Grills, Grills, Grills

A decade after wrapping up puberty and eight months into marriage, I finally became a man last week. I bought a grill.
Now don't get me wrong, I've got plenty of grill experience. I've had a few in my day, but I had never gotten a hold of a real full-bodied beauty like the Weber queen I picked out last week.
It sounds kind of sad and sick, but all of my previous grills were either community grills anybody could use and abuse for their own pleasure or hand-me-downs from my parents.
When I was in college, they gave me this petite little thing that required me to spend a lot of time on my knees to fan the flames. I didn't pay enough attention to her and she rusted out before we could establish a lasting relationship.
For years I missed the heat and smell of outdoor cooking, but my bachelor lifestyle never allowed me to settle down long enough to find a replacement.
Then I found the perfect girl and married her. It wasn't long after that I learned it doesn't matter how great your marriage is, it doesn't hurt to have a grill on the outside.
The wife and I actually went together to go pick her out. The story gets a little less sexy from here. For some reason when I was young and fantasized about having a grill, I would imagine going to some testosterone dream factory where there were a bunch pretty ones just lined up waiting to go home with you.
I found mine at Target, but I'm OK with that because this luscious 22.5 inch hottie looks and feels just like the grills of my dreams -- but came at a bargain price.
She looks so good that it's almost a shame to keep her in the backyard, but Carolina -- that wife I talked about earlier -- won't allow her in the house.
While I'm obviously proud of my new trophy grill, I have to admit our brief time together hasn't been without its difficulties.
Just like a good woman, a grill can be a complicated thing. There are so many different levers and heating techniques and I haven't quite gotten the hang of the whole thing yet.
The owner's manual/cookbook that came with her said if it's 70 degrees outside with little wind and fair to partly cloudy skies, it should take about four minutes to cook each side of the burger. It took me 35 minutes to get my patties to stop mooing.
At the 40 minute mark I couldn't take it anymore. I was hungry. Apparently, I pulled the burgers off prematurely because Carolina's weren't done. She said I needed more heat.
I was dejected. This wasn't how it was supposed to be.
But my understanding wife, my girl who always knows the right thing to say, cheered me up.
"This was only your first time," she said. "We have years to keep practicing."
I can't wait.