Spud Wars

 I had offered to make the team baked potatoes. To tell the truth, I just had a hankering for them myself, but when I found out that 2/4 other housemates also thought that sounded good, I was on it.  I like making food for people and the fresh tomato pasta sauce I had spent several hours making yesterday had been a disaster. It was all cooked, looking (and smelling) delicious when Bryan announced he didn’t like tomatoes OR squash, Lauren quietly sprinkled parmesan on her plain noodles and Danny was no where to be found. So I really wanted a take two at preparing dinner. Plus, potatoes are easy-- my recipe was simple—seven minutes in the microwave and voila—a meal fit for kings.

Or so I thought.

Midway through Potato One (Lauren’s), the power in the kitchen went off. This happened to us on the first day, when it was just Lauren and I at Blackstone.  We had been extremely proud of our problem solving abilities—the two of us had gone down into the basement and flipped the switch on the fuse box. It had worked and we gloated (neither of us are adept at all at solving those kind of issues). So, I trotted down the stairs, through the boys bathroom, a storage room, the communal laundry room and into the dark, damp and dank basement room where the fuse box is kept. I flipped the switch a couple times for good measure, and a few others just to be sure (and heard a yelp from Danny), and then I headed back up and restarted the microwave.

Two minutes later, all stopped again. I rolled my eyes and went downstairs, unlocking bolts and latches as I went. Flips switched, I traced my footsteps, securing the doors behind me.

Up in the kitchen, I started the spud baking again. A minute later, all was dead. I checked and the potato was almost done. I was going to cook this sucker no matter what.

“Your potato is almost done,” I said to Lauren, “I’m just going to flip the switch again.”

“It’s ok,” Lauren said. “You can have my potato.”

“No, no,” I said gallantly. “I said I’d make one for you. This one is yours.”

I traipsed back down to the basement and flipped the switch.  Lauren waited in the kitchen to start the nuking process the minute she saw lights blinking on the screen. A minute later, hers was done. I was triumphant. One down. Mine went in.

Towards the last few minutes of cooking, Bryan had began to pace hungriliy around the kitchen. I made a decision at that point, however—this next potato was mine. I had been noble enough with Lauren’s potato. Bryan would have to fend for himself him for his own potato (I was still a little sore from his refusal to eat last night’s pasta sauce.)

The power must have died three or four more times in the seven minutes it took to cook my potato. I began to leave the doors downstairs open and unbolted, expecting to return in a few seconds. We got a system down-- Lauren stood guard in the kitchen, finger poised over the start button to expedite things. One minor glitch when Danny went into the bathroom and access to the fuse was cut off, but roughly fifteen minutes and fifty sprinted stairs later, my potato was done. It emerged—soft, perfect, warm, and smelling delicious. Bryan’s went in and was done roughly nine minutes and one trip (which I made) later.

My potato seemed to glow—it was like a golden nugget, I thought to myself as I added butter, salt, tomatoes, lettuce, hummus. Never had I worked so hard for a meal. But oh boy was this spud worth it.