Friday, February 16, 2007

Expired Orange Juice and Pharmacy Milk and Last Summer's Diet Cokes

If I seem a little wonky tonight, it's because I've been drinking orange juice that expired on February 7. It looked fine and tasted great, honest! I mean, it's not like I've been eating peanut butter.

Why would I drink expired orange juice, you might wonder. Because it's all we had, orange-juice-wise, that's why. Besides, it looked fine and tasted great, honest. I feel great.

It had been sitting out on the counter for a few hours, but even so.

Well, I had to put it somewhere, because I bought two gallons of milk at the pharmacy and they had to go in the refrigerator, and the tall milk section was full of bottled water and expired miniature Diet Coke bottles, so something had to give.

Why did I buy milk at the pharmacy, you might wonder. Because I had a coupon worth eight dollars that expired tonight at midnight, and I had to use it or lose it. So I used it. I also got cranberry tablets, because when you're prone to urinary tract infections, nothing fends them off like cranberry tablets. But that's probably way more information than you really needed.

The expired miniature Diet Coke bottles are there because last summer, the grocery store ran a special on actual Diet Coke: four twelve-packs for ten dollars, and you got a case of miniature bottles for free. I put the case of miniatures behind a big box, intending to bring them out to impress guests, but once the case was behind that big box, I couldn't see it and I forgot about it until months later, and by then, it tasted really bad. There are still a few bottles in the 'fridge because, well, YOU come over and throw them out, okay? Sometimes I'll open one and mix it in with a glass of the good stuff, and pretend it tastes fine. I hate to waste anything, and I'm a great one to put generic Honey Nut Cheerios in a real Honey Nut Cheerios box, or generic crackers in a Keebler cracker box, etc. Ask Belle. Neither of my kids will touch a box of cereal in my house unless it's still sealed. Scoffers. They're imagining things, and besides, I don't do it any more.

Somehow all of the above trivia made me think we needed some pecan-studded brownies, so I made some, and they're on top of the stove as I type, cooling. Come on over.

We've got miniature Diet Cokes. They're really cute and classy. I saved them for guests. Have one?

P.S. I got up early this morning because I thought I had a doctor's appointment, but it's next week. This mental lapse occurred BEFORE I drank the ancient orange juice, so obviously I was starting to lose it long before I poisoned my system with ancient citrus drippings.

P.P.S. After I ate all that brownie batter, I felt lots better. My glucometer says otherwise, but I just hid it behind the cranberry tablets so I wouldn't have to look at it.