My arteries hardened and my left arm started tingling as I watched Paula’s Southern Thanksgiving on The Food Network tonight. The menu alone was enough, including:

• deep-fried turkey, with a cavity that was subsequently filled with melted butter;

• turducken;

• bacon wrapped breadsticks;

• mama’s fried cream corn, with a ladle-full of butter and bacon and oil and grease; and

• sweet potato balls, filled with marshmallows.

I was looking for food safety errors, but Paula Deen is fairly good about washing her hands and cooks, deep-fries and broils anything living out of the food.

But a last-minute apple butter run had host Paula sticking her grubby paws into jars of malted candy balls, praline pecans, chocolate covered peanuts and whatever other candies were around.

Paula said,

“I’m telling you what, you bring a fat girl to a candy store, and you see how big her smile gets.”

Rock Salt says,

“Keep the norovirus and the hepatitis A and whatever else is in the poop on your hands out of the candy jars. Use the scoop.”