Trena Eiden

Driving to work one very early morning, I saw animals running through the sagebrush and as I got closer realized there were about 15 head of cows chasing a doe antelope. I couldn’t blame them. Who wants a skinny broad at a Weight Watchers meeting telling you how fat she is?  

I obviously wasn’t myself last Friday because I actually cooked. Starting early, I made three dozen cookies and two loaves of pumpkin bread. I chopped fruit and whipped cream for a salad, sautéed mushrooms, and put a prime rib in the oven. I cooked the meat for the prescribed time, an hour and a half, but blood was still oozing out and we prefer things we’re eating to be dead, so I decided to put it back in the oven for another half hour. Then I stared at the recipe in surprise. I should have read it clear through earlier like a responsible person because after the meat was done, it still had to sit on the counter for another hour. Yikes! I thought, “We’ll have all the cookies eaten by then.”  

I’ve told you before but I think cooking ranks right up there with having slivers run under my fingernails. And as far as making dinner, if it’s more than open and serve, I’m slightly depressed. When I see recipe instructions that are long and drawn out, I look carefully to see if there’s a way to do it in two steps. If not, it has the same chance of happening as me seeing the Loch Ness Monster. Betty White had the right idea when she said, “I go out to the kitchen to feed the dog, but that’s about as much cooking as I do.”  

I’ve always thought if I was told I only had six months to live, I’d want to spend it at the stove because it would feel like an eternity. Gar is no better since he isn’t a chef either, and he’s not interested in learning. Since he can read like a librarian, I remind him of a little saying he always liked to tell our offspring when they were growing up, “If you can read, you can learn to do anything.” He ignores my blather, but interestingly enough, even though he doesn’t cook, he’s picky. One time when I’d made potato salad for a picnic, this “never made potato salad in his life” man, had the audacity to declare, “The potato salad is a little mustardy.” I can’t remember exactly, but I think I told him to “Shut it” and I doubt I meant the lid to the potato salad.  

Once, when I was home working and Gar was in our RV in Texas, parked close to our kids, they’d invited him over for pizza, then sent him home a slice. The next morning, as we talked on the phone, he said he’d eaten it for breakfast. I was stunned. I love pizza for breakfast, but in all our years of marriage, he’d never, not once, thought it acceptable to have it then. I have a theory — it all depends on who’s cooking and who’s merely eating. Am I right or am I right?  

I think it’s a shame that we can’t just eat without having to do some type of exercise. When I mentioned this to a friend, she said, “I exercise with chips in one hand and a candy bar in the other, that way I’m working both arms.”  

Our daughter, who’s the exercise queen, texted me a photo of her and some of her pals in their new Vuori jogging pants. They looked nice and soft so I googled them and had a little fainting spell. They were very expensive. I texted her back, “Wow, they’re pricey, but wait, they must jog for you. They do indeed, actually jog for you, don’t they? I mean if they do, they’d be totally worth it.”  

Like most folks, I’d rather not exert myself, and would like to simply drop my body off at the gym and pick it up when it’s in shape, but also like everyone else, I love food. Sometimes on Facebook I see a test for picky eaters saying I’m awarded one point for every item I wouldn’t eat. I always get a zero. It all looks good to me which is why I’d be like the husband with his pregnant wife. 

Wife — I’m going into labor.

Husband — When 

Wife — Now 

Husband — [sets plate of nachos down] Dang it Karen, I just made these.