DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

I have a germ phobia. You may know this; I’ve written about it before, and before that, and even before that. And again even before I began publishing my stories online — as evidenced by an old travelogue email I sent to friends several years ago, which recalled:

I saw a poster recently that screamed in 72-point Futura Heavy Condensed, “The Ten Most Common Causes of Infection.” The picture showed a pair of hands. I was thinking that they should have airbrushed something grotesque at the end of each of the fingers, but I suppose it’s better to leave some things to the imagination.

Why go to all the trouble of maintaining a phobia? For one thing, I work at home, so I’m not as frequently exposed to the variety of pathogens that, say, you are. For a second thing, I once had a condensed germ-transmission experience, where I sat down (healthy) next to a sneezing classmate and, within two hours, began sneezing myself. Actually it may have been the other way around — maybe I was the sick one, and I infected the person I sat next to, which would explain why I chose to sit next to her after she’d refused to go out with me the previous weekend. Anyway, I digress.

Traveling always makes me mindful of germs, because airports are chock full of vermin. I’m referring to the people. I once saw a skycap rub his thumb across his front teeth, like he’d dropped his toothbrush but kept on brushing, and then reach out with the same hand (thumb glistening wet) to pick up a suitcase. So when my mother cautioned me to wear a mask during my upcoming flight, I had to agree that it was a good idea. I work hard to stay healthy, and unsusceptible to bad germs, but still, avoiding exposure seems wise.

A trip to the pharmacy yielded two safe-travel treasures: a seven-pack of High Filtration Efficiency Maxi-Masks and a box of 200 (!) alcohol swabs. Yes, a few years from now I won’t fly without a personal oxygen supply and a full-body condom.

Once seated on the airplane, I reached for a mask, but stopped short. People will stare at me, I thought. My brother reported the same struggle — he carried a mask during his flight, but didn’t wear it either. It sounds dumb, I know, but there I was, not wearing a mask. “Send me your infectious vapors,” I seemed to be saying, “I’d rather breathe them in than risk having you laugh at my mask.” I finally put the mask on after everyone was seated.

I made liberal use of the swabs. I had to: the reason there were so many in the box is that each swab was only two square inches in size, about enough to wipe three of the Ten Unholy Fingertips of Infection before disintegrating.

So, did it work? Did I get sick?

I very nearly did. I used the mask for about half the flight, and I kept my hands clean, and yet the next morning I awoke to an unpleasant creeping nausea that made me wonder if breakfast would stay down. I had hot flashes. I had cold flashes. If it hadn’t been for the diarrhea, I’d have thought I was going through menopause. Fortunately all the symptoms faded after 12 hours. It wasn’t the flu after all.

The problem, I believe, was not a lack of sanitary precautions. My precautions were just not designed to protect me from bad airport-concession sandwiches, an unexpected vector of infection. We ate one at SFO that was so saturated with tapénade that the anchovy and olive flavor even overpowered the taste of the plastic sandwich wrap. Next time, we’ll remember an old lesson and bring our own sandwiches.

Costco has begun selling its customer list. If you are a Costco member, you may wish to opt out of “information sharing” — call 1-800-774-2678.

The rep I spoke to claims Costco has always had an opt-out policy. This may be true, but I believe they’ve just started taking advantage of it recently. She was unsure whether Costco rents its list or sells it outright.

If you call, please express your disappointment that Costco has abused your privacy in this way. Pressure from customers could cause the decision makers to change their policy. They gave me this excuse for assuming that customers want third-party solicitations: “all other major corporations do the same thing.” That’s so lame it doesn’t even merit analysis.

It really bothers me that they call it “sharing,” like they’re doing a generous thing, looking out for my best interests.

They tell me this is the largest portable Ferris wheel in the world. With the bright blue Christmas afternoon sky as a backdrop, the possibilities for neat photos seemed unlimited.

But then a plainclothes guard chased me away. I guess I’m just as threatening in real life as I am in my kickboxing fantasies, especially when I’m dressed in eight layers of sweaters and I have my face scrunched up behind a camera.

Taken on Christmas Day (note the Santa statue on the windowsill). As dramatic as the light is, I laugh at the dull subject of the illumination: a TV stand bearing a load of Disney videos.

The company nondemoninational holiday event ended up at a thoroughly demoninational restaurant: TGI Friday’s, home-away-from-home to poultry farmers and cattlemen and probably those ranch hands with tall boots and fat belt buckles who electrocute cows at the front door to the slaughterhouse. The menu even has an Atkins page.

Five of the six “salads” contain chicken, and in the sixth, it’s an option. At Friday’s you can probably get chicken in the ketchup, in the Coke, in the paper towel dispenser by the sink. It’s a chicken assembly line. Or maybe “disassembly.”

Someone ordered appetizers, cognizant that several at the table profess some degree of intolerance for the hormone and antibiotic-soaked mass-meat product typical of the modern American diet. Therefore one of the two platters contained no overt flesh. You might think I’d be pleased. In the effort, yes… in the execution, not so much.

I’d already picked out the celery garnish from the first platter (which aside from the token greenery contained five kinds of chicken). A glance at the second platter revealed a traditional Greek treat, something I ate and enjoyed several times on Santorini: fried zucchini. OK, so, not the healthiest food on the planet, but probably the healthiest food at TGI Friday’s.

I speared one, dunked it in the least-offensive of the available sauces, and then watched in horror as the breaded slab split to reveal not a tender slice of squash, but… you guessed it… cheese!

And then, the dilemma. On my plate lay a broken piece of fried cheese, which I didn’t want to eat. But to leave it on the plate would be to waste food. To return it to the appetizer platter, broken, drooping, and sauce-soggy, was unthinkable. I considered waiting for someone to reach for one of the other cheese slab things, and quietly offering mine, but dismissed the idea as unworkable. (“Hey, you want my food? No, I didn’t ‘do anything to it!’”)

One of the worst things about being a picky eater is explaining the logic behind every decision. It can be amusing sometimes, but other times I just don’t want to explain why I think cows are poisonous, any more than I want to hear some Atkins-diet nutball tell me he lost five pounds eating bacon three times a day.

Back and forth I went, not wanting to waste food, not wanting to eat this particular food, not wanting to make a scene, not wanting to invite questions of “hey, I thought you didn’t eat dairy?!” when in fact I generally do not…

In the end, the cheese won out. I choked it down, pretending it was zucchini after all.