Integrity

T

I first downloaded it to my phone in June of 2020 while we were quarantined. At the time it was just me, Amy, & Stephen. We worked at home, ordered groceries for delivery, & waved to Stephen’s dad when drove by the house a few days a week. All of this was well & good, but I am a social butterfly. I missed people and conversations & laughing. This is not to say that Amy & Stephen don’t make me laugh, they do but we were spending every second of every day together & I needed an outlet. You would have thought, with the abundance of free time we had that I would have gotten a TON of writing done. Wrong again. I had major writer's block & was on the precipice of quitting writing altogether. Terri A. Wilson, a fantastical author in her own right, sent me an outline program that gave me the kick in the ass I needed to start wiring again but I digress. I downloaded TikTok almost as a joke because of our 10-year-old (at the time). I was instantly & irrevocably hooked! TikTok has something for everyone. There is some drama, it is social media, but for the most part it’s been informative & fun.

Last weekend, while running errands, I asked Amy what she wanted to do for dinner. With Saturday being our only day off together, Amy usually grills or makes a big spread. We agreed on steaks & went to a local store that we frequent often, especially for steaks, pork butts, & ribs. While we were there, we decided on ribs instead of steak. Fast forward a couple of hours & we’re home. The boys & I are pulling the Christmas bins out & Amy is getting the ribs ready to throw in the smoker.

“Umm, babe?” She says as I walk into the kitchen. “Look at this. There’s something wrong with these ribs.” I walk over, inspecting the ribs I so desperately want for dinner.

“They look fine to me, “I tell her as she pokes a whole in the top of the rack. Something came oozing out & she had the forethought to ask me to video it so we could show my dad, another grill master. I took a 10 second video & she threw the ribs away. Gross, right?? Later, trying to find out what the hell it was, Amy tried to post the video to a Facebook group that focuses only on smoked meats, but they wouldn’t allow the video because technically the meat was not smoked. As a last-ditch effort, she posted the video to TikTok to ask, “What is this?” The video blew up over night! We were shocked by the numbers on something so disgusting, but we needed answers.

Once the video hit 6.5 million followers a reporter from the Daily Mail reached out to ask if they could interview Amy & use her video. While she was initially excited about the prospect, she had a few questions before she would agree. The number one question was “Do I have to name the store where the ribs were purchased?” The short answer was yes.

Amy declined the interview immediately. After much research she knew no one was to blame for the bad pork. The store where we purchased from doesn’t wrap their own meat and therefore would have no way of knowing there was a cyst in the ribs.

I have always known my wife was an amazing person but the amount of integrity she has to turn down her 15 minutes of fame is incomprehensible.

The video is still up, sitting at over 12 million views as I type this. Most recently Dr. Pimple Popper dueted it & confirmed that it was a cyst and should not be eaten.

Our 15 minutes was fun but it’s time to move on. Maybe some good will come of this disgusting video someday. I guess we’ll wait and see. I hope you all have a happy & safe Thanksgiving!