FOR A CHANGE                                                       JANUARY 26, 2015

A few week ago, the Warden and I were sitting around in the Visitor’s section of the Compound just shooting the breeze, and I came up with this: “You know, we haven’t had any stir-fry for eons. I can’t remember the last time; it had to have been long before some of my Humpty Dumpty days — the Nile Tile fall (with the hunks from 911,) the River Bed fall, ending up with MRSA, the San Juan Capistrano motel fall with the broken knee cap — these are a few I recall at the moment.”

And whaddya know! The Warden sounded all enthused — probably because I have to do most of the stirring. She said, “No, we haven’t done that routine for quite some time, besides the past few years have become quite a blur with all those visits to the ER, and I can’t remember when we had your wonderful, tasty stir-fry. I’ll go shopping for everything we need, so you will have to make a list, and I do hope you remember everything.”

That was a mistake right there, putting the idea in my head that I might forget some ingredient. That happened, not once, but about 3 times that something had been left out, so we finally tackled it last week. Warden had to slice up the pork into very thin strips — we seem to need a new, very sharp knife for this part of the dish — the strips were not all thin. The Warden was not at fault — we just need a knife for stir-fry to be hidden away until the next time stir-fry is on the menu. And I can imagine we can lose track of where we hid it.

I had to stir it a bit longer so the “strips” were sure to be done, and it meant that I did the vegetables a bit longer; so it was not my best “do” of stir-fry. But now that we got warmed up, the next attempt will turn out much better.

And you might guess what I have to relate next. But, of course, you would know my breakfast, or early lunch as the case may be, was absolutely loaded with stir-fry. First time I ever had lentils with that, and it was great. The bean sprouts were a little obstreperous when they had to get on the spoon, but other than that, the water chestnuts, the pea pods (Warden had cut these in half) and the other items all acted like they were old friends with my lentils.

If I weren’t feeling a little puny today, I could’ve given you a longer tale for you to mull over. Next week will be a better week. Love you — every last one of you. Melitas

MELITAS FORSTER                                       MONDAYS WITH MELITAS