it's got me craving some toast

This is not the toaster in question, although how cool if it was, right?

 



I got a toaster in the mail today, a real nice one that claims it's wide enough for a thick New York bagel and has cool-wall sides that are safe to touch, even right after a toasting session. I smiled and clapped and was ridiculously excited when I opened the box, knowing that my days of broiling bread in the oven were officially and forever over. One time in our marriage I had a hand-me-down toaster that burnt everything it looked at, and boy did I love that baby. But, you know, very few items make the moving cut and I tearfully passed it on to the next poor student in need of burnt toast when we left Stanford.

But my life was looking up as of that mail delivery, a new toaster from a real store...still in a box to boot. I looked on the packing label to see who could have sent such a brilliant gift (things like this happen you know: last month my mom sent me a crock pot, bless her heart, and it has a permanent place on my counter because it's used so much) but somehow the gift giver was me. Me? How could that be. It was from Heather and to Heather, but no Heather that I know (at least intimately) ordered me a toaster. So...

First I called James. There's nothing more romantic than a toaster for Valentine's Day so I was certain that he was the true giver--but I heard the underlying concern of cabinet space in his voice at my simple mention of a new kitchen appliance and knew he had nothing to do with it. He confirmed, it was not from him (I mean me, remember?) Yes, bummed, because a toaster? What a gift to be had! But now that he has heard my excitement over the toaster maybe he'll get me a new wooden spoon or something on Friday, gosh I love a good wooden spoon.

I texted my mom to see if she sent it. I still haven't heard, but I'm pretty sure not because the crock pot came with a cute little love note, and so why wouldn't the toaster? And then, again, there's that thing about me being the sender. Weirder yet, the sender is the me from Palo Alto, the receiver is the me from New York. Do you hear that twilight zone (do do doodoo do do doodoo) music in the background?

Now I've got myself into a panic that somehow this toaster was sent by mistake and was not meant for me after all and pretty soon I'm going to get a call from an angry shop owner somehow blaming me in the case of the missing toaster. And I'll scream back, "You did this to me, you dirty rotten hater of my toast! I'll never send it back. NEVER!" Which is totally overdramatic, but when you're stuck indoors in the dead of winter for endless days sometimes you go a little cuckoo, cuckoo and things like that seem totally reasonable. Because all of a sudden I am going to die if I don't have a toaster? Yes, precisely. If I didn't decide to take the screaming approach, I would beg for mercy and offer just about anything so that I could keep that toaster. "Take my money, take my house plant, take Jim's Swiss scary mask, just don't take my toaster!" It'd work, I think.

But then there's this other fear, that was only made worse when I just answered the phone. The fear: the box is actually housing a whole lot of drugs instead of a toaster and at any moment the mafia is going to bang down my door to get their loot. The phone call: The FBI reports a break-in in your area. And then I peed my pants. And then I realized the person on the other end of the line was trying to sell me a security system and was not, in fact the FBI. I might need the security system it turns out, since I still haven't opened the toaster box to see what's really in there.

Anyway, all this to say that I am now craving toast smothered in butter and raspberry jam. And I may not be eating it for breakfast tomorrow morning (you know, between the mafia and the repo man), but I sure as heck am going to eat some right now--while I still can.

Oh yeah, and if you are the Heather that sent me the toaster, thank you...and show yourself!