Today’s subject – kitchen accidents.  The Jessie dog wants to be right next to me ALL the time.  When I cook I open the cupboard door and put a stool by it to block her from coming into the kitchen because I am convinced that someday there will be a horrible accident and either she or I will be so very sorry.

Of course, she can just go into the living room and around the hall and into the kitchen from the other side and she sometimes does that.  So far the worst accident has been me dropping food and her eating it.  The hubster once dropped an entire fresh from the grill pork chop and the blasted dog ate it bone and all.  I pick up her poop and I don’t remember that one.  (Thank goodness!)

When I was little my mom always had a parakeet.  (Not knowing I am allergic to birds, and they thought all along that I had asthma.)  Her parakeets would come into the kitchen and bathe in the sink while my mom washed the dishes.  They would also sit in her lap when she stringed beans and eat the strings.  One of the parakeets, Stinker, Chico or Stinker Two even learned to talk and would say my sister’s name.

My mom would open their cage a couple of times a day and they could fly free in the house.  Usually they only were in the living room and kitchen.  When Stinker Two was pretty old he flew into the kitchen and made a head dive right into my mom’s cast iron skillet.  End of Stinker Two and of having birds in the house.

It didn’t matter because I was sleeping in a feather bed on feather pillows. My family tried to kill me as a child.

In the 1960’s the comic BC was pretty popular.  The local gas stations gave you a BC glass with every fill up.  We had several of these glasses.  They were narrower at the top than the bottom.  My mom had had surgery and my dad was doing the dishes.  One of the BC glasses broke and cut the crap out of the web of his hand.

When Addi was little and just barely walking, Rick and I took an evening off and went out for dinner.  He had a dozen oysters and I thought I’d bring one home for Addi to see.  I wanted to teach her so much.  And that brain of hers wanted to know so much.  Well she was excited to see the oyster shell and tried to eat it.  Not being able to eat it the newness wore off pretty fast.  She took a couple of steps and stepped on the shell cutting her foot pretty badly.  What’s wrong with me?  Well she recovered but didn’t really like sea food for most of her childhood.

When Jess was barely walking she tottered into the kitchen and right into the edge of the lid to our electric frying pan.  I don’t think she bled at all but it left a neat little white nick right beside her nose.  She carried that scar for quite some time.

I once set a fry pan on fire.  I grabbed the baking soda and put it out in no time but still have a dark spot on one of my cupboards.

When Addi was in college she lived in the German house for a year.  There were diplomats coming from Germany to visit the campus and so the German house was putting on a big dinner party.  Addi invited me down and I made my sauerbraten to take to share.

We got all set up to cook and sure enough, Addi cut her hand so badly she couldn’t help cook.  She stood aside and gave instructions quite well, thank you very much.

I am in the kitchen so much that I have kitchen accidents all the time.  Slip in grease on the floor, done that.  Cut my thumb, hand, arm – yes I have done that also.  I also frequently cut off my fingernails.  Those of you who know me know I don’t have fingernails.  So that is an especially hurtful accident.

I have burned myself, forgotten the sugar in a cookie recipe, and substituted stuff you just wouldn’t believe.  (Think rabbit tacos.)  Not really.  But I have threatened hot dog fried rice before.  (I hate hot dogs.)

But without accidents in the kitchen I am sure food would be boring. There’d be no peanut butter and jelly, no gingersnaps in gravy, no vinegar pies.  I’m sure all these things happened by accident.

Yesterday’s accident was my making a recipe for the second time and adding chopped tomatoes to it.  Stuffed peppers with chorizo and rice.  They were fabulous.  And I didn’t even cut off one fingernail.

Photo:  we are having big ass salad for dinner tonight.