An uninvited guest

Most weeknights after I get home from the Pork Palace, sometime around 10 o'clock or maybe even 10:30, you can find Jean and I sitting in comfy chairs on our front porch or the back deck. We like to sit and talk, have a beverage or two, check out the fireflies and enjoy each other's company. We listen to the crickets, chat about whatever happened during the day, and generally just relax and unwind.

It is, in no uncertain terms, a great way to end the day. With our schedules, we don't get to spend a lot of time with each other during the week, so Porch Time is something to which I eagerly look forward.

Such was the case last night. I got home from work, changed out of my uniform, and Jean and I plopped down into out chairs. She sipped on a chardonnay while I nursed a cold Sweetwater 420. The weather was nice, the conversation engrossing. It could not have been more pleasant. Until an uninvited guest popped in.

I picked up my beer from the table on the front porch and popped the bottle in my mouth when I felt an unfamiliar sensation. Lumpy. Slimy. Moving. Three things that the top of your beer bottle should never be.

I quickly popped the beer out of my mouth and found, much to my unbelieving eyes, that a small slug had found its way onto the lip of the bottle -- and into my mouth.

Uck. Serious uck. My stomach did flip-flops and my mind goggled.

I immediately spewed out the beer still in my mouth in a spit-take that would have made the Marx Brothers proud, then stomped around the porch making retching noises for a good 10 minutes or so, while Jean sat in her chair alternately being concerned for my well-being and laughing her butt off.

I was just about to flick the offending gastropod off the bottle when Jean wiped her eyes and looked at me pleadingly. "Oh, don't kill it," she said.

I paused and thought for a moment. In my mind, there was no other being in creation that deserved death more at that point. Not only did the slug invade my personal space, but more tragically, it had ruined three-quarters of a bottle of my favorite beer. I was ready to get salt, sulphuric acid, a blowtorch and some high explosives -- anything to repay the perpetrator in a manner befitting the horrid offense.

But I didn't. With a shrug, I carefully shook the slug off the bottle and into the front garden, where it could continue it's life of slime without interfering with my porch time.

After all, who am I to kill a slug that likes the same beer that I do?