In relationships, there are disagreements and there are disagreements. While some couples argue over the right way to load the dishwasher, some arguments are more serious… and potentially life-threatening.
At least, that’s what one San Francisco man thought about his wife’s habits in the kitchen. According to the man, who posted on Craigslist in exasperation, his wife constantly cross-contaminated food and cooking equipment, pulled dirty utensils back out of the sink to prepare food for their children, and didn’t believe in covering food that went into the fridge.
Alarmed, he turned to Craigslist to recruit a fake team of reality TV producers with the goal of making his wife the star of a show about dangers in the kitchen. His goal: shock her into better habits. And never let her find out the show isn’t real.
You can read his whole posting below:
Convince my wife she is on a reality tv show about food safety.
My wife is terribly dangerous in the kitchen. She cross-contaminates raw meat with other things constantly, takes dirty knives out of the sink to cut fruit for our children, refuses to wash produce from our urban garden or the grocery store before serving it, and refuses to use any kind of covering on food that is placed in the refrigerator. She has no normal sense of what is safe or appropriate.
While I have tried to point out to her that this is all extremely dangerous, she:
1. Is strong-willed and absolutely convinced that these things are not problems.
2. Notes that her mother does the same stuff and that she was trained in lab work by a Nobel Laureate (?!)
3. Believes she does not get sick and when she does, blames anything or anyone else.
As such, I would like to enlist someone’s help to assemble and lead a team to convince my wife that she is on a reality show about dangerous kitchen behavior (title of show: TBD). You and I will work together to plan a script and you will produce. I am imagining that it goes something like this:
One weekend morning, there is a knock at the door.
Your team comes in, perhaps a host, a doctor, a scientist, and a cleaning expert, along with an authentic looking shooting crew (at least two professional looking cameras, a sound person, a director, and lighting person) You ambush her and tell her she’s on a reality show about the most dangerous cooks or whatever, that you’ve been secretly filming her in the kitchen for the past month (you know how this part goes)… Then you show her the secret footage (which I have captured and which you will have edited).
The scientist, doctor, and cleaning person should all say appropriate reality show things like “in my entire career, I’ve never seen anything this dangerous….” etc. All reality show cliches welcome.
Then you will stage some kind of intervention in the kitchen, showing (and filming) how to clean with soap and water, how to wash a cutting board after cutting raw chicken, etc.
Then you will leave telling her that the episode is not yet scheduled to air, but probably sometime next year.
There will be no reveal. You will not tell her this was fake and I will not tell her this was fake – ever. We will be “waiting for it to air” for a year or so and then we will conclude that the show didn’t get picked up, etc. My hope is that my leaving it all hanging, the impact on her behavior will be more severe.
The ideal candidate will have some film/tv experience, access to friends who can play these parts, and ideally access to the camera/lighting equipment for free or cheap to reduce the costs of this endeavor. Note that none of this equipment needs to be functional – there is no need to record any of this.
To apply, please send a brief treatment of your vision for this production and how you would staff and execute it, along with an initial rough budget. I will select the top proposals for in-person discussions.
I look forward to working with you and I thank you in advance for helping to protect my family from food borne illnesses and pesticides.
Let’s hope his plan worked… and that he never got found out. Hooray for creative solutions!
Want to see a couple getting along? Check out the crazy stuff one couple got up to when babysitting their friend’s toddler…
