BIENVENIDOS!!! After a long and painful separation, I have returned like the Persian cat of the Internet, to shed hair upon your literary couch and make you wish you hadn't fed me the six Flirtinis and chicken livers that I just recreated upon your new rug. I missed you, amigos. It was a long month of redoing our kitchen, during which I nearly came apart at the seams, and Thanksgiving, after which my pants nearly followed suit. I know I promised photo updates of the kitchen as both a work in progress and a finished triumph, and I know you've come to look to me as a bastion of reliability, but would you believe me if I said the kitchen is still not done? It's definitely functional, after a solid two weeks of having no running water, no counters, and no dignity as we scarfed frozen pizza and paper-bagged cheeseburgers every night. But it's still not cosmetically done, in the sense that I could unveil a finished product to you with a flourish of my hand, fantastic mouth-trumpet noises, and intense profanity as I tried to upload the pictures.
Lawyer Boy is in there painting as we speak. Before you try to peg me as the lazy one, turn your eyes to the fact that not only did I cook and clean up dinner, but that my painting skills produce a finish similar to dropping a pigeon into a bucket of paint and letting it flap and freak around the room until its wings are clean again. Also, someone has to keep the dog and cat company in here.
What finally pulled me out of my intense writer's block was a paltry poultry adventure just now, wherein I got to third base with a chicken against my better judgment. Guys, I didn't even know her name! Here is the story. Don't judge.
Sunday I had bought an entire raw chicken, which is strangely cheaper than a venti caramel latte, to cook this week. I decided to brine it, which is when you make a cracked-out marinade that you soak your fowl friend in overnight. So I made the brine and pulled the chicken out of the fridge to drop it into the deep end, but before we could get on with the skinny-dipping, I had to undress the chicken. We didn't know each other very well, but I grabbed a knife and popped its plastic off in no time. I require no flirting. I require action. And here is where it gets graphic.
We all know that I cook all the time, but everyone has things they don't like to touch, and mine is raw chicken. If you want to call me weird, I'd like you to know that LB's is velvet and fleece. Yes, my husband won't touch velvet. Marinate on that for a bit. At least my fear would give me salmonella if things went south--his would just make him unwillingly plush and snuggly.
So as I prepare to get intimate with this chicken, I'm bracing myself for sticking my hand in its carcass to seek out the baggie of giblets, which as far as I can tell, are alien life forms sent from another planet to study our food. The brand of chicken I normally buy leaves the giblets intact, in a sealed plastic bag inside the chicken, just as God made them. Apparently this time I bought a different brand of chicken.
I thrust my unwilling hand into either the neck end or the ass end, whichever is bigger, and I would like you to know that if you can tell which is which, I'm concerned on your behalf. I wiggled my fingers around trying to find the baggie, and came out holding something that looked like a naked snail. Oh God. There's no baggie.
OH GOD. I realized at this point that I had two problems: First, that I had to stick my hand back up the chicken's muffler, and second, that I had no idea what I was looking for. Beyond the alien life form and the snail, do you have any idea what-all is meant to be retrieved from a chicken's rear? I don't. The baggie was missing, so there went my only guess. Elvis could be in there. This was, after all, a very plump chicken.
I pulled myself together and plunged my hand back into the chicken. I was rooting around in there like a truffle pig after the prize, fully engaged in my mission, probing squeemy bit after jumbly lump after funky chunk, when the most horrifying thought that could have possibly intruded into my consciousness popped in for a visit. As soon as I had finished thinking, while practically convulsing from repulsion, "Omigosh omigosh what what what ISSSS THAAAAAAAAAAAAAT??????" what came into my head but,
"THIS MUST BE WHAT FIRST-YEAR GYNECOLOGY RESIDENTS FEEL LIKE."
Quicker than you can say stirrup, my hand was out of that chicken and my mouth was running seventeen miles a minute in a chorus of "ew ew ew ew ew ew ew what the hell ew ew ew ew" as I flailed my salmonella-coated hands around helplessly and tried to figure out how to retrieve the rest of the aliens from the chicken's rear. Neck. Rear?
Ultimately, I turned the chicken neck-end up (I think) and shook it like a violent can of hairspray to dislodge the rest of the giblets. I got chicken jumblies all over my new granite counter tops, but I was able to spare LB's brand-new paint job from any harm. I can't say the same for the chicken's dignity, though. I think it'll be awhile before she's back in the saddle.
Lawyer Boy is in there painting as we speak. Before you try to peg me as the lazy one, turn your eyes to the fact that not only did I cook and clean up dinner, but that my painting skills produce a finish similar to dropping a pigeon into a bucket of paint and letting it flap and freak around the room until its wings are clean again. Also, someone has to keep the dog and cat company in here.
What finally pulled me out of my intense writer's block was a paltry poultry adventure just now, wherein I got to third base with a chicken against my better judgment. Guys, I didn't even know her name! Here is the story. Don't judge.
Sunday I had bought an entire raw chicken, which is strangely cheaper than a venti caramel latte, to cook this week. I decided to brine it, which is when you make a cracked-out marinade that you soak your fowl friend in overnight. So I made the brine and pulled the chicken out of the fridge to drop it into the deep end, but before we could get on with the skinny-dipping, I had to undress the chicken. We didn't know each other very well, but I grabbed a knife and popped its plastic off in no time. I require no flirting. I require action. And here is where it gets graphic.
We all know that I cook all the time, but everyone has things they don't like to touch, and mine is raw chicken. If you want to call me weird, I'd like you to know that LB's is velvet and fleece. Yes, my husband won't touch velvet. Marinate on that for a bit. At least my fear would give me salmonella if things went south--his would just make him unwillingly plush and snuggly.
So as I prepare to get intimate with this chicken, I'm bracing myself for sticking my hand in its carcass to seek out the baggie of giblets, which as far as I can tell, are alien life forms sent from another planet to study our food. The brand of chicken I normally buy leaves the giblets intact, in a sealed plastic bag inside the chicken, just as God made them. Apparently this time I bought a different brand of chicken.
I thrust my unwilling hand into either the neck end or the ass end, whichever is bigger, and I would like you to know that if you can tell which is which, I'm concerned on your behalf. I wiggled my fingers around trying to find the baggie, and came out holding something that looked like a naked snail. Oh God. There's no baggie.
OH GOD. I realized at this point that I had two problems: First, that I had to stick my hand back up the chicken's muffler, and second, that I had no idea what I was looking for. Beyond the alien life form and the snail, do you have any idea what-all is meant to be retrieved from a chicken's rear? I don't. The baggie was missing, so there went my only guess. Elvis could be in there. This was, after all, a very plump chicken.
I pulled myself together and plunged my hand back into the chicken. I was rooting around in there like a truffle pig after the prize, fully engaged in my mission, probing squeemy bit after jumbly lump after funky chunk, when the most horrifying thought that could have possibly intruded into my consciousness popped in for a visit. As soon as I had finished thinking, while practically convulsing from repulsion, "Omigosh omigosh what what what ISSSS THAAAAAAAAAAAAAT??????" what came into my head but,
"THIS MUST BE WHAT FIRST-YEAR GYNECOLOGY RESIDENTS FEEL LIKE."
Quicker than you can say stirrup, my hand was out of that chicken and my mouth was running seventeen miles a minute in a chorus of "ew ew ew ew ew ew ew what the hell ew ew ew ew" as I flailed my salmonella-coated hands around helplessly and tried to figure out how to retrieve the rest of the aliens from the chicken's rear. Neck. Rear?
Ultimately, I turned the chicken neck-end up (I think) and shook it like a violent can of hairspray to dislodge the rest of the giblets. I got chicken jumblies all over my new granite counter tops, but I was able to spare LB's brand-new paint job from any harm. I can't say the same for the chicken's dignity, though. I think it'll be awhile before she's back in the saddle.
