~Successful Dinner and Telling Dreams
2002-07-10 - 1:25 p.m.

Last night, overall, went well - but first I have to talk about my dream, before I forget. I think it was kind of sparked by the fact that someone range the doorbell at 8:30 last night wanting me to donate something to charity. She was probably perfectly harmless, but I'm reluctant to open the door to strangers at the best of times and I certainly won't do it (unless I've already locked the flywire (security) door, at night (I just called through the door to ask who it was and what they wanted). After Emma and Sally went home and I went to bed, I think I noticed my aloneness more than previous nights. I haven't, surprisingly, been very nervous at night. I'm always a little more aware of strange noises and things, but I've made myself not watch Buffy or Angel just before bed and firmly drag my mind from harping on every creak the house makes and therefore have mostly been pretty happy.

But in my dream I'd forgotten to lock the front door and these strange guys came into the house. They didn't do anything, but I tried very nicely to get them to leave because I didn't want to wait for them to do anything to the house - nor did I want them to get angry by my demanding they leave. I tried to lock the door - using a series of nail files, for some reason - but the files kept bending instead of turning the lock. I called someone on the phone to give me advice about the files/keys but in the meantime more people kept coming into my unlocked house and I began to want to call the police. Luckily, in my dream, Dad came home (which is the good thing about dreams, they don't have to stick to reality, although it took my mind long enough to realise that!) and then my dream switched to something else.

I was showing someone - Emma, I think - this new kit thing I'd bought. Ostensibly, I'd bought it for the religion teaching aids - it contained a video and a book or something - but what I was really showing off was that, once I took out the resource material, it was a nifty folder-holder thing. It was purple and it zipped up and contained many pockets for pens and note pads etc. I also discovered in it a complimentary Little Miss book. The cover was all dark purple and on the front was a little character, just a bit bigger than Little Miss Tiny, who was also all dark purple and was called, simply, "Peaches". It turned out that she was one of a new series of Little Miss children all called things like Peaches & Blackcurrent etc. They had parents who were zucchini-shaped but the same colour as their children (except I think they wore hats). All the children turned into the kids in my teaching rounds class and the other grade three class that is next door to ours. Suddenly I was teaching and controlling kids and did it quite seriously up until the point where they were all sitting quietly on the floor and my dream stopped or I woke up or something. I can still see those Little Miss children quite clearly.

I got most of my chores done yesterday. I didn't make it to cleaning my bedroom, beyond clearing a little more space on the floor! I really don't like living with the mess I've got in their at the moment, but I can't seem to find the energy to clean the silly thing. It's ok, I know suddenly I'll get stuck into it properly and all will be livable again.

I had planned everything very well. I spent the previous night writing up lists of things I had to do in order of most important and also of cooking steps so everything would be ready around the same time and I wouldn't forget to cook anything. I finished varnishing Sally's box and filled it right to the top with biscuits. I had been going to go down to the shops to get a beautiful lucious blue ribbon to tie around Sally's blue box, but in the end I found a less-impressive gold ribbon in my stationery/gift-wrap draw which looked quite nice and used that. It turned out quite well in the end because, coincidentally, the box and my clothes matched the table setting. I had a lovely cream table cloth of Mum's and had bought some yellow paper napkins. I put the napkins in napkin rings and also beneath a bowl in which I floated blue flower-candles and either side placed larger blue candles. I also put one of the larger and one of the flower candles on a mat on the bench by the table so everything was blue and yellowy (with a bit of cream). Sally's box was blue and gold, and I'd ended up wearing my camel-coloured trousers and a blue top! I had some nice music on when they came in - the end of my Babra Streisand tape and then Ella Fitzgerald (who we all love) - and that with the candles made for a lovely effect. I had the potatoes (which I'd seasoned and cut slits in the top of) and the chicken wings (which I'd marinated for a few hours beforehand) already in the oven so, once we'd got Emma's guinea pig ("Dim" - apperently not the brightest of pigs) settled into the backyard, I started cooking a packet of stir-fry veggies I bought from the shop and some garlic bread. I was quite pleased because everything came together at the right time and I'd been so well organised that I really didn't have to do much cooking while they were here (or at all, really).

I gave Sally her box (she had seen it sitting there but hadn't know it was for her) and she loved the box and loved the biscuits, so I'm very happy. She had three different varieties of biscuit, so I know that if she really didn't like some of them so much she could always let other people eat them and she could eat the variety she did like. The meal went well (except I burnt the garlic bread so had to put the second lot on) and I thought it was really yummy! I would have sat their eating for longer, but Sally and Emma had finished, so we went onto dessert. My theme for the whole thing had been to keep it simple but try to add a little something to make it special - hence the marinade on the chicken, the seasoning on the potatoes and the candles on the table. Dessert was vanilla ice cream into which I'd mixed crushed Maltesers then sprinkled Flake (cadbury chocolate) over the top and put two triangles of after-dinner mints in the top. It was very, very simple - laughably so - but they loved it (and so did I).

After dinner we watched bits of this Royal Variety Performance video from 1987 that Dad had taped. It has old performances by people such as Tom Jones & Shirley Bassey (who we fast forwarded after a verse), Sarah Brightman singing Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again, this very funny David Strassman-type ventriloquist and old comedy routines by Hale & Pace and Fry & Laurie (Mum always calls Stephen Fry "Laurie Fry" hehe). It was very amusing. Then we all retired to the computer room where we pulled out the Corrs music and had some music-making fun. I played the piano, Emma the guitar, Sally the flute, and we all sang at times. (I sang a bit less because I can't play the music properly - that is, the accompaniment as written, rather than simply block chords - and sing at the same time) We also sang harmonies to Castle on a Cloud and Emma and Sally sang some stuff from Phantom while I played (Sally was Christine and Emma was everyone else). It was really fun! Then, finally, they had to go because Sally was working at midnight at the hospital. I was having so much fun that it was a bit sad to have them go, but really I was glad that the night didn't end up being too late. I was in bed a little before midnight and had my light off half an hour later. I slept in til about 10am and didn't get up til after 11am. I had all of those dreams, but I slept straight through so I think it was a good sleep!

In a way, it seems like I've been planning and preparing for this dinner (and Sally's present) for a week and it was all over in a night. However, I've been doing other things (like going to uni or visiting Leonie) at the same time, it was fun to plan and prepare and it all went off so well I think it was well worth it! Pretty good for someone who isn't that fabulous a cook! I was pretty chuffed overall, really, because I felt I'd created a really yummy meal that made it seem like I was a really creative cook without doing anything that I haven't cooked before (I mean, I always do marinated chicken and seasoned potatoes for myself or Mum, I just don't normally cook for visitors at all).

Now I have a whole lot of left over food to eat. If it was potatoes and chicken, that would be OK (and I do have enough chicken left to have for lunch or tea today), but it's mostly half a packet of chips, maltesers, the leftover biscuits that didn't make it into Sally's box...Yummy things, but things which are bad for me and I'm only going to keep putting on weight if I eat all of these things! Aaargh! Mmm I feel hungry now...

...Now I've eaten most of the oh-so-chocoaltey biscuits and I feel a little sick...