Houston, We Have a Problem
Looking back, I justified my desire for sushi while in Houston with this thought: “Well, Houston is close to the water.”
The actual sushi tasted fantastic. I remember loving it. It was the after-effects that didn’t work out so well. Kind of like sex without a condom. Or sex with a condom, but with the wrong person.
We felt fine, my companion and I, until about 1 in the morning. My first memory was getting up with horrible stomach pains and making my way to the hotel bathroom. We had had a lot to drink. And by that, I mean we were fucking drunk. So, my first thought was I had just had too much to drink.
Wrong.
Note to self: Food poisoning feels much different than inebriation.
I sat on the toilet. The next thing I remember was waking up facedown on the bathroom floor with my pants down and had no idea how I got there. I hadn’t felt like that since Christian grade school.
After making sure my kidneys were still inside of me, I saw blood on the ground. Also disconcerting. Some quick algebraic equations helped me to realize I had fallen off the toilet and broken my nose on the bathroom floor. This might explain why people sometimes ask me if I’m Jewish, because now I have a crooked nose.
I never did get that fixed.
For now, I needed sleep. I made it to my bed and passed out. We had to get up at 5am to catch our flight. It took everything I had not to puke in the back of the cab on the 45 minute roller coaster ride to the airport. Surely this experience was designed by Satan and his wolfpack.
Once at the airport things didn’t get better. Anytime you couple diarreah, throwing up, and public bathrooms, you know you’re in for a bad time. Hell, any one of those things can ruin an afternoon tea party. But, the combination of all three is hell. Kind of like the Jonas Brothers.
I barely made it onto the plane. We should have stayed longer in Houston but we couldn’t afford it. Once on the plane, the losing of the proverbial lunch continued. I never realized so much liquid could come out of either end of me. Let alone at the same time. I felt bad for the passengers next to me. But, what in the hell was I supposed to do? The fasten seatbelt sign was on.
The plane landed back home. We had arrived. But, we had a business presentation to deliver. To this day, I think about how bad my breath must have been. We didn’t have time to stop and get gum. To those 120 people in attendance, I apologize for my ahi puke breath.
I went home and passed out again and felt much better the next day. Well, better about the food poisoning. I think I was sick enough that I had forgot to use a condom.
