Bette was talking to someone in the kitchen when I looked over to realize that she wasn't just leaning on the kitchen counter, she had her elbow planted in my rising dinner rolls! With an injured protest I quickly rescued my rolls and had to let them rise longer to regain their shape.
They came out of the oven just as Bette came in with another distraction, something that must be handled even as I stood with a pan of hot rolls. The writer watched as three of them slid from the pan to the kitchen floor. I quick scooped them up and told her sotto voce "what happens in the kitchen stays in the kitchen, just like Julia Child said." They were arranged into the platter and put on the sideboard with everything else.