Ouch. That one hurt.

“My heart goes out to the poor darling,” she said, scrutinizing her face in a magnifying mirror, and squeezing a blackhead. “So I’ve been helping her with her diet. One of these days, she’s going to look just fine.

“So how about it?” she said. “Will you stay for dinner?”

Was she kidding? If I had to listen to one more word about Aunt Melanie and her damned pecan balls, I’d go bonkers. No way was I staying for dinner. I’d head straight home with a pitstop at McDonald’s.

“We’re having beef bourguignon,” SueEllen said.

My salivary glands sprung into action.

“With cherry cobbler for dessert,” she added.

“Sure.” I gulped. “Sounds great.”

SueEllen plunked me down to wait in her oak-paneled den while she got dressed for dinner. The first thing I did was call Prozac. I once read that animals are comforted by the sound of their owner’s voice on the phone. Cooing into my answering machine, I told Prozac that I’d be late and that there was dry food in her bowl, and to please not pee on my pillow as she sometimes does when she’s pissed at me for being late. I told her to be a good girl, then made a few obnoxious kissy noises and hung up.

I tried to look over my notes, but I couldn’t concentrate. All I could think of was food. The smell of beef bourguignon simmering on the stove was driving me crazy. I ransacked my purse for something to eat, but all I came up with was an old Doublemint gum wrapper, which I’m ashamed to say I licked clean.

Then I glanced over at the wet bar and saw my salvation. A bowl of hard candies was sitting on the counter, beckoning to me. I raced over, only to discover they weren’t real candies, but made of glass. What sort of sadist has glass candies out on display to fool unsuspecting guests? The same sort of sadist who makes her writers sit on the toilet bowl, that’s who.

I decided to search behind the bar. Surely there’d be something to eat. Some nuts, maybe, or chips. But no. All I saw were bottles of booze. For a brief instant I considered chugalugging some Grand Marnier, but I couldn’t risk showing up tipsy at the dinner table.

I opened the mini-fridge. Nothing but white wine. Good heavens, these people were annoying. With all their millions, couldn’t they afford a measly bag of potato chips?

And then I found it. Way in the back of a cupboard, behind a stack of cocktail napkins: a jar of macadamia nuts. Macadamia nuts! I felt like Columbus discovering America, or Colonel Sanders discovering Extra Crispy Fried Chicken.

I grabbed the jar and tried to open it, but the Easy Open Lid wouldn’t budge. Lord knows how long it had been sitting there in the cupboard. Maybe it was permanently welded shut. I wanted to bang the lid on the counter to loosen it, but I was afraid I’d make too much noise. So I ran it under hot water in the tiny wet bar sink. It took forever for the water in the tap to finally turn hot, but at last it did, and I held the jar under the steamy water. Then I gave it another try. Still no luck. This was ridiculous. This jar was shut tighter than a bank vault. Somebody ought to write an angry letter to the Easy Open Lid people about the concept of truth in advertising.