Bugs, Bugs, Bugs

Dennis' dad Bill was with us this weekend and we were so happy to have him! He is such an easy guest and this weekend he was so helpful with some yard tasks we had to do to get ready for Saturday night company and for fall. Thank you for everything you did for us Bill, it was such a blessing and we appreciate it so much!

You may be wondering about the title of my post and it is essentially three fold (Note: if you have a sensitive gag reflex, like me as of late, you may not want to read numbers 2 and 3........consider yourself warned!)

1) Near the end of last week, I caught a cold and this weekend it decided to rob me of my voice. It's kind of hard to have company all weekend and not be able to talk! It has also been hard to not be able to sing, as I just love to sing, but I am hoping it will not hang on too much longer. Dennis, on the other hand, has been having a blast listening to my squeaking and wheezing and it's hard to find fault because I think it sounds pretty ridiculous too!

2) Last night, we had two families that we spend our summer vacation with over to our house for a cookout and campfire. It was such a beautiful night and cool enough for a fire, but not too cold and no mosquitos! The unofficial Minnesota state bird has finally died off for the fall and we couldn't have been more happy about it! One Wildwood tradition with these families is making "pies" over the campfire. Essentially it's two pieces of Wonder bread with pie filling in the middle and cooked in a cast iron pie maker. Kinda bad for you, but it just isn't a campfire with the White's and Hoffer's without them. So Bill is making the inaugural pie of the night and as we check it's doneness with the flashlight this is what we found........

Yep, that's a worm, a PaRaSiTe, deep fat fried onto the pie (butter is spread on the outside of the bread to prevent stickage)........ :s The best theory we could dream up is that there was a tree worm in the tree above where Bill was preparing the pie and it fell into the pie maker......wow, talk about taking all of the fun out of pie making! After daring Bill to eat it, we finally threw the whole thing into the fire. Yuck!

3) Just when I thought I had seen it all with the worm pie a la mode, I am having some breakfast before church and as I'm pouring out my brand new box of Oats and More with Strawberries I think, hmmm - that strawberry looks kind of moist which to me is odd for dehydrated fruit. So I pull all of the strawberry chunks out and don't think much of it until I grab the milk, come back to my bowl and find this.......

Yep, if you look to the left of the flash, that is a bug quickly crawling away from the rotting dehydrated fruit.......... :x I then take a look at my bowl and there are probably 10 other bugs crawling around in my cereal bowl!! Talk about unappetizing! As a woman who has had food issues anyway for the past 7 weeks or so, finding this sent me directly to the bathroom - I did not pass go or collect $200! Dennis and Bill were mortified as well, so on our way to church we stopped by the grocery store to return the infested cereal and let them know they should probably pull the other boxes off the shelf as well. Well after listening to our story, the store manager was LESS than sympathetic. Dennis had to ask for store credit (assuming we will ever shop there again - haha!) and as Dennis was leaving the store manager simply turned around and continued to talk to the checkers. No action taken.......VERY disappointing! I am still really grossed out by the entire situation and have no idea how I will eat my breakfast in the morning. I think I will be like Bill and have oatmeal every morning for the rest of my life - at least you cook that junk first!

Well if you are still reading, I hope I haven't grossed you out too much - I gagged TWICE just proofreading number 3! :) I can't wait for this morning/all day sickness to go away!