Scene: Arens house, 5:30 p.m.
The kitchen floor was strewn with the little angel's fashion design warehouse sweatshop. I got her this kit for making clothes with pretty paper and stencils and teeny-tiny little metal hangers, and I created a monster. The neighbor girl had just gone home, and I picked my way over the debris with the delicacy of a T-Rex.
Here is what I was trying to do all at the same time:
- Strip enough programs off our old Gateway laptop to accommodate some very memory-heavy version of an I Spy computer game.
- Avoid crushing the paper fashions littering my kitchen, as my tiny design star continued to labor like Katie Holmes over her creations.
- Finish some research I was doing for work when I realized that squawking sound was my baby bird wanting to be fed.
- Make sweet potato fries.
Raise your hand if you see the problem with this methodology.
I picked my way again over the Garment District in my kitchen to the library, where I found a recipe for sweet potato fries online and printed it out.
Then I remembered I had to uninstall a few more things on the Gateway. The Gateway obstinately asked me to disable Norton. The entire ordeal involved directions on yet another page. The little angel bounced in my lap, asking loudly when she could play her game before scurrying off to beat Michael Kors into submission.
As I was finishing that, I got an idea for the project I was doing for work and scuttled back to my desk to make a note of it, passing the preheating oven on the way and remembering the sweet potato fries.
As I studied the recipe, I realized it called for five potatoes, and I only had two. I decided to halve the recipe, including all the seasoning.
My groovy julienne knife-cutting thing made the sections look kind of wimpy. I was hoping for more robust fries.
The little angel asked again when the Gateway would be ready. The Gateway wanted to be rebooted.
Back to the kitchen. I may have dumped in the full amount of garlic before I remembered I was halving the recipe.
I pulled out plates, then realized the kitchen table was still part of the Garment District. Then I remembered I hadn't finished mixing up the seasoning.
I dumped more things into the bowl. The little angel saw me mixing dry ingredients and immediately pulled a chair over to help. If there's anything she loves more than designing, it's Cake Boss.
I may have put in more salt than I should've. That may have happened.
Finally the ingredients were ready, and the oven was hot. I drizzled some olive oil and tossed the potatoes into the seasoning.
It seemed like an awful lot of seasoning.
The smell almost took me out. I looked at the clock. Almost 6:00. I opened a window and forged ahead.
After I tossed the potatoes in the seasoning, I put them in a colander and tried to shake off the extra seasoning. (Yes, there was that much.) I thought I had it all off, but when I dumped the potatoes out on the cookie sheet, there was still a huge mess of it. Maybe it'll burn off! I thought.
Shut up.
I put the whole thing in the oven and went back to my work e-mail, forgetting about the Garment District.
I rebooted the Gateway again.
About this point Beloved walked in and complimented me on the garlic smells emanating from the oven. I looked at it warily. At this point, I ALREADY KNEW.
We cleaned up the Garment District, we explained the Gateway needed major surgery and I shut my laptop for Family Dinner Bonding Time, because that will keep my daughter off drugs. Beloved popped open the oven and took one of the fries into his mouth. I shuddered and turned away, unable to watch.
*cough*
*cough*
He was very polite about it, but I didn't even want to try one. I transferred the entire cookie sheet directly into the garbage and put the ceiling fan on high. The seasoning smell almost made me hurl. We had chips with our turkey burgers. Once again: RITA COOKING FAIL.
I know I'm doing too many things at once. But how do you not?
