They look innocent, don’t they? Those little cubes of carrots resting in a holding container? Sure. They look that way, but they’re tricky. When you least expect it, they can hurt you.
Two important words:
1. Confidence.
2. Over.
Also important to remember not to put those two together.
As a matter of fact, I’m having a little trouble with my touchtyping as a result of that combination – Overconfidence.
Here I am, on my one day off a week, in the kitchen peeling potatoes and dicing carrots. (Actually, I’m NOT in the kitchen at this exact moment, but you get the work-on-the-weekend idea and the fact that I am now typing.) I thought I could invest a little time on Sunday afternoon and save myself some time in the morning. On these types of things, I work more efficiently in the PM.
Two types of cuts for the carrots. A bigger dice for the stew and a smaller cube for the soup. Pounds and pounds of carrots. So little time. “Hustle!” said Marshall Allen, my first boss, whose voice I still hear when working on any such projects. (He knew I was moving as fast as I could, but I believe he was trying to instill a work ethic in a fifteen-year-old.)
Cut the carrots length-wise and then begin the knife-work. If you’re in a hurry, change up your method and try to make that second cut without flipping the half that landed on the round side. (That’s sarcasm, aimed at myself. The rest of you in the kitchen: don’t really change up your habits when holding a sharp knife.) Confidence. Don’t think any more about it. (Overconfidence.)
Here’s a physics tip, too. Round things roll. After the first slice, one side of the carrot is flat, and the other – well, it’s curved like a half-carrot would be.
Hustle! said Marshall, somewhere in the back of my grey-haired head, from somewhere around four decades ago. Hustle!
Don’t need to flip that carrot onto its flat edge, just slice!
The carrot rolled.
You foodies know that it’s best to hold your fingertips under or curl them down when dicing. It keeps the fingertips intact for use over the rest of your life. Conversely, I should have had mine extended when making that particular slice. The carrot rolled and the knife jumped and the vinyl glove offered no protection whatever.
(I just now thought about one of my young cooks, years ago, and the cheese-grinder episode. My insides clinch, just remembering. I think I was more startled than she was. She was the picture of calm. Apologized even. That sort of coolness isn’t learned or inherited. It must be ingrained in the DNA, and in life-and-death situations, most successful outcomes depend on people like her being in attendance. I’m ashamed I never asked to see her finger, later. I couldn’t bear it then. The family of the work place and the empathy of pain: It turned out okay.)
My fingertip will recover. No guitar playing for a time, though.
As you know, mistakes beget mistakes. While I was fooling around with my fingertip, I scalded a pot and suddenly the kitchen has the aroma of burned popcorn, second on the offensive-smell list only to a roadkill skunk. I jumped up and spun around, trying to figure out what was burning, grabbed the pot and dashed it under the water.
Scrubbing is ahead, still. Tough scrubbing.
Priorities call. Books absorb odors. Readily.
I threw open the back door and propped it that way with a bungee snagged to the dumpster out back. At the front, I wedged a piece of wood to allow the breeze to move through the store. Front to back, McHuston Booksellers & Irish Bistro is a long and narrow location. With Sunday’s north wind, it was near-gale-force as it whips down the aisles between shelves.
Probably have a few minutes to write this, while it airs out.
Why am I suddenly shivering and sniffling? I trot back to the back hall, leaning into the wind that is tunneling through the building. How long have I been typing? Not THAT long! Oh, there was that thing about the firewall and needing to shut down computer security to move the carrot picture to the other computer and another change of the bandage on my finger. The thermostat’s thermometer says it is 53 degrees in the back of the store.
Back door: closed. Trot to the front, passing the front-of-store thermometer: 62 degrees. No wonder I’m a tad chilled.
Front door: closed.
Fingertip wound: closed.
Case: closed.
Happy weekend, almost over as it is. It is back to work as usual Monday morning, except we’ve all sprung forward to Daylight Savings Time and we’ll be starting out in the dark.
Let’s not finish that way, shall we?
McHuston Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
Broken Arrow, OK
122 South Main Street, 918-258-3301
