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DOES MARTHA GO THROUGH THIS? 6 January 2005 I swear, you'd think I was expecting Queen Elizabeth herself to walk through the front door. Last year we had a sum total of ONE, count 'em--ONE, dinner party, plus the family Christmas dinner. For some insane reason, I volunteered to host last night's meeting of the SPCA newsletter committee. I figured that the house would be clean enough after Christmas and it wouldn't be that big a deal. Only I forgot that the one meeting I'd attended at someone's house, dinner was served. I asked if I was supposed to provide dinner. "Oh yeah," I was told casually. "We usually just do casseroles, but if that's going to be too much for you, I can bring something." "Oh no," I said a month ago. "No problem. I'll make something." Well...the meeeting was last night and the day before Olivia had come, and Jeri came back home to pack to fly back to Boston. We had our Joe Btfsplk day, I hadn't had a car to go shopping, and I hadn't really even thought about what I was going to do. I decided on lasagna, as something simple (and I already had ricota cheese I meant to use a week ago, so I had the rudimentary beginnings of a lasagna already). It involved a trip to the supermarket, then Walt took the car and took Jeri to the airport and I had to ask him to stop at the supermarket again to get mozzarella, which I'd forgotten. The living room had to be straightened, the good Christmas table cloth went on the table and the good Christmas plates, 'cause I hardly ever get a chance to use them--and since the tree is still up, I figured it would be OK. I did a couple of loads of dishes in the diswasher, made what I swear is the last of my now-infamous cranberry bunt cake for dessert, had Walt pick up wine, cleaned the wine glasses and set them out on the table. I mean, I didn't go to this much trouble for the Christmas dinner and this is only a bloody meeting (and I can't remember the names of most of the people on the committee)!! I would love to be one of those people who is already ready for unexpected guests. Whose house is comfortable, but tidy. Who can encourage the guests to stay for dinner and then go to the fridge and take out a few things and whip up a gourmet dinner. Who has time to sit down and relax before invited guests come, not wonder if there has been so much sweat that the deodorant needs a refresher. Which sounds like I'd like to either be Martha Stewart...or Tom. How my fourth-born has acquired these qualities--the ability to have drop in guests, to whip up gourmet treats without hardly raising an eyebrow and to have time to relax with his guests boggles my mind every time I visit him. So anyway, I actually got everything as ready as it was going by be with 30 minutes to spare. I had made 2 lasagnas, a big bundt cake, and had two fugazi breads and a huge salad. I had Walt buy two bottles of white wine. Five people showed up, one of whom was a vegetarian. Less than half of one lasagna was eaten. Only one glass of wine was drunk, and that was a glass of red which the person who brought the red wine brought. Well, at least I'm not going to have to worry about what to serve for dinner for the next.....month! I sure hope Walt likes lasagna. Mood Katherine mentioned in the guestbook that she wanted a review of Phantom of the Opera. I don't do movie reviews for the paper, but I'll do a brief one here. When we came out of the theatre, we ran into a couple of women who raved and raved about it and, had the theatre been showing it again, said they would walk right back in and see it again. I was not so moved. I would rather have seen it in the theatre than on a TV screen because it is grand--everything larger than life and you really would miss a lot seeing it on television without surround sound. That said, however, it just didn't grab me--or any of the others with us. Jeri said it couldn't decide if it was trying to be a stage show or a movie. I was bothered by how they sang some dialog, but spoke others. The things that are fantastic on stage are ho-hum on the screen. Each of the characters individually did an excellent job, but there was just something missing in it for me. Also, each number seemed to be done as a finale and I wondered more than once if there was to be an intermission. Also, in true Andrew Lloyd Webber style, Phantom is a 2-song show, with each song reprised over and over and over again. Still, bottom line is that I'm glad I saw it. And I have no desire to see it again. |
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PHOTO OF THE DAY
Another of Peggy's pictures. I loved it so much,
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Created 1/1/05
