Aselin

Recently my sister moved to Arizona. Not having lived by family before, I wasn't sure how this was going to work out. Much to her credit, she is not as weird as I remember from our childhood and has not wandered the streets topless or peed her pants once since arriving. (Both true stories from childhood that I may or may not have caused.)

So I have lived here 12 years and know about 15 people. Six of them acknowledge me when we accidentally run into each other in public. She has lived here a month and has a social calendar that would rival Halle Berry. She has had parties at her house and gone to parties every weekend and even some weeknights since she moved here. I can't say I'm jealous, because a) she's my little sister and that violates The Sibling Code and b) I don't really like parties much BUT one does like to be invited. Don't we?

Tuesday night, 'lil sis goes out to a cookie exchange. Who doesn't like a good cookie exchange. It's an excellent format for a party. Bring some of your yummy stuff and go home with a bunch of other people's good stuff. And it's EDIBLE! I'm all about free food.

Props to Sis because she generously figured out how to bring a guest, leave with extra platters of cookies and right after the party she delivered a giant platter of Christmas goodness to me! Gotta say, I would totally invite her to a party if I had one.

I'm looking over this gift from Heaven as it sits on my kitchen counter and I'm planning how I'm going to divvy up these delicacies among my family. You can probably guess that it is not going to be an equitable distribution. It's much more socialistic with me as the head dictator and the one with the greatest need.

I dictated to my minion that they were welcome to all the chocolate varieties - the chocolate chips, chocolate mallows, chocolate drizzles. Lest you get the wrong idea, and think I'm being magnanimous, I don't really like chocolate much. I was planning on having ALL the other cookies. The snicker doodles, gingerbread, pumpkin, and a divine looking fluffy sugar cookie with red sprinkles on top.

While this plan works with most of the fam, there are a few of them who would like to venture outside the chocolate parameters I have set and try a few other selections. This is highly frowned upon, especially before I have had a chance to peruse the non-chocolate stash I have amassed. I'm sitting in bed Wednesday night thinking about the platter of cookies, and think that if my children are anything like I was as a kid, they will try and get up in the middle of the night and eat all of my cookies. They would then blame it on each other and finally settle on the dog as the one who unwrapped the platter and ate only the non-chocolate cookies.

Of course, I can't fall victim to this plan; it would probably ruin Christmas. So without hearing so much as a clatter, I spring from my bed to consume sugar-matter.

Sorry, had to riff a little on 'Twas the Night.

Pattering down the hall toward the kitchen I get my heart set on the fluffy-looking sugar cookies. Turning on the oven light so I don't awaken anyone who might want to share, I peel back the plastic wrap and deeply inhale the cornucopia of freshly baked goodness.

I lift one of the fluffy-looking sugar cookies and it is so moist it crumbles a little to my touch. My heart skips a beat as I realize it's a delicate baked good, and I love it even more.

I break off a bite-sized piece and gently place it in my mouth, waiting for it's buttery goodness to melt into bliss...

...and then I gag, and choke a little and run to the sink to spit it out clawing at my tongue as it burns.

Not only is this cookie deceptive in its self-promotion, whoever made it should not be allowed to cook. Ever again. Ever.

Far from a fluffy, delicate sugar cookie, the baker - no, The Evil Poisoner - had put peppermint extract in the recipe. A whole cup. It was bitter with peppermint. So minty it was like 45 million Altoids were crushed up and put in one cookie. It was so unbelievably bad I was shocked at how bad it was. I'm typing with my pupils dilated and my mouth wide open I'm still so shocked.

Crushed, I bit the head off a gingerbread man and went to rebrush my teeth.

Fast forward to the next morning. I'm with my sister and say to her "Hey, did you try the cookie with the red sprinkles yet?"

She and her party-attending companion both made gagging motions and said they had thrown them out they were so bad. I mention that I had suffered neurological burns from the trauma of the poison peppermint cookie. We then started to talk about all the reactions people were having in the privacy of their own homes because of these horrible, awful, deceitful cookies. How if you fed one to a child they might have a seizure it was so spicy and bitter. I told my sister if I was ever in the presence of poison peppermint cookie baker that I wanted her pointed out. People need to be warned. She needs to be banned from potlucks, church socials and definitely cookie exchanges. Banned. She can bring napkins and watch the other people exchange cookies.

Really people. If you want to be invited to lots of parties here's a tip: TASTE YOUR CRAP BEFORE YOU INFLICT IT ON OTHER PEOPLE. WE KNOW YOU BROUGHT THOSE COOKIES AND WE WILL BE MAD FOR A LONG, LONG TIME BECAUSE OF THEM.

This is the stuff grudges are made of.