Kitchens bear up to attack

Everyone has a bad day now and then. But you don't expect it to revolve around cooking pot roast.

That was the case in Vail, Colo., recently when a 72-year-old woman's culinary skills attracted some uninvited guests -- a bear and her cub.

The woman walked into her kitchen and found the bear standing six feet away. The bear hissed at her and swatted her chest and arm, resulting in some minor scratches, the Associated Press reported.

The woman, whom police didn't identify, then scared off the bear by yelling and clapping her hands.

But the cub wasn't nearly as receptive to leaving. The cub apparently wanted to stay for dinner. The woman ultimately had to push the cub outside.

The bear and her cub apparently are the same ones that made themselves at home in another house, eating food off the kitchen table.

Now I like a pot roast every now and then, but I'd never show up to a stranger's home just to get a bite.

Who knew that cooking could be such a dangerous endeavor?

No doubt, the federal government will have to start attaching warning labels to pot roasts. Warning: cooking a pot roast could expose you to bear attacks.

What would have Julia Child thought about having to cook dinner for a bunch of bears? She would, no doubt, have been appalled.

I've viewed her kitchen on the Internet. The kitchen is on display at the Smithsonian, and as far as I can tell there isn't a single bear to be seen.

Maybe the government needs to mandate bear-proof kitchens. Perhaps bears are just too enthralled with the Goldilocks story. They think they're owed hot porridge and decent beds.

It's incidents like the pot-roast calamity in Vail that make me thankful that I'm not a good cook.

I can't imagine a bear ever wanting to eat what I cook. Even my children are reluctant to eat food cooked by their dad. So I figure no self-respecting, large, shaggy-haired mammal is going to show up at my house for dinner.

I can't blame them -- the children or the bears.

But thankfully none of us have to starve. We have a microwave that can provide quick meals before the bears get a smell of what we're up to.

Anyone can nuke something with a press of a button. You don't have to be an expert cook. Even teenagers can do it.

Fortunately, bears don't know that yet, or our neighborhoods could be overrun by the creatures.

Clearly the problem in Vail is that the bears aren't being trained properly. If the city fathers could just get the bears to go to drive-through restaurants like everybody else, the town's kitchens once again would be safe from attack.

Rather than being chastised for eating out so much, Americans should be praised for protecting their home kitchens from wild animals. Not to mention, such activity keeps our economy from going into hibernation.

A final thought: I want to express my heartfelt appreciation to my friends, acquaintances and loyal readers whose written and verbal expressions of support comforted me during my recent ordeal. Your common-sense values, compassion and sense of justice lifted me up and provided me a visible reminder of what is good about Cape Girardeau. It's to you that I rededicate my journalistic efforts.

Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.