A simple buffalo chicken dip or three-ingredient meatballs? An extravagant replica of Levi’s Stadium made out of marzipan? YOU TELL US.
I’ve reached that point in my mid-thirties (gross) where life is,
effectively, over. MNWildkit is three, SmileyKit is almost ten months, and my waking moments that aren’t spent dying at or commuting to Regional Public University are spent doing the self-affirming things like cooking for, cleaning up after, bathing, and attempting not to throttle the aforementioned spawn.
I mean, uh, the apples of my eye, the darling children I get to raise.
At the moment, though, Mrs. MNW—a name I have learned she resents, as she is a proud graduate of that university in madison—is on paid leave thanks to the state of Minnesota*, which now provides her and all other new moms not lucky enough to have employer-paid leave with twelve weeks to be with her new child.
* Thank you and rest in peace, Melissa Hortman.
That’s meant a lot of things: a break for her from the rat race of working geriatric health care in an aging state, time to bond with our two daughters who otherwise spent ungodly amounts of time in daycare because of our work schedules, and saving thousands of dollars in daycare costs, a financial respite after a nearly-bankrupting summer in which I was not being paid by Regional Public University—what prehistoric-ass system can’t pay out a nine-month contract over twelve months?—and she was making a pittance off her short-term disability (that we had to pay into).
All that is to say: it’s nice to be home with the kids.
The problem, though, is that—owing to me grading until Dec. 29, us being with the in-laws beginning on Jan. 1, my online Winterim class beginning on Jan. 2, and then all three of the Wildkit gals getting a severe bout of the flu between Jan. 3 and Jan. 17—I got approximately 1.5 days of Winter Break before going right back to school and having the house, on my precious work-from-home days, occupied by a family that purported to understand “I HAVE WORK TO DO” but really enjoyed interrupting it at every turn.
It’s…nice…to…be…home…
So. I was excited, last Sunday night, when the wife and kids were going to go up to her parents’ cabin for a few days with Mrs. MNW’s childhood friend and her baby. I would get Monday completely to myself, Tuesday a full teaching day, and then a few precious hours of solitude on Wednesday before it all came crashing down.
And then, at about 2am on Monday morning, MNWildkit threw up five times.
It’s so nice to be home.
BUT! After an RSV scare for SmileyKit (negative), some negotiation with her friend, and a thumbs-up from me, Mrs. MNW decided to replace our family’s planned trip to the cabin—scheduled for this Sunday to Wednesday—with a trip for the girls: Sunday night with her parents at the lake, then the friend arrives Monday through Wednesday.
Neither one of us, at the time, remembered that this Sunday was Super Bowl Sunday. So now I’m alone for The Big Game.
My childhood hometown has a pizza place that, whenever I’m back, I angle to order for dinner. It’s the square-cut, Minnesota tavern-style pizza that’s not quite cracker-thin, but crunchy enough, with a liberal helping of cheese and—crucially—a sauce that’s got a little kick, rather than the cloyingly-sweet options at Carbone’s or Pizza Man. (Think Red’s Savoy minus the pretense, with a notorious den of sin and ill-repute right across the street and my first elementary school literally 300 feet up the hill. It’s your one-stop pizza shop.)
The problem is, I am rarely successful at convincing my wife or parents that what we need tonight is a large pepperoni—and much less so that I should be allowed to eat most of it in the car on the way home.
This Sunday, that changes.
Advantageously, that pizza place—one that, until 2024, did not take orders online, not even from DoorDash—has opened up a second location in the northern suburbs, a 15-minute drive from my house.
Advantageously, I will be alone in my house on Sunday night.
Let’s eat.
Let us know: what will YOU be making for the Superb Owl? Do you have a chili recipe to die for? Cook up a buffalo chicken dip that’ll burn off your nose hairs? Opt for something sweet, like a cannoli dip? Tell us in the comments.
