Don't come over for chicken dinner

I am slightly accident-prone.

It's actually somewhat of a byproduct of being absent-minded. I don't always focus on the task at hand, and it will frequently result in disaster. Friends can attest to this. Hell, random people around the city can attest to this. I once tripped over a huge recycle bin while waving to someone, and fell on top of it as I emptied its contents, in front of a good thirty people, most of whom could not conceal their laughter. But, I digress.

I am also not much of a cook. I can cook what I like, and I do it well, but I am certainly not what you would call a cook. I can cook, I am not a cook.

I once was responsible for watching a close friend of mine while his parents were away on vacation - he was sick, there were concerns that he might need to be taken to the hospital, and we decided it would be best for me to stick around just in case. With a pounding head and exhaustion (among other things), he was basically out of commission - this was not going to be quality time. Just time.

I decide to get a cooked chicken from the grocery store, as I am starving. He is well enough to suggest (read: insist) that I purchase an uncooked chicken from the store and cook it on one of those stand up chicken-cookers (the chef's terminology just oozes out of me, doesn't it). I will call it a chicken-stand. I think this is a bad idea. He reminds me that it is much healthier. I relent.

I pre-heat the oven while I go quickly to the store to pick up a chicken. I put the chicken on the stand. I open the oven, and realize that with both racks inside, the chicken will not fit. I remove one rack, and place it on the stovetop. I pick up the chicken for a second time, lean forward to place it inside and.... SEARING PAIN!

I let go of the chicken and tear my forehead off of the metal rack onto which my skin has just melted itself. I scream in pain. I swear. Every word I can think of. I can hear my friend, who has gotten accustomed to complete silence, start asking what's going on.

Now picture this. All he knows is that I have been attempting to cook a chicken, and he walks in the kitchen to find me doing all I can not to scream in pain, with the skin ripped off of my forehead in a perfectly straight line about 2 and a half inches long and maybe a half inch wide.

I tell him nothing. I am angry at him, because I know what is coming. He starts to laugh. I am furious. Here I am, starving and sitting around in the dark for him, and I have managed to injure myself in the most ridiculous possible way, and he is laughing at me. Really, I don't blame him now. In the days that followed, I observed some of the most reserved people I know laughing like they have never laughed before. My dad's girlfriend, who is outgoing but typically attempts to be nice to me, laughed with no restraint for about 10 minutes straight. A group of regular customers at work the following morning laughed until they cried - only one of them was able to get out a full sentence - "That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard!" The mayor's wife, whenever she sees me, reminds me that she will never forget me - I was the one with the huge burn on my forehead from cooking chicken.

Still, I was pretty angry right then. I'm a touchy person when I'm hungry. And if I had just gotten the pre-cooked chicken, I wouldn't be in this situation. But I didn't. And it hurt. Badly. I keep ice on it for the rest of the night. I am not able to put concealer on it before work in the morning, as it is so deep, I would just be rubbing it into the wound. My skin is completely seared. I suffered humiliation for approximately 3-5 weeks. I put polysporin and vitamin E on it about 10 times a day until it was completely healed. The only scar that remains is the one on my dignity.