In need of adult supervision

So the very first day The Texan was in Colorado, I found that I have less sense than your average kindergartner.

Here's the deal: Friday morning, I was puttering around the house, reading through emails and having my coffee. I got up for my second cup, went to pull the clothes out of the dryer, put the wet ones in the washer, etc. Really exciting stuff. I fix myself a bowl of yogurt and take it to my desk.

I was focused on some news stories and not really paying attention to what I was doing. So when I realized that I had something on my left hand, I figured it was some splashed-out yogurt and casually licked it off. What? Stop judging me, I work at home and my standards are pretty low.

Within about one second of having licked what I'd thought was yogurt, I realized two things: 1) I was eating blueberry yogurt, which was blue, but the liquid I'd ingested was white. 2) I felt sick. Very, very sick.

As soon as I finished thinking, "Hmm, I don't feel good," my body's like, I don't know what you put in me, but we're getting it back out. NOW. And the heaving and gagging began.

I'll spare a graphic description of the next few minutes. Let's just say it involved a lot of gargling with water and rinsing of the mouth.

The only thing I could think that would've caused that sort of reaction was that somehow, when I'd been pulling the laundry out of the dryer, some laundry detergent dripped on my hand. I'd been exposed to absolutely nothing else that could've caused that sort of reaction.

So I checked out the box for directions on what to do if you accidentally swallowed some. I'd done the first part - drink a big glass of water - and decided to do the second thing that they recommended, which was call a doctor.

My health insurance has this program where you can call in to talk to a nurse to see what you should do. The woman I spoke with said as long as my lips weren't blue and I didn't have trouble breathing, I didn't need to call 911. But she did recommend I call the poison hotline.

I remember when I was little that was a really big deal - whenever your parents left you with a babysitter, the name/number of the restaurant, the doctor's number, and the poison hotline were left in the "just in case" instructions. But I'd never had cause to call them before.

Let me tell you, they pick up a hell of a lot faster than 911 does. The guy was very nice and said that unless some new symptoms emerged, I'd be just fine. He did want to know how old I was. I guess not many 34-year-olds call in having accidentally eaten laundry detergent. Sigh.

The back of my throat burned all day, and I had this persistent nauseated feeling I'm willing to believe may have been psychosomatic. Other than that, I don't think any serious damage was done.

The ten minutes when I was desperately trying to get that shit out of me, all I could think of was that The Texan wasn't expected to be home for three more days; how long would the cat wait before snacking on my corpse? How long would The Texan hang out at the airport, expecting me to pick him up, before realizing I wasn't going to be there? And I had one very strong thought overriding everything: I did not want to shuffle off this mortal coil in my bathrobe with unwashed hair (again, I work at home - all the stereotypes are true). What an asinine way to go. It's even worse than the time I was eating beef kabobs with Grits a few years ago and tried to swallow far too big of a piece that stuck for an excruciating long second in my throat.

At any rate, I learned a very important lesson: always, ALWAYS use a napkin. Mom was right after all.