v-day

If you want to be romantic, take lessons from the best: what you need to do is attempt something that your mate can definitely do better than you, just to say "As you can see, I've tried, and I'm totally sucking at this; I really need you!"

In our case, I didn't have to look far. All I had to do was to try my hand at cooking. Here's my recipe for eggplant sandwiches:

1. Decide that you're a big boy, and don't need your mommy's help in preparing her staple dish. Look for cooking hints on the internet.


2. Cut two eggplants into 1" slices.


3. Check the recipe again. Figure out that it calls for 1/2" slices. Cut each slice that you have in two.


4. Pour some oil into a pan, and start frying eggplant slices.


5. Observe, in amazement, a previously undiscovered physical phenomenon, where oil disappears from the pan.


6. Pour more oil. Flip the slices when they start smoking, burning a finger in the process.


7. Decide that you may be a big boy, but mommy can still help with the recipe. Call her to find out that the recipe calls for garlic paste and tomatoes.


8. Assess the ingredients at hand. Decide to substitute garlic paste with garlic powder, and tomatoes with nothing.


9. Finish the first batch of eggplant, dry the slices, put them on bread with American cheese, stick them into the toaster oven, start frying the next batch.


10. Realize that you are terrible at multitasking.


11. Realize why you suck at cooking.

After I finished, I totally expected them to taste like cardboard, but the sandwiches actually turned out decent. There was still no way I could have matched the mastery of the chefs in "Tu y Yo", this Mexican place where we went later on at night. After a full meal and a pitcher of white sangria, we just wanted to go home... good thing we didn't have to drive!