If you have ever asked yourself, “How does one end up with a spatula burn on their shoulder while cooking?” I can answer this question for you now.

It began simply enough. With a craving. We don’t generally eat a lot of meat meals in this household, but, every once in a while, we just get a hankering for a rectangular grass-fed burger with fresh mushrooms and provolone on a thick slice of challah.

I think everyone does.

So, last night, we hit the store and got a pound of meat, and I shaped four rectangular patties of roughly the same size. Two for dinner last night, two for lunch today.

Since last night’s burger-frying went off without a hitch, I felt safe going into the lunchtime fry. Why wouldn’t I? I cook things in hot oil regularly with great success. What could happen?

Apparently, this could.

While giving the patties a good grease-releasing squeeze, suddenly, the spatula flew into pieces, with the hot metal part coming right at me. Instinct moved my head out of the line of the trajectory. But there was no hope for my shoulder.

It done got spatula-ed.

And, most unfortunately, I was wearing a tank top, or this could have just been a humorous tale of clothing destruction instead of a tragedy of personal bodily woe.

The fact that I realized the inner parts of the not-cheap metal spatula were made of breakable plastic instead of durable metal, and my personal feelings on that issue, is not something with which I will burden all of you. But it was irksome. And I would love to discuss it with the brilliant engineer who decided that plastic and glue could somehow hold metal firmly in place.