So, Hi There

Having just spent approximately 800 years trying to fix this layout, I'm giving up in disgust and just saying Hi.

Hi!

I missed you.

So much has happened, and I totally meant to hop on the NaBloPoMo bandwagon again this year, but I blew it, so we'll just have to see how it goes.

For my triumphant return, I would like to share with you the story of my beagle, the oil baroness.

Every New Years, Thomas and I have a party. It used to always be a Fondue party (or as Thomas calls it, Fun-due), but more recently we've been having Ugly Sweater Parties for New Years instead. Anyway, I think the last time we had a full blown fondue New Years was two years ago. And that's how long the huge jug of peanut oil that we bought and barely used has been sitting on my back porch.

Frankly, I'd grown fond of the jug. It was like my personal thermometer or something. Every morning when I let the dogs out, I'd check the oil. Frozen? Need a sweater. Not frozen? 3/4 sleeves ok. It was just a fixture, like the tree that randomly grew up through the porch. Annoying, but finally just part of the landscape.

Anyway, we went on a mad porch/yard cleaning spree before holding an oyster roast last Saturday, and Thomas tried to throw the jug away. And the plastic that had endured two winters on my porch... well... shattered. So, not all of it shattered, thank God, just the top of it, and we covered it up with plastic bags and vowed that as soon as we got a hard freeze and the oil froze again, we'd get rid of it somehow.

Flash forward to my Beagle, who is suddenly hiding under the house all the time. WTF? Why is she doing this? And she won't come out, even when I offer cheese. I keep having to get a flashlight and go after her. And why is her head so gross and oily?

Because she's been under the porch, rolling around in (and eating, I'm sure) 2 years old peanut oil.

Yum-may.

FUN-due

The first time I ever had fondue was New Year's Eve, 2000. Some friends and I went out and bought 2 fondue pots and then we went to the grocery store and picked up some meat and vegetable oil. Then we went to the cheese counter and asked what they recommended for fondue. They recommended Gruyere. I wonder, can you see where this is going?

Vegetable oil isn't good for cooking at high tempuratures. It smokes, and it stinks to high heaven. Gruyere is not what you would call a mild cheese. In fact, that night, as it cooked, my friend Bethany said, "This cheese smells like scratching your ass." And that was true. None of the rest of us were going to say it out loud, but that was, in fact, exactly what it smelled like.

By 10, I had a headache so severe that I went to be early and missed the new year.

Several years later, when Thomas recommended doing a fondue night, I thought, "WHY? Why would anyone do that?"

But it turns out that the secret is peanut oil and brie. Much better taste to stink ratio.

So last night, we hosted our 2nd annual New Year's Fondue (or, as Thomas insists, Fun-due) Night. We added a chocolate pot for the first time this year and it was highly successful. Steak, tuna, chicken, vegetables, fruit, rosemary bread and little smokies. Yum.

Just after our first post-midnight sip of champagne, we somehow coerced the entire party into several renditions of "I'm Driving Down Highway 40 in my Big Old Pick-up Truck," including one for the benefit of my parents who had called to wish us a happy new year and I think were quite baffled by the whole thing.

Best wishes to everyone for a very happy 2007.