What's Grosser than Gross?

One day, when I lived in London, I was down at the pub with my friend Lloyd. He were talking about pub grub and he was explaining to me what mushy peas are. He said that they are regular peas that are mashed within an inch of their lives until they resemble baby shit. Mmm, can't wait to get my hands on some of those.

I said, "That's pretty disgusting, but you wanna hear something even more disgusting?" Of course he did. So I told him about my friend Jeff's toenail jar. When we were in college, Jeff and his rommate, Lee, decided to collect all of their fingernail and toenail clippings in a jam jar. Their goal was to completely fill it, but they only made it until the jar was about half full. By then, Jeff was so repelled by the funky clippings, that he put an end to their little project and threw the whole jar in the garbage.

Lloyd agreed that was gross, but he said he had something to top it. He then proceeded to tell me about a mate of his, who, on a dare, wanted to see how long he could go eating only mince pies and drinking lager. (Mince pies are kind of like raisin pie. They're ok, but I wouldn't want to subsist on them. )

After a few weeks, Lloyd's friend started to feel sick. (Shocker, I know.) So he went to the doctor to get checked out. The doctor knew right away that something was awry, but he couldn't figure it out at first. After a few tests and some questioning, he was able to reach a prognosis. It turned out that the guy had SCURVY! I didn't believe Lloyd at first. I hadn't ever heard of anyone except for seamen (ha ha, "seamen") getting scurvy from being out on British ships way back when. Lloyd explained that the reason that his friend scurvy was that he wasn't getting any vitamin C from his all lager and mince pie diet! (Incidentally, that's why they called the British sailors "Limeys". They had to eat limes to keep from getting scurvy.) After receiving this news, Lloyd reported his friend finally went back to eating regular food and kicked the scurvy. But I still think this guy deserves a Darwin award, don't you?

I'll be going back to London for a visit in a few weeks, and I might have some mince pies. I know I'll definitley have some lager. Although I plan to expand my menu beyond that, I may bring along some vitamin C tablets just to be on the safe side.