I Have Seen the Face of Death

Actually, I've seen it twice. In the span of five minutes.

First, I read my friend Liz's blog, in which she recently posted the final picture ever taken by a very famous Japanese nature photographer. Before he was mauled to death. By a bear. This picture is exactly what you think it is, but it still doesn't make it any more horrifying.

Darrell and I looked at this before heading to Emily's place for a Memorial Day barbecue, the centerpiece of which was Karen's grill, lovingly delivered from Toftrees for Emily's future enjoyment. Today was the christening, which entailed re-hooking everything up and making sure it all was working right so that we could grill all the deliciousness we've planned to.

And who was in charge of lighting this grill? Of course, it was me, Mr. I Guess The Handyman Genes Never Quite Made It To Me From Dad's Seed.

After a few failures, I did what my father would never do: called for help. So I got Karen on the phone, solicited her advice, and hung up. I did what she said, clicked the ignition button a few times, failed, tried a few more times, and was about a second away from giving up when--

HOLY FUCK!

--which is Manspeak for, "I'm staring down the maw of a giant fireball that came inches away from singeing off all of my facial hair!"

But hey, at least the grill's lit now.

Once my breathing was restored to normalcy--and after I called Karen back to assure her that all went well and I had not, despite my best efforts, burned my face off--I decided that two near-death experiences (even if one was only vicarious) was still too many for one day. So I grabbed another beer, took a long swig, and told Emily, "Hey, there's a picture on the Internet I need to show you..."

Then, as I'm attempting to show Emily the aforementioned picture, she replies, "Make it quick. I need you to cut the melons with a really, really big knife."

Who the hell thinks this is a good idea?