Losing
Last night DC whipped up some yummy grilled fish for dinner, and we invited L (of the “Trulucks fiasco” fame) to join us.
(As I mentioned earlier, DC does the cooking in our house, and I stay out of his way. One kitchen is not big enough for the two of us, so to speak. However, don’t think that I lounge around while the cooking is going on, watching DC do all the work and perhaps getting a foot massage and being fanned with a palm frond. No, I am a very valuable participant. I am the table-setter, the dish-washer, and the runner-to-the-grocery-store-for-essential-but-forgotten-ingredients. I contribute, and I just want us all to be clear about that.)
Sometimes when L comes to dinner, he surprises us (and when I say “us,” I mean “me”) with a gift of dessert. And boy, did he ever surprise us (me) last night. It was a dark chocolate mousse cake from a local bakery. An amazing, luscious, covered-in-butter-cream, orgasm-on-a-plate, chocolate mousse cake. Lordy, it was beautiful. I quickly cleared a spot for it in the fridge so the butter cream wouldn’t melt, and we carried on with dinner, both preparation of and then eating.
After dinner, L and I fell on the cake like a couple of starving hyenas on a bloated wildebeest carcass. Forks, teeth and elbows were flying everywhere, and I think we might have stirred up a small cyclone in the corner of the room. We ate and ate and ate. It was unbelievably good. Wonderfully, blissfully, toe-curling good. GOOD. Mmmmmmm. DC kept his distance. He isn’t much into dessert and is even less into chocolate. His idea of a nice dessert is a second helping of the entrée, so L and I were left to handle the cake ourselves. Plus I think DC knows about how you’re not supposed to approach animals while they’re eating. He is smart like that.
Later, even after L and I had eaten until we could eat no more, there was still three quarters of the cake left. So, when it was time for L to depart for the evening, he and I went through this little ritual that we have when there’s any dessert left after we’ve both had our fill. It starts like this:
“You’re taking that with you!”
“No, I’m not!”
“Yes, you are!”
“If I take it, it’s going in the trash.”
“You’re not leaving it here!”
“I’m not taking it, I’ll eat it all.”
and so on….
The ritual almost always results in the dessert being left for me, and the reason is this:
When L says “I’m going to throw that out if you don’t take it with you,” what he means is, “I’m going to throw that out if you don’t take it with you.”
However, when I say “I’m going to throw that out if you don’t take it with you,” what I mean is, “I want you to take that so I don’t finish it, but I can’t bear to see it thrown away, so if you’re not going to take it and actually eat it, then leave it for me.”
DC once made the mistake of grabbing the extra dessert while L and I were in the middle of our ritual, tossing it into the garbage can and then STOMPING ON IT, thinking he had just solved the problem. You should have seen the look of proud accomplishment on his face. But later he learned that he had not, in fact, solved the problem. Instead, he had completely traumatized me. Me, the love of his life. How could he not have known?? I still haven’t gotten over the shock of seeing something delicious crushed under his size 10 Tevas right in front of my eyes. I’m still hoping it won’t permanently affect our relationship, but you just never know.
Naturally, he stayed out of the fracas last night, and left me to defend myself against L and the evils of leftover dessert. And naturally, I failed. Again. As I sit here now, licking the chocolate mousse out from under my fingernails and sucking at the butter cream stuck in my hair, I’m wondering if I will ever win.
Doubt it.
(As I mentioned earlier, DC does the cooking in our house, and I stay out of his way. One kitchen is not big enough for the two of us, so to speak. However, don’t think that I lounge around while the cooking is going on, watching DC do all the work and perhaps getting a foot massage and being fanned with a palm frond. No, I am a very valuable participant. I am the table-setter, the dish-washer, and the runner-to-the-grocery-store-for-essential-but-forgotten-ingredients. I contribute, and I just want us all to be clear about that.)
Sometimes when L comes to dinner, he surprises us (and when I say “us,” I mean “me”) with a gift of dessert. And boy, did he ever surprise us (me) last night. It was a dark chocolate mousse cake from a local bakery. An amazing, luscious, covered-in-butter-cream, orgasm-on-a-plate, chocolate mousse cake. Lordy, it was beautiful. I quickly cleared a spot for it in the fridge so the butter cream wouldn’t melt, and we carried on with dinner, both preparation of and then eating.
After dinner, L and I fell on the cake like a couple of starving hyenas on a bloated wildebeest carcass. Forks, teeth and elbows were flying everywhere, and I think we might have stirred up a small cyclone in the corner of the room. We ate and ate and ate. It was unbelievably good. Wonderfully, blissfully, toe-curling good. GOOD. Mmmmmmm. DC kept his distance. He isn’t much into dessert and is even less into chocolate. His idea of a nice dessert is a second helping of the entrée, so L and I were left to handle the cake ourselves. Plus I think DC knows about how you’re not supposed to approach animals while they’re eating. He is smart like that.
Later, even after L and I had eaten until we could eat no more, there was still three quarters of the cake left. So, when it was time for L to depart for the evening, he and I went through this little ritual that we have when there’s any dessert left after we’ve both had our fill. It starts like this:
“You’re taking that with you!”
“No, I’m not!”
“Yes, you are!”
“If I take it, it’s going in the trash.”
“You’re not leaving it here!”
“I’m not taking it, I’ll eat it all.”
and so on….
The ritual almost always results in the dessert being left for me, and the reason is this:
When L says “I’m going to throw that out if you don’t take it with you,” what he means is, “I’m going to throw that out if you don’t take it with you.”
However, when I say “I’m going to throw that out if you don’t take it with you,” what I mean is, “I want you to take that so I don’t finish it, but I can’t bear to see it thrown away, so if you’re not going to take it and actually eat it, then leave it for me.”
DC once made the mistake of grabbing the extra dessert while L and I were in the middle of our ritual, tossing it into the garbage can and then STOMPING ON IT, thinking he had just solved the problem. You should have seen the look of proud accomplishment on his face. But later he learned that he had not, in fact, solved the problem. Instead, he had completely traumatized me. Me, the love of his life. How could he not have known?? I still haven’t gotten over the shock of seeing something delicious crushed under his size 10 Tevas right in front of my eyes. I’m still hoping it won’t permanently affect our relationship, but you just never know.
Naturally, he stayed out of the fracas last night, and left me to defend myself against L and the evils of leftover dessert. And naturally, I failed. Again. As I sit here now, licking the chocolate mousse out from under my fingernails and sucking at the butter cream stuck in my hair, I’m wondering if I will ever win.
Doubt it.
posted by Jill at 8:47 AM
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