Friday, January 20, 2012

the proper way to eat breakfast

Even the most horrible of weeks is not without its highlights, like this morning's conversation:

GRANDMA: Morgan, you weren't going to have a cookie for breakfast, were you?
MORGAN:  No, Grandma, of course not.
GRANDMA: Have a bagel first.  After you've had breakfast, then you can have a cookie.
(MORGAN gets himself a bagel and starts heading out the screened-in porch for the cream cheese.)
GRANDMA:  Morgan, you weren't going to eat that without toasting it, were you?
MORGAN: No, Grandma, of course not.
(MORGAN puts his bagel in the toaster.)
GRANDMA:  Now don't forget to unplug the coffeemaker before you turn the toaster on.  Everything on this wall is on the same circuit breaker.

(Maybe it loses something in translation.  I thought it was funny.  But maybe you just had to be there for the previous night's discussion about what it was that fixed the refrigerator: the younger generation thought it was that the plug to the fridge had been bumped lose (and thus reinserting it fixed it), while Grandma insisted that it was because too many appliances were running at the same time (and thus turning off the toaster fixed it).  During the five minutes she was yelling at her kids, she probably ate more calories (a couple of chicken tenders) than she had during the previous 48 hours (nothing).  Morgan and I decided that we all just need to provoke her more.)