…unlike her husband who said hello to the bottom of a cart wheel.
No, instead I share a cautionary tale where I speak of poor lab hygiene and the danger of long hair. But first, a definition:
Satori (n): sudden enlightenment and a state of consciousness attained by intuitive illumination representing the spiritual goal of Zen Buddhism
I while back I conducted an absinthe taste test challenge. For the safety of shipment, my absinthes were stored in nalgene bottles. I transported them in my smallest backpack, brought them home, and then promptly forgot about them for several weeks.
As I write that, I realize that I just described a scenario that has been repeated so many times in the accident histories and cautionary tales its not funny.
While cleaning up later on, I came upon my backpack and opened it up. At first, I was elated to see my precious bottles of evil green liquid. I then felt stickiness. I immediately checked the lids of the two bottles and found that one had some give. Dammit. I then reached into the bag to feel for any wetness and found a sticky spot. Double dammit.
Six hours pass.
I got home after dropping my girlfriend off. I start undressing so I can throw these clothes in the load of laundry I am about to run. There is tremendous pain from the tugging of hair. A tangle has caught on one of the buttons on my shirt. As always, I run my fingers through my hair to clear the tangle. It doesn’t work though, this is a serious snarl and it is sticky.
I look at my hair to inspect this oddity.
Then I stick it in my mouth.
I would like to say that I did it to moisten the sticky substance so that I could clear the tangle. Even the scientific inquiry of wanting to determine the material by taste, while a bad idea, would be reasonable. I wish I could say these things, but honestly it was action without thought.
King of Spirits is a revoltingly herbal flavored absinthe, worse than chartreuse can ever hope to acheive. It got in my hair when my copper tresses dangled into the bag, as I realized sputtering and spitting my hair back out.
I am not sure I should be allowed to play with hazardous materials. I have also come to the realization that achieving the zen like state where one acts without thought, satori, does not preclude stupid action. It is a wonder samurai didn’t wander around with underwear on top of their heads. Of course, as they were the people with the pointy and sharp things it probably wouldn’t have done to point that out.