Calvin's Weblog

New Years Resolution #3

I made a lot of resolutions last New Years. I swore I'd keep a real budget this year, and I actually did really well at that for the entire month of January. I swore I'd cut my beer consumption in half, and as long as I was having gallbladder problems, that one wasn't too hard to handle. I swore we'd get away more often this year, planning at least one long-weekend getaway every six to eight weeks, but pre-surgery, being away far from hospitals (or worse, being in the U.S!) made that resolution impossible to keep.
The one resolution that was important to me was to be more social- both at work, and at home. With coworkers, friends, everyone. I know that I was a bit of a hermit last year, and compounded with my health problems, I was a pretty crabby hermit (or is that a hermit crab?) - so I resolved to not only be 'friendlier' day to day, but to also entertain more. That meant having people over more often. We had always had our annual summer BBQ but we've even skipped that twice in the last five years... so THIS year, I swore that we'd have a different group of friends and/or family over for dinner once a month. I resolved to throw twelve dinner parties in 2005, and within the first week of January we had already planned the first three meals... but then, reality set back in, and I was hit with the "what the heck are you thinking? All you've been able to eat for the last three months is broiled fish, rice, and steamed vegetables... who's going to want to come over for THAT?"
So, my resolution became slightly modified. I now resolved to get the dinner parties happening AFTER I had recovered from the surgery. January, February, March, now April... a third of the year gone already, and not a single dinner party? Something had to be done!

I called Wayne and Patty last week and said "Hey guys, remember that time about six months ago when I said I wanted to invite you over for
a traditional British Sunday Roast dinner? Well, let's do it!"
It was great timing too - had just bottled a batch of U-Brew the day before (part of my 'spend-less-on-beer' resolution) so we had fresh Cream Ale to go with our Sunday Roast. A made a big hunk or roast beef, with Yorkshire Pudding, horseradish, traditional roasted potatoes, peas and broccoli, and covered it all with the most amazing "from scratch" gravy I've ever made. It was absolutely perfect. Sure, I'm really into making exotic, worldly dishes and this meat-n-potatoes standard seemed pretty dull compared to some of my past culinary masterpieces, but it was GOOD old fashioned cooking, and everybody loved it. I was really happy with how everything turned out - especially the gravy! Desert was the not-so-traditional combination of ice cream and apple pie.

Dinner party number one, the Traditional British Sunday Roast, was a smashing success. It's hard to believe that a month ago, having all that gravy would have sent me straight to the emergency room. So formost, thank the heavens for my newfound health. And Thanks Wayne and Patty for your company, we were really happy to have you over!

Now it's on to dinner party number two ... oh yeah, did I mention? We've got four months of missed dinners to make up! We've having my aunts over next week, so now I've got to think of a new masterpiece!