Hazmat Adventures in Refrigerator Cleaning

or what the HELL was that?!?

Okay, so Suzette stopped by this morning to partake of our traditional Sunday brunchfest before attempting to clear out the various tchotchkes and such she's amassed over the past 20+ years.

In the afterglow of a very satisfying meal, we got the misguided notion to tackle the contents of the dreaded department fridge.

Holy Crap!

First tip: Dawn a hazmat suit. Seriously. There is so much unidentifiable goo and glop liquefying in every nook and cranny of that beast it's a veritable petri dish of epic proportion. Plus a respirator would be a wise accessory to prevent accidental aspiration of the powdery air-born spores lurking in any number of long forgotten paper bags. Not to mention shield one's olfactory system from the full frontal attack of the inevitable odoriferous nuclear waste.

This purging process never fails to solicit a chorus of EEeeewwwwws! and gags and shivers down the spine. I suspect innocent bystanders walking down the hall think something untoward is going on behind the curtain.

"Untoward" ... isn't that a great word. It sounds so...Merchant/Ivory English. Fa Fa Fa Fa

but I digress...

Pop quiz: 

Q: How many single-serving sized containers of applesauce, jello and yogurt does it take to fill a refrigerator? 

A: Apparently 1,006 and still counting. People, people...how about doing us a solid and eating this crap with the shelf life of a half century.

So this week's bounty worthy of a technicolor yawn starts with this lovely example of neglect--a mold-laden, half used can of enchilada sauce circa 1999. Or as that pompous personality Alex Trebek might say, En-shi-la-tha. (he's such a tool.)

I know what you're thinking... "That's not so bad, ya Pansy. It didn't even make me gag." It's a matter of pacing. Don't want to share the coup de grace, the mother of all vom inducers, the nightmare on Kenmore Street too early. 

Next up may I present to the court the dripping, slippery remains of what was once a vibrant yellow pepper. 

It actually was dripping through the baggie. Smelled real charming, too.

When we first uncovered this next exhibit of heinous handiwork, it was corralled in a rather nice plastic container which had locking sides. The container was way too good to toss with the contents so we opted to transfer the unknown substance to a Ziploc bag. Imagine our horror when we gazed upon this ...

What the HELL is that?!? Seriously. It looks like Satan's spawn ...  preserved in jelly. I'm not kidding. You can see it's head on the righthand side. Or perhaps it's the evil contents of Beelzibub's colon. Either way call Cyril Wecht! Or better yet an old priest and a young priest... 

The last horrifying discovery is well... I don't even know how to begin to describe this... this furry former food stuff... this science experiment gone horribly, horribly awry. 

I have no earthly idea what this could have been in its former, edible life. All I know is you totally do NOT want to inhale a single atom of this powdery peculiarity for fear of contracting some sort of Andromeda Strain or the Hamthrax. Even Alexander Fleming would have given this lot a wide berth, despite his love affair of all things surrounding that moldy marvel, penicillin. 

Well I'm happy to report Suzette and I survived our journey through the center of Lucifer's lair without contracting Mesothelioma. Only good thing about this activity is it's a great appetite suppressant.