TheBanyanTree: Fish Hell

[Monique]

The asparagus arrived right on time Friday night. (Time being a subjective
concept that has less to do with clock than it does with the concept of
being ready for asparagus, or not ready for asparagus.) The tilapia was
awaiting the arrival of the asparagus before cooking itself, and we would
like to take this opportunity to disavow all knowledge of how the tilapia
was cooked, or seasoned, for reasons we will arrive at shortly.

I had put myself into a tub of scalding hot water, not with the intention of
boiling myself alive, but of relaxing some of the muscles that had taken the
opportunity of tightening themselves into knots. It was a good bath. I had
gotten around to walking the dog earlier, despite my delaying tactics. I've
been coming down with a cold, haven't been feeling quite myself, though not
feeling like anyone else either. 

So that was the situation when my loved one arrived home with the asparagus.
The fish was cooked (I use the indirect term because I really do not want to
take the blame for this particular fiasco) and my loved one steamed the
asparagus. 

He brought me a plate with tilapia and asparagus. He set his down. I looked
at mine. I didn't know if it was because of my cold or because I was very
tired, or because I had ruined the fish, but I was not feeling as if I
really wanted to try it. 

So I looked at it for a few minutes. I ate some asparagus, which was cooked
just like asparagus should be. I looked at it some more. 

And I took a bite of the fish.

My loved one still had his plate sitting next to him untouched, being
occupied with other matters temporarily. 

And I thought to myself, "Self, what the hell is wrong with this fish?"

I hesitated to say anything out loud. How could I have ruined the fish? Last
time I cooked tilapia it had turned out just as expected, better even, which
sometimes happens when I'm lucky. Perhaps, I thought to myself, it was just
because I was sick and nothing tasted right. 

The asparagus was fine, but what else would you expect from asparagus?

I looked over at my loved one's plate. His fish was still untouched. 

Fish is good for me, right? So I took another bite. And I knew, with that
second bite, that I had somehow managed to ruin the fish. With a sound of
disgust that might have been mistaken for a whine (since it was much like a
whine), I pushed my plate away and said, "I can't eat this!"

"Why not," he asked, since he had not yet had the pleasure of tasting the
fish.

"I don't know," I said, still unsure if I had ruined it or if it just tasted
ruined to me and would taste fine to anyone else.

He tasted it.

Yep. The fish was bad. Not only was the fish bad, the fish was inedible. In
my defense, my loved one said it was the fish, not my cooking or seasoning.
I'm still not sure if that's true, but it was rather vile, for fish. Even I
have trouble ruining fish. 

Pizza Hut knows me pretty well. We're in their system. We just go online and
before we know it, there's pizza at our door. Except the week before, when
we placed an order online and there was a mix-up at Pizza Hut and they
forgot to make our pizza order. Then, having rectified that error, they then
forgot to deliver it until they were ready to close and noticed it was still
there. Since we'd ordered the pizza hours earlier, we were wondering what
had happened to it. When we finally did receive it, we were not charged.
Free pizza! But on disaster fish night our pizza order was not misplaced,
and delivery was made in a timely manner, and we had pizza. Good thing to .
. . we would have starved if all we had to eat was tilapia.

I'll be avoiding the tilapia for awhile. I suggested fish tacos for lunch
today, having temporarily wiped the painful fish incident out of my mind
(selective memory being a wonderful thing to possess), and was met with an
unqualified "NO FISH!" Salmon and halibut are still welcome here, or will be
when we can stomach the idea of fish again, but tilapia will have to make
amends to us big time before we're willing to let it back into the house. 

The pizza was good. We can always count on pizza. 

Monique