Pickles and Pizza

I drop things. It happens a lot.

One morning, I wanted to be helpful in the kitchen while Chris was cooking breakfast. I offered to cut up the avocado because I am unusually excellent at skinning an avocado and I figured it was difficult to mess up. I happily started cutting around the avocado, hardly paying attention to what I was doing (because I am such a profound avocado cutter) until I noticed that the cut I intended to completely encircle the fruit was more of a jagged diagonal line. I tried to pull the avocado apart and it kind of crumbled into a sloppy green heap. Having little tolerance for imperfection, Chris suggested that I just put away the materials he had finished cooking with. Demoted but not demoralized, I grabbed up a few refrigerator items and began strategically balancing them in the overly full fridge. Not soon after I started, a large jar of pickles fell from the fridge and shattered on the floor. The pickles sprawled across the floor, looking like a fleet of green turds, laying in their own pungent juices. Expecting my laughter to be echoed on Chris' face, I looked up to find a stern face shaking slowly from side to side. Misfortune really does come in threes: avocado, pickles, disappointed boyfriend.

I agreed to take Christopher to the store so he could get some deli meat.
First, we decided to stop by Great Harvest for some fresh bread and I figured while we were there, I would grab a sandwich for dinner. We bought the bread but I was disappointed to find that the sandwich makers had called it quits for the night. By that time, Chris was also ready for dinner. As we left the parking lot, he suggested Falafel King but we agreed that finding and paying for a parking spot on Pearl Street was not favorable. As we continued to head downtown, Chris suggested Heidi's Deli, a place I had heard served great sandwiches. We parked on the outskirts of Pearl Street and walked to a very quiet, mostly deserted deli. Similar to most times I order food, I wasn't prepared when I was asked what I wanted so Chris went first. “Could I have the ?”. The sandwich artist got to work but was quickly stopped by the absence of avocado. “Sorry, we're out of avocado”. Equally disappointed, I mentally made a different sandwich and Chris agreed to have his sandwich sans avocado. The artist continued. “Sorry, we're out of bacon.” At this point, Chris' sandwich was reduced to two measly ingredients. I volunteered to order while he perused the menu for a second choice. Without avocado, I resorted to a sandwich of cheese, sprouts and mustard. “Sorry, we're out of sprouts”. Needless to say, we decided to leave. Now, we felt starved.

As we walked out of the highly overrated Heidi's, Chris noticed Nick 'n' Willy's take and bake pizza. Desperate, we agreed. Twenty dollars later, we brought it home and promptly preheated the oven. As soon as the oven started beeping, signifying its eagerness to envelop our beloved pizza, I scrambled to unwrap the plastic surrounding the pie. Unbeknown to me, the pizza had been wrapped with ninja-like efficiency. With my final tug to safely unwrap the coveted meal, the pizza unexpectedly jumped off the counter and crumbled onto the floor in a big doughy mess.

First, something must be said about the condition of the floor. The unspoken rule of the house was that anything to fall on the floor was exempt from the five second rule and must immediately be thrown away. The large area rug covering the majority of the kitchen floor was probably, at one point, a light cream color. Over time, it took on a dark tan color and was riddled with mysterious stains that extended from one side to the other.

I gasped while simultaneously having pickle flashbacks. From his chair, Chris sensed my anxiety and slowly turned to see me crouched above a heap of what was formerly dinner. Again, he shook his head. No words, just disapproving head shakes. I burst into tears. The pizza that I hoped could be salvage had taken on a new texture with hair and crumbs poking out between the loose ingredients.

To make matters more unthinkably unfortunate, Chris resorted to the most pitiful pizza alternative for dinner: a toasted slice of bread with cheese.

This story cannot end without redemption. The next day, Chris surprised me with a frozen pizza. At least this time, if I dropped the pizza, all the ingredients would stay put. We ate the entire thing.