I burned my tongue today

I sold the most bottles of wine over the last week and the restaurant was running a contest. I won a big bottle of this California red and then I also got a fancy travel coffee mug.

In the break room later, gave the red away to Angie. I said I only won cuz I used her clever lines. She said that was really sweet.

Then at the end of today's lunch shift, I made some tea and used the hot water from the coffee machine and set it aside to steep in that fancy new mug.

On the walk home this afternoon, I tried a sip and holy hell the tea was so hot I immediately had to lean over to dump it out of my mouth. That travel mug kept the tea at a boiling hot temperature.

The inside of my mouth hurt like hell. I got home and swished cold water around. And I could feel tiny pieces of skin coming off the roof of my mouth.

Then I studied for a while.

After my shift ended, I bought a bowl of the tomato crawfish bisque to go and two loaves of french bread to eat while I studied. I realized that stuff was still in my backpack.

I force myself to study a while before I eat. I finished two very dull chapters of this book of essays I have to read and then I figured it was OK to eat now.

I put one loaf of bread in my toaster after slicing it in half and adding lots of butter on top and sprinkling on some salt.

Then I tried the bisque. Tomato bisque is like one of my favorite foods ever. Particularly the version at my restaurant. It's amazing. A few cool people come into the restaurant just for the bisque.

But today, standing in my tiny kitchen, I sampled some with a spoon, and it tasted like hot thick water. No flavor. I tried it again. Nothing. I wondered if the chefs had screwed something up.

I got really suspicious when I tried the bread and I couldn't taste the salt on the bread.

I grabbed my bottle of tabasco sauce, shook some out into a spoon, and I couldn't taste anything.