If You Can't Take The Heat...

After several successful dates, I offered to cook dinner for a lawyer I was seeing. As I thought he was  quite a catch, I desperately wanted to impress him, so I researched recipes and decided on a salmon dish. On the day of the date, I lovingly seasoned and prepared the salmon for roasting at his apartment. I felt quite confident that my cooking skills would seal the deal as far as our budding relationship was concerned. I arrived to find his kitchen in a bit a mess. I cleaned up a little, popped the fish in the oven and proceeded to join him in the living room for a glass of wine.

We were in deep conversation when we noted a funny smell filtering into the room. It was coming from the kitchen. When we entered it, it was full of smoke. Not just wisps escaping from the burnt salmon, but actual plumes of smoke, which had us gasping for breath. The oven was on fire! The fire extinguisher was not going to cut it so he called the fire department. As he did so, I anxiously envisioned the entire structure - it was one of those tightly packed New York apartment buildings - burning to the ground, thanks to my culinary efforts. They arrived in minutes, providing me with a small degree of relief. 

However, after they put the flames out, they proceeded had to tear down the walls of his kitchen to make sure there was no unseen electrical fire. Being the lawyer that he was, my date began snapping pictures of the damage to document it for his landlord. It turned out there had been some oil left in the oven, which was what likely caused the fire. It was totally my fault, but the firemen looked at my date with an expression that said: get rid of this girl!

My date was quite the gentlemen about the whole fiasco. After the firemen left, he even asked what we should do with the rest of the evening. Utterly mortified that I'd just burnt his kitchen to the ground, I said it was probably time for me to call it a night. Neither of us called each other again.