we *try* to cook dinner each night of the week. usually this task falls on me, which is entirely inappropriate because i am not a good cook. at all.

people, if you happen to be the better cook in the household, just pony-up and take it on… everyone will benefit from it.

when jackson was around a year old, i had HAD it with the cooking. i was in the rut of rotating the same 4 meals and throwing in papa johns in between… and then our favorite chinese takeout… and then a burrito joint that’s down the street.

at that point, paul and i came to the decision that he would take on the cooking and make it his bitch 2 nights out of the week. paul cooks on wednesdays and saturdays. sometimes this means that he is the one ordering the chinese takeout or double checking my chicken burrito order, but for the most part he makes an effort to actually cook on the nights that are designated his nights to cook.

i’m grateful. SO GRATEFUL. with each wednesday and saturday that rolls along, i know that there is ONE LESS THING that i have to think about on that day. i don’t have to think about dinner… like at all. and that, for me, being one who doesn’t enjoy cooking, means a lot.

which brings me to the other night… when i was cooking.

i don’t remember what it was that i was cooking, probably pork chops. i seem to struggle with pork chops, but i’m damn sure not going to give up working on perfecting the fine art of grilling the pork chop. often when i cook pork chops, i ask the twitter for help… help with marinades… stuff that goes with pork chops… etc…

and i thank you, all ye of the internets who come to my rescue.

so yeah, i was cooking a few nights ago. our kitchen is small, which makes me dislike cooking in it even more, because you know how when you have people over, no matter what appetizers are placed in the living room, around the dining room table, EVERYONE CONGREGATES IN THE KITCHEN. us having a small kitchen in our apartment makes this very not fun when we host stuff (which we enjoy doing for the most part). it also makes things very claustrophobic.

point being, our kitchen is small.

so, i’m cooking in our small kitchen and since i (probably) was attempting to grill pork chops, i had the fan running because we do our grilling on a small little griddler thing that is in our apartment and not outside on an actual grill because we are 3 stories up and that would be a pain in the ass.

the fan is running on HIGH to keep the smoke alarms from going off, pork chops are sizzling, i’m at the sink washing my hands of raw pork chop juice. there’s a lot of noise going on in this small kitchen that is a confined space to work in, and let’s face it, whether you enjoy cooking or not, cooking is work. this means that i’m probably sweating to an extent because after you pop out a kid, your hormones never return to normal again and for me, this means i sweat at unnecessary and awkward times.

also, the kitchen was hot.

as i’m fanning myself and splashing cold water on my face AFTER washing pork chop juice off my hands, i stop because i think i hear something. something that is not of my doing. something that is not in the kitchen.

i turn the fan down from HIGH to MEDIUM (can’t do LOW because LOW is practically nonexistent and the smoke alarms would go off), and peak out of the kitchen to find where the noise is coming from.

the noise is a combination of hyena-like laughter, a high pitched squeal, and a gastly “UGH” grunt.

entirely confusing, i know. i was confused too.

i go into the living room and the volume of the noise grows. i find paul laying on the couch with jackson laying on top of paul. they both see me and the noise immediately stops.

the three of us look at each other. i am giving paul a “WTF?” look and he’s looking at me like “woman, you should be cooking” and then jackson stops looking at the both of us, turns to face paul again and then licks his face.

the noise returns. paul grunts out a “UGHHH” but then laughs hysterically which tickles jackson to the point that he squeals with delight, knowing he has made his dad laugh, and then the two of them do the hyena laugh where you can’t stop laughing because you are feeding off one another’s laughter.

when i was little, i went to church with my mom and my brother, and for the most part we behaved like good catholic children. occasionally though, my brother and i would give each other a look… a cross eyed look, try to touch our tongue to our nose, snort when the priest paused and it was DEAD SILENT. mostly though, the looks that my brother and i shared were in reaction to the horrible cantor that was singing and causing our ears to bleed. it was during that shared moment, my brother and i laughed until we cried.

because, ya know, you couldn’t laugh out loud. JESUS WAS WATCHING. so we stifled our laughter as much as physically possible and then mom would look at the both of us and just shake her head. on the very rare occasion, mom would laugh too because stuff like that is contagious.

so paul is laughing to the point of making himself cough because eww gross, his kid just full on licked his face, and jackson is laughing to the point of making high pitched squeal sounds… which makes me laugh at the both of them because, like i said, stuff like that is contagious.

i overcooked the pork chops that night. it was totally worth it.