The good, the bad and the yummy

As wifey and I reminisced about vacation, we found ourselves saying such silliness as " Ahhh...remember that night we were drunk and ____ picked your nose? Remember that?" and "Oh, remember when ____ spilled the beans and told your mom that secret that mom didn't remember the next day? Remember that?" and " What about your cousin getting blasted and calling you Ellen Degeneres, what was that about?"( I told her just to be glad he didn't call her Rosie!)

"Remember how I almost got into a fight with the old man at the business center at the lodge over using the computers?" Friggin' old ass golf playing smart ass business types! Oh, and there was the bar tender who called me "Miss Picky" and told wifey "You drink that, you can't puke! You puke, you clean it up! No one pukes at my bar!" He'll forevermore be known as "the bar nazi".

One frantic day, I cooked for about 20 people. That's the largest crowd I've ever cooked for all by myself. I made paella and enchiladas. I made the enchiladas beforehand and froze them to keep the day-of preparations to a minimum. I'm glad I had that foresight. I devoted the majority of the day to the paella and it came out like a divine treat from the gods. Since the enchiladas were done, all I had to do was place them in the oven while my paella was cooking and reheat them. They reheated fine and everyone was immensely impressed that a white looking girl like myself can throw down some Spanish food like that. My Latina shines through when I cook, that's for sure. I guess standing around the kitchen while all my aunties and some uncles cooked the feasts paid off. I learned a lot about Mexican and Spanish cooking from them. I had a couple of people ask me if I cooked professionally for a living. I'll take that as a compliment, especially considering one of them is a restaurant owner! I was a bit disappointed, though, because the local grocery store didn't have clams. They did give me the number to a local fish market, who did have clams. We got directions to that store and headed out, couldn't find it, asked directions from another person, headed out again, the way they said to go, still missed it, finally gave up and made clam-less paella. It was still really good. I just added extra shrimp. We had lobster, chicken, shrimp, tomatoes, onion, cilantro, saffron, all kinds of yummy goodness in that paella! MMM...now I'm getting hungry just talking about it.

Another surprise about vacation was that I totally panicked and bailed on my obligation to the bride and groom to read the reading in their wedding. Wifey bailed me out and read for me, but I feel bad. We pulled up in front of that church and I totally panicked. And that was just the rehearsal. Who am I kidding? I flipped out the minute I met the priest. It's the priests that freak me out. I can't help it, and add to that I was going into a catholic church for the first time in about 15 years, and wow. I totally reverted to being an 11 year old who was just too scared to move, to breathe, to speak. I suppose I still have some very deeply seeded issues with catholicism and priests and the whole bit. Who wouldn't? I see the white collar and my palms get sweaty and I just want to puke or run and I don't know which one will happen first. My leg was thumping faster than it's normal pace for the duration of the ceremony, only relaxing momentarily, when wifey placed her hand on it to ease me of my discomfort. I truly wanted to be able to go in there and do this thing, face my enemy, conquer my fears...sigh, I guess I need to schedule some more time on the sofa with the therapist to work that mess out.

So that about sums it all up, the good, the bad, and the yummy of our week in paradise. What did yall do last week?