[garandgal]

Only much later in life did I discover that not only could I eat raw spinach (as well as some other vegetables raw) but I actually liked raw spinach. If I had known that as a kid, I might have been able to save myself some real misery.

Me too! Only, I now will even eat it cooked in something like spinach dip or lasagna.

I can STILL smell that horrific cooked, canned, spinach that they served at school...I gagged every time I was near the cafeteria. Same with butterscotch pudding....ICK!

By the way, I am quite a picky eater. Not picky at all about any type of food...very picky about how it was prepared and by whom.

An example: I purchased a pound of ham at a local grocery deli the other day. Only after I ordered, did I realize that the woman who was handling the food was sick as a dog...coughing, sneezing, etc. Took it home, and threw it in the garbage can.

It is shocking how many food service people go to work when they are ill...I distrust most restaurant food for that reason. I am probably crazy...but ending up in the hospital with food poisoning will do that to you.

[fr_freak]

An example: I purchased a pound of ham at a local grocery deli the other day. Only after I ordered, did I realize that the woman who was handling the food was sick as a dog...coughing, sneezing, etc. Took it home, and threw it in the garbage can.

Heh, I've done the same thing. I can remember once at a local mom-and-pop sandwich shop watching a college kid make my sandwich. The employees there didn't use the plastic gloves like they do in some of the chains now, and I thought that the kid who was making my sandwich was handling the lunch meat a little excessively (he kept weighing it, then holding it in one hand while picking bits off with the other, then re-weighing it etc.). I even told him that he wasn't actually required to touch every square millimeter. He assured me his hands were clean and all that, but when I took the sandwich back to a table, I couldn't bring myself to eat it. The kid was some lefty-looking wussy boy who seemed like he'd be a good candidate for carrying a viral STD, if you catch my drift, and eating something he had just got done molesting was unappetizing, so I threw the sandwich out and left.