This
weekend we had company at our house out on
Prudence Island. A college friend of my
stepmother's had come for a visit, along with her
husband. It's
unfortunate that I was not in the best shape at the time, having been doing
yardwork all day. Bluntly, I was fucking exhausted and not feeling terribly
conversational.
During
dinner, the subject of
power outages came up, and the
college friend (Eileen) mentioned that she had once very nearly lost a
hundred dollars worth of
beef she had just bought to a power outage.
"I don't know what I would have done if it wasn't already frozen!", she exclaimed, plainly
very glad she had frozen it
in the nick of time.
"Make
jerky." I muttered.
"Excuse me?"
"Well, if the
meat's about to go bad, might as well break out the
grill and some drying racks and make jerky."
"Well, when the power went out, I doubt making jerky was the first thing on her mind.", my
stepmother interjected, coming to her friend's aid.
"
Well shit, it's the first thing I think of!" I slumped my shoulders, half-closed my eyes, and did my best
Captain Caveman impression. "Ugh, no lights. Make Jerky!"
The ensuing silence and gaping expressions were a perfect
backdrop for my chuckling exit to the
kitchen.