The Imbiber Vs. Non-Stick Skillets
The universe doesn't eat your soul in one gulp. It savors every morsel. I know exactly where I was when it last took a bite out of me. It was last September, in the cookware section of the Bed, Bath & Beyond in Culver City, California.
At first I didn't even know I was wounded. My girlfriend and I needed frying pans. In the past, this particular task had required a bare minimum amount of thought and effort on my part. Indeed, up until that day, I’d spent roughly the same amount of time pondering frying pan design as I had writing out thank you cards to aggressive student loan officers.
My girlfriend, on the other hand, appears to have minored in Skillet Science in college.
“Are you crazy?” she shouted, practically swatting me over the head with a Teflon pan I’d indiscriminately plucked from a shelf. “We’re not buying that!”
She then offered up an impassioned indictment of the non-stick coating used in Teflon pans, claiming it releases toxic gases and has been linked to cancer and all sorts of other gross health problems. Oh, and it also inexplicably kills cute little birds… and not just when frying them.
I countered weakly with, “Yeah, but Teflon’s, like, easy to clean and stuff.” She looked at me with a mix of disgust and pity that has become strangely comforting to me, especially after sex.
