El Shito.

After spending seven hours at a very crowded, very hot King's Island for Labor Day with Ron, Kearstin and Caymen, we stopped at one of our favorite Mexican places on the way home.

We'd never eaten at this particular location, but it was very clean, our waitress was nice, and we easily fell into our normal El Toro routine, which is to say, we placed our food and drink orders and then devoured baskets of chips and bowls of salsa at rates of speed that resemble your typical Man vs. Food contest.  We're a delight to our fellow diners.

I ordered my usual.  Pollo Fiesta.  That's fancy schmancy Spanish for boneless, skinless, grilled chicken breast.  Or as my kids call it, "Mom's diet food."  Maybe if I changed the name at home, they'd actually eat it.  What's for dinner, you ask?  Why it's Pollo Fiesta!  And they'd excitedly shout, Olay!  A mom can dream, right?  Anyhoo, Ron ordered the same thing.

You know that feeling in your gut that tells you something is terribly wrong?  You know, the one we're always told never to ignore, thus the phrase 'Follow your gut?'  Well, within my first two bites, I got it.  And I ignored it.  I WAS HUNGRY, OKAY?!?!  It wasn't exactly bleeding all over my plate or anything.  It was just tough with an ever so slight aftertaste you might describe as...foul...not to be confused with fowl.

By the time Ron took a bite of his chicken, I'd already eaten all of mine.  Don't judge me.  I was starving, remember?  I was literally sitting there silently convincing myself that my chicken had been thoroughly cooked when he said, "Does this chicken taste done to you?"  and handed me his fork.  I took the bite of chicken that looked and tasted exactly like mine did and said, "That's what mine was like."  He glanced toward my squeaky clean plate, did a double take and looked at me like I'd just eaten our family pet.  Then he said, "Chef Ramsey says undercooked chicken could kill somebody."  I thought, Chef Ramsey also calls people f-ing donkeys, so if you wanna live in that world, just say the word, Chuckles.  Not everything on reality tv is real, okay?!?  Why must I always be the voice of reason. 

He called our waitress over and told her our chicken was undercooked.  She apologized and immediately picked up his plate of chicken and then reached for mine.  I sat awkwardly staring at her and she said, "Wow.  You must have been hungry."

Well, it would appear somebody doesn't want a tip this evening because the only thing you're getting from me is the fowl I'm about to flip you by way of middle finger.

Fifteen minutes later, Ron was obnoxiously eating his thoroughly cooked and safe plate of chicken while I sat Googling Salmonella symptoms.  Diarrhea, fever, severe abdominal cramps, cold chills, and an incubation period of 5-72 hours.  I mentally cleared my week's schedule.

I'm relieved to report that I successfully made it through last week.  There was one close call Wednesday evening when I might have experienced a Psychosomatic symptom and frantically told Ron, "I think I'm having the Salmonella cold chills!" and he calmly said, "Or, and stick with me here, the air conditioner kicked on."

I've had just about enough common sense out of you, donkey.