This article was originally published in 2019 and resurrected for you now for no other reason than to make you laugh. Please enjoy the true story We Ate Spaghetti and This is What Happened.
Super Husband was away from the hospital on a conference week, which meant he was on kid duty—pickups, dinners, and all the chaos that comes with it—while I held it down at the hospital. Just as I’m inching toward the finish line of my day in the ER, his text comes through: Tyler’s puking. Again.
Tyler, our resident hurling champion, is determined to make his mark on early childhood by perfecting the art of large-volume spews and breath-holding spells. By the time I make it home, we’ve hit seven times throwing up. Seven.
Fast forward a week, and the stomach bug has conquered every member of the house. We’re finally starting to recover, though I had to stop reading a Bored Panda article about terrible food photos because—well, too soon. But we’re hungry again, so we’re winning.
“What’s for dinner?” I ask my now non-GI-infected children.
“Noodles with sauce!” shouts my daughter Kendra.
“Spaghetti!” agrees Brian.
This is brilliant. This requires boiling water and microwaving sauce. I got this. I grab the bag of shredded parmesan from the fridge, inspect it through the clear packaging, verify its freshness, and sprinkle it generously on everyone’s plates. Dinner is served.
We sit. We eat.
Super Husband: “Umm, Hun…”
Me: “What?”
Super Husband: “Look.” He passes a shred of parmesan across the table. The tip is moldy.
He digs through Brian’s plate and finds another. Kendra’s already mixed her noodles, sauce, and moldy cheese into a culinary horror show and started eating.
Me: “I just ruined dinner, didn’t I?”
What better way to celebrate surviving gastroenteritis than spaghetti with moldy cheese?
P.S. Super Husband, ever the hero, didn’t miss a beat. He salvaged some stray noodles, fed the kids, made himself a bagel, and didn’t complain. As we scraped my dinner fail into the trash, I hugged him tight.
Me: “I love you. Thanks for being cool about the moldy cheese.”
Thanks for reading! If you want to keep me company on the list of dinner fails, reply to JCBCpublishing@gmail.com and tell me about yours.