Mara Eastern recently described a lousy Christmas, and it reminded me of something similar that happened to me back around Thanksgiving. After leaving a lengthy comment on her post, I thought, “Hey! This might make a funny blog post!”
Thus the following was born. 🙂
Similar to ours
My husband’s been away for work during the week for the past two months, so naturally, he took a few homey things with him to make his hotel room feel less hotelly. One of those things was our very nice can opener. Silly me, I didn’t even realize it (or our salt and pepper shakers) was missing till he’d been gone for a month and I wanted to have chili. But I didn’t want to spend a whole lot on buying a new one since we already had a really nice one. Still, the craving for chili was not to be ignored. And since I needed tomato juice, too, I stopped at Fareway on my way home from work.
After wandering the aisles for a good ten minutes, I finally tracked down their cooking utensils. They had all of one can opener in stock that night, and at $1.97, the price was just right. Still, I had to wonder about its quality. But a trip to Walmart was out of the question because it would make me late picking the boys up from daycare, so I pushed my doubts aside and headed for the check-out.
Similar to el cheapo can opener
Twenty minutes later, I’d picked up Cricket and Thumper up from daycare and made it home. It was a blustery night, perfect for chili, and I couldn’t wait to have some. I got the boys in the house, grabbed the beans and hamburger from the basement, and set about making supper. While I waited for the hamburger to thaw, I decided to get the beans opened and drained.
But of course, nothing ever happens easily on a Monday.
I opened the first can of beans without any problems. I daydreamed about the delicious chili I would soon be eating; I could already smell the chili powder and the cooking meat. I could almost taste the soup’s spicy tang. I could almost feel the tomato juice’s velvet touch as I swallowed imaginary spoonful after imaginary spoonful.
But halfway through opening the second can, reality came crashing back upon me. Part of the can opener snapped off as I turned the hand crank. The whole thing fell apart in my hands.
Well, crap (and many other colorful words). Now what the heck was I supposed to do?
Perfect for opening cans of juice, but not so much for beans
By this point, the closest store was closed for the night. I considered using a church key to open the rest of the cans, but quickly discarded the idea. There was no way I’d be able to shake all those beans out of the tiny little holes a church key would make. Even if I could have shaken them all out, it’d have taken all night. Too bad I hadn’t been opening the tomato juice – then I’d have been fine.
*sigh*
Oh, can opener, thank you for not breaking on me!
I got my chili eventually, after spending a few more dollars to buy a decent-quality can opener, but I’m still annoyed about the stupid cheap one that didn’t even last five minutes. I hate wasting money like that, even though part of me knew it wouldn’t last. And now that it’s freezing cold here again, chili is starting to sound really good for supper tonight… 🙂
Have you had equipment malfunctions ruin a much-anticipated meal? How did you cope?
Happy New Year, everyone! I hope 2016 is treating you right! 🙂
(c) 2016. All rights reserved.
Suddenly they all died. The end. 
Not so much an equipment malfunction but a hand malfunction a few weeks ago as I was preparing spaghetti bolognese. Upon pouring the bottle of pre-prepared sauce (cos’ I was too lazy to do it myself) I dropped the bottle into the saucepan, where it broke.
It was beans on toast that night.
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Oh, no! I once had a jar of spaghetti sauce roll out the back of my van before I could catch it. It shattered all over the driveway. I’m not sure I ever found all the glass shards.
But beans on toast is no substitute for good spaghetti (which, oddly enough, we had for supper last night).
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You should try beans on toast the way I have them. Not for the squeamish – which rules out my wife and daughter, or in fact anyone with functioning taste buds.
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Given that I’m not a huge fan of beans (unless they’re green), I think I’ll have to pass.
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Good choice. The cat only has to hear the chilli jar opening and she bolts, but luckily she’s finally learnt to wait until the door is open after several “incidents.”
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Lol! You’d think one incident would be enough to learn from… 🙂
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I know the feeling, the same thing happened with me and a can opener once.
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Isn’t it maddening? All I wanted was a bowl of soup! 😀
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The first thing I ever bought my husband (this not long after we started dating) was a decent can opener. He had one just like El Cheapo, and while I didn’t break the thing while trying to open a can, I did wind up stabbing myself with the pointy bottle opener bit. He cites that as the reason he fell in love with me: that instead of just yelling at him for having a crappy, dangerous can opener, I fixed the problem so it wouldn’t happen again. A year later, he did the same thing with my crappy, dangerous car. 🙂
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Awww, what a great story! 🙂
I should have known better than to buy El Cheapo, but, well, I was feeling cheap. At least I have a decent one now! 😀
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I love this ❤ I don't of course love it that you were threatened by starvation, but first world problems are my favourite – I cope with them so often myself!
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I laugh in the face of starvation. Ha ha ha! 😀
Of course, usually the reason I’m laughing in the face of starvation is because I can’t make up my mind what I want to eat. Or, you know, I’m feeling too lazy to cook. 😉
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I know, right! I often nearly starve before I make my mind what I want to eat today…
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Yep. And then there are the times where, instead of making up my mind, I just go without because cooking is too much effort. That was pretty much the case last night. After all, who needs food? 😀
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Who needs food as long as there’s drink 😛
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😀
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It’s like when I bought dollar store headphones, and the sound quality wasn’t very good. Who knew?
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Right? Just because it’s cheap doesn’t mean it should be cheap! 😀
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A quality tool feels good in your hand when held. Quality tools always pay for themselves by time saved or money gained- even can openers
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Indeed. And I’ll never buy another can opener that cheap again. But still…I hate to spend the money to buy something I know I already have, even if I don’t know precisely where I might have stashed it..
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