A Fun Evening

Tobias had a dinner guest last night, and he was thrilled about it.  Actually, Dakki, his guest, was pretty thrilled too. Dakki loves cuddling a lap creature, and Margaret won’t sit on Dakki’s lap.  She stations herself under Dakki’s chair, beseeching her for handouts.  Unfortunately for the two of them, Dakki is forbidden to give Margaret bits of dinner – and is only allowed to give legitimate dog treats after the meal is done and the dishes are being cleared away.  This treats rule has been very difficult to enforce, as Dakki is a real softie, especially when it comes to a pleading pup.  After a near disaster, however, Dakki has finally become compliant, but she suffers true pangs from the sight those loving little hungry doggy eyes.  Happily, although Margaret was still sitting there, patiently eyeing every tidbit that went into Dakki’s mouth, there was a delightful distraction – a polite kitty, who only wanted the company, but did not beg, and left Dakki’s dinner alone.  After dinner, as we sipped our tea, he positioned himself on her lap and writhed in comfort, purring in ecstasy.

The real reason for Dakki’s visit was not to see Tobias, but to watch some Rumpole episodes after dinner.  I had planned to make a meal-in-minutes – something like poached eggs on English muffins, but then decided to make poached eggs on polenta, topped with tomato sauce.  This seemed like almost a meal-in-minutes, but it turned to be quite a few minutes.  I was making the polenta in my fabulous fuzzy logic rice cooker, which meant that I could start it whenever, - any time early in the day - and then tell the cooker the time that I wanted the polenta to be ready.  I went to cupboard to get the polenta, and – shades of Mrs. Hubbard – the cupboard was bare.  Bare of more than a few teaspoons  of polenta anyway.  This meant a trip to the store.  As long as I was at the store, I got a few vegetables to add to the menu.  As dinnertime was approaching, I checked to see how the rice cooker was doing, and realized I had set it to be done at 5 a.m, instead of 5 p.m!  Aaaaargh!  And I had no idea how long the polenta would actually take to cook.  But it all worked out, we had a very nice dinner, and the Rumpole episodes were, as expected, delightful. 

Tobias overseeing the meal preparation