Fire Drill!

It didn't seem like cheating on my Lenten forsaking of sweets; how on earth could anyone classify a bagel as a sweet?

That this one was a cinnamon-sugar bagel put me into the gray zone. I opted to label it a "bread and grains" and eat it, goldarnit. Any enjoyment of the delightful crunch of toasty-sugary-cinnamony topping would be secondary.

After all, Prince Tatertot and Sir Screamsalot had picked out huge, fluffy doughnuts from the case at Kroger. No mere wimpy ring-shaped doughnuts for my dear boys; oh no, these were manly football-shaped doughnuts, easily twice the size of their weak brethren. They oozed chocolate frosting - and the sprinkles! Oh my! The sprinkles were a culinary masterpiece of pastel rainbow perfection.

Indeed, after a side-by-side comparison, my cinnamon-sugar bagel with plain cream cheese seemed downright spartan in comparison to their yummy treats.

So into the toaster it went, my wee bagel, as the boys dove face-first into their doughnuts at the kitchen table. I pushed down the lever, then headed just around the corner into our office (which began life on our home's floorplan as a formal dining room). I pulled up Yahoo! and brought up my email. Then, while Yahoo! maddeningly took it's time to retrieve all the pseudo-spam in my mailbox, I stood up from the desk and headed back into the kitchen to check on the weeboys.

This took all of twenty seconds.

Turning the corner, I saw Prince Tatertot licking his fingers without a care in the world. It was the look on Sir Screamsalot's face - and the wafting scent of burnt, carbonized sugar - that focused my attention. I followed Sir Screamsalot's wide-eyed stare and saw it, too.

The toaster was on fire.

I have apparently either missed my calling as a high-danger situational employee or I've just become used to dealing with high-risk moments resulting in bloody injuries as a mommyfolk to three wee daredevils. Either way, I reacted calmly.

"Oh dear," I said, my voice slow and measured, "Looks like we've got ourselves a little kitchen fire."

I walked over and unplugged the flaming toaster, moving it out from under it's countertop perch under the wooden cabinets. The fire that devoured my now-ruined bagel hadn't gotten out of control; the cabinets and the wall hadn't come even close to being scorched.

Sir Screamsalot's expression of dire fear had abated a bit at my even tone; Prince Tatertot had finally finished his doughnut and was now intently following the latest little ditty from Laurie Berkner on Jack's Big Music Show. Fire, shmire - Laurie was singing about clouds, man. Clouds.

I reached into the spice cabinet just up and to the side of the stove and pulled out the baking soda. Pouring the entire box on the flames, I watched the fire disappear in an instant.

Which is when the smoke alarm went off.

And Prince Tatertot finally snapped into action.

"Oh no! OH NO! Get out! Stay Out! Don't! Go! Back! In!"

*************************

And so now I must count my blessings:

1. For three years of public-school mandated Home Economics classes, grades 6-8, for a third of the school year; and

2. For my Mom and Dad; Mom who showed me around a kitchen from the time I was wee myself; Dad for his random fire drills; and

3. For Arm & Hammer; damn, those folks make one useful product; and, lastly

4. For this fine theatric masterpiece, one of Prince Tatertot's all-time faves -

WM