Old Dogs, Old Friends

My husband is still overseas, so while he is gone I finally got around to uploading more photos off  of my camera.  Other than make me droll it brought back a good memory of the last outing with had with our closest friends.

It had been a very busy week at work - the Big Cheese was gone which made me Acting Big Cheese and there were more politics and meetings than I want again in a 5-day stretch.  I remember coming home and having a piece of ciabatta bread and a glass of wine, feeding my husband and then going to bed to sleep for 10 hours straight.

That Saturday dawned much brighter. Silver dollar "World's Fluffiest Pancakes" and a game or two.

If you have never played Ticket to Ride (especially if you love trains) check it out - it is VERY fun and can be quite competitive.

But it's also simple enough the younger members of the family can play. Each player gets x number of trains, each with their own color. You get three destination cards (city A to city B) worth varying points based on their length. You can discard one, but if you keep all and don't finish the track you deduct those points. Each track is colored or has a neutral any color goes segment. You draw cards with varying colors of trains, some are shown face up, or you can select a wild card or two. When you have enough to build a track you can on a turn, one track per turn and you can't draw your two cards when you do that.  You are done when one player is down to one train. Each track is worth x number of points which are added up as you play.

Then, we met with two couples who are our closest friends.  You'll remember MC and Mr. B., from The Book of Barkley (the house with all the rescue cats) and Mike H. and his wife who show up on my Facebook and whom I've been friends with offline for many years.  With them was Mike's best friend from childhood, still his best friend today.  With MY husband actually home, it was going to be a great day.  Abby knew something was up when I got the house tidied up earlier than normal

It's MC!  It's MC!  Mom's best friend! 

 First I had to give them a tour of Abby's recent additions to the  "Stuffie Zoo".

Then - after pets all around and some time to catch up, it was time to head over to the Pub, now that it would be less busy and we could get one of the big tables.

The building is really old, but it's fixed up really warm and cozy with two fireplaces and it's within walking distance of the Bungalow.

Everyone started with appetizers, fried pickles, corned beef bites, and fried cheese curds in beer batter, but I forgot to take pictures as it was late when we ate, and I was getting hungry.

I was almost full on the goodies so I had a salad with grilled chicken and radishes. MC kept saying "radishes" with a thick Scot accent that had me cracking up. That soon had us doing the Taysiders in Space thing.  

 MMMM.  Shepherds Pie with the homemade Irish bread.

 Poutine. Mrs. H is from Canada so she had to order it.

 Fish and Chips

 Irish Breakfast.  MC:  "Fries and Irish bread - what's not to love!"

 Guinness Stew. Yes, that bowl is as big as it seems.

There was lots of conversations on science, and mechanics, and engineering including sharing some telephone photos of "projects gone really wrong" with lots of laughter and refills on our beverages.

I bet Abby is at home thinking "don't forget the doggie bags"

Back at the house, we got caught up on things we'd been doing or reading.  Mike spotted the "F is for Effort (more of the very best totally wrong test answers)" book and was reading it out loud making us all crack up.

"Explain one reason why people are concerned about rising water levels in the world's oceans?"

"Dolphins will invade coastal cities in phase 1 of their plan for world domination!"

Then there were horror stories of world travel, including the very worst of Five Star Hotels and why the passenger in the seat next to you drooling on you can only get worse.

All too soon it was time to say goodbye, Abby getting a bunch of love all the way around one last time.

She looked at them as they left as if to say, "I am so happy you all visited. Please come back - I love you!"