The good news is, I lived, and I guess in truth I was never concerned that I wouldn’t live, but I was concerned that I was having a real problem.

Here’s the story.

So, you know, it was one of those hectic weekends, as I had known it would be.

And among other things, Liam and I had a bunch of rock shop shows at Manalapan Day, this big outdoor day of fair stuff, booths and games and prizes and food and all those things.

And we knew that he was performing a set, we knew that I was performing a set.

We found out while we were there that he was performing a second set.

His second set and my only set got delayed a bunch.

So we were there forever.

And so we’re buying various bits of horrible fair food, which of course I love.

An Oreo is fine, but a deeply fried Oreo, wow, that’s the way to go.

But so, there’s one point where he’s going to go walk with friends and I’m just going to sit around waiting for his second set to roll around.

And I decide I’m going to buy some food.

So I get a large soft pretzel.

And I sit back down on a bench where I’ve been sitting for a while, police car nearby, where two officers have been sitting, eating, and not really doing anything the whole time.

There’s nothing for them to be doing, but I guess they’re there to, you know, make sure things stay safe and good at Manalapan Day, I don’t know.

But I take a bite of the pretzel, a normal bite, by the way, and I swallow and instantly I’m like, this has not gone well.

Not like, oh, I, you know, got food stuck or went down the wrong pipe.

Like, I am not able to breathe.

And something has gone very wrong with this pretzel.

Spoiler alert, I’m doing this podcast, I lived.

So I’m like, what am I going to do here?

And first of all, I have a very dad brain moment, which what I mean is Liam had used up his water, and so I went and bought him a nice cold water bottle that I had for him and he was supposed to come back to me to get it as soon as he was ready.

And in my head I’m like, I want to try to use water, but I can’t use Liam’s water, that’s Liam’s.

Now, a sane person in this moment would be like, hmm, let me use this water, but I was like, that’s Liam’s water.

So I still have like dregs of water in my own water bottle.

And I pick up my water bottle and try to take a sip, but because of how my choking is happening, I cannot get any of the water down, right?

So I pour water down and it just comes out my mouth and nose, really.

And I find out a minute later that an officer has noted at least that I’m having this problem, like that I try to take a sip and that water just goes everywhere, I cannot get anything down.

And I’m like, trying to see, can I cough it out, can I do anything?

But I cannot cough or breathe or do anything, so I get up and wave to the officers.

I do kind of like the, I do the get your attention wave and then the international sign for choking, hands around neck thing.

And they come, to their credit, I’m not always the world’s biggest police fan, depending on the police and the situation, but to their credit, they came out of their car right away.

And I’m like, are you okay?

And I try to kind of Heimlich myself, where I’ve got a hand on my own ribcage, chest, upper ear, whatever, and I hammer it once.

And so I’m standing up now, I’m facing those officers, I hammer my own chest and lodge free, whatever I am choking on, well, this bite of pretzel.

And basically like cough it up and then, I don’t want to be gross, but we’re just going to go for gross, like kind of also puke, right?

Because whatever water could get down there, it comes through, like it’s just, it’s only the pretzel, but then like it’s also the grossness of your body having attempted to swallow this thing and failed.

So again, all this is happening in seconds, but it’s try and fail to drink, which is noticed by police officers, stand up and really get their attention.

They come out, they come to me and then like puke slash choke up pretzel directly in front of them, kind of mortified.

And they’re like, are you okay?

And I’m like, I am now.

And they’re like, what happened?

I’m like, I don’t know.

And one of the officers is like, small bites, man, small bites.

And I’m like, hey, I agree with you.

It wasn’t like I had bit off this massive chunk of pretzel or whatever, but they confirmed that I was okay.

And I was like, yeah, sorry.

That was a lot there for a second.

Like, well, I’m glad you did it yourself, which I had.

I will say I’m still a little bit sore in two places, one on my chest and one in my throat.

Like it still almost feels like there’s something stuck in my throat.

I’m sure just from some irritation there, but it was crazy.

And then Liam comes back and I’m trying to tell him this story.

And he is like, he is very amused by my embarrassment at like, hey, I stood up, got officers to come out of this car and then barfed in front of them to undo my choking, to free myself.

But it was intense.

After that, I was fine.

I ate the rest of the pretzel.

I shared some with Liam.

Not the part that I choked on, that we left on the ground.

But yeah, it was intense.

I lived.

Yeah.

I also got to drive eight hours yesterday to celebrate Father’s Day, I’ll save some of my Father’s Day stuff for tomorrow.

Happy Monday.

Don’t choke.

Lex.