Jon has been experimenting with his grilling technique this week, and Sunday night he almost set the house on fire. We bought a set of cedar planks on which to grill (free range, ethically grown, lulled to sleep every night with a gentle nursery rhyme) meat, and although I think he read the directions I believe he did so with his eyes closed. Not thirty seconds after putting a set of sirloin steaks onto those sizzling planks he lunged through the back door screaming GET ME A SPRAY BOTTLE. I quickly handed him one that I found in a dollar bin at Target which in terms of spraying water performs about as well as trying to spit out a wildfire. He swung open the door again and was all PREFERABLY A SPRAY BOTTLE THAT WORKS.

Right. This is not my problem here. Don't you think you should have checked to see if there was a working water bottle on the premises before you decided to carve your initials on the lawn with a blow torch?

You could say the meal that night was somewhat difficult to chew.

Last night he tweaked his approach a little bit to cook a plank or two of fish, and since it was going to take so long we let Leta eat dinner before us. She'd been in a horrible mood all afternoon, and sometimes it's not worth it to wait for the happy family dinner when we know that letting her have her chicken nuggets early will add back those two years she just stripped from our lives by screaming all sorts of preschool obscenities over the fact that Coco had looked at her toys. Hurtful obscenities like "bum-bum," and "booger," and my favorite, "disgusting poo-poo head." You know, to distinguish it from the compliment "poo-poo head that is delicious enough to eat."

She finished her meal in record time, and as I was preparing a pot of green peas she asked for a treat. I told her yes, but she'd have to wait until her father and I had finished eating, and since we'd just started cooking it would be a while. She sat there thinking this through, processing the fact that she would eventually get her prize, but not fully comprehending the time frame. That's when she leaned over in her chair, grabbed agonizingly at her stomach and said, "Mama, my tummy hurts, and I need a chocolate treat to make it feel better."

Right. Unless you're on day two of your period it doesn't work that way. So I said, "Excuse me?"

She hunched over so far that her face was almost touching her knees. "It hurts," she moaned, her voice as raspy as a 50-year smoker who has to breathe through a tube. "It hurts so bad. A chocolate treat will fix it."

That's when I walked away from the stove, poked my head out the back door and said, dude, I know you need to keep an eye on that fish, but we need to have a talk with our daughter about her eternal salvation and how IT HANGS IN THE BALANCE.