Missing rice

Image
  • Missing rice
    Missing rice
Body

I have developed a habit of buying in bulk, or at least in multiples.

Say I run out of shaving cream. When I go for more, I’ll buy maybe four cans, which will last me six months or more.

Toothpaste? There are a dozen tubes in the drawer. Plus a couple of five-packs of toothbrushes.

And we have a kitchen cabinet devoted to mustard.

My thinking is: this cuts down the number of shopping trips I have to make and, coincidentally, on the opportunities for impulse buys.

Thus, I was in my comfort zone when the virus hit back in March and people starting buying mass quantities of stuff.

Toilet paper was never an issue. Just with supplies already in the house, we were good until June, I think it was.

But, Kindra and I had a simultaneous thought: Perhaps we should stock up on food that has a long shelf life.

No telling how long the shutdown would be, and we wouldn’t to run out of edibles.

Which is how we came to buy 30 pounds of cornmeal and 40 pounds of flour, most of which is in the freezer so it will last longer. And we bought about 25 pounds of pinto beans, figuring we could live on beans and cornbread for months, if need be.

And rice. One day, I forgot how much we had in the pantry. Turned out, it was a lot.

Not only did we not need the 20-pound sack I bought, but we didn’t have room for it in the pantry

So we shoved the sack into a bucket and put it in a safe place and felt good knowing that we had 20 extra pounds of white rice, should worse eventually morph into worst.

It was a great plan. Fool-proof, even, except for one small flaw.

We can’t remember where we put it.

I know. It is difficult to lose a bucket with a 20-pound sack of rice in it. But we did.

It isn’t in the pantry. It isn’t in the Harry Potter room, which is what we call the broom closet under the stairs where we keep the dog food.

It isn’t in any of the cabinets.

And it isn’t in the laundry room or the bedroom closet.

I remember in a vague kind of way that I snapped the lid on the bucket and thought: “I’ll just put this right over here so we can get to it easily.”

I just can’t remember where ‘right over here’ was and no amount of self-hypnosis has helped.

No doubt, the rice will surface some day, just as some chicken and mushrooms are ready to fulfill their destiny in a crock pot.

In the meantime, it is slightly distressing to misplace that much food.