Say Cheese... Now Smile!

With all the talk about "throw up" , I decided to share a delicious little "yakking" story of my own. So sit back, relax, and hold that barf bag close to you cause it ain't pretty. This one goes out to the Dan, the one who rocks... and the oh so sexy heart nippled Rolo.

So when I was 9-10 years old, my sister and I got invited to go on a mini road trip with some family friends to Death Valley. I don't remember why exactly we were going, but I remember being really excited because it seemed like it would be a lot of fun. My parents weren't going and at the time, Carlene and I were really good friends with the other little girls our age on the trip... so as you can imagine, it would be an "endless" slumber party sort of road trip!

My Aunt came and picked us up in the wee hours of the morning... then we were off! 4 little girls in the back of the van makes for a lot of noise and movement. Add to that the rocking of the van itself on the road, along with warm stuffy air... Poor little Nicole was getting awfully nauseous an hour into the trip.

I remember saying out loud "I don't feel very good" but there wasn't anything anyone could to do to make me feel better. Back then, once I had just a hint of motion sickness, it was pretty much over. I was once on a boat to Catalina, and seriously spent a good portion of it hurling off of the side of it. I even took the drugs and had a patch for motion sickness beforehand, but it was ineffective for me.

Anyways, so there I was, sitting in the very back seat of the van, trying to hold down every urge to spew... until I just couldn't take it anymore. I cried "I'm going to throw up!" and put my hands over my mouth. "Yeah right!" The girls just laughed and one girl turned around to face me. Right then, I yakked into my hands.

I guess the impact of the throw up was pretty intense cause barf bits exploded out of the nooks and crannies of my fingers and into that one girl's bangs.

All a while, I think the car was swerving and pulling over to the side... as well as a lot of screaming going inside the van.

As I'm sure you all know, the scent of barf is pretty putrid, and so that set Carlene off and she lost it right onto the floor of the van. One by one, everyone else starting yakking as well.... but luckily they all got out in time to christen the side of the road with vomit.

Afterwards, we went to some restaurant and had cheesecake for breakfast after "bathing" in the public restroom. My shirt was soaking wet because I had to rinse the puke off of me. Everyone later made fun of the situation calling it "Nicole and the barfers" in homage of "Barbie and the Rockers" which itself was a sad doll spinoff of "Jem and the Holograms."

Needless to say, we never made it to Death Valley.... but we did get to Apple Valley, which to my disappointment had NO apples and didn't fit my conjured up image of a land that would have been fit for Strawberry Shortcake. We did stay at a house that had shag carpeting and glitter on the ceiling though. Nice huh.

Later my mom heard some old wives tale about oranges helping stop motion sickness. Well, it has worked for me and every road trip that I've taken with my family afterwards, I've made sure that theres a bag of oranges in the car at all times. Then, if things were to get "iffy", I can just stick a piece of orange peel in my nose and I would be a-ok. It works! Really!

Moral of the story: When someone says they're gonna throw up, believe them and pull the car over. Or else you might get it in your high 80's bangs. And THAT really does blow chunks.