In sickness and in grease

In our apartment, I am Queen of the Kitchen.
And I make a Royal Mess.

Even though I've been baking since I was 6, I didn't realize the blast zone I created was in any way atypical. Until college, when one of my best friends informed me that she had never seen anyone make as much mess in the kitchen as I did when cooking.

This actually explains why my mother wasn't as eager for me to cook as my dad was--that, and I usually baked sweets.

I haven't yet figured out how to avoid making a mess, but I thought I had at least gotten better at containing it to a smaller area or cleaning it up or something.

I don't think I had adequately tested that theory before marriage, because I didn't cook every night as a single person. I ate a lot of green smoothies, cereal, tomatoes on toast...hey, as one of my favorite jokes says, if it's just me, why cook? So I now present better evidence to the public.

      As mentioned earlier, I'm in charge of the cooking in the household, and Mark is in charge of the dishes. I really love this arrangement. It's fantastic. I like trying new recipes, and Mark likes listening to podcasts to endure kitchen clean-up drudgery.
   Unfortunately, Mark has been sick--as in probably-contagious-so-don't-touch-that sick--for nearly a week now. Therefore, the four times I have cooked (okay, so I don't cook every night as a married person either. Mark eats leftovers, praise be) in that time period, I have been in charge of the whole kitchen show, start to finish.
                   I made potato soup--I got ham juice and fat on the stove, but it wasn't cooked on, so not too bad.
                   I made quinoa-oatmeal with apples--and, it turns out, beetles or weevils or some sort of small pest. [Okay, that one wasn't my fault.] We may have gotten some extra protein before I discovered who else we were sharing the bowl with. Not even fair that I had to clean up dishes without any food product to show for it.
                  I made an oven pancake--and somehow the mixing bowl with the batter tipped over and spilled at least a quarter of its contents all over the stove. That took a while to clean up.
                  I made lasagna--and got pasta sauce not only on the kitchen counter, but also baked on the bottom of the oven. I actually still haven't tackled the oven clean-up.
I had been thinking that the deliciousness of whatever I made compensated for the mess I created in making it, but the longer I do dishes, the less I'm going to think that.

Moral of the story: Mark is sick, and this is a strain on our household. I miss hugging him. I miss talking with him [he has been rather hoarse lately]. I miss cuddling with him. But I really miss him doing the dishes.