​​​​​​Because humor is funnier when you know it's true.

My stove, my ole gas stove, lawd,will be the death of me

Blues aficionados will rise from the grave when they hear the so-rare-it-never- existed acetate recording of Blind Brain-Damaged John Mississippi Dead Man’s “Gas Stove Blues”.

This phantom ditty soaked into my brain two days ago, November 4, 2019, when Carol awoke me with, “Mark! You left the gas on under the frying pan. Again! I fired you from cooking years ago, remember? Grrrr!”

The growl did sound rather like a wolf heading for my carotid artery, but Carol hasn’t done that yet. Nor has she hired a wolf or a rabid badger as a professional bite mammal to do me in while she is off somewhere enjoying an unbreakable alibi.

Carol wouldn’t do that.  She loves me.

Back to my transgression: all I ever try to cook are yummy grilled cheese sandwiches, oozing cheddar cheese with mayonnaise spread on the outside of the bread rather than butter.

It makes a good sandwich, yep, yep, but better if Carol does it if you consider “better” not burning the house down.

After her initial ire toward me subsided, she recalled for me similar incidents when my lust for grilled cheese nearly led to catastrophe:

April 27, 2010: I went a little crazy with the heat and reduced the sandwich to a small black fist of smoldering carbon. The escaping smoke inspired a smoke alarm to strike a skull cracking E-flat over double high-C that drew the neighbors over brandishing firearms

January 6, 2011: A routine failure to turn off the burner, ho-hum.

November 27, 2015: Thanksgiving Day. Instead of fixing a sandwich out of the damn left-overs, I made myself a tasty grilled cheese with the mayo trick. This time I turned off the burner, but not entirely. I think I should get 99% credit, but nooooooo. The flame went out but the natural gas kept leaking from the burner for several minutes.  My brother-in-law and his little doggie were sleeping just feet away from the kitchen.

This was without a doubt one of the top three fuckups I ever committed. I crawled with my face scraping the floor for the rest of the weekend. This is when Carol fired me from the stove. What I did two days ago was not defiance by any means. Call it failing memory, an older American’s lament.

I do have a few good qualities but that’s for another day.

-Mark Wilt

Mark can be contacted at mlookw@hotmail.com.