Two 3.6-mile city rides. I improvised a way around the one actual hill without adding any mileage, I think. I will measure the next time I drive. Evidently I am all about reducing the exercise impact as much as possible.
As I was hanging out laundry, RDC came to the back door with Nisou on the phone. She is coming home! for two months! with Emlet and Siblet! and I am going to join her, tra la. Unfortunately, not toward the end when both SPG and SEM will also be in Connecticut, nor earlier than that, when PLT and his family will be; but I take what I can get. Emlet told me about her favorite book with Max, M-a-x spells Max, and about her pony ride--at first she was scared and then she wasn't; and I heard about Siblet's progress.
Then I had lunch with Lucy, Koroshiya, and Jared in Cherry Creek. Frequently and overly self-aware and chi-chi Cherry Creek is notable because at first I snarked at a woman walking by with three Highland terriers in Harley harnesses--harnesses instead of leashes because dustmops are so hard to control--but then she clipped those harnesses to the sidecar of her retro motorcycle and drove off and I wanted to marry her even though she didn't wear a helmet or restrain her shoulder-length hair while riding. Of both snark and facetious lust I spoke at a normal volume, so I should have expected that the woman at the next table would say of the dogs' tack that they have leather helmets as well and so clearly knew my victim. Hi, I'm subtle.
I have no idea what happened on the rest of Saturday, but Sunday RDC made us pancakes for breakfast and we hung the pantry doors and then I attacked the backyard while he cleaned his office. I combed the grassesque and weeded and mowed it, added the clippings to the compost (and admired the mouse tunnel from the asparagus-strewn top surely leading to the warm interior), added the last of last year's leaves to the other compost, ruthlessly watered both composts (and didn't drown any mice this time that I noticed). Also I took the big pots of dead annuals off the porch columns.
We tried a new fastish "Tuscan" grill for dinner, and took a long walk through the park and the autumn color, and, let me repeat, hung the pantry doors. It makes a huge difference in the doneness of the kitchen, white paneled doors instead of shelves of boxes of food.
And then, oh gods, dinner on Monday. We got to be tasters for an upcoming executive dinner at Adega. The sommelier matched wines with each different dish--two different dishes for each course, and six courses. I decided to try wine, and I don't know if I should be congratulated for trying something new or cautioned that I am an alcoholic waiting to happen. We had champagne before an amuse-bouche of puréed leek tartlet with tomato jam; different white wines with our soups (amaranth with pomegranate-stuffed acorn squash and spaghetti squash with almond); again with the entrées we selected (tangerine-drenched pheasant breast and foie-gras braised fluke); and reds with the ones the sommelier gave us (prosciutto-wrapped gurnard and albacore tuna); and reds again with our plats, monkfish and crown of rabbit.
Sorry about the rabbit, Haitch. It was my last rabbit, presented in a rack just like lamb (leading RDC to call it rack-o-rabbit, or wacko-wabbit, and many Thumper, Watership Down, and Bugs Bunny jokes.
And then two ports with our desserts, a half-baked chocolate-port cake with blackberry ice cream and bittersweet chocolate crumble with hazelnut brittle.
I liked the white wines and the port. The reds, RDC decreed, were more complicated and more of an acquired taste. I'm not surprised I liked the port: it was very sweet.
Also I got to wear my blue velvet beaded dress and my new silvery grey satin slingbacks. That was fun.