Multitasking is something a lot of us do.  It seems that we feel the need to convince our hands and our brains that it is, in fact, possible to do more than one thing at a time.  I’ve been guilty of surfing the internet while making an attempt at an intelligent conversation on the phone.  It sort of works but have you ever asked someone a question and as the words are coming out of your mouth you sort of remember asking that very same question and feel quite sure you received an answer?  Perhaps you’ve been half listening to the person on the other end of the line and then all of a sudden there’s dead silence.  You know they’ve asked your opinion on something but because your brain wasn’t fully engaged in what was being said you stumble and stammer and make a feeble attempt to change the subject.  I hate to admit I’m guilty, but there have been a few times when I was distracted and convinced myself I was capable of giving 100% of my attention to two completely different things at the same time.  Not all multitasking is the same. I have been successful folding the laundry, making the bed, organizing my desk, washing the dishes and baking while on the phone and the only glitch I remember is accidentally dropping the phone in my dish water and then I guess there was that time when I was making zucchini bread…..

Late last fall Don brought home two huge zucchinis from a friend’s garden.  I really don’t like to bake but if encouraged, I will eventually give in.  A few days before the zucchini would have been ready to toss in the garbage I decided I should probably whip up something so I found a couple of different recipes I wanted to try.  I picked up some cute little foil pans and decided to make 8 cute little loaves of zucchini bread.  I will sometimes buy things like cute little pans in an attempt to convince myself I don’t hate baking.   With 8 loaves, Don and I would each be able to take some to work and I could easily freeze the others and take one out when we began to crave a little treat.  I assembled all of the necessary tools and ingredients and got things going.  About then, the phone rang.  It was my mom.  She always has all kinds of things to tell me and before I knew it, I had the batter evenly distributed between the 8 pans and they were ready to pop in the oven.  Just as I flipped the oven door open I realized I had forgotten to spray the pans with non-stick cooking spray.  I knew I didn’t want to take a chance on the bread not sticking after going to all the work of peeling and grating a zucchini the size of a watermelon so I scraped all the batter back into the bowl.  I washed and dried the pans and sat them on the counter. (This is the part where talking on the phone and baking will probably have to be taken off my multitasking ability list.)  I grabbed the bowl and once again I divided the batter evenly between the 8 cute little pans.  They weren’t looking nearly as cute as they originally did but they were still cute.

Mom was chattering away and I was attempting to be a part of the conversation and get my bread baking but just as I opened the oven I realized I had forgotten to spray the pans AGAIN!!!!!!  When something like this happens you experience a moment of disbelief.  It’s a moment when your eyes bulge out of your head and you say things to yourself you wouldn’t normally say and then there’s a bit of frustration followed by that “I could just cry” feeling.  You entertain thoughts of fairy godmothers being real and you just know yours is going to appear and wave her glorious “non-stick cooking wand” over your bread in an effort to convince you there really are happily ever afters.

In reality, I dumped the batter back in the bowl again.  I washed and dried those ridiculous little pans again and fought the urge to smash all 8 of them with a hammer.  Don saw 8 delicious little loaves of zucchini bread sitting on the counter when he got home from work and said, “Hey, great, you used the zucchini.  Now, that wasn’t so bad, was it?”  I didn’t bite him but there may have been a low pitched growl and a bit of teeth gnashing going on….just saying.