Partied Out

    I'm standing over the kitchen sink, rinsing the soap off of my hands, running the water as softly as possible. 
    "Come in and sit down," my sister calls to me from the other room.
    "I have to finish my homework!" I shout back. 
    "The Saints just scored another touchdown," she yells in return. 
    I sigh.  It doesn't look like the Colts are going to turn this back around.  Turning from the sink, I survey the counters.  Oreos, Mother's Taffy cookies, an emptied bag of potato chips, a scraped clean bowl of dip.  Oh, and the chocolate cupcake batter that I just mixed.  What was I thinking?  I absentmindedly lick the spatula, feeling the heaviness of accumulated junk-food from Super-bowl Sunday in my stomach, but unwilling to stop eating the rich cupcake batter. 
    I received the cupcake cookbook on my last birthday, a gift from my mother, full of tempting full page color photographs.  Strange how the results never seem to live up to the picture.  I consider the unfairness of food photography.  Sure, the pictures in the book always look better.  No one has to eat that food, the stylist can do whatever they like to it.  Like the contrast between the McDonalds commercials that run between football plays and the actual food you find yourself presented with at the counter, the food is always better on the other side of the camera. 
    At this point, though, I don't much care if the cupcakes burn to a crisp, sit in the oven as batter overnight, never reaching that magical point of change to solid food, or explode when I turn my back on them.  At least if they do that, I'll have something interesting to blog about.  The oven's temperature was measuring over 999 degrees Fahrenheit the last time I checked it, but I've left it for nearly three hours now, the over-heated stones giving me an excuse to sit on the floor and play Canasta while constantly nibbling junk-food and berating the on-screen football players for not making better plays.  
    Now that I've left it, I'm worn out from not moving enough.  An odd paradox, the fact that resting all day only seems to make you more tired by the end.  It's dark out and cold, but I'd rather let my feet get chilled than walk the extra few yards to my nearest pair of shoes.  I wear my headlamp to carry the cupcake tins out to the oven, another benefit I'm certain previous brick-oven bakers lacked.  At this moment, the headlamp is a welcome help.  Previous bakers most likely were done with their day's baking by this time of night anyway.   I tilt the heavy square of cement that is the oven door away from the opening and swing it to the side.  Not wanting to bother with pushing the barely visible fire further into the back of the oven, I shove the pans in, pointedly ignoring the ashes that fall over the far edges.  So some of the cupcakes would have a bit of ash baked into them.  It wasn't as though we really needed the extra sugar.
    Twenty minutes pass, in which I do not much of anything, still looking in annoyance at the cookies arrayed on the counter.  I can't bring myself to sit down and watch the last few depressing plays of the game, when it's fairly obvious that the Saints aren't going to let go of their lead.
    The idyllic-seeming day has begun to disintegrate, like they always seem to.  While you work through your math homework, while you run errands, while you clean your room, you wish there would be one day, one day where you could simply sit around, eating unhealthy food, playing games, being absolutely lazy and incompetent.  Then you do it and instead of feeling satisfied, you wonder why you ever wished for it.  Something like when I was younger and would wish I was sick so that I wouldn't have to study - right up until I actually was ill. 
    I check on the cupcakes.  The moment I lift the oven door away, I see the front row collapse as the cold air hits them.  Lovely.  There goes my plan to pipe filling into them.  The toothpick comes out sticky and I shiver my way back into the house.  
    This time last night, I was panting, gasping for breath that wouldn't quite come, as I tried to get a stubborn soccer ball between the other team's goalposts.  I was sweaty, exhausted.  The knee I'd had surgery on was beginning to ache. I was utterly happy.  We lost the game.  I was still full of excitement.  Last night, I had slept soundly. 
    Tonight, I pace the kitchen, twitching towards another piece of sugar, frowning at the dirty counters.  The cupcakes need to be done now, I no longer care if they're raw in the center.  I grab two potholders and open the sliding door again.  When I deposit the hot pans on the stovetop, I can clearly see the burnt edges of the back row, in contrast to the sunken craters in the front row.  It no longer matters.  I'm past it, done with it, done with today.  I leave the cupcakes on the counter and go to bed.