my cookie nightmare

We just moved in to a new neighborhood. As usual someone brought by the proverbial cookies. My wife, knowing how much I like cookies, thanked the welcoming party, and left the cookies for me. I uncovered them and pulled one out. Interesting shape. I set the cookie down and wandered off into the living room to think about it. I wondered how they made that shape, and where they got the idea. I became so intrigued with it that I went to my tool shed, got some tin that came with us (for some bizarre reason), and began to fashion a cookie cutter to match the shape of those cookies. It was a little tricky, lemme tell ya. First, tin is unwieldy. And dirty. And it leaves this silvery black film on your hands that is quite difficult to get off. I cut myself several times and bled all over the kitchen after a few expletives. But I survived that phase. And the cookies for the most part did, too. The tin wasn’t really pliable enough, though, and my hands and wrists were beginning to feel it, so I heated up the tin in the oven. That actually worked great, but hot tin burns flesh. Gloves help. The other thing about tin is that it cools very quickly, so I had to go with this process of placing another cookie on a board, throwing the gloves on, swiping the tin out, darting over to the counter where the cookie was, and trying to trace it before the tin cooled and became rigid again. After a dozen or so iterations, I got pretty good at this. In fact I would even say I perfected it. But there were still problems. When the cookies first arrived they were warm and a little pliable. The problem was that I ended up misshaping them a bit with the tin. And of course I didn’t want a cookie in the image of my tin. I wanted a tin in the image of my cookie. During the time I worked out the process, though, they cooled and hardened, which solved that, but led to a new problem. I kept breaking the cookies with the tin. The shape of the cookies, if I could describe it, was almost a human shape. Almost, but not quite. And it was that not quite part that I really wanted to immortalize with my cookie cutter. So frustrating. I broke a leg here, a hand there, chipped a head, broke one right in half. And then the worst thing of all happened. I got ready to run the process again and found that I had run out of cookies. Yep. Every single one was either blood-stained or broken. Well by this time I was all in. You can imagine that this was no small thing. I mean, I had roped off the kitchen and threatened my wife and kids with bodily pain if they disturbed my lab in any way. Thus, the panic at the cookie basket’s silence. But then I had a comforting thought. I would just go and ask the neighbors that left the cookies if they’d mind cooking another batch. It seemed a little imposing I guess, but at this point it was for the greater good. So I checked the name on the card, warned my family once again, and headed out the front door. This would be quick. Right. I finally was informed that said family leaving said cookies had moved. This I found to be completely ridiculous and exponentially improbable and patently unacceptable and…unnerving. I walked then jogged then ran back to the kitchen to get at that basket to look for another clue as to the identity and whereabouts of the cookie people. I was beginning to worry. Ok it was an all out anxiety attack. I saw that card tied onto the wicker basket and ripped it off, which was not a good idea because I tore right through a handwritten note. When I pieced it back together here is what it said:

Welcome to the neighborhood and goodbye. We’re sorry we won’t get the chance to know you because we’re packed up and moving out again to follow another crazy dream. We hope you enjoy the neighborhood as much as we did, and that you can take as many and varied memories with you as we’re taking with us, starting with some warm cookies.

Sincerely,
The Striders

So here is my desperate plea. If anyone named the Striders moves in next door to you, PLEASE ask them if they have a special cookie cutter like the one described above and let me know immediately. I never even got to taste those cookies. But they sure had the most wonderful aroma when we first received them.