Allergies and such...

There are some things that I think need explanation before people do them. The affects of using dynamite, rat poison, and the ever so rare gasoline fight all have a certain inherent element of danger that, to the average person, would merit a certain amount of explanation. Until last night, I did not consider the eating of a walnut to be anything meriting a casual off-handed remark, much less 3 hours of research on how you could potentially die from them. However, after having an allergic reaction in front of a large group of friends, I felt that I needed a little background.

In order to understand my current predicament, I feel that there must be some explanation as to how I first came in contact with this vicious fruit. On Wednesday nights, I trapes over to the International House of Charlotte for the French Conversation Hour. Usually the hour involves lots of jokes and carrousing typical of francophones with the occasional sexual joke covered up by the wonderful use of double entendre and horrible accents. Personally, I think that these situations more than make up for the pain of learning a second language and I would urge everyone who reads this to do just that....but I digress. The best part of the hour is that every week, someone from the group bakes a cake/cookies and brings it to the bar where we eat after the meeting. This week, the cake was dressed with Walnuts. Now, if you have never seen a walnut, it looks like a white and bumpy pecan or maybe a small hard piece of popcorn. Apparently God did not see it fit to include devil horns and a tail which, I feel, would be truth in advertising....however, again, I digress. Upon seeing this delicious cake, I immediately felt the need to express my pleasure with having it so close and thusly took one of the walnuts and ate it. It was delicious....for about a minute. After which point my stomach felt that my mouth needed to have a second visit from the walnut and my throat decided that breathing was too much of an inconvenience for it at that particular point in time. Immediately, I left the table and talked to the waitress, who was graciously offered me a benadryl and then promptly informed me that she had none.....typical. Having exhausted this option, I walked briskly across the street to the pharmacy and bought my own benadryl and immediately downed the recommended dose (this is the part where I say don't do drugs). After a few minutes my throat relaxed and I was able to sit down calmly and take the usual amount of shenanigans inflicted upon those of us counted fortunate enough to sit next to the very boisterous and flamboyant Manu. All in all, it was a quality night.

Of course now my interest in this offensive little fruit is at its peak. So, I started researching and it seems that the history of the walnut is quite interesting. Apparently, the earliest known walnuts have been found in Persia or what is now modern day Iran and Iraq. Early references to the walnut have been found in boastings about the Hanging Gardens of Babylon which allegedly had "groves of walnut trees". Further, the walnut became highly prized in both the Greek and Roman societies and in fact, Walnuts were among the foods found preserved in the City of Pompeii after the eruption of Vesuvius. Further, during the Middle Ages, the walnut was so highly prized that the Church accepted tithes using walnuts. In the current era, Walnuts are found all over the world and in the US, California is responsible for practically all Walnut production.

Thus, in synopsis, the Walnut comes from a section of the world known for its ruthless empire building (see 300), is responsible for the destruction of Pompeii and Hurculaneum and the down fall of the Californian economy, AND tried to kill me. In fact, I would venture to say that the majority of the worlds problems can be somehow tied to the existance of the walnut.

The civil war? - Plantations grew walnuts.
The First World War? - Walnuts were first mass produced in England around 1910.
The stock market crash? - Europe had a shortage of walnuts after the first world war.
The Second World War? - See previous answer.
The presidency of George W. Bush? What do you think "W" stood for!!!!????!!!!

All of the ills of human history can be traced back to this offensive fruit. But of course, I am in no way biased. In fact, I should probably be thankful. The walnut DID inform me through a mild reaction that I am, in fact, allergic to them and that I should avoid them from here on out. I think that I will definitely take the advice.

Thanks for reading.

-Graham