First Time For Everything

I, much to the horror and disbelief of my friend Ben, have never had Taco Bell. Have I been deprived? No. Uninitiated? Yes. Well, I am innocent no longer. Yesterday, I had Taco Bell for the first time.

After a night of bowling… Aah let me rephrase. After a night of watching my friends bowl while drinking beer in a bowling alley in Virginia (an experience that is difficult to convey without pictures. You just wouldn’t believe me), it was decided that the time had come for me to experience the wonder and potential stomachache that is Taco Bell. And so I did. Pulling up to a Taco Bell drive-through in one of the million strip malls that make up the entirety of Northern Virginia, I let Ben take the reigns and order his favorites. A giant bag of his favorites.

My gastronomic curiosity did not get the best of me – I stayed away from things containing lettuce and/or beef… if beef it be. I stuck to chicken – spicy chicken taco, I think. Or burrito. Don’t remember. I have to say, it wasn’t terrible. It was certainly not as bad as I was expecting, having programmed myself to believe that Taco Bell is the representation of all that is wrong with fast food. It was better drowned in hot sauce, but not awful. The rice was on the crunchy side and the tortilla tasted slightly raw, but the chicken pieces were blessedly small enough that I didn’t have to have an opinion on their quality.

I don’t know if it was the late hour or the bowling alley or the beer that didn’t sit well with me, but I admit that it may have been the Taco Bell. I felt a little wonky for about an hour but was perfectly ok in the morning. No doom or major gastro-intestinal distress to speak of, even though I was told to expect it by people less enthusiastic than Ben to have me try the Bell. I don’t think my body was all that surprised at what it was given, considering my never-ending love of fried pickles. I am not an haute cuisine 24-7 kind of girl. There is too much to eat all around me to confine myself to organics.