A Fireside Spaghetti Dinner

I know you're not going to believe this one, but I swear it happened. My family will back me up. Back when I was maybe around 12, Mom had made spaghetti and meatballs for supper. Since Dad didn't like spaghetti, he was having hamburger. Dad was at the head of the table; I was to his right, then my brother Mike. Mom was at the other end of the table, then my brother Mark and sister Rita. That's all of us.

We were lovin' the heck out of our spaghetti and meatballs. It was a family favorite; well, except for Dad who was chowing down his burger. As Dad always did, he ate fast and grabbed his cigarettes. (I hated when Dad smoked, but especially when I was trying to eat.) Dad stuck the cigarette in his mouth, grabbed his matches, and lit up.

Suddenly, there was a loud "WHOOSH" and a flame that shot out of Dad's mouth clear across the table! I've seen Dad breathe fire with his words, but never actually shoot a flame out of his mouth! Dad got up and took off to the bathroom. All of us sat there in shock trying to figure out what in the heck just happened. After a few minutes, I started coming back to reality and could hear and see again. I looked to my right, and there was my brother Mike with his face buried in the seat of his chair. He was making this soft crying sound, like a "wooooooooo". Then I looked at his plate. In the shock of the moment, I had taken my hand and smashed it into Mike's plate of spaghetti. I had pushed down so hard that I had actually cut the strands of spaghetti between my fingers. And my hand was still sitting in that plate of spaghetti.

While we were trying to recover, Dad had gone to the bathroom to wash out his mouth. Then he came back and explained why he was "flame-throwing". Before dinner, Dad had been working in the garage. Dad always had a long-neck beer with him. He grabbed the bottle of beer and took a big swig, but it wasn't beer. It was gasoline! Some time earlier, he had put gasoline in an empty beer bottle. Then later he picked up THAT bottle instead of the one that contained beer. Don't ask me why Dad did these things--he just did.

So after Dad lit his cigarette with the match, he blew out the match. He still had gas vapor in his lungs and you know what happens when gas vapor hits a flame or spark. WHOOOOSH!

Again, I swear it happened.