Kitchen Conflict

Quote of the Day: "I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate.
-Julia Child

We have a new dish at work--a tasty jambalaya dish that is a tad more complicated than our other menu items to prepare. It is done in the sautee station over a burner, and it includes cooking three different proteins--chicken, chorizo, and shrimp--in the same pan. All three must be put in at different times for them to cook all the way through, and it requires undivided attention in order to keep the garlic from burning.

Our weekend sautee cook is slow, and he can't cook. In a way, I'm dreading Saturday and Sunday, when I know he's going to go down in flames, but for whatever reason I'm kind of looking forward to it. It'll be a real spectacle. Why do I do this?

The other day, I coworker told me that the night before he had gotten into a fight with his girlfriend. "She even slept on the couch," he said.

She worked later that day. I couldn't wait for her to get there so I could see the crackling tension between them. When she arrived, her boyfriend said, over-enthusiastically, "Hi!"

"Hi," she said, and she followed it with a fake grin.

"Wow," I said. "That was awesome."

Why do I thrive on conflict? I feel like a sadist.