Frozen

I've had two experiences involving frozen things over the past couple of months, both of which have been really disturbing. This has been a cold, bitter winter...more so than most Michigan winters through which I've lived. So anyway...a few weeks ago, I had a nice, steaming hot burrito for my lunch. I'll admit it, I have a weakness for Taco Bell, though more for the hot sauce than the food. I don't go there often because I'm trying to avoid the whole fast food pitfall, but alas, I digress!

So there I was, sitting in my car, eating my nice, hot burrito as I waited for my next class to begin. The outside temp was (I think) maybe 5 degrees that day, so yeah...cold! I was hungry, having not eaten since early that morning. I looked into my bag, and...no hot sauce! To understand the magnitude of this problem, you have to understand my relationship to TB hot sauce. For me, eating TB food without hot sauce would be...I don't know, like eating a sandwich without bread. I love Taco Bell hot sauce! So anyway...I was disappointed, but still very hungry. I looked around my car and saw the long-forgotten, and very frozen hot sauce in my cup holder. I thought about this for maybe two seconds and then decided it was better than no hot sauce. I opened the packet and put the sauce on my burrito. The stuff was the consistency of thick mucus and it was so cold that it hurt my teeth when I took a bite. The combination of very hot with very cold was unsettling. Let's just say I ate the remainder of my burrito with no sauce and it has been easier for me to avoid Taco Bell since then. The mental image of that slimy, frozen packet of snot keeps creeping into my mind...gross!

Then yesterday, when the temps dropped below zero again, I was on my way to school when I realized I had forgotten my chap stick. One annoying side effect of extreme cold and dry heating all winter long is dry, chapped lips. I needed my chap stick! Again, I looked around my icebox of a car and discovered some long-forgotten and very frozen chap stick in the center console. I pried the cap off and placed the tip on my lips. I attempted to move the tube back-and-forth, in the manner of a person applying chap stick, but no...the thing just sat there, affixed to my lips in one spot. Apparently, frozen chap stick is closely related to glue! I might as well have had a glue stick in my hand and been trying to put that onto my lips. I managed to get enough chap stick to make a small difference, but it was cold and clumpy and basically just gross. I survived the rest of my day without chap stick, but I've certainly learned that some things are just better left alone when frozen!