The Attack of the Freaky Spoon Biters

I spent the last three days entertaining the closest thing to in-laws I’ll ever have. And I use the word entertaining very lightly because all I offered was conversation and a bed. The entertaining, was done mostly by them. They bought groceries, cooked, cleaned and took us out on the town. It was a pleasant time.

And aside from the lingering belief that I was always one second away from liver failure and lung collapse from an allergic reaction to my amoxicillin, I controlled my anxiety surprisingly well. Until Friday night, when Rey’s dad pulled out a spoon and black cherry yogurt after dinner, and I suddenly heard the familiar sound of teeth grating across metal.

He was doing the same “spoon bite” as Rey. The same spoon bite that makes me want to punch myself in the face.

Instead of gently wrapping their mouths around the spoon and removing the food from its hard metal surface, the Ramirezes have it in their mind that it’s better to chomp down on that hard metal surface and rake their teeth across it while spewing ungraspable food back into their bowls. It’s disgusting. They're disgusting! Spoon biting is my number one pet peeve.

But, I sat silently as Rey followed his dad’s lead and chomped down his spoon, I mean bowl of raspberry sherbet. I sat silently as their teeth raked across the metal. Sat silently as I imagined myself removing their eyeballs with those spoons they were chomping.

Then I died from liver failure, because what else could I do? Certainly not stop Rey from biting his spoon. It’s in his genes.