Domestic bliss

It's no secret that I lack a certain prowess in the kitchen. Perhaps if my kitchen was wider than your average hallway I might like to flit around the room with my favorite recipe book and a few Pyrex dishes filled with desserts, but my humble abode came complete with a stove smack dab in the middle of (you guessed it!) a hallway and, well, I can't be bothered to spend any length of time there.

Given this obvious lack of skills, whenever I do feel the urge to cook/bake or do anything in the kitchen that involves a hot appliance (stove/oven, toaster or coffee maker to name a few), my friends joke around about my not setting fire to the place. This joke is usually quickly followed with another joke about how I should start a fire, if, for nothing else than to get the fire department to my house and meet my future husband.

While I haven't actually started a fire in order to meet hot men, I have spent a considerable amount of time in their presence and while they're definitely up my alley, they're most definitely not husband material. At least not for me. I'm sure their wives would argue that they make perfectly acceptable husbands, but I digress.

I've got a sudden urge to bake something lately, potential risk of fire be damned. Apple crisp, brownies, cookies, cake...you name it, I wanna make it. The cleaning up process after said baking is a bit of a turnoff, however. With so little space in my kitchen, my sink leaves a little more to be desired. The bowls, pans and spoons from dinner/dessert last weekend are still waiting to be cleaned, although if you ask me, they've been "soaking" for so long they've probably cleaned themselves by now.

This sudden need for delicious scents to waft through my apartment (and not through use of scented candles) coupled with my recent redecorating project at home is starting to raise a number of red flags in my mind. What on earth is going on with me lately? Has domestic tranquility finally set in at the tender age of 27? Say it ain't so! But then I'd rather sit home with a bottle of wine, some homemade dessert and a romantic comedy than go out bar hopping with my friends.

Perhaps the world has fallen off its axis?After all, I live in Western Mass after swearing never to return after college; I'm dating someone whose profession isn't listed as one of the civil services; my apartment has never been cleaner and I appear to want nothing more than to be June Cleaver or that damn Donna Reed.

My, how things have changed.