I’m allergic to peanuts. I’m the reason you have to endure a transcontinental flight with low blood sugar. I’m the reason your kid can’t bring PBJ on a field trip. Peanuts make me tip over and grab my throat.
So, of course I ate some last night.
It might not have been peanuts. It could have been chick peas, peanut oil, ground pistachios, or pine nuts. Any of those disreputable characters could have caused the trouble.
All I know is: I was lied to, and I had a very bad evening.
The Indian take-out restaurant on the corner will NOT be getting a holiday card from me this year. If someone would care to write out a polite note for me in Urdu, I would love to graphically detail for them the throat-closing unpleasantness that follows a wide grin and un-fact-checked assertions of “no nuts! no nuts!” that are obviously uttered to get me out of the way rather than out of any actual understanding of what I am requesting.
I made it to work this morning despite the powerful epinephrine-hangover that follows one of these episodes. Fortunately, Betsy saw through my ruse and sent me off to the Zen Room (yes, we have a zen room) to lie down until I could go to the doctor’s.
So now I’m home, with a fridge full of Indian food and a powerful need to check my email. 
I opened my computer and was greeted with today’s horoscope:
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Oh dear. ROT IN HELL peanut pushers!!!
Oh no PB&J goodness for you. No oatmeal walnut raisin cookies. I am sad. :-(((
I think it’s horrible when restaurants treat food allergies as trivial rather than something that is potentially life threatening – it should be something that can be reported to health officials and could lead to a place shutting down until they develop proper practices.
I’m glad you survived! I also ran across this news article today that might make the world a safer place for you in the future:
U.S. scientists say they’ve found a way to deactivate peanut allergens
Restaurants very rarely care enough about this sort of thing to give the real answer rather than just the right one, unfortunately.
Glad you’re okay.
I suppose a near-death experience would give most anyone an adrenaline flood. Kooky how the whole universe knows about it though!
Ah! I got one of those exciting types of hangovers a couple of weeks ago too. But man am I happy I can eat chick peas. They’re like my favorite food.
So my question is, what is the Urdu/Hindi/Gujarati word for peanut? My husband has a nut allergy and always has to go to great length to explain that peanuts are OK. They aren’t nuts! It’s just this crazy English language that causes people to confuse the two. Perhaps if your server speaks another language s/he was not so confused and truly didn’t realize your nut allergy meant peanuts as well.