Ewwwwww...

*****Warning for the faint of heart: Just... spare yourself. Please.*****

It seems like there is an unprecedented amount of "yuck" in my life at the moment. Lab isn't the problem, although dissecting 10-day old chicken embryos isn't necessarily lacking in the gross-out factor area. But I also get to do way cool things like the "window-prep," which I learned today. At three days you can actually see the tiny heart pumping away, and man is that neat!

No, my problem at the moment is mold. Although I'm sure scientists that study mold leap for joy at the chance to observe it in its natural habitat, it just doesn't do anything for me.

First off, there's my window. I mentioned before that it has a bit of a condensation problem. I've been taking care of that by opening it up for at least a few minutes every day and turning the heat off when I don't need it. But it is December, after all. Anyway, the window is a little recessed, and lately I've noticed that the corners on either side are splotchy, green, and fuzzy. Gotta talk to the dorm management folks about that before I come home for Christmas.

The window isn't the worst of it, though. I worked in foodservice once, so I am slightly picky about a few things, like leaving the milk out. For hours at a time. Until it develops a skin. Several milimeters thick. Everybody does that here, and it creeps me out... although supposedly this H-Milk is indestructable and doesn't even need to be refrigerated in stores.

Just as a bit of background, they don't refrigerate any beverages in stores here, unless you count yogurt shakes or single-serve items intended for immediate consumption. It's also a big thing for food products to be labelled "ohne Konservierungsstoff," or without preservatives. And the date on the top is always at least a year in the future, so the stuff keeps. Maybe that lulled me into a false sense of security... they must not need to take such hyperbolic American precautions. But just yesterday, I learned the hard way that they don't pasteurize the applejuice.

Granted,the jug was first opened a few weeks ago... but since then, it's been in the fridge. No problem, right?

Oh, wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.

The worst of it is that I drank half a glass before I caught on that anything was awry, thanks to the phenomenon of opaque drink containers. Maybe it tasted a little different, I don't even know. What I did notice, however was some kind of wierd transparent pulpy stuff floating around at the bottom of the glass. I actually went to pour some more, which came with even more pulpy-something until glop! Something that I would estimate to be about golf-ball sized and really squishy-sounding disengaged itself from the bottom of the jug and fell to the nozzle, blocking it. That's when I looked - really looked - at the nozzle. A centimeter-long glob of pulpy-whatever hung out forlornly, and the little plastic tab thing that breaks the seal when the cap is turned was... fuzzy. Greenish and fuzzy. Did I mention that I had already imbibed half a glass at this point??

Next time if I can't drink the whole jug in one sitting, it's getting pitched. If there is a next time.

Amazingly, I'm not dead yet. Or even remotely sick. I gave myself a massive dose of gummy bears, just to be on the safe side.