Easy Cinnamon Chocolate Cake Not So Easy After All

Friday night had company for supper and baked Easy Chocolate Cinnamon cake, double recipe, in XL pyrex.

Company did not finish cake.

OMG Is that your complaint? I agree. I hate being stuck with leftover cake. Who wants to have cake lying around. Especially chocolate. That's the worst.

Saturday morning I wake up and thugs my teenagers and their friends have eaten the entire middle of the cake leaving only a narrow strip of crusty cake pieces on either side.

OH Man. No wonder you are complaining. I feel your pain. Crusty chocolate is just not worthy. Need more gooey chocolate.

Later that same day am making conversation with Almost Complete Stranger who mentions that she has two older teenage boys still living at home plus a daughter who is a serious athlete.

It must be IMPOSSIBLE to keep them fed, I say sympathetically thinking about my chocolate cake crust. My kids and their friends eat every piece of chicken that isn't nailed down. (Not that we nail chicken down, it's an expression.)

Well, says Almost Complete Stranger. I used to have four boys. One died during open heart surgery when he was 17 almost 18.

(Gasp)

And the other was murdered. Shot and killed in an alley. Wrong place at the wrong time.

(Oh)

So I guess keeping the other ones fed is the least of your problems then? I actually said. And we both laughed.

Sunday morning I wake up and XL pyrex is in fridge, covered in tin foil, but completely empty. All the cake was gone.

Never felt so lucky in my life.

Morals of the Story (Choose One)

1. Yes, complaining is fun, but never forget how lucky you have it.

2. Even when faced with the dark tragedy of a complete stranger, a joke may be appropriate.

3. Just because Complete Stranger gets shot in gun fight doesn't mean you can't put finished cake pan in the sink.