Sandwich Fail

Dear World,
I am a simple man with simple needs. In fact, I am typing this on a laptop nearly 7 years old held together by duct tape and extra strips of aluminum. I do not ask for much.

One thing I do ask for, however, is sandwiches. They are beautiful, pure, and delicious. They are versatile, they are humble, and they are there when you need them. Therefore, I do not think it is asking for too much to be able to make a sandwich for myself without having a cockroach crawl out from inside the toaster.

Well, technically, it just popped its head out of the toaster, much in the way one might when encountering a giant who was converting your home into an oven to brown two slices of bread. That is to say, it looked slightly annoyed and assumed that I would shortly stop.

And what else could I do? I unplugged the toaster, took out the very lightly toasted toast, and carried the roach/bread duplex and shook the crap out of the it until the roach conceded the fight to gravity and my blind fury. It promptly burrowed in a pile of leaves which I have no plans to make sandwiches on.

I returned to the kitchen, dropping the toaster off on the washing machine on the way. I felt betrayed by one of my favorite small appliances. I then looked at the two slices of rapidly cooling toast. I tried to imagine eating them and enjoying the sandwich they were a part of, knowing they had been nextdoor neighbors to the roach. I couldn't do. I dangled them over the trash before shaking my head and finally letting go.

How do we feel safe again after a trauma? I made a new sandwich, this time using the George Foreman grill, which is brilliantly designed and has precious few roach nooks and ant crannies. However, the sandwich wasn't as good as I hoped it would be and my stomach quickly turned on me. My appetite was still being held captive by the Toaster Roach.

It might not have done anything to my food, but it could've. And as I look around my kitchen, "could've" is the new mandatory condiment for every food I see. Could've touched the box of raisins. Could've scampered across the package of gnocchi. Could've taken a nap inside the chicken I was going to cook in the crock pot with a delightful array of now-roachified herbs and roach-tastistic butter. How do you reclaim your mind from the roach?

It's not a complete answer, but about a year ago it was a warm night and Sarah and I were walking downtown. There were roaches out and we did our best to avoid stepping on them and we dreaded hearing the crunches that let us know we failed. Then as we turned a corner there was a duck. It waddled along the sidewalk, paused, and gobbled down a roach whole. A few steps ahead scuttled another roach. The duck ate that one too. The duck never got full. It was awesome. Like there was this whole anatine army protecting me from all the roaches of the world.

What I'm trying to say is, I'm buying an attack duck to help get my appetite back. I'm pretty sure revenge can make anything taste sweet.

Comments

Annie Fox said…
Seems to me that when a roach claims your mind, the only sensible thing to do (reasoning with whatever part of your mind is left) is to vacate said mind. At least for the time being. Mental real estate is a precious commodity, oh Earth Child. and when roaches move in, real estate values plummet.
5:42 PM
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