scoleciphobia. not for the squeamish.
Inspired by Lawyerish's confession of her funky phobia I thought this would be a good time to expose yet another of my quirks. I am a hard core Scoleciphobe. I am afraid of maggots. Deathly afraid. Completely unable to breathe afraid. Cold hand of death squeezing out my will to live afraid.
My college roommate and I rented a house from my parents during the school year. Over the summer we both moved back home and disconnected the utilities to save money. So, about a week before class started I arrived at the house to crank up the air conditioning and start moving back in. When I opened the door it was clear that something was amiss. Hundreds of dead flies were littered about the kitchen floor. Odd. I wandered around the house and found more and more flies but no point of entry or visible food source. Still odd. Then I heard it. A strange sound was coming from inside the refrigerator. Like something was repeatedly hitting the door from the inside. I mustered up my courage and opened the freezer door. Bad idea. An unholy stench filled my nostrils and I gasped in horror as a writhing mass of maggots spilled out of the freezer down the front of the refrigeraotor and onto my Birkenstock wearing feet. Writhing maggots in my sandals. Under my toes. On my skin. ON MY SKIN!! Blehhhhhhhhhh. I admit to losing my stomach and making a deposit into the sink.
For what it's worth, moving whist sporting maggot filled shoes is... um... unpleasant. They squish, you know. I have no words for the degree of stomach wrenching horror that is slimy, squishy, maggoty shoes.
So, back to the freezer... Seems the previous roomie had left a frozen chicken breast in a ziploc in the ice bin where it had been overlooked. There it sat in the unplugged freezer for the better part of three months. At some point a fly found it's way to dinner, or perhaps a fly egg was somehow already in attendance at the party, I know not, but the formerly frozen chicken sludge was the primary source from whence the maggots came. The smell was acrid and sulphery, with a hint of bile and rotting flesh. Just thinking about the aroma makes me gag a little.
Finally coming to my senses I ditched the shoes, shook off the maggots as best I could and ran out of the house. Then I called my mom. She told me to buck up and clean it. I am, after all, prone to exaggeration, and I was likely blowing this out of proportion. She would pay for the cleaning supplies and come up to check on my progress that night.
My new roomie, having a biology major and a strong stomach, volunteered to help clean the mess. Poor girl. I didn't show her what she was up against until we were already back from the store armed with our gear. We bought step stools so the the maggots couldn't fall into our shoes. We bought rubber gloves that extended past the elbow and respirator type masks. And bleach. Lots of bleach.
So there we labored for the better part of 9 hours. Perched atop our stools doing our best to rid the fridge of it's gnarly maggot infestation. There was much vomiting. Also tears. Lots of tears. Seems that the smell combined with the herculean task before us was too much to bear and we finally retired to the porch for some fresh air and a good cry. That's where Mom found us. She entered the house all stoic and nonplussed and almost immediately exited visibly shaken and teetering on the edge of a projectile puke. She sat down beside us and said, "clearly that was no exaggeration". For the first time all day our tears turned to laughter.
Of course, there's nothing quite like a maggot crawling across your neck to bring a girl back to reality. The kitchen was literally crawling with the vile creatures. And what to do with the fridge? That thing was simply not fit for food. After many, many phone calls we were able to get someone to haul it to the junkyard and we secured a maggot free fridge for our kitchen. It took about three days of scooping and scrubbing and bleaching before we felt that the kitchen was anywhere near clean enough for food to be there, but we never felt like it was ever truly clean. Funny thing about maggots, their presence has a way of boring into your brain and making you think that they could appear at any time, without warning or provocation. To this day I live in fear of discovering another pulsating blob of grossness.
Blehhhhhhh. I have to go wash my hands.
My college roommate and I rented a house from my parents during the school year. Over the summer we both moved back home and disconnected the utilities to save money. So, about a week before class started I arrived at the house to crank up the air conditioning and start moving back in. When I opened the door it was clear that something was amiss. Hundreds of dead flies were littered about the kitchen floor. Odd. I wandered around the house and found more and more flies but no point of entry or visible food source. Still odd. Then I heard it. A strange sound was coming from inside the refrigerator. Like something was repeatedly hitting the door from the inside. I mustered up my courage and opened the freezer door. Bad idea. An unholy stench filled my nostrils and I gasped in horror as a writhing mass of maggots spilled out of the freezer down the front of the refrigeraotor and onto my Birkenstock wearing feet. Writhing maggots in my sandals. Under my toes. On my skin. ON MY SKIN!! Blehhhhhhhhhh. I admit to losing my stomach and making a deposit into the sink.
For what it's worth, moving whist sporting maggot filled shoes is... um... unpleasant. They squish, you know. I have no words for the degree of stomach wrenching horror that is slimy, squishy, maggoty shoes.
So, back to the freezer... Seems the previous roomie had left a frozen chicken breast in a ziploc in the ice bin where it had been overlooked. There it sat in the unplugged freezer for the better part of three months. At some point a fly found it's way to dinner, or perhaps a fly egg was somehow already in attendance at the party, I know not, but the formerly frozen chicken sludge was the primary source from whence the maggots came. The smell was acrid and sulphery, with a hint of bile and rotting flesh. Just thinking about the aroma makes me gag a little.
Finally coming to my senses I ditched the shoes, shook off the maggots as best I could and ran out of the house. Then I called my mom. She told me to buck up and clean it. I am, after all, prone to exaggeration, and I was likely blowing this out of proportion. She would pay for the cleaning supplies and come up to check on my progress that night.
My new roomie, having a biology major and a strong stomach, volunteered to help clean the mess. Poor girl. I didn't show her what she was up against until we were already back from the store armed with our gear. We bought step stools so the the maggots couldn't fall into our shoes. We bought rubber gloves that extended past the elbow and respirator type masks. And bleach. Lots of bleach.
So there we labored for the better part of 9 hours. Perched atop our stools doing our best to rid the fridge of it's gnarly maggot infestation. There was much vomiting. Also tears. Lots of tears. Seems that the smell combined with the herculean task before us was too much to bear and we finally retired to the porch for some fresh air and a good cry. That's where Mom found us. She entered the house all stoic and nonplussed and almost immediately exited visibly shaken and teetering on the edge of a projectile puke. She sat down beside us and said, "clearly that was no exaggeration". For the first time all day our tears turned to laughter.
Of course, there's nothing quite like a maggot crawling across your neck to bring a girl back to reality. The kitchen was literally crawling with the vile creatures. And what to do with the fridge? That thing was simply not fit for food. After many, many phone calls we were able to get someone to haul it to the junkyard and we secured a maggot free fridge for our kitchen. It took about three days of scooping and scrubbing and bleaching before we felt that the kitchen was anywhere near clean enough for food to be there, but we never felt like it was ever truly clean. Funny thing about maggots, their presence has a way of boring into your brain and making you think that they could appear at any time, without warning or provocation. To this day I live in fear of discovering another pulsating blob of grossness.
Blehhhhhhh. I have to go wash my hands.
