It's a smell. A smelly smell. A smelly smell that smells. . . .smelly.

For those of you that have already had babies, do you remember those pregnancy cravings (for those of you that haven’t had babies. . .just wait!)? How you’re all “I must have this one thing RIGHT NOW and if I don’t I will just continue to puke until you (DH) feel sorry enough for me to just go and get me some damn CHEESECAKE!!!”? Well, I have been blessed in the fact that those cravings never went away for me (no puking, however, so that’s a bonus) except they are a lot less often. But when they hit, I am OBSESSED with whatever I’m craving until I eat it and the craving is gone.

The last couple of weeks that craving has been for Chicken Fried Steak. I know, right? So not healthy, or really all that hard to make for that matter. But every time I was at the grocery store, I would forget. Until I got home and I was all “CRAP! The CHICKEN FRIED STEAK!” Wednesday, however, I finally remembered at the store, and while I was already planning dinner for that night, Thursday was just around the corner. Thursday, glorious Thursday!

I obsessed all day and as soon as it was time to start making dinner, I did a little happy dance out to the kitchen. I made my mashed potatoes, country style gravy, and buttered corn. Then I popped the CFS into the oven and set the timer. Everything was going according to plan. . .

When the timer buzzed, I made my way back out there and popped open the oven door. An odd colored smoke (blue-ish gray-ish brown-ish) came billowing out. Now, while I’m no Rachel Ray and have been known to burn a thing or two in my time, it really is near impossible to burn CFS patties. I looked at them and they didn’t look burnt. So I pulled them out and THAT’S when I noticed it. The little blue and red pool of melted plastic on the bottom of the oven. That’s when I established what the funky, yet familiar, smell was that had been permeating the kitchen since I opened the oven door.

Turns out CJ had left his prized eraser (he’d just gotten it for taking a reading test & getting a good grade on it) on my table. When I put the pan on the table before putting it in the oven, the eraser must have stuck to the bottom of the pan and fallen off when it started heating up.

Imagine if you will, the scene in A Christmas Story where Ralphie’s dad has been looking forward to the Turkey all Christmas morning, only to have it be devoured by Bumpass’ dogs. While there were no dogs present in my story, THAT’S the devastation that I felt.

And we ended up having Chinese afterwards. Which is good, but still not CFS.

CJ felt horribly bad, so I shared the story about the time I made my mom go on an Easter egg hunt and I hid an egg in the oven. She didn’t find it and I forgot about it. Until she started preheating the oven. Needless to say, we had a good laugh about it and I made my chiropractor laugh so hard she couldn’t even adjust me. So, it all turned out all right in the end, I guess. And after a mid-day full of people dumping bad news on me, I really needed to laugh.

How about you? Any good plastic-in-the-oven tales to share?