sometimes, i get weird cravings for oatmeal. we never ate it growing up, and i've never had a bowl i like, but every once and a while i get all nostalgic about cooked oatmeal and i'll buy a pack of cinnamon bun instant oatmeal, make myself a bowl, and hate it.
i hate cooked oatmeal, but i keep buying it and making it, forgetting that it just isn't for me.

(this is just an example of a problem i have all the time. i used to have the same issue with polenta, although i think part of my stubbornness came from not wanting to admit that i didn't like something that every foodie in the world drools over. i'm elitist as well as stubborn, i guess)

so today i get in one of my moods and i find an old, but not yet expired, package of instant oatmeal, and i splash a little milk in it and stick it in the microwave. and even before the ding i'm saying to myself, "you dumb bitch. you know you hate oatmeal. don't even taste this. just put it right in the trash, because that's where it's going anyway."

(it's the pep talks that get me through my mornings, you know?)

then i pull the bowl out of the microwave and realize, through too much microwaving and not enough milk, i have BURNED THE OATMEAL.

oh, what a failure. you can see in the above picture, there is no creaminess to this oatmeal, no warmth. just dry, chewy chunks of cinnamon.

you will also notice that half the bowl is gone. this is because, friends, it turns out burned oatmeal is totally delicious. to me, anyway.

maybe everyone, even oatmeal, deserves a second chance.