At home, I am equally inept. When people visit, they are invited to carve the dinner meat. The same greasy-handled knives that slip from my hand to land quivering in the wooden floor and which, when applied to bird by me mash it into five or six unappetizing pieces manage - in the hands of others - to magically find the points by which the bird is best disjointed and to carve paper thin slices from the breasts, skin intact.
My wife's recent foray into island cookery led her to try the various kinds of b'dang b'dang. One of them is pshtwar b'dang, a delicious spicy concoction with a frictionless feel like okra slime and the adhesive tenacity of old chewing gum (I am not denigrating the dish, we all love it, but its consistency is a bit strange). A few weeks ago I had decided on a midnight snack of this delicacy and went to the refrigerator to indulge in leftovers. Our dinner with the owner of my tree-trimming company had come off rather well. I had done nothing the entire evening but sit in my chair, and he never noticed the dollop of banana pudding that ended up in my penny loafers. I reached into the chilly shelves and pulled the plastic tub in which the pshtwar b'dang was stored and, characteristically, managed to drop it on the floor. Knowing what I was in for, I jumped back to avoid the splash. This was probably a poor decision, since I knocked the large flower vase off the island counter behind me. It crashed to the floor only a few instants after the pshtwar b'dang. The latter's tub landed on its corner, popped partially open, and squirted the sticky stuff onto me, the counter, the refrigerator and the ceiling.
The noise brought my wife running. She looked in and said, "Oh, it's just you." as some of the pshtwar peeled off the ceiling and landed on her shoulder. I offered to clean up the mess, but she knew better than to let me try.
The very next day she purchased some three hundred dollars worth of a new set of plastic tubs, juice containers, and various organizers that were guaranteed to not open when dropped. Scarcely a week later my wife had donated the old containers to children, relatives, and the Salvation Army. It was time to inaugurate the new equipment. She again made pshtwar b'dang. Again, the surplus of this pungent thixotropic mixture was left in the top shelf of the refrigerator. Again a desire to recapitulate the sensations of dinner struck. Again I reached for the fatal container, again my hand slipped. Again I stepped back as the plastic met the floor. But (calloo, callay!) the squarish lid held, the container contained, the contents remained contented, the insides stayed inside. For once my retreat broke nothing (partially because so few breakables were left in the house), my arm did not swing to bring down the water glasses arrayed in a triangle (too reminiscent of a set of bowling pins) alongside the sink. No damage. No mess. With immense relief I picked up the errant container and airily set it on the counter. I held the bottom firmly, grasped the little tab in the corner, and pulled.
The guarantee held because the lid did. It would not come off. I may not have normal digital competence, but I have never failed to get the lid off a plastic container. I grasped the bottom with my left hand, the tab with my right, and tugged again to no effect. I checked to see if the container was so full that there was no air inside, to see if I was the victim of a refrigerator-induced vacuum. There was air, so I put the container into the microwave and looked at my daughter's motorcycle magazine while it ticked away. At the ding, I removed the plastic dish, amazed that it hadn't exploded, leaving the interior of the microwave oven a mess like the time I overheated some leftover tomato gumbo soup. The pshtwar was hotter than I expected and it fell from my fingers. I deftly moved my slippered feet out of the way as it bounced from the hardwood floor to a second and then a third landing. It didn't pop open. It splashed me with no hot, oozing pshtwar b'dang (a similar event with a less secure brand of container last year had taken me to my doctor where I appeared at his office with burned patches on my ankles).
I picked up the dish with more care, put it on the counter, and proceeded to pull upon the tab. That didn't work. So I tried to pull another corner up. No dice. I got out the old butter knife we saved for such times and pried at a third corner. I should have known better, my gripping hand slipped, the knife went skittering toward the refrigerator, the pshtwar b'dang went sliding toward the sink. Action and reaction, opposite and equal. I reached for the knife, since I didn't want it to drop into the crack between the counter and the refrigerator, which would have meant moving the double-door monster out to retrieve it. Consequently, I registered a strike on the glasses with the pshtwar b'dang. With admirable unanimity, the glasses committed seppuku as they struck the porcelain bottom of the sink, the container slithering in afterward. As I had reached the other way for the knife, my elbow hit the wall switches which both turned out the lights and turned on the built-in garbage disposal unit. The obedient disposer proceeded to destroy itself in the dark trying to digest the glass shards without benefit of water. I stumbled around trying to turn on the lights and knocked the pop-up toaster to the floor. This permitted me to trip over its cord and I ended up on the floor with my chin on my wife's foot. She had come in and competently turned the grinder off and the lights on. She didn't say anything.
The container of pshtwar b'dang remained unscathed and closed. I hardly needed to explain to my wife what had happened, it was old hat. She told me to sit down at the kitchen table. She turned on the exhaust fan to get rid of the smell of the overheated garbage disposal unit, got out a plate and a spoon, and brought over the pshtwar b'dang. She tried to open it, and failed. You can understand my surprise at this only if you know that even inanimate objects think twice before opposing my wife's dominant will, forged as a seventh grade teacher in the Bronx. "The old butter knife," I said as she opened the drawer to find it, "slid between the counter and the refrigerator." She took another butter knife and tried what I had tried, but without slipping. But also without success. My wife is not used to being thwarted by anything. She had me hold the bottom with both hands, and grasped the top firmly with two of hers. "When it comes open, " I said, "it will end up all over my lap."
"That will be no new experience," she grunted as she pulled. I did not slip. She did not lose her grip. The top did not come off. She went to the refrigerator and got out the container of cooked carrots. It wouldn't open either. "There must be a trick to it," she said. We had to wait until morning to try the 800 number stamped on the bottom, so I went to bed to nurse my bruises and to get away from the smell of the overheated electric motor's burnt wiring.
Before going to work I called the 800 number. "Thank you for calling A-1 Containers," said an electronic voice that brooked no interruption, "If you wish to order merchandise please press 1 now." There was a pause so that you could press 1. "If you are a retailer and wish to carry our line of fine plastic containers, press 2 now." That didn't apply. "For problems with your order call the order problem desk at 1-800-555-1212. Thank you." It hung up. I couldn't remember the number so I had to call and listen to the whole spiel again. I wrote down the number and then dialed it.
"Thank you for calling the A-1 Containers order problem desk. We will be open from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM Eastern Standard Time on Tuesdays through Thursdays." It hung up.
It was 8:15 AM on Monday. We kept our food in bowls covered with plastic wrap that night. Next day I called from work. "Thank you for calling the A-1 Containers order problem desk," said the electronic voice. "If your order was incorrect, please press 1 now." It paused. "If your order hasn't arrived, please press 2 now." It paused again. "If your order has been damaged in shipment, please press 3 now." I waited. "If your order was not billed properly, please press 4 now." I hoped my boss was not watching. "If you have received someone else's order, please press 5 now." I picked up a copy of "Modern Tree Trimming" I had been avoiding for two weeks and began to leaf through it.. "If you wish to speak to an operator, please press 8 now."
I pressed 8.
Somewhere a phone rang. It kept on ringing. After seven rings another electronic voice said, "All our lines are busy, but please hold on. A customer service agent will be with you as soon as a line is clear. Calls will be handled in the order they are received, so you will lose your place in line if you hang up and call again."
Some highly distorted music came on, and eventually there was a little click. A moment or two of silence followed, my hopes rose, and then the electronic voice said, "All our lines are busy, but please hold on. A customer service agent will be with you as soon as a line is clear. Calls will be handled in the order they are received, so you will lose your place in line if you hang up and call again."
As this sequence repeated I read that Henry Mycielska had been made the president of the national organization of tree-trimmers, that Cyclone was introducing a new line of guarded re-ground remote tree clippers guaranteed to work on branches up to 2 1/2" in thickness, that Nyerson's agency was offering cut-rate insurance policies for tree trimmers and that...
"Hello, thank you for calling A-1 Containers order problem desk. This is a real human being speaking. How may I help you?" I snapped back to here and now and tried to remember why I was calling. It took me so long I was afraid she'd hang up. "Wait," I said. Oh, yes. "I have one question" I began, "just how do you get the lids off your containers? We can get them on all right, but how do you get them off again?"
"Oh," she said brightly, in a tone of voice hinting that my call was one she had been waiting for ever since her heart-throb Ralph moved to Indiana when she was in sixth grade, "you want technical assistance! I'll connect you." and the phone went dead.