There are things that a majority of adults can do that I fail at: drive a car, wear pants, hold down a regular job, wash dishes, use chopsticks…y’know, the basics.

One of those things can be moved to a conditional list of ‘kinda actually can’ now.

That’s right! I can now use chopsticks!

We’ve got this place in town, H Mart [no matter what the H Mart website says]. I’d heard quite a bit about it–mostly that it was a magical place of Asian Food and cheap prices.

I’d heard this from relatively reliable local friends [one, especially, who actually made me Pho for my birthday once. Who also told me what it was when I noticed it that day I first had Pho at this place in the same lot]. I also heard, mostly on the internet, that the place was incredibly fishy. Not, like, suspicious fishy. Fishy fishy. A ton of fish-stank.

Which is why I went to a whole bunch of trouble to arrange a trip there without Gremlin. See, he doesn’t like the smell of fish. That’s pretty inconvenient for me, since I’ve found that I rather like fish. Especially battered fish, of the ‘fish and chips’ variety.

Fortunately, he’s okay with tuna. I can do without pretty much everything, but tuna? I need tuna.

Those plans I mentioned kinda fell through until much later that day [after I’d gotten a nap], and, by then, Gremlin was awake. So I asked if I should arrange to be picked up, or if he wanted to actually go there.

He went. Because, if things were intolerable, he could just wait outside.

H Mart turned out to be not quite as fishy as reported. At least, not all over fishy, including the parking lot. There’s one corner that’s nauseatingly fishy, even for me. Like, so fishy you feel like a fucking carp decided to start living in your mouth. Amazingly fishy.

But it has so many other things, and at such reasonable prices. For example, check these out:

Each of those is, like, twenty individual chopsticks. Ten pairs. Each for two dollars. And they’re reusable. They had all sorts of chopsticks, and they were all way cheaper than they would be anywhere else. Even their stainless steel chopsticks were under three dollars a pack. The last time I got stainless steel chopsticks, they were twelve dollars a pack!

This is decidedly awesome, yeah? Totally. Except I just bought something I have no hope of ever using. Because I’d never mastered the complicated finger-dance of chopstick use. People have tried to teach me, but I seem to lack something. And they’re always trying to teach me while my food is getting cold, and I’m hungry and seriously fuck this gimme a fork.

Meet the Fun Chop Chopstick Helper. Again, marvel at the price. I’ve seen these at other ‘Oriental Gifts’ type stores, three for five dollars, and they didn’t even come with chopsticks.

Yeah, sure, they’re disposa-sticks, but there are still chopsticks included in the package. All for two dollars!

It’s really just a piece of plastic. A springy piece of plastic with holes for chopsticks.

It sorta works like this [and there are instructions on the package, which, actually, are very helpful. The ones at Oriental Gifts? No instructions. How the hell would I know which way to put it on the chopsticks?].

Simple, right? As simple as using chopsticks probably is for the average adult. This little bit of plastic works, too.

Before, like, ages ago before, I had these joined-at-the-top chopsticks. I got them for a dollar at Target. And they broke like a thing I got for a dollar at Target [that isn’t a bottle of Goo Gone]. They were just oddly cut pieces of wood glued together at the top, and only slightly springy. They split at the glued spot, and would not be stuck back together.

This thing does not have that obvious failure point. And, if one of them does fail? I have four spares.

Not bad, right? And, obviously, other chopsticks fit in them, so I don’t have to find out where those disposa-sticks come from.

The only question: will this actually work for me? Will the equivalent of training wheels for chopsticks actually allow me to use chopsticks?

I found out Sunday night.

We made ‘stir fry’ stuff–beef and veggies in special ‘stir fry oil’ we found at H Mart, and rice noodles [sorry, ‘rice vermacelli’, also at H Mart, and, again, so much more for so much less than what the store sells]. The beef also came from there. It’s the thin-sliced stuff they use for Pho [so thin that just dipping it into hot soup cooks it], but who cares? We just wanted some beef, and this was definitely beef. The veggies: snow peas, carrots, and those adorable little ears of corn. We also added broccoli.

This would be a good trial. I couldn’t pick up any of these things with chopsticks. The only thing I’ve ever been able to eat with chopsticks was potstickers, and only because I could stab them. That’s not how you use chopsticks.

And they totally worked. Not only was I able to get the beef and the veggies–even individual peas that escaped from their pods–but I managed to eat the noodles. I ate all my food with chopsticks. All of it. I did not get discouraged, I did not resort to a fork. I didn’t even have to lift my bowl to my mouth to sorta shove the noodles in [something I later learned was totally acceptable when noodles are involved].

I am still very proud of myself for this.

I used chopsticks. For a whole meal. I was not defeated.

Thank you, Fun Chop Chopstick Helper. Thank you for making me as capable as a young Chinese child. You are officially awesome.