#9: Leave the butter out

When I went home for Christmas this year, I purchased something I think is one of the closest things to manufactured perfection in the grocery store: Pepperidge Farm Brussels cookies. They're crispy, crunchy, delicate, and they have just the right amount of chocolate. But I found, whenever I would sneak off to the pantry to have a little treat, some culprit was not only sneaking off to the pantry for a treat but was also leaving the package open, therefore decreasing the life of my cookies' crispness. So, of course, I had to call a meeting and explain why the package should at least be re-closed, not to mention that these were my special treats just for hoarding. I was willing to share as long as we all respected the freshness of the Brussels.

In my apartment, this would never have happened. Well, it might have happened, but if it did, I would know exactly who the culprit was: me. Somehow, knowing you have no one to blame but yourself really makes you much less angry and much more willing to eat stale cookies.

This long introduction, though, is actually to say something about butter. On that same trip home, my mother imparted to me one of the most joyous bits of information I have yet to receive: You can leave the butter out!

Why is this so important, you ask. Well, I will tell you. I'm pretty big into the jelly toast scene, and I particularly like to butter my bread before it's toasted. Refrigerated butter, though, comes out of its paper eager to rip holes in your bread so that the jelly will fall in your bed while you're trying to watch the Today Show. This won't do. So, of course, I was overjoyed to hear that my butter could not only be spreadably room-temperature every single morning, but now I could have a cute butter dish sitting on my counter!

And all of this brings me back to why it's great to live alone. Because I'm the only one lurking in my apartment, I know that butter's going to be waiting on the counter for me when I wake up, room temperature in its emerald green depression glass dish. No one will secretly put it away in the night. No one will use it all before I get any. That butter is room-temperature, and it's mine, all mine.