A Kevin Bacon Moment
My spouse has a regular gala dinner exchange with other mothers from a pre-school connection made a "while" ago. There are six or seven of them who take turns playing hostess to the others once a month (December and Summer months typically get a bye).
It was our (her) turn last month. Aside: I understand that there is one hubbie who routinely does all of the cooking when the event is scheduled at their platz. I'm sure I am not alone in resenting the unrealistic expectation that sets up for the rest of us frail males. And, lest I forget, there is a vegetarian in the group.
Rather than take on the whole beast, my normal approach has been to offer to help, e.g., often selecting cheese appetizers, a personal favorite. This time I went a bit beyond that, offering up concept, doing some of the procurement, and then basically assembling a Salad Nicoise, featuring of course green beans, olives, high-quality tuna in oil, hard-boiled eggs, potatoes, and a bunch of other good stuff. This is a personal favorite, ideally made several times over the course of the Spring and Summer.
They seemed to choke it down enthusiastically, but most vibrant feedback was over my Buttermilk Blue Cheese.
But in the course of that dinner, which I flitted in and out of (okay, "flit" might not work here, but you get my drift), never entirely clear in these events how far away I should be parked, there was an epiphany (hence the confusion on proximity!). I overheard mention of Governor Mitch Daniels. I had seen his face on my alumni magazine quite recently and thus was sensitized. He was not someone I was especially aware of, but there he was, in my face. A classmate, actually, though I did not remember that. I had begun a bit of due diligence on him, wary after a certain Supreme Court justice appointment a few years back about further blots on my alma mater.
So I shared photo-exhibits from freshman, senior, and 25th reunion with the group, to the great enjoyment of the Daniels-mentioner. More to the point, it turns out that this mom was the HS senior prom date of Sir Mitch, being asked on the rebound when his "regular date" for whatever reason couldn't/wouldn't attend.
Obviously much of the zing of this amazing conjunction, which happened back when MD was being highly touted as a probable Presidential candidate, is past. Apparently concerns about skeletons, though presumably neither his need to scramble for a prom date or inadvertent academic association with dfh's from the Other Washington, compelled him to decline such a run.
But we had great fun with it.
It was our (her) turn last month. Aside: I understand that there is one hubbie who routinely does all of the cooking when the event is scheduled at their platz. I'm sure I am not alone in resenting the unrealistic expectation that sets up for the rest of us frail males. And, lest I forget, there is a vegetarian in the group.
Rather than take on the whole beast, my normal approach has been to offer to help, e.g., often selecting cheese appetizers, a personal favorite. This time I went a bit beyond that, offering up concept, doing some of the procurement, and then basically assembling a Salad Nicoise, featuring of course green beans, olives, high-quality tuna in oil, hard-boiled eggs, potatoes, and a bunch of other good stuff. This is a personal favorite, ideally made several times over the course of the Spring and Summer.
They seemed to choke it down enthusiastically, but most vibrant feedback was over my Buttermilk Blue Cheese.
But in the course of that dinner, which I flitted in and out of (okay, "flit" might not work here, but you get my drift), never entirely clear in these events how far away I should be parked, there was an epiphany (hence the confusion on proximity!). I overheard mention of Governor Mitch Daniels. I had seen his face on my alumni magazine quite recently and thus was sensitized. He was not someone I was especially aware of, but there he was, in my face. A classmate, actually, though I did not remember that. I had begun a bit of due diligence on him, wary after a certain Supreme Court justice appointment a few years back about further blots on my alma mater.
So I shared photo-exhibits from freshman, senior, and 25th reunion with the group, to the great enjoyment of the Daniels-mentioner. More to the point, it turns out that this mom was the HS senior prom date of Sir Mitch, being asked on the rebound when his "regular date" for whatever reason couldn't/wouldn't attend.
Obviously much of the zing of this amazing conjunction, which happened back when MD was being highly touted as a probable Presidential candidate, is past. Apparently concerns about skeletons, though presumably neither his need to scramble for a prom date or inadvertent academic association with dfh's from the Other Washington, compelled him to decline such a run.
But we had great fun with it.
posted by Sir Gumbo at 9:08 PM
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