c
e c e’s e e
oven-baked cookies
Words by Jialun Qi
Ceecee enjoys baking cookies. She bakes them at a commercial kitchen run by Farquaad & Co., a local multinational conglomerate. Farquaad & Co. owns all the high-quality baking ovens, because they ran their competitors out of business a few years ago. Lately, Ceecee has been having trouble with the ovens. More often than not, the machines become extremely hot or extraordinarily cold, and swing between very dry and very wet in a matter of weeks. Such extreme fluctuations have had a terrible effect on the cookies – Ceecee is not making as many as she used to, no matter how hard she tries. Unable to put up with it any longer, Ceecee confronts Mr. Farquaad, the owner of the kitchen.
Farquaad strikes a reconciliatory tone. “OK. I hear what you are saying, and your concerns are important to us. I’ll convene a subcommittee to begin a bidding process for a twelve-part contract outlining the initial scope of the questions surrounding the behaviours of the ovens that may potentially exist.” Ceecee shakes her head. “This is urgent. These extreme temperature fluctuations impact all of us. If things go on like this, I won’t be able to bake any more cookies.” “So?” Scoffs Farquaad as he salivates at the quarterly earnings projections on his laptop. “I have enough cookies.” “I know you do, but hundreds of millions of people poorer than you won’t.”
“You need to fix your ovens,” Ceecee says.
“That’s not my problem though, is it?”
“Why? They are not broken,” says Farquaad. “They are behaving erratically, and I think it’s because you’ve stressed their systems too much.”’
Ceecee kicks Farquaad in the shins.
Farquaad crosses his arms. “Don’t tell me how to run my business. If you don’t like my ovens, go someplace else.” “I can’t,’ says Ceecee, ‘you own all the ovens.”
50
“Ow!” Farquaad exclaims. “You kicked me!” “Does it hurt?” Ceecee asks. “Of course it does!” “Oh, does it?” Ceecee gasps megalomaniacally. “That’s not my problem though, is it?”
