Why I Punked The Turkey

“Ah! Turkey breast, hot out of the oven. Perfect.” I carefully picked up one neatly packaged turkey breast and added it to my shopping cart. Isn’t ready-made turkey the best? Poultry perfection. Saves you loads of time, and it tastes pretty good too.

When I got home, I made a salad and wanted to top it off with slices of warm turkey. So I took out a knife and started to carve that tantalizing hunk of deliciousness. Hmm, the only thing was – I had never carved a turkey before. I had never carved any type of meat before. But it couldn’t be that difficult. I mean, all those television Thanksgiving commercials and sitcom specials make it look so effortless. If Alice on the Brady Bunch can do it, then I can do it. She’s not even a real cook.

I began to cut the turkey on a bias, moving the knife back and forth like a saw. Wow. The juices were flowing and everything – just like an episode of Paula Dean! Back and forth, back and forth, back and whoa! When I got to the bottom of the slice to finish it off, my knife met some resistance. Was there like a bone down there or something? I pushed the knife down with a bit more force. No budge. Even more force. No budge. Hulk Hogan force. It budged. Except this time my knife went through the bottom of the plastic pan. Good grief.

I stood there, looking at this turkey on my kitchen counter. I imagined it talking to me: “So you thought you’d have some turkey with your salad, huh? Silly human. You couldn’t carve your way out of a paper bag. Ha!” There was no way I was gonna let that turkey get sassy with me – even it was just in my imagination. I tossed the knife in the sink, looked at my hands, and…

By the time I was done, the poor turkey looked as though it had been involved in a very bad fight and lost- which it did. I ate my salad. It was quite delicious. And the leftover turkey currently sits in a Tupperware container in my fridge, and has not uttered one word to me since.