Science Fair Flashback

Today I had a childhood flashback in a most unexpected venue - Bristol Farms. Hungry for rainy day sustenance, I stopped in for their chili - basil chicken mixed with roadhouse style is mighty good.  For a hellaciously over-priced store, their soups and sushi are surprisingly affordable. Mixed among the $30 bouquets by the check-out was a plant that demanded respect and wayward flies with its water - The Venus Flytrap.    

I had one when I was 11.  It was my science fair project and my obsession.  Its inner leaves had a ruby glow and irresistible scent that attracted insects like a femme fatale in a skin-tight dress on a sticky summer night. I even touched it myself 'cause I liked to feel it clamp down on my finger.  Unfortunately, I touched it too much and it died.  Scrambling for another project - I decided on ants.  But I was going to be different - no ant farms for me.  Too contained.  I went to Catholic school, I wanted to gross out the nuns.  I looked in the phone book for the nearest city - Toledo, Ohio.  I called every specialty store - trying desperately to find chocolate covered ants.  I had read about them in the paper, they were a new delicacy, and I wanted the nuns to have to try them.  I had eaten bugs myself - no biggie.  I'm not sure why I did.  Maybe for the attention.  Maybe to freak my fellow students out.  Who knows.  Luckily I got boobs early, otherwise I would've forever been known as the girl who ate bugs.  

Much to my chagrin - there were no chocolate covered ants for sale, I changed my project to molds and brought in limberger cheese.  Now that's some stinky shit.  I turned heads and people pinched their noses as I walked in the small gym. It was filled with rickety folding tables that we used to set up our projects framed by 3-sided cardboard boards.  I won first prize for my class, but only had one nun as a judge.  And she politely abstained from trying the cheese.  Oh well.  I tried. 

And recently I've wondered...  What about all those students who did the solar system models? Do they feel let down now that Pluto's not really considered a planet?  Are they pissed off at their under-paid science teachers and NASA???

Anyhow - I am very happy about my new Venus Fly trap.  I'm putting it in the sun during the day and in my pasta filled cupboard at night. Beware bugs, that sweet green seducer with the ruby pink lips is going to suck you dry!