I Was Once An Aspiring Ballerina. Really.

When you live in a Manhattan apartment no bigger than a shoebox (one for flip-flops, not winter boots), you have to get creative with your storage options.

The biggest challenge in my Lower East Side hovel has been the kitchen, specifically, the fact that I don't have one. I have a living room with a sink, stove and refrigerator, all of short-person stature, shoved against one wall. There is no counter space, save for the few inches beside the sink on which the dish-drying rack sits, and there are no drawers.

Some years back, someone (either me or one of my four roommates since moving into this apartment seven years ago) purchased a wire basket with compartments, which we use to not only dry the silverware right next to the dish-drying rack, but also to store it.

Why am I boring you with the details of my non-existent kitchen, you ask? Backstory. Now on to the real story. You may not know this about me, but I am a klutz. A big klutz. A Mandy-Moore-on-Scrubs-klutz-only-not-as-endearing-because-Mandy-Moore-is-way-cuter-than-I-am klutz. (As an aside, I only recently discovered Scrubs, and only watch it in reruns, so I can't tell you during which season Ms. Moore played Zach Braff's girlfriend, but damn, she was funny.)

So I was doing the dishes the other night, because The Roommate wasn't home yet and she was going to make us couscous with lamb and vegetables, and I thought maybe I should clean up for her so she could cook. Nice of me, right? Not really -- all of the dishes were mine.

I washed a pan, put in on the rack, pulled my arm away and something happened. I'm not sure what, exactly, but it was either a sleeve or an elbow. Whatever the case, I launched the pan back over my shoulder and it went crashing down on the ground. I bent over to pick it up, and when I stood up, knocked my other arm into the silverware holder, sending no fewer than 73 utensils onto the floor. I picked them all up, put them back into the holder and put the holder in the sink so I could rinse them all off. Somehow I managed to flood the counter, break a wine glass and hit my head on the open cabinet door above my head. This all happened within the span of, oh, about ten minutes.

Once I'd gotten myself back together, The Roommate returned home. After I recounted my tale of personal injury, she told me about how she'd just been in Key Food, where she'd managed to not only hit her own head with her shopping basket, but also to assault some unsuspecting fellow with it as well.

Hey Zach Braff, want to date us?