1.  You reach for the recipe in the recent issue of "Cooking Light" only to find it's actually in "Gourmet".  Result: Dinner will be at least an hour late.

2.  You glance at the recipe in the morning to confirm you have all the ingredients.  But when you start cooking you realize you don't actually have everything:  Result:  Dinner will be about half an hour late so you can go to the store. 

3.  You glance at the recipe in the morning to confirm you have all the ingredients.  But when you start cooking in the evening Step 2 says "Marinate 8 hours".  Result:  Going out for dinner.

4.  You glance at the recipe in the morning to confirm you have all the ingredients - check.  But when you start cooking you are unpleasantly surprised to learn one of the ingredients is no longer, or perhaps never was, edible.  Result: While you could go to the store, your discovery has removed your desire for that particular item for quite a while.  Looks like dinner out.

5.  You are cooking a quick and easy pasta dish and get everything all prepped and set to cook only to realize you forgot to put the pasta water on.  Result:  Dinner will be late by about 15 minutes.

6.  Step 8 of 9 is to blend the sauce ingredients together but when transferring the ingredients from Step 7 into the blender they end up on the floor instead of in the blender.  Result:  Going out for dinner.

7. Halfway through cooking your Thanksgiving turkey the oven dies .  Result: Beg neighbors to use their oven and dinner will only be late by an hour or two.

8. You turn the oven on to preheat before prepping all of the ingredients and assembling the casserole only to find out you didn't actually turn the oven on.  Result: Dinner will be 20 minutes late. 

9.  You've worked all day and head home to make a nice easy casserole that can bake for 1/2 hour while you relax.  But just as you pull into the driveway the electricity in the whole neighborhood goes out because of a rolling blackout (benefit of living in California a couple of years ago).  Result:  Looks like something grilled.

10.  Husband turns on the grill to warm-up while you prepare the meat and vegetables.  Husband goes out to cook the food only to return grumbling about an empty propane tank.  Husband then goes to get propane only to return 20 minutes later complaining that the store is closed.  Result: Dinner out, about an hour later.

Hopefully I won’t be adding too many more to the list anytime soon!