On Tuesday Anne put on a special dinner for me in honour of my birthday -- for which I got out the candelabrum (a bit more elaborate than the one above), plus a few other candles. So we had a genuine candlelit dinner. I bought 16 lamb cutlets for the two of us so with fried onions, bread rolls etc that made a big dinner. Anne brought along some Sydney rock oysters for starters, which were, as ever, excellent. And we had a McGuigan red to wash it down.
And Saturday dinner was also flame illuminated. I have a fairly wide backyard so on rare occasions I like to do something there. And just about all I do is put on the very occasional dinner there. I have the dinners at night under party flares. So I do my bit towards consuming fossil fuels, as the party flares run on kerosene.
So I put on such a dinner last night in honour of Joe's birthday. As usual, it was a pizza and champagne dinner. That is humble fare but everybody likes pizza and I supply the champagne, a Seaview one that everybody likes.
Paul was waxing eloquent about England and how real estate is cheaper there than in Brisbane. He was talking about the Cotswolds rather than London, however. He likes a lot of things about England and, as a UK citizen by descent, he is entitled to live there. His ebullient personality is very un-English, however, so how well he would get on with the English is a bit of a question.
Paul had apparently done a Rolf Harris impersonation at a mining function recently, which was a bit close to the bone in view of Harris's recent conviction for pedophilia. When he told us about that, Jenny was very critical, saying that he should be more careful of upsetting people, but I defended Paul, pointing out that the gathering was a conservative one and as such unlikely to be politically correct. I have always defended Paul -- even from his own mother!
Russ and Suz brought their kids and both kids were greatly entertained by Joe -- playing games that consisted mostly of him tossing them about. They loved it and even came back to him with demands for "More"! It reminded me of the same demands on me by an earlier generation of kids.
We had 12 adults present, including Nanna but Timmy and Dave were missed. No doubt they had other fish to fry on a Saturday night, being both single again. George again lent his calm and sensible presence to our deliberations. Russ spent a lot of time talking to Joe.
One thing that amused me was after the dinner when we had adjourned upstairs preparatory to everyone going home. Paul discovered my biscuit barrel. I normally set out biscuits (cookies) for him after a dinner as he has the most incredible appetite. So when he discovered on my kitchen bench a big bottle of fruit slices he really got into them. He was at one stage walking around eating one slice while he had another one in his hand. And he made a final raid on them immediately before he actually left. They are very yummy so I don't blame him.
Fruit slice packet
The pizza was home delivered from Pizza Hut so I had very little to do. Joe and his friend Kristian got the tables and chairs out and Jeff set up the party flares the day before. I may be the world's laziest host but everybody must enjoy my dinners or they wouldn't keep coming.
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