Silly Little Things on the Way to Your 20th Nervous Breakdown
I had no idea green potatoes could kill a person. Or four, in this case.
Now, I'd once thrown a potato, hit a dog, inadvertently, of course, and it knocked it out... initially I'd thought it had died as a result of the blow, but I saw it around the neighborhood later, which leads me to believe it didn't.
Also, as the police found when they searched my house, after the deaths, I was in possession of a potato gun. Now, let me explain a little bit. These things, as you may know, are not standard issue, open market sort of things. Usually you either need to engineer your own, often with some sort of small hydraulic engine, a metal tube, and some sort of heavy base. Or you can find them in many professional kitchens. Don't ask me why. I was only ever a line cook, so I never got into the rarified strata of the head chefs, who all seemed to know what they were used for, and why they were kept around. But I'd seen them, sitting underneath a cooker, or wedged discreetly, as discreet as you can be with a potato gun, behind a fridge. Well, this is how I got ahold of one. The curiosity just got the best of me. Funnily enough, it also did kill a cat. Which I found amusing at the time, though obviously not that amusing, as anyone who's had to clean up a dead cat will tell you. It sort of tempers the amusement, I've found in my one experience.
So anyway, as a cook, I happened to be working at a private event. Cooking the potatoes. It's funny, when I think about it. So much of my personal history is tied up in potatoes. I don't know what that says about me as a person.
I'd pulled them out of the bag, ready to peel 'em, dice 'em up, and chuck 'em in a pot of boiling water. We were making mash. I noted that the potatoes were slightly more green than I was used to, but I quickly blamed the lighting for the discrepancy. No one else in the kitchen had much time for me, I was left alone to master the mash, so I went about my task. I found the salt, chucked a couple dashes into the water, and started getting rid of all the peels and eyes I'd scattered all over my area. A couple trips to the trash can, a quick cigarette, and then back in to check on the potatoes. It was about 20, 25 minutes later, so I pulled them off, drained them, great gallons of murky milky water washing down the drain, slopping on the floor, on my arms... the resulting potatoes were still slightly green. Again, I blamed the lights. I mashed them, added some milk, which helped take out the greenish tinge, to a degree. A little butter, some cumin, more salt, pepper, oregano, and they were spooned out and off they went.
Which was great. I went back out for another cigarette, about to take on the dishes, when I saw the police, and four people slumped over their plates. Which is when I left.
To be continued?
disclaimer:
So... anyway. How's it going? Good? Good.
Great. So. Anyway. No, no news on the Further Fenway Fiction thing just yet. We're getting there. Trust me. Not in the sense that we've moved any closer to our goal of having something to present to you, but in a sense that eventually, we will, I'm sure, deliver.
We're splitting time between Seattle and Winchester, Massachusetts this week, so... well, so nothing, really. So we're just trying to change the subject, really, and provide a possible excuse as to why we don't have any more news on the signed bookplates.
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