In the juice

There aren’t a lot of situations in which being stirred awake by a sudden splat of liquid to the face is the start of a wonderful adventure. If you’re lucky, a pipe burst. If you’re less lucky, your creepy roommate’s getting his kink on. And if you’re the least lucky person ever, then it’s the run-off from the upstairs neighbour’s liquefying cadaver. Sylvia Pena of Modesto, California, is one unlucky lady.

Pena was sleeping on her couch when she felt the drips. Initially, she says, she thought she was drooling. But then there was the smell. A smell Pena describes as “just something beyond.” Something Great Beyond, as it turns out. Reports say her neighbour’s death, likely of a drug overdose, went unnoticed long enough for his body to become “moderately to severely decomposed.” Which is when it started raining corpse.

Adding to her plight, Pena’s insurance company refused to compensate her for her contaminated property because “blood and bodily fluids” were “not among the 17 named perils covered.” Unwilling to accept that, Pena turned to Emmy award-winning consumer/investigative reporter Kurtis Ming, whose tireless efforts reaped Pena full compensation, leaving her nothing to contend with but zombie nightmares.

by SCOTT SAXON