Savior and Downfall

On New Year's Eve, a friend and I were babysitting. They were the sweetest kids; a sixth grade boy and a fourth grade girl, very quiet, very good company. It was actually quite fun. Anyways, the mother left us with a magnet with a number for Chinese food, and a sheet of numbers and addresses.

About six o'clock, we decided we were hungry. We abandoned our Game of Life, and tried to find something to eat. After about a half-hour discussion about whether to eat the frozen pizza in the fridge (which also led to the discovery of an Oreo ice-cream pie) or order take-out, we decided to order take-out.

The boy hauled in the phoneboook, and we tried to find a pizza place. After about ten minutes of more discussion over whether the quality of the pizza might be in correlation with the quality of the ads, we tried calling one place. They didn't do take-out, so we tried another.

Unfortunately, the sheet the mother gave us didn't include the house's address or phone number. My friend's conversation with the pizza place went something like this:

Lady: Welcome to {______'s ___ety ___ something Pizza} (I honestly can't remember the name)

Rosie (my friend): Oh, uh, hi, I'd like to order a pizza delivery

Lady: Your name?

Rosie: Rosie...?

Lady: What's your order?

Rosie: Oh, just a second. (to us) What do we want?

{five minutes later}

Rosie: Hi, you still there? Okay, I'd like a small pizza, one third cheese, one third pepperoni, one third tomato.

Lady: We don't to thirds.

Rosie: Oh, okay. Just a second.

{Thirty seconds later}

Rosie: Okay, so, one small pepperoni pizza.

{I am grumbling in the corner about the loss of my precious tomato}

Lady: What's your address?

Rosie: Oh. Crap. Sorry. One sec. (to the kids) What's your address?

Kids: blankety blankety on blabla street.

Rosie: blankety blankety on blabla street.

Lady: What's the nearest cross-street?

Rosie: WELL, F*CK IF I KNOW!!!!!! (slams down phone)

Well, that was slightly dramatized, but I'm sure she felt like swearing and slamming down the phone internally.

Well, to make a long story short, we decided to make pasta. I felt so sorry for the kids, because plain pasta is a bore, especially on New Year's, so I looked up a quick alfredo sauce recipe on the internet. Ah, the World Wide Web.

They had about a quarter cup of heavy cream, so I used milk. That was fine. The butter melted nicely, and then came the parmesan. All they had was this Kraft parmesan crap, more preservatives and flavorings than actual cheese. It went in, but wouldn't quite melt. Ah, woe is me. I added salt, pepper, and garlic powder for flavoring, but it remained resolutely lumpy. My only consolation is that the first thing the boy said was "This is good." So, maybe it wasn't so bad. It actually tasted fine, it was just that stupid Kraft crap that screwed it up.

We watched Hairspray and Pirates of the Caribbean 3, with an ice-cream break in-between. The kids wanted some of the Oreo pie, so Rosie and I got it out so them. It took about ten minutes to slice, or should I say hack out a piece for them to share. The girl took a bite, and said it was freezing her mouth, and so it was. So, into the microwave for 10 seconds. I'm sure it was good, but the whipped cream was frozen to a point of being more like very hard frosting, and the Oreos were all soggy. Needless to say, Rosie and I stuck to some very good chocolate chip ice cream.

But, after all, it's a new year. New cooking, new recipes (I'm currently on a hunt for copies of all my favorite Starbucks scones), and new adventures in babysitting.