Not long ago, my family and I dropped in on our good friends, the Maizes. We hadn’t planned to barge in uninvited, honest to gosh we hadn’t. But we were in the neighborhood and we rang the bell simply because we feared they’d be looking out the window as we passed and wonder why we didn’t stop in.

The fact that it was dinnertime and that the Maizes serve up the best grub on a Saturday night this side of the Pecos was purely coincidental, I assure you.

“You’re in luck,” said Roy after the customary greetings. “We were just about to grill up some cheeseburgers and we’ve got some roastin’ ears that are just right for the pickin.’ ”

Roastin’ ears just right for the pickin’! Color my family happy. He wouldn’t have seen a more delighted group if he’d offered up a bucket of soup bones to a group of starving dogs.

Armed with a box of salt and an abundance of butter, my family went to the table like a pack of hounds. And if it weren’t for my thighs and the fact that my upper arms are sprouting bat wings, I’d have joined them. There’s just something about having to stand up to lose one’s stomach that makes corn and carbohydrates taboo.

The boys ranted and raved over the corn, and my husband, Pat, kept nodding his head in agreement. “This corn is the best we’ve ever had,” they exclaimed in unison. If one was to believe what one was hearing, that corn was so good that they felt they’d died and gone to heaven.

“Would you like to take some home?” asked Roy’s lovely wife, Egberta.

“Oh, heavens no,” replied Pat. “We’ve infringed upon you enough.”

“Nonsense,” replied Roy as he headed off to get his loader, “I insist.”

Ten minutes later we were driving home with the back end loaded down with enough corn on the cob, green worms and horse flies to feed the Western Hemisphere for a month.

“What do I do with a bushel of corn?” I asked my mother the next day as I looked at the heap of produce on the kitchen counter.

“Oh, it’s simple,” she said matter-of-factly. “You clean it, shuck it, pluck off the nasty stuff and then you’ll want to blanch it.”

“I can’t believe that women still blanch in this day and age. Have we learned nothing from the women’s movement?”

“Honey, you’re the one who was stupid enough to bring home a bushel of corn.”

I spent the better part of the afternoon removing husks and that nasty hairy stuff. I toiled and I boiled, and when the time was right, I blanched each cob.

By the time I was done I had enough bagged up corn to fill the freezer. It was truly blanching at its best.

I hadn’t planned on serving the corn to the family right away. Thinking that one does not like to just pull out the good corn for everyday occasions. Good corn is sort of like Grandma’s china; it has to be saved for special occasions such as Christmas, Easter and visits from old college roommates.

Yet, I couldn’t wait. So when the barometric pressure was just right, the Dow was up and one of the kitchen counters was clean, I decided it called for a celebration with corn.

With steaks and real butter, I served up the Maizes’ corn with all of the pride I could muster. When the family began to consume it, I sat back and awaited the praise.

“Where’d you get this corn?” Pat asked with a mouth full and a look of distaste.

“It’s the corn the Maizes gave us,” I replied.

“Do you still have that stuff around?”

“Stuff? You said that was the best corn you’d ever had.”

“I was just being polite.”

“But I blanched it and cut it off of the cob and everything.”

“Well, you shouldn’t have. That was the worst corn I ever tasted.”

See if we ever barge in on the Maizes again.

Lori Clinch is the mother of four sons and the author of the book “Are We There Yet?” Her e-mail address is clinch@atcjet.net.