Was “accosted” by Third Son soon after waking from a 5 hour “nap” to detail The Saga of the Tater Tots… with a twist ending

Apparently SOMEONE put some tater tots in the oven and forgot about them. Luckily he discovered this and managed to air out the house while I was sleeping and turn the oven off. I went into a lengthy explanation as to this being the kind of reason why using a timer is so very important. Then he tells me he did not put the tater tots in the oven, but his brother, Second Son swears he did not either.

Now, being as Eldest Son has been gone since I went to bed (and he does not generally eat Tater Tots) and I was asleep and Lil Miss was gone to her dad’s and roommate no longer lives here…apparently someone broke into my house, put some tater tots into the oven and left someone else to take the fall for the ensuing near-conflagration

“wait but Cece! Did you consider that maybe you were so tired you put the tots in the oven and fell asleep and forgot?”

I had considered this possibility except that as i explained to Third Son; when I worked in restaurants (total of 15 years) I once had a situation wherein I was threatened with being fired should I ever put food in an oven without a timer again

So after all those years of restaurant work I’m pretty sure that even were I sleep walking (which I have never done before) I would probably still put a timer on somethin in the oven

Eldest just got home. He walked over to give me back my Target card, saw this on the screen and said “oh yeah I totally forgot about the tater tots… my bad”

(we are sharing a car right now and he thought I was staying on campus late so he put some tots in the oven to go with his burger. When I returned home early, he grabbed his keys, his burger and left, forgetting he had JUST put the tots in the oven)

When I mentioned the timer he railed a bit about how the timer is too quiet and doesn’t register for him. That’s because he plays video games.

Conclusion: gaming can burn your tots.