Oatmeal: It’s explosive.
1) Carefully read instructions on oatmeal packet. This time you will do it right. For once, breakfast won’t end in messy defeat.
2) Stir together milk and oatmeal.
3) Set microwave according to directions. Hide pre-victory grin. Whistle. Exude confidence.
4) Watch oatmeal spin on tray, ready to halt all cooking at first sign of boilage. Squint a little. Hold breath. Fear overflow, despite yourself.
5) Stir and check status. (Answer: Oat flakes drifting in warmish milk soup.)
6) Another minute in microwave.
7) Still floaty dry oats + milk. This could take a while.
8) Set microwave for one more minute. It’s still raw, and barely lukewarm. You’re totally safe.
9) Go set table. Take your time. Swagger a little.
10) Saunter back to microwave, spoon in hand, poised to stir.
11) Open microwave door. Discover that, in your absence, your impending meal became an oatmeal volcano, spouting thick, gloppy, magma-esque mess all over clean microwave tray.
12) Congratulations! Your oatmeal is hot and (mostly) cooked. So is the tray beneath. Blow on breakfast. Wait for it to cool so you can finally eat it.
13) Clean-up time. Soak bowl for sixteen hours. Chisel cemented cereal off bottom of microwave. Try not to swear.
14) Vow to use water instead of milk next time, though tasteless paste isn’t your preferred dining choice.
15) Scribble “Buy bigger bowl” on shopping list. Amend to “Much, much bigger.” Underline. Add exclamation point.
16) Or there’s always toast. Toast is safe. Usually.
Your turn – what’s something you repeatedly attempt, even though you know it will lead to your ultimate doom? Talk an elderly relative through way-too-techy computer issues? Jump into NaNoWriMo with the threat of Thanksgiving (and all those pies you have to bake) hanging over your head? Make coffee in that complicated machine in the break room? Sew pants? Come on! Make me feel better. Spill it. (Yeah. Spill. You and my oatmeal…)
Oh yes, I’ve done that. Now I set the microwave to 30-second increments and stir in between 30-second increments. No more spills!
I’m doing NaNo and it’s going well despite new job and kids and always lots of stuff to do. Last year I aimed to finish before Thanksgiving (and did!), this year I’ll just do the best I can to finish on the 30th. I’ll take whatever I can get.
Good luck with your oatmeal!
I wish I had your patience! I should; I know I should. More importantly, though, great job on NaNoWriMo!! Finishing early last year? Wow! And doing it again this year with all that other stuff going on? You have my total respect.
Caryn, this made me feel better–and yes, I just add and add Nano to Thanksgiving to giving a library talk to trying new recipes to promoting my “coming out now” stories and “out now” novels–well, you get the idea.
But my personal best lately has been starting lunch in a pan, then going and writing “while it cooks for a couple of minutes”. Result: burnt lunch, burnt pan–I’ve done this several times!
Whoa! Conda! You have such a busy month. And yet you still seem sane, so color me impressed. 🙂
And, yes, I have done similar things before. Now I set timers (because I’ve learned the hard way), but I did it once or twice when I was in college and got so wrapped up in everything I had to do that I forgot I had put my lunch in the oven. Oops.
No matter how many times I try to bake home-made cookies, they always come out wrong. Either the bottoms cook to fast, or they burn, or they fall flat, or they’re too soft, or I used the wrong chocolate chips…
Never goes wrong though when I just eat the dough.
Ha ha ha! I agree – cookie dough has it all over baked cookies (and not just because you can’t burn dough, or make it fall flat, or undercook it, which I somehow manage to do every time, too).
Ha! This is fun. Hmm, let’s see… Oh, I have one. Roller skating. I’m so bad at it, I won’t try it a-n-y-m-o-r-e. And if I want to live to see my grandkids one day, then it’s best. I always get a nice groove going and eventually flop on my (thankfully) cushioned backside. Only once or twice did I sprain my ankle pretty bad. In fact, after a REALLY bad ankle sprain (unrelated to skating) a couple of years ago, where it was almost broken, I wouldn’t chance it again. ~The bigger they are, the harder they fall~ 😛
Ooh! Good one! I remember roller skating when I was little, back when they had skating rinks. (Do those still exist?) It was so fun, but painful for anyone who’s subject to the effects of gravity.
I laughed so much at the photo too! 😛
And I always burn pizzas in the oven! And burn pots too!
This is a pic of one: http://twitpic.com/8ds4xy
Though my hubby burned that one, lol. 🙂
Ha! Love your pizza picture. Thank you so much for hunting it down and sharing it. It actually made me laugh out loud. I like my pizza well-done, but even that might be a little much.
It is after midnight and somehow I am wanting a bowl of oatmeal! I am not clever enough to cook it in the microwave, so I use a teakettle to make instant oatmeal. Thanks for the late night laugh and a great reason to return to blogs. 🙂
A tea kettle sounds like a good idea! So you boil the water (I assume) and pour it in a bowl, mix in the packet, then let it sit for a while to cook? Sounds like the least messy way I’ve heard of, though I do admit I’d miss my milk in my oatmeal. More than I miss my clean microwave after every cooking attempt? Hmmm…Might be worth thinking about!
Glad you enjoyed it and that it made you laugh. I figured I could either get annoyed or I could laugh. I decided to laugh. And since laughter is more fun when shared, a blog post was born. 🙂
I needed this reminder. I just dove back into drafting and I’m the hump stage. Where I know how I want to end but just need to keep plugging away reminding myself I can make it better later. LOL.
Ah, yes! THAT stage. It’s a hard one, isn’t it? Then you get to the end, and it’s all downhill, and WHEE!!!
Good luck! Hope you get there soon!
Ha! And yes to #16.
Thanks. And me, too, on 16. That was this morning’s breakfast, actually. Much less messy. 🙂
You write the best posts, Caryn! Thanks for making me smile. 🙂
Awww, thanks, Robin! And now you are making me smile!
P.S. I love your posts, too! They’re always so cute and warm and fun.
Ha ha! Yeah, it always does turn out that way. For me, it’s NaNo that never works out. Something always comes up that means I have to stop a week or two in! Oh well, at least I’m writing. 🙂
Exactly! And just think how many words you have that you wouldn’t have had otherwise! I have a feeling the same thing would happen to me, which is why I haven’t attempted NaNo yet. Someday! Good luck with it!