The Dinner Party

Actually, the evening started with me being a bit of a doofus. The party officially started at 7:00, but the invitation said people could show up earlier (mainly if they had stuff that needed cooking, since it's a semi-pot-luck party, meaning the hosts make some dishes, but everyone else is encouraged to bring something). I had expected Adrienne to show up at my workplace around 6:30 to drive up, but she was there at 6:00. You may know (or have suspected) that issues of timing like this can throw me off, and my main reaction to Adrienne showing up was startlement. Which was of course exactly the wrong reaction, since she was already nervous enough about meeting people.

(True to our forms, we each blamed ourselves. Though I think mainly it was a miscommunication about the time, combined with me acting like a doofus, as I sometimes do. My tunnel-vision kicks in at inopportune times.)

Anyway, I suggested we walk around the neighborhood around Apple for a while to kill time and get over our discomfort. We had a decent walk, and on the way back passed Tom who was in his truck going home. Tom being Tom, he gave made a show of staring and pretending not to stare, and generally acted bemused by seeing me walking down the street holding the hand of a pretty woman. Adrienne and I both laughed quite a bit at his behavior, the goofball!

We got to the party a little after 7:00, running into John (not literally) who was coming back from the grocery store. ("Can you believe the Safeway down there doesn't have bacon?" groused John.)

Ben was throwing the party for his friend Sylvan, who's visiting from Australia. Ben's roommates are a recently-married couple, Joe and Lisa. Other attendees included Subrata, his friend Katherine from work and her SO, John's cow-orker Anders, and another couple I didn't know. The meal included three kinds of casseroles (chicken, veggie and tofu, I think), corn on the cob, plus the usual wealth of appetizers, such as John's famous guacamole. I also made my semi-famous baklava and brought it to the party, and it went over well. (Anders has been waiting months and months for me to make it, as he'd heard a lot about it. I actually overcooked it slightly, but only slightly. Even Subrata, who had excellent baklava recently at his sister's wedding, seemed fairly impressed.)

As far as I could tell, Adrienne charmed the socks off of pretty much everyone at the party! John in particular made a point of saying (to paraphrase) that he thought she is pretty and nice (which she is!). She and Lisa seemed to connect pretty well, too. She said later that she'd been afraid that we'd be sitting around talking about geeky stuff and that she wouldn't have anything to contribute to the conversation, but she found herself able to keep up just fine.

We did engage in mild PDA (that's Public Displays of Affection, if you didn't know!), and John later said that he thought was make a good couple.

It was a good party. I enjoy the parties they throw. Adrienne said later that it was just about the most fun she'd had since she moved to the Bay Area last year, which is really nice of her to say! She actually says many nice things about me (and I have many nice things to say about her!).

It was a wonderful night. We didn't leave the party 'til after midnight. Can't ask for better than that!