The Culprit

In my last post I mentioned that over Christmas I had to deal with food poisoning. Here's what happened: I went to bed on Saturday, December 26th looking forward to the next day for two reasons. First, it was a one-service-only Sunday at church meaning Andy and I would go to church together. There are only a handful of those Sundays in a year. Second, we'd be heading out of town to spend time with the Murphys. But around 1:00 am I woke up with a horrible feeling. You know that feeling...should I sit on the toilet or face it? I rushed to the bathroom and barely made it on time. I went back to bed feeling great only to be up again at 2, 3, 4 and finally 5:30. By 7:00 am I knew I was not going to church. Andy took Georgia with him so that I could sleep and hopefully feel better in time to leave that afternoon. But I was still in bed when they got home.

Andy got a phone call from his mom, informing us she had also been sick. A few phone calls later and we learned my sister-in-law had been sick, as well as my nephew. What could have caused this? The only conclusion that we could come to was that every sick person had eaten some of the cake I had made in celebration of Christmas. I had decided to make a cake that had a definite 'wow-factor'. It was six layers tall and beautiful. But I had so much trouble making the layers that after I made them, I only produced three and my mother-in-law had to repeat the process for me so we'd have all six. This cake was already frustrating me.

HOWEVER, only my mother-in-law and I had large pieces. My sister-in-law and nephew only had small bites. Was the cake really to blame? The more I thought about all the food that had been left out and snacked on throughout the day made me think that it couldn't possibly be the cake. (I think it was one of the dips that had mayo in it.) But, alas, I couldn't bring myself to try another piece, you know, just in case.