John was cooking dinner. Some sort of curry. And I had arrived home from work and was quite busy with lounging about and sitting on my arse. Then I realised that helping with the cooking (or at least making a cheerful offer) was probably a good idea, since I was going to gorge myself on the result.
"Can I help with anything?"
See? Done. That's all it takes to seem like a fabulously helpful and giving girl. And then he replied.
"You can either chop the chicken, or the garlic."
Gah! Why don't you tell me to go and scoop poo off the floor with my bare hands, because that would be preferable. This is the offer I get? I was hoping for 'stir the contents of this pan' or 'stand in the kitchen and drink the rest of this cooking wine.'
It's not that I hate chopping chicken. There's just things I'd rather do, for example, hacking out my own liver with a rusty piece of barbed wire or, say, slowly decapitating myself with repeated papercuts. Hooray for manhandling OOZING SLIMY GIBLETS.
I ran for the garlic.
As I was finely chopping two cloves of garlic, it crossed my mind that I was due to attend a fancypantsdancing class that very evening, and that I might smell quite fragrant. I washed my hands very thoroughly.
We ate, it was fab, and we trotted along to the class.
And then we danced.
And then I started sweating.
And then I started positively PONGING.
All I could smell was garlic. I wiped my hands furiously on my jeans, to no avail. Boys walked up to me, did a couple of dance steps and then RAN AWAY with an 'oh, uh, that was great, thanks. I'm going to stand over here. Um.' The instructor showed me a couple of things, gave me a friendly tap on the shoulder, smiled, and swiftly walked to the other side of the room.
Who needs silver bullets and a stake through the heart to rid themselves of their pesky local vampires? Just grab the nearest GBE; your very own vampire pied piper*.
I sure know how to make an impression.
(*John has just made me aware that a vampire wouldn't actually follow a pied piper who reeked of garlic. They would run away. And this has made me laugh, so I have left it there. Perhaps if the pied piper chased the vampires, instead. An anti-pied piper. Instead of leading the vampires away, I could just move into the centre of town, and they'd all leave immediately. Um.)
"Can I help with anything?"
See? Done. That's all it takes to seem like a fabulously helpful and giving girl. And then he replied.
"You can either chop the chicken, or the garlic."
Gah! Why don't you tell me to go and scoop poo off the floor with my bare hands, because that would be preferable. This is the offer I get? I was hoping for 'stir the contents of this pan' or 'stand in the kitchen and drink the rest of this cooking wine.'
It's not that I hate chopping chicken. There's just things I'd rather do, for example, hacking out my own liver with a rusty piece of barbed wire or, say, slowly decapitating myself with repeated papercuts. Hooray for manhandling OOZING SLIMY GIBLETS.
I ran for the garlic.
As I was finely chopping two cloves of garlic, it crossed my mind that I was due to attend a fancypantsdancing class that very evening, and that I might smell quite fragrant. I washed my hands very thoroughly.
We ate, it was fab, and we trotted along to the class.
And then we danced.
And then I started sweating.
And then I started positively PONGING.
All I could smell was garlic. I wiped my hands furiously on my jeans, to no avail. Boys walked up to me, did a couple of dance steps and then RAN AWAY with an 'oh, uh, that was great, thanks. I'm going to stand over here. Um.' The instructor showed me a couple of things, gave me a friendly tap on the shoulder, smiled, and swiftly walked to the other side of the room.
Who needs silver bullets and a stake through the heart to rid themselves of their pesky local vampires? Just grab the nearest GBE; your very own vampire pied piper*.
I sure know how to make an impression.
(*John has just made me aware that a vampire wouldn't actually follow a pied piper who reeked of garlic. They would run away. And this has made me laugh, so I have left it there. Perhaps if the pied piper chased the vampires, instead. An anti-pied piper. Instead of leading the vampires away, I could just move into the centre of town, and they'd all leave immediately. Um.)
posted by GBE at 6:05 pm
9 Comments:
But... garlic smells good! (I think that makes the part of the 1% of the population that doesn't run at the smell of garlic)
Maybe you'd get the emo vampires following you because they are depressed and want to die... or do vampires get happy and want to die? Or are vampires actually dead already? So many questions.
I'm with you on touching raw chicken, or any raw meat for that matter. I'd rather saw off an arm than touch raw meat with my bare hands, I need to double glove to consider touching it. I'm shuddering even thinking about it, ew!
Clever young man that John...
The solution is simpler than you could have dreamed.
Simply run your hands under cold water (NEVER HOT!) directly after handling onions or garlic, and rub your hands on the kitchen faucet - make sure all the skin that touched the onion/garlic touches the metal of the faucet neck.
Something in the metal of a kitchen faucet neutralizes the odor molecules.
You will feel vaguely pornographic giving your kitchen faucet a hand-job, but you're in your own kitchen, after all, and it's better than hand stank during dance class!
- M
P.S. An older-fashioned but yet still functional option is to pour a bit of bottled lemon juice into your palm, then shake a goodly amount of salt into that, and rub it all over your hands. The salt/lemon combo does the same neutralizing thing as the metal faucet - but if you have a paper cut or hangnail, you'll be singing soprano in the choir with this treatment.
Oh dear.. personally I like the smell of garlic but yes.. maybe not while I'm dancin w/ someone. Hey at least John will still dance w/ you, right? Did you ever think maybe he did it on purpose? ;)
Lemon and salt? If they can make tequila taste okay, then they can do anything. Good call.
~Mark
There's this brilliant lunch place in Adelaide called Vego n Lovin' It that serves delicious vegetarian cheap food. The only problem is that even sitting in there seems to make you reek of garlic - and not just slightly sweaty garlic, but about three day old sweat dried on your teeshirt garlic. Yetch. I never used to notice it before I got knocked up but I think my extra sensory olfactory ability has been given a superhero charge that will never go away.
PS great tip marcheline! You sound like a french household goddess.
MadameBoffin, I think it smells great in food, but I can't say that it's my favourite Person Scent. Well, I don't know, really. I don't know if I've met anyone who reeked garlic. Maybe I wouldn't mind it. I just assumed that people wouldn't find it too pleasant on me.
Jen, I'm thinking that vampires are already dead, but now I'm focusing on it, I'm not so sure. People are bitten by vampires and look like they're dead, but then they suddenly wake up with eternal lives and fabulous hair. Hmm. So puzzling. I bought Bram Stoker's Dracula the other day so I will read it soon and be all up to date and clever.
Nails, too clever, if you ask me. I was quite content coming across completely thick until he had to butt in.
Marcheline, ah HAH! You are so clever. If I ever let John offer me garlic again (unlikely, as it would most likely result in punching and a torrent of verbal abuse from me) I will most definitely try the tap method. And then the boys won't run away, hurrah!
Miss Devylish, I said the exact same thing! "You just don't want any of the boys to touch me, do you! DO YOU?!" and followed it up with crazy wild eyes and waving my clenched fist about.
Anonymous, I could even use it Combo Style, e.g. smear it on my hands, shot of tequila, smear it on my hands, shot of tequila, etc., spew, pass out, and so on.
Mark, this is the second Silent Treatment incident that has occurred in the last couple of weeks and I am very dismayed.
Audrey, I've never really noticed pongy garlic smell before the dancing incident, on myself or on anyone else. But I have learnt my lesson. Never. Again. Gah.
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