Geez Noreen.....Do you like roasted chestnuts? I had always had a romantic idea of them.....you know, "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire" and all that. Oddly, though my family was very big on Christmas and wintery traditions, we never did the chestnut thing that I recall.

So a few years ago, we're at the Columbus Zoo for the Christmas Lights. They put up 1.25 million lights at the zoo here and it's become a tradition for us to go every year with Connie and Wayne and all the kids. The zoo is also very different at night and you get some neat views of the animals. Anyway.............On the way out, over by the open skating rink is a chestnut stand. They're roasting the things and selling them on the spot for a healthy price, but I figure what the hell, again being a romantic....and it was a very cold and beautiful night. Wouldn't this be wonderful?

I pay the gouger his price and walk away with my chestnuts, excited to surprise everyone. We get to the van and I pass out the nuts to one and all. Wayne prepares mine since I'm driving and everyone begins to chew. I pop the thing into my mouth, expecting something like a hot brazil/filbert combo or something like that, and ready to wax poetic about Christmas and traditions and family. Before my taste buds kick into gear, there are already noises coming from the rear of the van and Wayne in the front.....and they don't sound like yummy noises.

The flavor traversed the nerve endings and a series of synapses later registered in my brain. I heard another non-yummy sound and realized that I had joined the chorus. The texture was pretty bad, but the flavor was.......uh.....worse! Now I have never tasted dog shit and I wouldn't taste it even for comparison purposes, but up in that part of my brain where the imagination lives, that chestnut registered as comparable to dog shit. Obviously I was not alone as there seemed to be a clamoring for napkins and a lot of gagging, spitting, sounds going on around me. I had a feeling my upholstery and the cut pile carpeting was taking a beating too. For me, I pulled the van out of the line of exiting traffic and began hacking on the side of the road.

All of this also mandated that we pull in down the road for drinks. I figure the guy with the chestnut stand also owned the conveniently located Shoot & Scoot where we were equally gouged for drinks, some of which also found their way onto the van's seats and floor. I figure by the time it was all over I had spent about five bucks a nut. We did try them again the next year though, figuring that perhaps we'd gotten a bad batch or something but this time only Wayne and I had the guts (read:stupidity) to sample them. I'm sorry to report that my reaction was the same.....chestnut=dogshit.

If these things are part of Halloween too, I think I can understand the absolute need to also bob for apples, although I would want to be the first to the tub. If they are a part of your Christmas, no amount of mistletoe could induce me to kiss anyone who ate one.

Spaw