What's small and white and starts with "M"? (Hint: not mice)

Ok. What's the grossest thing you can possibly imagine? You might be able to think of something theoretical, or conjur up disgusting images from some horrible violent british gang movie called Gangster Number 1, or maybe you have a very vivid imagination... but have you ever physically SEEN the grossest thing you can think of? I officially have.

I may be exaggerating for the sake of drama. But only slightly.

I recently observed an autopsy on a body that had been dead for between 2 and 3 weeks. Now, while there is a bit of an odor, and a slight green tinge to things, and a good deal of bloating about the abdomen, this is not as awful as one might think. No goopiness or rotting. I learned that there are basically two routes that a body can go after it expires: putrefaction or mummification. The former occurs in warm, damp environments; the latter in dry. Fortunately, the one I observed had taken the mummification path, which involved a lot of very hard, yellowed skin and some shrunken facial features.

So I am hanging out looking at this body, listening to the Medical Examiner dictate the external exam, when I happen to glance down at the body bag. Or maybe it was that something had caught my eye, some slight, subtle movement on the white plastic. And oh my god. Maggots. "M" STANDS FOR MAGGOTS!. That has got to be one of the more disgusting words in the english vocabulary. Maggots. And we are talking very large maggots - about an inch long - and they were very mobile little guys. Soft and sick and horrible.

So this is where our forensic entomology comes in. These are larvae of the blowfly, which is always the first bug on the scene. They are there in minutes to hours (sometimes arriving before the person actually dies). Some kind of amazing sense of smell or something. And they go for the dark, damp, enclosed areas to lay their eggs. The... private... areas. And that's exactly where they were on this body. Wriggling and spilling out of... ugh.

I know, right? Pretty effing gross. I am not one to be physically affected by "gross" things. I have seen many a bloody, gory, mess withough flinching. I have looked at pictures of gunshot wounds to the head while eating lunch. But I must admit, when I sat down that day to eat my lunch, which conveniently enough was a lovely rice dish, I couldn't do it. When I found myself scrutinizing each bite to make completely sure that the grains of rice were not actually dead maggots, I knew it was time to just put the fork down.

I'm pretty sure, though, that Cabel, Nicole, Noby, and Kaori appreciated hearing this story later that night while we were eating sushi.

Other very intense things that I have done this week:
- Read a suicide note
- Stuck a needle in someone's eye to remove the vitreous fluid (something that is done on every body for toxicologic exam)
- Gone with the medical investigator to a scene of death