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Recent News... Just for Pope Gregory... |
2001-12-10 - 9:02 a.m. Dead zombies and a giant ho-ho Oh, yeah. The zombies are dead - took many swipes of the Power card, but they are dead, dead, dead. The team spent a happy "Are we done yet?" celebration at D&B's over in Rockville. You know what? Their food service is agonizingly slow. When we were there for Kevin's birthday, I thought the service was slow just cause we had a group of 30ish, but it's apparently slow even with eight people. The part that sucked: Four of the eight *really* wanted to play pool. All the pool tables were 'reserved for a private party.' Okay, that's unfortunate. However, the private party wasn't using them. Five empty tables. And they still wouldn't let our guys play. Grrrrr. I suck at pool anyway, so I went over to the Midway to play video games. You know, the noise level is a lot more manageable with congestion buffering your ears. Gotta look for the silver lining. Engineers suck at the six person Galatican game. Man, oh, man, these people have no aim. I was top gunner two games running - and I'm usually the worst shot amongst my friends. We (obviously) failed to save the planet. So Joe and I went over to "House of the Dead" and shot our way through five levels of zombies and demons. Yeah, baby. It alarms my lead, Martin, how much I like the shooting games. That's all my beleaguered body could take so I went home and promptly fell asleep again g**&*( frickin' fracin' cold. Really, have you ever reached the point you're too tired to find the phone and order pizza? Roland fell asleep in between order and delivery, poor sick puppy. And the cat climbed across his sprawled body, curled up in his lap and assumed a strangely � well, what's the warmest part on a guy's body? It was very � odd. We did, minor productivity triumph, manage to write most of the Christmas cards Friday night - easy thing to do between napping. Gen: Yeah, I should do that. Hey, wait - you already *have* them, don't you? Hyphenated � Yes, I admit, I actually stock cards and wrapping paper in my home, which Gen knows cause I helped her pack gifts for shipping one year and I actually had the cellophane wrap for fruit baskets. I'm Southern. I'm hyphenated. Deal with it. Saturday, Roland slept late. My body was so sick of sleeping, I was up around 8 am. Went by the post office and library - noticed the Tahoe exhibiting growing electrically oddities - so that's another thing to deal with this week. Geek moment: Why can't they put UNITS on the dashboard gauges? Little battery symbol next to a 9 to 20 range - I assume that's Volts, but how does that help when I want current readings and I have no clue what the resistance is between those readout points? Seriously, who designs this stuff? We *meant* to clean the house and sort and straighten � but *$%& plague. I swear, I'd do something for half and hour, then fall asleep on the couch again. Move a few piles around �. Zzzz. Measure for new bookshelves so we'll have space for book storage � Zzzzz. Think about starting a sewing project. �. Zzzzzz. Most productive thing I did was run up to Jo-Ann's to pick up my framing when Jess called. Nice having a friend deal with your framing. My Pelican scroll, Roland's Pearl, my AoA, my Golden Dolphin, and all the pictures from my Pelican ceremony (put the series in order by where Ragnarr is in the shot - thanks for the faboo pix Lis) - neatly framed and ready for the dread hanging stage. When it took Roland fifteen minutes to psyche himself up to go buy a bag of catfood, we realized the plague victims were not going to Chris's party Saturday night. So I called and apologized � She was mulling wine, darn it - no mulled wine for Theo. But she understood we'd probably show up and fall asleep on her couch within twenty minutes. Dinner plans after the new year, I say. I think we're paying for doing too much since Pennsic. Sunday. My task for the day - making dessert for dinner with Katherine and Ryan. Dig through cookbooks, can't hardly reach them because they're behind the stacks of things I should've put away yesterday. In my "Cooking with Julia and Jacques" cookbook a find a chocolate roulade recipe - perfect. Not too hard. I think I'll make this Roland Rob stares at me. You know, that thing I made for Easter. Rob stares at me. Cream filling rolled in thin chocolate ganache Rob stares at me. I sigh. Okay, let me find the picture, but I hate this part because � Rob looks at the pictures and yells joyfully Giant Ho-Ho! The giant ho-ho cake! � sigh You call it a giant ho-ho. This cookbook is based on a PBS series with Julia Child and Jacques Peppin - the two of them would pick a theme (bisque or lobster or dessert), buy some ingredients and randomly make it up during taping. The cookbook recipes were 'backed out' of the tapes - recipe in the center, left hand margin - Julia's comments, right hand margin - Jacques' - it's kind of like reading a dialogue between me and Kevin while we're both thinking we know the best way to cook something. The book is hilarious. And the recipes are good. You gotta like a cookbook that reads "Next, trim the ends of the cake roll to neaten them before placing the roulade on a serving platter. Discard the ends (this means eat them yourself in the kitchen before taking the tray to your guests.)" Kind Roland contributes by going to the grocery store for cream and eggs. He comes back while I'm talking to my sister-in-law on the phone and tells me they didn't have heavy cream at the Giant. Yep, plain English message - but my brain translates that to � so he must've gone somewhere else to get the heavy cream. Nope. He got table cream. (Pause for Kevin to wince.) But I didn't look at the package. Roland goes out to rake leaves. I make the ganache (flourless cake - rises based on whipped egg whites). While that's baking, I start making the Chantilly cream filling (I have no clue why it's called that.) Sugar, cream, vanilla, cognac. You are *not* using VSOP cognac to cook with? � Yes, yes, I am - I only need a Tbsp - you got it in duty free. It'll be okay. You know (Kevin's already guessed the next part), table cream doesn't whip. Not enough fat content. So I create a cognac flavored cream milkshake before I actually *look* at the carton. Aghhh. Need whipped filling so can spread on cake and roll while it's still hot! It'll break rather than roll once cool! Arghhh! Cake will be done in two minutes! Roland, our hero, kindly goes to a different store to get the heavy cream cause he's good and he probably didn't want to be stuck watching the cake. You know, if I'd just listened to him�. But it's all mostly okay. He makes it back. I feel too guilty to use more cognac, so I use Baileys and make the filling and dessert is all done. Phone call from Mel who's in her new home -first visit since buying the place thanks to her work schedule - and she's noticing how empty and big and how much there is to do and she needs to get this and that � you know, they say female friends get their cycles synched. Is that why I'm having home d�cor nesting urges? Wanting to finish my curtains and get new bookshelves and contract for the built in counter and hire someone to fix the lawn and � Maybe it's just cause my family's coming for a visit after Christmas. When you think Mel and Christmas - think gift certificates. Cause she's at the stage she needs trashcan money. You know, you go out to buy a trashcan for the new powder room and $300+ later, you escape the home section. Eventually, I decide to make myself presentable so we can head over to Vienna for dinner. We ran late - didn't allow enough time for traffic. Rob suddenly thinks of our cat You did put away the cognac milkshake, right? It's not out on the counter, is it? That's all I need - sick, drunk cat. But I remember putting the glass away. I think. We make it Ryan and Katherine's. This is the funny part about having normal dinner plans with people you mostly see in the SCA - you don't know a lot of details about their regular lives - Just as Ryan's finishing the delicious pork chops and setting out the shrimp appetizers, Katherine thinks about Roland's last name and wonders if he's Jewish. And she thinks and thinks, trying to remember if she's see me eat pork or Roland eat pork - Ryan simply lays down on the bed in panic for five minutes, thinking shellfish and pork and dairy in the meat - argh, could I've cooked anything less kosher. Katherine tells me all this and I laugh and laugh. (I did the same thing once when Nikulai came to visit. Got out a pork loin for dinner before I processed the fact he was Jewish, so we had a nice roast chicken with turkey sausage stuffing.) After reassuring her no one in Roland's family is Jewish, Ryan heaves a sigh of relief and Katherine puts the Christmas music back in he CD player. We had a fabulous dinner and great time. Wow, we should have simple, ordinary dinner parties more often. Pork was excellent, wine was great (Katherine worked in several of the Virginia vineyards and they both know something about wine) and everyone liked the giant ho-ho. But it's a work night, so we leave about 9:30. Whew - did put the cognac shake away. Cat is sober. I rearrange a few pictures to hang the newly framed scrolls - a project I would've finished if I'd have the motivation to walk downstairs and hunt more nails. Maybe tonight. And now that I'm in the mood to putter about the house � I have to go back to work. � � � 
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