(246) Cullinarily challenged

The organizer called up, assuming that the fried vermicelli my family promised would be cooked by me. Honestly, I only cook three possible types of food for pot bless: fried rice, fried wanton and Chinese spinach because I have done it thousands of times that these are my fail safe food.

When my husband was courting me, I confessed that I am willing to cook for my future children but cooking is at the very bottom of my list of life skills. He said never mind, for he is a talented and great amateur cook; we would never starve. Hence we have the relationship that I prepare the food and I do the cleaning up but he would artistically cook up whatever happened to be available in the house. For I hate to shop too, my idea of nourishing myself would be to swallow some desiccated food with mugs of water and then able to not be hungry for the next 6 hours.

Genes do not lie, I look at Elizabeth attempts at cooking and realize that God has been more than kind to me. At least I could fry decent omelets and judge well how cooked or whether instant noodle is just cooked and crunchy. And interestingly Michael could whip up sinfully delicious food from funny combinations of ingredients in my fridge. Crystal is just at the stage of frying up all kinds of process meat and beginning to brew some old fashion soups her employer likes. She is in the business of geriatric care.

Just in case you think that the clutz in the kitchen is not too hot in other spheres of life, I happen to have won quite a number of full scholarships in the earlier years. Elizabeth is articulate and quite accomplished in singing, acting, music making and quite a good student if you look at her track record. Believe it or not, we are not adept at multi-step sequences like cooking. Elizabeth and I would be equally hapless in the chemistry lab. But I could have chosen to continue with a Masters in IT concentrating on expert systems, it might not have been as fun as working on children's brains and character; though the former would have been equally challenging as well. Elizabeth's professors are telling her to consider going for a Masters as she is gifted in academic writing. We will see what God has in store for her.