Thanks for Nothing, Marilyn: A Wild Friendship and the Texas Trash Chex Mix Recipe That Survived It All

Marilyn is an original, I’ll give her that. More than outspoken, more than verbose. She is one of a kind, when they made her, they threw away the key. When she was around, if you heard laughter, it was coming from somewhere in her vicinity. She was funny, but I liked to tell her she was funny looking.

I hurried across campus, taking the stairs two at a time to Old Red, also known as the Ashbel Smith Building, on the University of Texas Medical Branch Campus in Galveston, Texas. It was a real stunner of a building, built in 1891 by Nicholas Clayton, a prominent architect known for his High Victorian Era style. Massive doors closed behind me with a finality that made me feel like greatness had happened there and was still happening there. It had gotten its name ‘Old Red,’ due to its red pressed brick and red Texas granite used in its construction. Back in the day, medical students took to calling it old red, and eventually the name stuck.

The Ashbel Smith Building, renowned for its impressive architecture, proudly stands with its detailed design on the University of Texas Medical Branch Campus in Galveston, Texas. Image by WhisperToMe on Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

Once inside I felt like I’d stepped back in time. There were statues of medicine’s greats. Each one had a story, and every one of them gave me goosebumps. From Hippocrates, known as the Father of Medicine, Louis Pasteur, inventor of pasteurization, developer of the germ theory, and creator of the first vaccines against rabies and anthrax. Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen, discoverer of x-rays, Jonas Salk, developer of the Polio Vaccine, and Madame Curie, discoverer of radium and polonium and also known for her vast contribution to cancer research. There were others, as I looked at them with awe. I could never leave that building without thinking about those huge giants in medicine that made all our lives monumentally better and helped us live decades longer. No more loitering in the building’s front entry, I’d better hurry, I was going to be late for class, again. Time management wasn’t exactly my forte. I was in my first semester of nursing school, and I was a mess. 

Reaching the amphitheater, I plopped down on the first row, close to the lectern. I had to get paper and pen out and ready to take a mountain of notes. I liked to think myself studious, but a ton of other people were writing nonstop, too. All but someone I later learned was Marilyn. She sat way in the back listening, but not a pen in sight, no notes for her. What was she nuts, we were going to have a test in a few days, and I was apoplectic. Not her, when we got a break, she sat cracking jokes, inviting everybody out for margaritas. I was intrigued, and appalled.  At that point in my life, I wouldn’t know a margarita if it bit me. When class was out, there was a swarm around Marilyn, I kept trying to listen subtly, but nada; there was no subtle to Marilyn. I thought her a strange bird. I hurried home to study. 

We had class for lecture, but soon into the semester, we had lab, bedmaking, skills for nasogastric tubes, chest tubes, IV starts, medications and the like. I had my nose in a book when the lab instructor paired us for practice. Looking up, I got a shock, and who was my lab partner, none other than Marilyn. No way, no how. We had to make an unoccupied mitered bed. I was holding my mouth just right when Marilyn barged over.

Marilyn, Karen's best friend and nursing school classmate.

“Ok sister, move. Listen and learn.” She sounded like a drill sergeant, I knew they had to make mitered beds as well but was she for real.

“Ok, tuck in the top sheet. Then hold one hand with the draped sheet elevated, then fold over the draped sheet against the mattress while the second hand tucks it in, not undoing the mitered corner.” 

I looked at her like she’d grown another head; not quite mastering it. Marilyn was huffy, finally teaching me and some of the other students the art of the perfectly mitered corner. She was pleased as punch. We made it through lab, as I slipped out a side door, I heard a commotion off in the distance, glancing at a group that surrounded Marilyn. She smoked like a chimney, cussed like a sailor and told jokes that had people folded over in half with laughter. Me, I was off to study. 

In two short years, I graduated from nursing school on a song and a prayer. I got my dream job in the ER. That’s when I found out Marilyn was going to be working in the ER too. Heaven help us. It took me a minute, but I realized why Marilyn never took notes in nursing school. She was bloody brilliant. It proved true throughout school and in the ER. Sometimes, she’d come up with a diagnosis and tell the physicians. They didn’t believe her at first, but learned later, the old girl was right after all.

Heading into the hospital nurses conference room I straightened my scrubs, cleaning my stethoscope with alcohol while ditching my winter coat, trying desperately to remember the lock combination. It was new, I wasn’t. I took one look in the mirror and screamed so loud. My hair looked like a tsunami hit. It was a topsy-turvy mess. I was a fairly new nurse in the ER, and I was still petrified.

Doing my best to wet my hair down, I spit on my fingers, running it through the madness atop my head. I was hoping for a miracle. No such luck. 

Marilyn breezed into the nurse’s lounge like a tornado let loose in a spring storm. Her wedge haircut fell just so as she ran her hand over the length of it. I tried to scurry to the other side so she wouldn’t see me. I knew she would have a field day with my new coiffure. She spotted me and zoomed in, pupils dilating, mouth agape. “What on the planet happened to you? Got your hand stuck in a socket, didn’t you? If I were you, I would run outa here before someone sees you and arrests you for that do. Oh no, you got a perm! All bets are off. I’ll give you three guesses who’s in charge today.” 

“That’s not funny, Marilyn. I couldn’t possibly be in charge. I hadn’t been a nurse for long enough; there’s no way they would trust me with that, (would it ever really be long enough?). Are you serious?” I truly thought of grabbing my coat and running out and never coming back. Taking a train, a plane, an automobile to the next state over. Marilyn, my pal from nursing school was brutally honest and she and I usually ended every conversation with the salutation, TFN, Thanks For Nothing. I knew she was joking so I went out to start report, after I tussled with my hair. Never mind, it was a lost cause.

Flexing my neck down, I tried to relax, doing range of motion, trying to relieve the tightness. The night crew did a double take as I tried to slip in unannounced. Not meant to be. A couple of them kept staring, trying to figure out if it was me under all that fuzz. Oh boy. 

The day charge nurse, Sally touched my shoulder and patted my arm. “Leslie, the Nurse Manager wants you to be charge nurse tonight. It’ll be a good learning experience.”

My ears went into buzz mode. I felt light-headed. “What? You must be kidding me. I, I,” nothing else came from my mouth. What could I say? How hard could it be, right? I readied myself. Fortified with coffee, I could pull it off. 

The ER was like lightening, catastrophe could strike in a second, as patients presented with everything from coughs and colds to CPR in progress. Also, strange to say but my feet worried me. I got these new shoes. They were a little tight, rubbing a blister where there shouldn’t be one. I hoped it was going to pass, but the pain had already started in. I felt my foot pinch and a blister bigger than Dallas was already running all along my heel. You know how when that heel pain starts with new shoes and everything else is downhill. That kind of pain. Getting report, I shook it off as we rounded.

The East side had full occupancy: In 201 was a patient with a Maxillary fracture, was smashed right in the face by a baseball bat. The Oral Surgeons were trying to decide if it was a LeFort I, II or III. None were advisable, as the physician, in full faculty teaching mode explained it all to us.

“First described by French surgeon, Rene’ LeFort, these are midface fractures that occur with blunt trauma.” Holding up the X-ray to a reader, he expounded, “looking at this Waters’ view, the patient has a LeFort I, as you can see its horizonal floating palate. They take the image through the chin at an angle to see the maxillary and frontal sinuses. Let’s stabilize his fracture and take him to the OR. I will post him.”

I was limping by then, my feet felt like I had a vice on them. I could barely walk. Both of them joined against me. I was going to have to do something quick. Waves of pain wrapped my leg like a viper. I took my shoes off, quickly covering my feet with disposable shoe covers. I know it wasn’t kosher, but I almost went down. 

Another patient needed blood and was quickly typed and crossmatched, as we sent off the requisition straight away, getting the blood rather quickly. Marilyn and I checked it with another nurse and were about to hang it. I couldn’t get it spiked, the blue tube didn’t quite meet the top of the hub. They tried it too. I wiggled, twirled, and held my tongue every which way but no-go. With one final shove, it was there, or so I thought. I went ahead and hung it up. The doctor wanted a pressure bag on it to help it go in a bit faster. So far so good. The blood was going in beautifully and was three quarters of the way in when she suddenly blew! Blood coated every inch of the room, the patient, me, the other nurse, and Marilyn. With my tail between my legs, I had to clean the patient up. She was just fine and was going to be admitted. I was in shambles. Mind you, this was many years ago, but I still remember it like it was yesterday.

Marilyn and I both were blood-splotched and had to give report to the oncoming shift. What with blood splatters all over, barefooted and shoe covers on my feet, and the new perm and all, I was a freak job. People laughed till they cried. Someone said Halloween came early this year. Marilyn called me every name in the book. I was not asked to be charge for a long, long time after that.

Despite that, Marilyn seemed to forgive me, and we stayed friends, becoming good friends over the years. Really? We cooked many meals together, some memorable. One of my favorite things we made was Texas Trash, Marilyn’s family recipe adapted from Chex. It always hits the spot when you want something slightly spicy, salty, buttery and crunchy.

Zoom ahead twenty-five years, Marilyn called. She had a present for me, she was moving to Nashville and couldn’t take her cat Tabby. She lived in Weimar, Texas, a three-hour drive from me and my family, near Galveston Texas. She said I’d better bring a crate, that the cat was kind of wild. Kind of wild, that wasn’t the half of it. Before I got her home, I was like a cat on a hot tin roof. That cat cried all the way home, mewing insistently like she was dying. When I got home, she met my other two cats and immediately started a whopper of a cat fight. Marilyn told me previously, they’ll get along great. Not. 

Tabby, also known as Marilyn, relaxes in style on a plush, grey blanket, embodying feline elegance and comfort.

From the day I got her, Tabby tried to trip me with her paws, throwing them out at the last minute before I got by her and escaped. She chased me off my own couch many times, has tried to bite me for no reason, has threatened to jump in the tub with me as I took a bath, and eats like a grown man. I quickly renamed her Marilyn. They were just alike! Every day with Marilyn (the cat) is one for survival and even today after seven years with her, I must still watch myself around her, she is not exactly your sweetheart of a cat. She will take me down if given half the chance. Lucky me. TFN, Thanks For Nothing Marilyn. (The cat, and the person).

Marilyn the cat up to no good.

Here you go, Marilyn’s favorite Texas Trash recipe. This is for you Marilyn, the both of you.

Tell me if you have your own Chex Mix recipe. Let me know in the comments!

Marilyn's Texas Trash -3.pdf

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Marilyn’s Texas Trash

A savory Southern snack mix of cereals, nuts, pretzels, and chips tossed in a bold, buttery seasoning and baked until perfectly crisp.

Recipe By: Karen Hand Allen (www.karenhandallen.com) 

This delightful, just-right seasoned mix of nuts, chips and buttery crunch is perfect for a ball game or party snack and is sure to please a crowd. It’s surprisingly addictive and the slightly spicy taste will have you coming back for more.

Servings: 24-30

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cooking Time: 1 hour | Rest Time: - | Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes.

Ingredients:  1 stick butter melted 2 tsp seasoning salt ½ tsp garlic salt ½ tsp celery salt 3 tbsp Worcestershire sauce 1-2 tbsp Tabasco sauce 2 cups Wheat Chex  2 cups Corn Chex  2 cups Rice Chex 1 cup dry roasted peanuts 1 cup dry roasted macadamia nuts 1 cup cashews 1 cup bite size pretzels 1 cup bite size bagel chips 1 cup Goldfish

Instructions: Preheat oven 250°F. In a small bowl, melt butter, add seasonings, Worcestershire & Tabasco. Mix well. In a large bowl, add cereal, nuts, pretzels, bagel and goldfish.  Pour over butter and seasoning mixture, coating well. Pour onto a baking pan lined with parchment paper. Bake for 1 hour, stir every 15 minutes. Cool, store airtight container.