Bob Wire Has a Point (It's Under His Cowboy Hat)

Pickled Eggs From Hell. I Mean, Idaho

By Bob Wire, 11-16-07

	One of the many disgusting things I've put in my mouth.

The box on my front porch looked like it had been around the world three times. Dented, mangled, taped and re-taped, this mysterious package was waiting for me when I came home from having my teeth cleaned last week. I was still chewing on some of that dental grit when I picked up the box and took it inside.

It was heavy. The box was the size of a microwave oven, and must have weighed 15 pounds. I set it down on the kitchen table and looked for a return address. Idaho Falls. That could only mean one thing: Clarence Worley. He was the lead guitar player for my two formative bands, the Potato Heads and Rotten Tuna. I had lost contact with Worley for 15 years or so, but had picked up the thread recently via the internet. I knew he was living and working (and drinking) in Idaho Falls, so this package had to be from him.

I donned a lead apron, safety goggles and a football helmet, and took a utility knife to the box. Inside, floating in a sea of peanuts, was another box. I opened it up to reveal a large, heavy lump of newspaper and duct tape. I carefully sliced through the duct tape until I got to the real payload. It was a gallon sized jar made of clear plastic, with a big red lid. The kind of container that might hold Red Vines. It was full of a cloudy, beige liquid, though, and the silt and sediment obscured the contents. I set it on the table and by the time I’d disposed of the copious packing material, the sediment had settled to reveal…

Eggs.

And some jalapeños. And some habañeros. And a few carrots. By god, this was a jar of Worley’s famous pickled eggs. He had told me about them long ago, and the word was that these things were so hot, yet so tasty, that you couldn’t help but eat them until the lining to your esophagus burned away like a beer bottle label in a camp fire.

I’d never had one myself, but I was there when Worley’s fascination with pickled foods was ignited, back in our college days.

We’d been up all night, building our fraternity’s homecoming float, a near-life-sized replica of the first Space Shuttle. Much like the NASA craft, ours was constructed of chicken wire, paper mache, and crepe paper. With the help of our Little Sisters (a loose conglomeration of loose women), we had worked feverishly on the Shuttle for several nights in a row, stuffing crumpled napkins into the chicken wire, nailing a 2X4 frame to a borrowed flatbed trailer, and consuming superhuman quantities of Rainier. When the sun came up on the morning of the parade, we towed the Shuttle float (dubbed ‘Uranus Probe’) down to the parade grounds. From there, it was only a half a block to the Copper Penny, which was pouring liquor at 7:00 that morning.

Clarence and I sat cheek by jowl at the bar, drinking bloody Marys and staring at our own bloodshot eyes in the back bar mirror. Suddenly he sat straight up, pointed at a large jar of bright red sausages suspended in a clear liquid, and shouted, “Gimme one a those!”

The bartender, a wizened old specimen with nicotine-stained fingers, hefted the huge jar over to the bar. “I don’t know if these are still good, son,” he said, trying to unscrew the lid. “No one’s had one in a long time.”

“How long have they been here?” I asked, inspecting the cryptic label.

“Well, this jar was here when I started working here,” said the old man. “Right after the war.”

Clarence and I exchanged looks. “The Vietnam War?” I asked.

He’d gotten the lid off, removed his wristwatch, and plunged a hand into the brine. “Nah. I mean dubya-dubya two. The big one.” He pulled out a handful of sausages. The label said they were “pork franks, pickled in brine.” He put a couple on a napkin and slid it in front of Clarence. “Bon appétit,” he said, and shuffled away to pour a boilermaker for my journalism professor.

Clarence picked up a shiny red link and regarded it in the morning sunlight that was slanting in through the filthy bar windows. “Looks pretty harmless,” he said, and held up to his nose for a sniff. He made a face, then took a bite. “Hmm.” He chewed. He chewed some more. Then he popped the remaining chunk into his mouth and took a long pull off his bloody Mary.

Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he said, “Hey, old man! How much for the whole jar?”

From that point on, Clarence was possessed by some sort of Pickle Madness. He would eat any pickled offering he found in a bar. Pickled pig’s feet. Pickled turkey gizzards. Pickled Snickers bars. The man was obsessed.

And so it was with some trepidation that I unscrewed the lid on this jar of eggs. When I got the lid off, fumes immediately filled the kitchen with a powerful scent of garlic, divorce, and acetone. I pulled out a slippery egg and took a bite. Big mistake. My freshly cleaned teeth vibrated with pain, and a shock of tang and heat went right up into my gums. I dropped the egg back into the jar and quickly replaced the lid. I decided to save the eggs for my poker buddies, who were due to show up for a game that Saturday. I set the jar over on the kitchen counter, and called the dentist to schedule a mercy cleaning for the next day.

Barb came home from work shortly after, and stopped dead in her tracks when she spied the jar on the counter. “What the hell is that?”

I explained about the package from Clarence, and how I was saving the eggs for the poker game. A few minutes later, I came into the kitchen to get a beer, and noticed that she’d draped a kitchen towel over the jar. You have to admit, it looks like a manatee fetus, or something else that should be on display in a lab somewhere.

So the guys came over as planned, and after a few adult beverages and a few hands of cards, I brought out the eggs. Being guys, they didn’t care about the origin of the eggs or how they were prepared. They just ate them. And we also ate the peppers. And a carrot or two. The eggs themselves were quite tasty, with the kind of heat that you know is doing some damage, but you just can’t quit eating the stuff. We got through about half the jar, a mighty achievement.

Now the half-full jar sits on my tool bench in the garage (Barb won’t allow it back in the house), awaiting its next victim. But who will I be able to pawn these things off on?

Ah, an opportunity presents itself: next week’s Thanksgiving potluck. Thanks, Clarence.

[Bookmark NewWest.net/BobWire right now. Do it.]

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