Oops

Yesterday I decided to try frying up some corn fritters. I had never fried anything before but didn't think it would be a big deal. I put some oil in a pot, put a lid on it so it'd heat up faster, and went about making the corn batter. I checked on the oil a few times but the last time I pulled the lid of flames burst out of the pot. Kevin saw the light from the other room and asked what happened. "It's on fire!"

I moved the pot off the heat and Kevin came over to help me. He put the lid back on and moved the pot outside. I thought of pouring water on it but a red light went off in my head so we continued thinking. It didn't seem like it was going to go out anytime soon, so while Kevin went to get a shovel to throw some dirt on it, I, despite my first judgement, went inside to grab a pitcher of water. On his way back outside Kevin was just in time to see me running away from a huge fireball.

When I had started pouring the water on the pot, of course, flames burst up about five feet and all I saw was fire before I dropped the pitcher and ran the other way. Kevin came out and I threw my hands up and said, "I'm sorry! I was just covered in flames! I can't do this!" I ran inside and immediately jumped into a freezing cold shower to cool off my right underarm which felt hot. I then discovered that about an inch of my hair had been burned off the ends of the right side of my head.

Luckily Kevin was able to get the fire out with only a little damage to our grass, and I was able to cut off most of the fried hair on my head. We both escaped with only the most minor of burns. The pot, however, didn't have quite the same luck. It was thrown out, and I have to admit I don't plan on trying to fry anything for quite some time. We were able to have a good laugh about it for the rest of the day, and I hope some of the neighbors saw the craziness. We now know our fire alarm works perfectly, and Kevin is going to purchase an extinguisher soon. I definitely have learned my lesson about how not to heat oil, and I was able to bake some pretty delicious corn muffins instead.