My smoke detector started chirping at 3:26 this morning. I hope it woke the marble droppers upstairs. It certainly woke me. It wasn’t a blaring, constant alarm. It was more like a panic-inducing, three-chirp warning that repeated every minute. I heard the first three chirps and was out of bed by the second three. What the hell was happening? I had to wake Michael, who could clearly sleep through a fire. (Finally I found a flaw!) And thank God he’s so tall because he was able to reset the squawking thing without having to climb the step ladder. He just helped me change the battery two weeks ago. Ugh! Must google reasons smoke detectors chirp. But better to do that when I’m fully awake.
I wasn’t able to fall back to sleep immediately, but he was. I stayed under the covers while my mind raced with thoughts of deconstructed bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches. I’d start with thick cut applewood smoked bacon in the cast iron skillet and use the bacon grease to do a quick sauté of the second half of the amazing focaccia that I planned to cube and season. Sunny eggs with a sprinkling of cheese would be carefully slid on top of the bread base and bacon would either be chopped and added to the top or served on the side. Both? I wasn’t sure if I felt awake enough to grate my own cheddar from the block or cheat by using the Sargento extra sharp, pre-grated stuff in the resealable bag. Stomach rumbling, I was finally able to go back to sleep once I’d nailed the recipe in my head.
But all my breakfast strategery was thrown out the window when hours later, Michael offered to hoof on over to Pick-a-Bagel for toasted whole wheat everything flagels with scallion cream cheese and Nova. You could literally see God after just one bite. (I swear.) How could I say no to a semi-religious experience on a Sunday morning? The bagels were perfectly crisp, with the warmed, speckled cream cheese oozing out the rounded sides. The Nova, which I causally call lox, even though technically lox is Nova’s saltier cousin, was buttery, salty, and covered every inch of the bagel. Seriously this is the breakfast of champions. Wheaties be damned.
We read the digital Times together because who gets a paper delivered anymore? The sun was back today and appeared not to be playing tricks. Outside clothes would most certainly be needed if I planned to actually leave the abode today, which didn’t seem likely. We watched another episode of The Handmaid’s Tale and I had a death grip on Michael’s arm for much of the second half, which he found amusing and told me that he was impressed with my commitment to the show.
Sunday means the end of the weekend to working people, which unfortunately does not include me. Working people usually check their agendas for the following day or week, or they might click through important emails they left hanging from the previous Friday. I had a whole list of things I would do to prepare for the upcoming week. I’d think about wardrobe choices, weather complications and how that might affect my hairstyle of bother to blow it out or screw it and just wear it up, restaurants I’d be visiting and what I might be ordering (say no to the bread basket but allow yourself to share dessert), when I’d have time to haul my dirties to the dry cleaner, and I’d often contemplate my supply of Fage Greek Yogurt and fresh sliced fruit toppings I’d bring with me for my healthy at desk breakfast…unless I threw caution to the wind and ordered a greasy breakfast sandwich from the deli downstairs. But nooooo, not anymore! And I don’t have to be asleep by any specific hour either. So I convinced Michael to stay until Monday morning instead of leaving Sunday night like he planned. We maximized our time together with Chinese takeout and a serious talk about our fucked up government until most of our conversation was just just quiet mmms and yeahs.
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