Hello,
It's Mastiff and I'll be reviewing your piece. These are just my thoughts and forgive me if I ramble, and realize I make just as many mistakes as anyone else. Thank you for sharing your writing, and I hope this is helpful!

Title: I suppose I'm up for a disaster story anytime, so it made me want to see what happened. Not sure what to make of the ellipsis, but it seems fine to me.

Initial Reaction: I always read a bit, then decide if I'm going to continue and review. At least, when it's not compulsory at I write! Now I had to wonder what kind of disaster could happen at a birthday party. I know you couldn't use the word, but I can!

Setting: In such a short piece, it's difficult to set the scene, but you had enough for a reader to get a good feel for where we're located. At least, anyone who's been in the south. People who haven't would need much more than you could provide in a short story.

Character Development: If you ever lengthen the story, this would be a good place for development. I'd have liked to have "seen" your people with some description. I got a feel for them through their actions, but couldn't visualize them.

Plot: It's cute, and certainly not what I expected. Maybe it should have been Kitchen Disaster! It tells the tale front start to finish, and flows well.

Ending: It wasn't what I expected, that's for certain. It could have even worked better if you had foreshadowed the "giant hole" earlier when you mention the rented cabin.

Line-by-line and Suggestions:

Para. 1 Ln. 1 - I think you need a comma after "day."
Para. 2 Ln. 3 - A comma after "more." Also, you should avoid ending a sentence with a preposition, even if it's not as big a deal these days.
Para. 5 Ln. 3 - I would have incorporated the text in parenthesis into the sentence, but that's just me.
Para. 6 Ln. 1 - Comma after "baker."
Para. 9 Ln. 1 - Comma after "reveal."
Para. 11 Ln. 2 - I think you want "chagrin" there.
Para. 14 Ln. 2 - Computer, or "leetspeak", still isn't a very acceptable unless you're writing about computers or an internet story.

Overall - Not too bad, mostly just punctuation. I'm sure a quick edit could fix those right up.

Adherence to Contest Rules: No problems here, I didn't see one naughty word.

Overall Opinion: It was an easy read, and I liked it. I do think it could be better if you added more content.


Write On!

Mastiff