The difficulties of cooking pasta

As this pregnancy moves along, and I get bigger and bigger, and more and more uncomfortable, I find it harder and harder to suffer fools. This makes it quite difficult to spend time with IQ, talk to IQ, think about IQ. So I thought if I told some IQ stories, it would make me feel better.

I first met IQ the week Wes and I eloped. There was a formal naval dinner (and I looked great!) for all the officers and their wives/girlfriends. Wes's ship is fairly small, so I literally met everyone there. When he introduced me to Mr. IQ and IQ, he mentioned I was working on my Ph.D. IQ looked at me, with all sincerity, and said, "hey that's cool, because I'm working on my bar tending licence." We moved away and I looked at Wes and asked, "Did she seriously just compare working on a Ph.D to getting a bar tending licence?" Yes, yes she did. I vowed that I would try to stay away from her after that.

The next interaction I had with her was more than a year later. The ship was deployed and our two husbands were being flown back to attend school in Rhode Island. Now, IQ doesn't drive, but like me, she wanted to spend some time with her husband. I offered to drive her back from Rhode Island. She couldn't help drive, but at least she could help me stay awake. I figured I would just make the best of it. I learned several things that day. First, she grew up in foster care because her parents didn't know how to take care of her. Second, she is aware that she is learning disabled (and blames everything she doesn't want to do on that, but that's a different story) and third, she wants to be a cook and start her own restaurant.

I love to cook! Great, we have something in common. We can talk about that!!! Yay!!! So, what do you like to cook? Her: Well, I've made soup before. Me: What kind of soup? Her: I don't remember. Me: um, ok, anything else? Her: I can make spaghetti. And that was the end of that conversation because apparently, that's all she knew how to cook.

After the guys completed the 6 week school, they had to go back to the ship. They were gone like 2 weeks before they got back. I took IQ to the pier to get the guys. She was very upset because her husband had duty, meaning, he wasn't able to come home. Her: I'm so mad!!! I can't believe he has duty. And I bought him his favorite Hungry Man for dinner too. So said the woman who wants to be a cook.

Over the next couple of months, I discovered that she doesn't actually cook ANYTHING!!! And what she does "cook" is stuff from the frozen food section and she microwaves it (including mashed potatoes. Who doesn't make their own mash potatoes?)!!! Several times I would tell her what "exotic" food I was cooking and she would complain that it took too long or was too hard or what is Indian food anyway. If you wanted to be a cook, wouldn't you actually cook stuff? Once she showed me the syllabus to the cooking school she wanted to attend (and I have to give her credit for actually taking the initiative and doing something, because, as my next IQ blog will show, she never actually does anything). I noticed that one of the classes was only about weights and measures. IQ had told me that she wasn't very good at math (actually, she told me her family had gotten her a leap frog math game to help her). I pointed out that that would be a very difficult class for her (and for me). She laughed and said that because of her disability, she didn't have to take the class and they would just have to understand that. I didn't feel the need to explain to her that that is NOT how the American with disabilities act works (after working at a university as a TA, I kind of know how it works). I knew she would never actually get to school anyway.

Fast forward ahead to this year. She wants me to come over for dinner. She is making spaghetti. I try to ignore the fact that her house is disgusting (more on that next post). I figured she knew how to make spaghetti, since she told me she did. I get there, there's a big pot of water on the stove. Every couple of minutes she would yell for Mr. IQ to come check the water to see if it was time to put the spaghetti in. Apparently, she can't tell when water is boiling. Finally, it was good enough. So she put it in. Then, after that, she kept yelling at him to tell her when it was done. She doesn't make her own sauce, she opened up a jar of sauce. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with jarred sauce, except for the fact that she claims she wants to be a cook and she claimed that she knows how to make spaghetti. Then she made pudding, and again, had to ask Mr. IQ if it was done (it was instant pudding). Overall, a very interesting night. All I can say, if you ever see a restaurant owned by IQ, don't eat there.