrigerator as her food collection, and made a point to throw almost all of it away every couple days or so. There was no need for it to be there, and she never ate it herself, so...
Kevin, I realize that my mother's neurosis about having her fridge always overflowing was the result of having gone hungry as a child of the Great Depression. Why I caught her malady is a mystery to me, but when I was growing up it seemed that a packed fridge was the way it was done. I knew no better. I do now, but can't seem to shake that food hoarding impulse. The really smart thing to do would be to keep the fridge nearly empty and walk to the store every day for one days provisions. But being the exercise averse woman I am, that sounds like a lot of work. Plus, I shop for sales on things that are expensive one at a time, but cheap if purchased in larger quantities, like say, meat. The I package it in single serving sizes and freeze it. The best thing to do would be to give up eating meat.
Since I'm away a lot, I can't pretend my mess is much better. One trick I learned in my search for indulgence was to leave the ice cream upside down. The ice still preciptates out - to fall on the lid inside the container, not the contents.
On a more serious caution, one lady near where I lived a few years back cleaned the way you did - and ended up a vegetable in hospital from toxic fumes. Read the label on bleach : Do Not Mix. There's a reason.
Split fingers are from the cleaners. If you hate gloves that much you know the price. Ouch.
Hell of an intro - nag.
Fun post though.
Opit, I realized late in the evening that my eyes were burning and I felt as if I were having a reaction to my chemical brew. Glad you confirmed it. I won't do that again.
I payed you a visit. Glad you stopped to comment.
NOT with naked HANDS! You were supposed to weed naked (gloves on hands is fine), and you were supposed to take pics to blog it.
If you were a better mindreader, or if I were a better transmitter, you would have soft, delicate hands like refrigerated flowers.
;)
your fridge sounds like the edible version of my home office ... the repository of all hazardous household waste.
I am happy. I am happy that you got out, cleaned your fridge and ate comfort food. Heck that to me is a red letter day!
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