A day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
-- NOT--
Lesson # 14131
Well this will be another mid week entry. Yesterday was the fourth of July, Independence Day, and the university was closed. I had the opportunity to also take Monday off as well but chose to work instead. I decided that I would rather take off on Friday. It is on Friday that I am going to Shakespeare in the park with a bunch of friends and I want to spend the day cleaning house and cooking. So I figured it would be a better day to take off. I know what you are thinking, why didn't I just take off both days. Well I am not going on holiday or anything and I think taking both days would be a waste. I still haven't gotten the evening planned and this outing was my idea, so I will be spending Friday getting things organized.
As I said yesterday was the fourth and I was off. I ended up sleeping most of the day away. I got up around 1:00 pm and then took a nap from three to five. As I have mentioned in several past entries I have been having sleeping problems. I think I have now made up for what ever sleep I had lost in the last week or so. I even slept well last night.
After I finally got up and around, Charles came and got me to go to a bar-b-que that one of his swim teammates was having. I am not usually comfortable going to a party w/ Charles where he is the only one there that I know. He is quite gregarious and outgoing and usually spends the evening being pulled from one group to another. The main reason I agreed to go this time was because I had already met several of his teammates earlier and most importantly both Andy and Alma were going to be joining us.
Alma ended up unable to join us. She went to a celebration with her family, so it ended up just being the three of us. I must admit that I was just a little apprehensive because I don't think that I have been anywhere gay oriented with both Charles and Andy since the breakup. I know that they are getting along well but I didn't know how things would play out in that environment. Well in the end I needn't have worried, they got along fabulously and the evening went smoothly.
Our hosts, Troy and Scott, had a nice set up ready for us with a nice spread of food. There was a nice group of people there and I felt at my ease. I met and spoke to a guy named Chris who owns a condo right across the street from me in this big beautiful building. He invited me to come over sometime to see his place. I am going to ask Charles for his e-mail to invite him to see "King Lear" with the group of us.
As I said they provided a nice spread. The two things of note were the shish kabobs which were delicious and a pineapple dish they had that was simple but good it was just a pineapple sliced in half cored and cut in slices the slices were covered in strawberry Jell-O right out of the box. This changed the flavor of the pineapple which normally would have been sweet and sour to just plan sweet. As I said this was a very good cool summer hors d'oeurve.
We spent the evening eating, talking and watching movies. When we got there they were watching "The Matrix" on DVD and we then watched part of "The Sixth Sense" We ended up going out to the fireworks before it was over. By the time we stopped watching I had already figured out the secret and was ready to move on anyway.
Though I enjoyed watching both movies I think it was a mistake to have the TV on. If you want your guest to mingle then it's best not to have the TV on. People will watch the TV instead of talking w/ people. To me that pretty much defeats the purpose of having a party unless the party is specifically to see a movie.
