heavenly

so yesterday was my birthday, and we had a small party here. just nine people (including us) -- the love shack ain't that big, see? but it was all pretty comfortable, with the porch set up to accommodate smokers, candles burning for that essential flattering light, good music, and lots of entertaining talk. in short, it was all love. which is, as jackie deshannon sang, what the world needs more of.

00soul cooked a whole awesome meal, but, as the photo-taking was left to me, visual documentation is made of fail. i mean, what documentation exists is fine ... but there's not much of it. b/c i was too busy getting drunk and having fun to snap photos, oops! so just think of this as "stunt cooking: behind the scenes edition." we've got before and after but no during.

he made spanish tapas, paella, and some kind of spanish-style chocolate almond cake. one layer, no frosting, just sprinkled with sugar and cocoa. here's what it looked after it was cooled and removed from the springform pan what birthed it, but before that final application:



the tapas, pronounced "authentic" by the divine ms. m, were basically delicious things on thin slices of lightly toasted french bread (00soul did the slicing AND the toasting). one variety was garlic, tomato, and olive oil all rubbed into the bread. another was canned tuna and pieces of green olive (he sliced the olives himself, after removing the pimentos, b/c couldn't find any already sliced). and finally there was serrano ham and manchego cheese. oh, and we also had bowls of marcona almonds and whole green olives.

sadly, i don't have ANY pictures of the tapas! they were eagerly consumed by the ravenous horde, most of whom contributed bottles of cava and champagne to make it all go down smoothly. (see the body count at the top of this post.) the paella also turned out amazing: it had chicken, shrimp, scallops, mussels, ham, and of course the usual rice, pimentos, and peas. and probably other stuff i'm forgetting. 00soul used his paella pan, which was a christmas present from me some years ago, and you can see how it has been weathered with use, as this photo is of the last bit left many hours after we fell upon it like wolverines:



i think it was somewhere around this time that JD and i attacked the remnants with our fingers and a spoon.

in the gift department, i received a cache of awesome barrettes and haircolor-saving shampoo and conditioner from ms. m, and this super-cool hot wheels model of the enterprise 1701-A from the chief:



pretty excellent, right? (this isn't my photo; i stole it from amazon.com.) it nicely complements the set of four "star trek" movie glasses JD gave me last week.

it all ended with 00soul playing 45s till he fell over and JD asleep on the couch, while antonym and i kept talking till some time after 2. then i stayed up till around 4 and drank water. which sorta helped stave off a really gnarly hangover, but i haven't been too ambitious today (understatement).

so big thanks to my main man, who worked himself nearly to death to give me a really fabulous birthday. b/c that's what he's like. and that's why i love him.