The Kitchen is alive!

So, Cara has been at the stork's nest for the past week and a half, and I've gone up there quite often to visit her. When I'm not at the stork's nest, I'm back here at the apartment pretending its 2006 and Cara and I are separated again. The only difference is that Cara cooks a lot of food and there are leftovers.

Well, this past week, I looked at the kitchen, but never ate much in it, or cleaned much for that matter, and just went about business as usual. We had a few warm & humid days this weekend as well, and to keep the house safe, the windows were closed. Today, however, I was determined to eat into the stockpiles of good leftovers in the fridge (the leftovers in the fridge aren't the problem, so don't worry about those). Cara made some shrimp(s) with some olive oil and spices, and suggested that I pour them over noodles for a good dinner dish. So, I figured I'd give that a shot.

Around 9:30ish PM I turned the water on to the sink, and noticed that gnats started flying around. Great, must be mold in the sink trap. I open it up, and voila, mold. Ick. Followed by more gnats. Ug. So I promptly take the sink trap to our food trash, open it up and get surprised by some more gnats. At this point, I hold my breath, tie the food trash shut, and take it outside. Boy, that was nasty.

I start to fill up a pan to make noodles, when I notice the gnats migrated over our kitchen table. As I ponder what could be over there, I soon find our banana bread bananas have begun to mold as well. I throw those away, while attacking the gnats with table cleaner. Now, I have set myself to clean this kitchen. Its attacking me!

So while I'm boiling the noodles, I fill up the sink and start to soak some of the dishes and open an old salad bowl. Mold. Ugh. But its salad? Oh, that's right, there was feta cheese in it. Realizing that the salad bowl was pretty nasty, I remember the container sitting next to it.

*****

Earlier last week, I had dropped off Cara at the stork's nest, and she told me I had to try the potato salad, cause it wasn't too mayonaisey, and it tasted pretty good. So one night, I was looking for regular green salad, and took out the potato salad to get to the green salad. I polished it off and threw the empty container on the countertop. The next day I set myself to try the potato salad. So I pour a glass of Kool-aid to wash it down, open the fridge, and look for the container of potato salad. The only problem is, I can't find it. So I look a little harder through the fridge, and then I realize what I did. I look on top of the fridge, and find the container of potato salad that had been left out for a day or so. Annoyed at myself, I throw it on the sink counter telling myself that it is 'off limits' for food. But I never moved it or emptied the contents after that...

****

Anyway, as I sat there next to the kitchen sink trying to convince myself to open the 1.5 week old potato salad left out in the heat & humidity. It takes me a while, and then I hold my breath and open the container. I jump a little. Wow... it was a total colony. So, I did what any man would do. Ignore it. I washed just about everything else except that.

I even contemplated throwing the whole container away. I took the potato salad outside with a garbage bag, but then I realize that's just a tad wasteful. At about this time, I realize I need more dish soap. So I run to the shoppette real quick and get some soap and juice.

So after telling myself that it is only mold, and I can wash my hands, I grab a food trash bag, go outside and dump most of the potato salad without looking at it. I figure I should actually see what it looks like, so I take a look, and get semi-amazed about how much mold grew, and the different types that grew. So, what do you do with something that looks cool? That's right, you take a picture of it! So I did. (still freaks me out kinda). So I take the tupperware container back inside, make fresh sink water and let that sucker soak for a while. I do some more cleaning to rid the kitchen of more mold, but as far as I can tell, it'll be a while before the gnats retreat.