I’ve got a basketball-sized ball of dough out on the patio with me. The crickets and frogs are in full swing, harmonizing beneath the glow of the patio lights. What can I say—I’m a night baker. Supposedly, I’ll get 36 hamburger buns from this buttery beast, but that remains to be seen.
I’m in my usual dilemma: do I shape them into smooshed rounds now and stay up baking into the wee hours, or pop them in the fridge and finish the job tomorrow morning? My better self says fridge, but my curious, impatient one wants to see what they’ll become.
Earlier, I sliced my pointer finger while coaxing a head of napa cabbage through the mandoline. I downplayed the sting—until I noticed the pale green slaw speckled with dots of deep red. It reminded me of that fictional movie where the cook’s emotions seep into the soup, and all the patrons are overtaken by whatever he’s feeling. I can still picture that jam-packed restaurant, everyone’s face buried in their hands, sobbing into their bowls.
I’m not religious, but I could get behind a triumphant “He is Risen!” just before sliding my full-grown buns into the oven.
Alas, he has not risen. And thanks to a bout of absent-minded Facebook scrolling, it’s now 11 p.m. Time to call it. Which, in this case, means covering the dough with a cloth and letting it rest in the fridge overnight. I’ve rushed this step before, and I know the heartbreak of claylike bread that never quite becomes what it could’ve been.
And one last update before I go: I found a tick on Evelyn. The tiny black thing had half-buried itself in her neck. When I first tried to pinch and pull, I got it in my pinch, pulled, but no luck. Another mom at the library came to the rescue with a pair of tweezers, snagged it, and stuck it between two pieces of tape. “Keep this,” she told me. “If a ring forms around the bite, it’ll help the doctor identify any potential diseases.”
She went on to tell me her own tick horror story—how it left her unable to eat red meat. My panic meter for Evelyn rose three notches. Other than that rogue dandelion she once inhaled, she’s been pretty free of health scares.
Then there’s the story of my uncle, who lost a good portion of muscle in his buttocks due to a tick. If you could’ve heard my Aunt Tracy tell the tale of his one-cheek situation, you’d have been on the floor laughing.
Alrighty, that’ll do it for tonight. I’ll see you here tomorrow!
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 