The quick and the snowy
Managed to arrange my schedule to work from home on Friday, after a very VERY long week. On Wednesday, I'd had five meetings in a row; Thursday brought six. Glen also managed to study from home on Friday. I was reasonably productive, but hardly touched several of the things I still very much need to do, having instead to work on the creation of a budget for a new research proposal. It also started snowing like crazy on Friday, killing our dinner arrangements with family friends of Glen's. Instead, we went grocery shopping in the afternoon, and had frozen pizza for dinner.
Saturday, we dug out a car, and I got to the dojo just at the start of the class I was supposed to be teaching. Much to my surprise, three kids actually showed up. The rest of the classes were also small, but they went well. The kids were pretty chill, which was great. The best news, though, was that the black belt test prep workout scheduled to happen at the dojo that afternoon was cancelled, which allowed me to leave three hours earlier than I expected. This was a boon because my parents were coming up on Saturday afternoon, and I had thought I would be hardly home yet and definitely exhausted by the time they arrived. Now I had time to get groceries!
On my way home, I stopped and picked up brunch materials for Sunday, since we planned to have Glen's family friends join us given that we couldn't see them Friday night. I orchestrated a feast: bagels, cream cheese, tomatoes, onions, lox, capers, melons, strawberries, citrus fruit, OJ, cranberry juice, etc. And I got fixings for butternut squash risotto for Sunday night, knowing that we wouldn't be cooking on Saturday.
I got home and had just enough time to take a shower and half a nap before my parents arrived. Once here, we watched a couple episodes of the Daily Show, then they changed, and we left to go to dinner. We had reservations at Rendezvous for 6 PM. The meal was good, but the service was excellent. The waiter was extremely conscientious when we asked questions about the menu. In one case, my mother asked if the casing on the duck sausage was pork. It was. She asked if they could substitute something for the sausage. The waiter confirmed they could, but then asked if pork was the issue, pointing out that something else in the dish had bacon in it, which was not obvious in the description. Later, for dessert, my father and Glen were going to share a chocolate cake that had cinnamon cream on it. My father didn't want the cinnamon cream, so we asked for it on the side, and the waiter asked if there was an allergy to cinnamon, noting that that the cake had cinnamon in the batter. So that was very nice of him to check, even though we were just asking due to preference. The salads we had (frisee with warm duck and pears) were delicious, and everyone enjoyed their meals, but I actually think the food was stellar last time and not as tremendous this time. Both Glen and my cocktails were interesting again. I had a mint-cucumber cocktail, and he had a curry leaf cocktail. When we got home, Dad and Glen watched Donnie Darko while Mom and I played a very close game of Scrabble, with both of us scoring over 300.
We got up early this morning to prepare for brunch. Glen and I made a pear tart from the fruit tart recipe that's becoming my specialty. It came out fantastically, but next time I think we should quarter the pears instead of halve them, and Glen thinks we should peel them too. Then cut up all the fruit for the fruit salad, and plated the lox, tomatoes, and onions. Our guests (Jill and baby Morgan, Jill's parents, and Jill's grandmother) arrived a bit late and stayed longer than I had thought they would, but the time flew, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. We went through four pots of coffee! Everyone, including my parents, left around 1:30, and Glen and I cleaned up as best we could, watched a cartoon we'd TiVo-ed, and then collapsed for a nap after watching and laughing at the kids next door.
It is very icy on top of the snow, and we watched the neighbor's kids and dog play some sort of hockey derivative, run around, and fall down a lot. Earlier, right as my parents were leaving, our neighbor from the other side (our 70somethings) called, much to my surprise, since they've never called us before!! (And she was the one who was yelling at our plumber as he tried to install the side sump pipe...) I figured she was calling to tell us we were flooding them or otherwise doing something unacceptable... Instead, she asked if her granddaughter could sled on our hill. Of course that was no problem, but the poor girl, once she got down the hill could not get back up, since she had absolutely no traction!
I have a feeling it's near dinner time, so I'm going to post this and eat. Have I mentioned I love it when Glen cooks? :)
Saturday, we dug out a car, and I got to the dojo just at the start of the class I was supposed to be teaching. Much to my surprise, three kids actually showed up. The rest of the classes were also small, but they went well. The kids were pretty chill, which was great. The best news, though, was that the black belt test prep workout scheduled to happen at the dojo that afternoon was cancelled, which allowed me to leave three hours earlier than I expected. This was a boon because my parents were coming up on Saturday afternoon, and I had thought I would be hardly home yet and definitely exhausted by the time they arrived. Now I had time to get groceries!
On my way home, I stopped and picked up brunch materials for Sunday, since we planned to have Glen's family friends join us given that we couldn't see them Friday night. I orchestrated a feast: bagels, cream cheese, tomatoes, onions, lox, capers, melons, strawberries, citrus fruit, OJ, cranberry juice, etc. And I got fixings for butternut squash risotto for Sunday night, knowing that we wouldn't be cooking on Saturday.
I got home and had just enough time to take a shower and half a nap before my parents arrived. Once here, we watched a couple episodes of the Daily Show, then they changed, and we left to go to dinner. We had reservations at Rendezvous for 6 PM. The meal was good, but the service was excellent. The waiter was extremely conscientious when we asked questions about the menu. In one case, my mother asked if the casing on the duck sausage was pork. It was. She asked if they could substitute something for the sausage. The waiter confirmed they could, but then asked if pork was the issue, pointing out that something else in the dish had bacon in it, which was not obvious in the description. Later, for dessert, my father and Glen were going to share a chocolate cake that had cinnamon cream on it. My father didn't want the cinnamon cream, so we asked for it on the side, and the waiter asked if there was an allergy to cinnamon, noting that that the cake had cinnamon in the batter. So that was very nice of him to check, even though we were just asking due to preference. The salads we had (frisee with warm duck and pears) were delicious, and everyone enjoyed their meals, but I actually think the food was stellar last time and not as tremendous this time. Both Glen and my cocktails were interesting again. I had a mint-cucumber cocktail, and he had a curry leaf cocktail. When we got home, Dad and Glen watched Donnie Darko while Mom and I played a very close game of Scrabble, with both of us scoring over 300.
We got up early this morning to prepare for brunch. Glen and I made a pear tart from the fruit tart recipe that's becoming my specialty. It came out fantastically, but next time I think we should quarter the pears instead of halve them, and Glen thinks we should peel them too. Then cut up all the fruit for the fruit salad, and plated the lox, tomatoes, and onions. Our guests (Jill and baby Morgan, Jill's parents, and Jill's grandmother) arrived a bit late and stayed longer than I had thought they would, but the time flew, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. We went through four pots of coffee! Everyone, including my parents, left around 1:30, and Glen and I cleaned up as best we could, watched a cartoon we'd TiVo-ed, and then collapsed for a nap after watching and laughing at the kids next door.
It is very icy on top of the snow, and we watched the neighbor's kids and dog play some sort of hockey derivative, run around, and fall down a lot. Earlier, right as my parents were leaving, our neighbor from the other side (our 70somethings) called, much to my surprise, since they've never called us before!! (And she was the one who was yelling at our plumber as he tried to install the side sump pipe...) I figured she was calling to tell us we were flooding them or otherwise doing something unacceptable... Instead, she asked if her granddaughter could sled on our hill. Of course that was no problem, but the poor girl, once she got down the hill could not get back up, since she had absolutely no traction!
I have a feeling it's near dinner time, so I'm going to post this and eat. Have I mentioned I love it when Glen cooks? :)