In anticipation of the inevitable bird flu infestation that will kill me in the next 6 weeks (I’m sure of it, if NPR mentions something 8.2 billion times then it MUST AFFECT ME) I am re-reading Stephen King’s The Stand. I’d forgotten how much I like this book. I am of the opinion that It was the last good book to come out of the man. We’re not talking high art here or anything, it’s just that everything up to It is scary, creepy, has developed characters and coherent plot lines. Everything after, eh…not so good. Things get cheaper, more fart jokes and scat references, more sodomy allusions and uni-dimensional characters.
I remember when Insomnia came out, I was excited. I read it and when I was finished I thought “what the fuck just happened?”. It just didn’t make sense.
But The Stand, good novel. Cheap thrills and great character development. A story that winds through 1141 pages. A good curl up with the dogs book.
shifting gears…
In a week we celebrate my grandfather’s 80th birthday. We’ll be throwing a party for him. Hosted at my sister and her boyfriend’s place (there must be an easier way to say that). I’ll be doing the food (woo) and all the hard stuff is being taken care of by other people. I just have to do foo. Someone else is doing liquor, plates, glasses, cake, candles whatever. I have the easy part.
It used to be that for years if you wanted me to do the food for the party I had to do EVERYTHING for the party. I was all about flow. You couldn’t contribute SOME food to the effort because I balanced all the foods off one another so they would flow together and not disrupt or overwhelm each other. Then I would also pick the beverages, the dishes, the napkins, the candles, whatever. It all went together. I’ve relaxed a bit. Food’s easy. I can do food.
I’ve got about half the menu figured out in my head right now. I need to sit down and figure out a cheese plate (thanks to Mark and Jessi for my cheese books!). I’ll even try my hand at a homemade jam or two. The real challenge is making stuff that can be restocked constantly through the night but won’t have me trapped in the kitchen.
Anybody up for stuffing and rolling croissants? I can make a metric buttload of those. I’m also pondering veggie sushi, I can make a lot of it, but it takes so long to make.
Anybody who’s been to one of my parties and had a favorite finger good, let me know!
Tomorrow I am helping Betsy with her birthday party, maybe she will have good ideas for me to steal!