Follow your nose....actually don't....

Right anyways.  You ever just have a gut feeling?  Like something isn't blatantly obvious but you just know in your heart something is...off!

We got mussels to steam for dinner.  I have done this countless times.  We buy from the same place every time.  But something...something was nagging at me at the store.  We still got them though....

We washed and cooked them as soon as we got home.  I was sautéing onions and garlic in butter...hubs was washing and removing the dead ones (about 7...hmmmm that seems like a lot). 

There wasn't an "OMG WHAT IS THAT SMELL" moment like our friend up top had ....

I dumped in the wine and lemon juice, seasoning and dropped in the mussels. 

I have a really good sense of smell...like freakishly good.  Something didn't...it just wasn't...right...it was off.  As soon as I removed the lid my body recoiled.  Again nothing slapped me in the face but on some instinctive level my brain was screaming....

Hubs was like it smells fine, like steamed mussels in wine/butter sauce...

And they were fine.  Until I saw one that looked like something hubs hacked up during a sinus infection and then let dry in the sink. 

So I just moved it to the trash pile.  My lovely hubs had one also...he did not see an issue with the jerky looking YELLOW mussel...he immediately spit it out and gagged. 

I couldn't bring myself to eat anymore but I sniffed the "jerky looking one" (not the one he spit out!) and a memory came flooding back. 

An incident a few years back where we a  boiled sack of crawfish that about 1/3 of was dead.  For those non southerners...a few dead ones are gonna slip in...but they are usually like freshly dead.  1/3 of a 40 lb sack is A LOT and these were hidden in the center of the live ones...and pale...clearly been dead...a while! 

The smell...it...its hard to describe but its like rotting flesh that you seasoned really well and then laid in the sun...for a week. 

A friend compared it to badussy...but I think that was being kind...

Clearly, there must have been a few LONG dead mussels in the pot that we missed.  In such a small sample just a couple, spoils the WHOLE pot. 

It wasn't the slap you in the face funky cooch smell from the crawfish boil but clearly I smelled something that had been dead...a while...

Lesson...trust your gut.  If its telling you food is spoiled...its probably spoiled.  And I don't mess with bad seafood....I've had that...talk about wanting to die...worst food poisoning of my LIFE! See this Post...

When I said I thoguht the devil was cute, I was talking about the actor!!! Not the actual devil!!! Please remove this curse!

Right so in a previous post I was rambling on about my crush on "the devil" but not really the devil...an ACTOR playing him on a TV Show.  Apparently the part where I said "NOT ACTUALLY THE DEVIL" was lost when some of the divine were reading my blog and they decided to punish me.

We did a travel race recently and thought "whooohoo excuse for a girls weekend".

Everything was fine.  We had some adult beverages and decided to do a buffet for dinner.  Buffets are usually a waste on me because I don't eat THAT much but what the heck, why not...?

A few of us went straight for the snow crabs...mmmmmm snow crabs.  They were delicious.  There was also boiled shrimp, prime rib, calamari, oysters, clams, scallops, pad thai, sushi (um no thanks...buffet...just...no), etc etc etc.  We were having fun and chatting and drinking (water/cokes at this point).  30-45 min later everyone started eating dessert but I wasn't in the mood (this is normal...I don't eat many sweets).  Mid-sentence I got the absolute worst stabbing pain I have EVER had.  I literally just stopped talking.  Then it passed.  Okay...that was weird...moving on.  A few minutes later it happened again...lasted longer but then passed. "Hmmmm what is wrong with me...?" Attributing it to "NOLA Gurl never eats this much" I ignored it (bad idea).  It happened again...SO BAD I white knuckle gripped the table and closed my eyes.  I thought I was going to pass out from pain.  My friends were like...dude you okay?  No...no...I think...I think I need to pop off to the potty for a tic.  Everything I ate was just dying to make a reappearance.  They were all done so they opted to go back to the room with me before we headed to our next destination.

I wasn't dying but I felt...off...and I was terrified of what the next "knife in the gut, rolling nausea" pain would bring with it.  As we are going up in the elevator one of my other friends stopped mid sentence and bent over in pain..."Uh oh".  She did not fare as well as me with the "OMG someone is stabbing me from the inside" pain (told you I have a high pain threshold).  No...no...she was about to....have a moment in the elevator.

It was like a childbirth moment.  "Sweetie breathe, breathe.  Okay you are fine...you're fine", *crying out in pain*, "you've got this...just 3 more floors" *to the other friend* "get the key out, NOW!".  We couldn't run down the hall because...just trust me when I say, that would have been unwise.

We barely made it into the room.  While one of us "died" in the bathroom, the rest of us just hung out in the common area with the TV up loud, for privacy purposes. I was not doing well sitting there but we only had one bathroom...*deep breath* you can wait.  Suddenly you hear "y'all *gasp* I think I might be dying!"  

By this point I am sweating and pale. *whoosa, whoosa*

"I'm fine...feel great...yep..." Yea no!  She came out just in time for me to bolt in there, I couldn't "breathe" my way through the pain anymore.

After my friend's second bout of dying in the bathroom the following occurred:

Me: Okay, so we are, uh, staying in...good, that's good.
Friend 1:  I need pepto, *groan* flopping onto the bed
Friend 2: Yea, I think that would be wise, y'all don't look too good
Me: *taking off leggings to put on my PJs* Right, I'll text the others and...
*running with leggings around my ankles and just a cami* 
*tripping over the leggings* 
*slamming into the wall* 
*crawling into the bathroom* 
*barely made it to the toilet*

***5 minutes later*** 

Friend 2: NOLA Gurl, you need to get out the bathroom, NOW!
Me: *in a sing song voice* I caaaaaan't , I'm having issssuuuuuessss *stabbing pain* *gag* *groan*
Friend 1: I can't, I can't hold this in *starting to cry* it hurts so much
Friend 2: *screaming* NOLA Gurl, we have a PROBLEM!!!
Me: *dying* * just straight up dying*
Friend 2: Weeeeellll there is a trash can in here
Friend 1: Ha! *gag* *groan* don't make me laugh...
Me: *sobbing* it just...it just won't stop! 

This went on for hours.  It was like a gladiator match trying to get to the bathroom.

We cuddled with each other on the bed, moaning in pain, and watching videos on a phone until we fell asleep (sort of).  I mean who wants to fall into a deep sleep when there is a chance you could puke or $hit yourself before you get to the f**king bathroom 

So we are 99% sure we had some type of food poisoning but we can't figure out what we ate differently. 

UPDATE - we think it was the snow crabs.  They were dumping the fresh ones on top of the older ones...we think ours were from the bottom...who knows how long there were there...o_O