All of my problems began when I decided last week to be more organized.
By the way, I don’t have that skill. I have never had it.
I do not have even a slightly appropriate organizational ability.
I lose my car keys, my cell phone, my cell phone charger or both and at least one shoe every single week. And that is a fact.
If you question my confession, just scroll through my Facebook page and count how many times I ask friends to call my phone so I can look for the dumb thing.
Anyway, I planned to turn over a totally new leaf by first preparing spaghetti sauce and a big pot of chili. Then I intended to divide and freeze those delicious choices in smaller containers for the days I have absolutely no time to cook.
Oh yeah, they were really awesome goals ... for someone else.
When I realized that I had accidentally added the freshly browned beef to the spaghetti sauce instead of the other pan full of browned Italian pork, I came up with one of my absolutely ridiculous, hair-brain ideas.
“I’ll just drain the beef from the spaghetti sauce,” I muttered. “And then, I will pour the beef into the chili stuff.”
Of course, some of the spaghetti sauce was also dumped into the other concoction. It just couldn’t be avoided.
“Oh well,” I shrugged. “No big deal. I will just add more of the other ingredients to cover up the spaghetti sauce.”
Well, well, well.
My bad ideas were just boiling over in my brain.
My delusions of grandeur led me to actually believe that I was blazing a new culinary trail for repairing bad cooking decisions.
When I tried a spoonful the chili did not at all taste like spaghetti sauce. Instead, it tasted like I had boiled a couple of rusty cans in the pot with the other stuff.
“I’ll just add more chili powder,” I whispered.
But when I started to sprinkle the chili powder, that other little tab marked “pour” came undone.
A small mountain of chili powder poured from the container and sank into the mixture. Even when I frantically tried to remove big globs with a spoon, the chili powder taste and scent burned the lashes off my eyelids.
“Fine. I’ll add tomato sauce,” I said aloud. “And then I will also add some water.”
But the chili powder remained as an unmistakable bitter addition.
“OK, I will add sugar,” I quickly decided.
But I was in a hurry to get this problem fixed since I was also sprinting back and forth from my laptop to the kitchen. I was working on deadline.
I did not take the time to add sugar with a spoon.
Nope, I sure didn’t.
I poured the sugar directly from the bag into the pot of yuck.
I won’t even waste your time to explain how the chili suddenly tasted like a pastry.
A few minutes after I recovered from the culinary stress, I posted on Facebook that I probably needed to wear a hazmat suit when I threw the concoction away.
I am too disorganized and too inept in the kitchen to change now. I’m 55 years old. I think it’s OK if I eat cookies and popcorn on the days that I don’t have time to cook.