A post in which I truly squander an invitation*

But not by design.

I woke up this morning feeling surprisingly good. Could partying actually be good for Epstein Barr?, I wondered briefly until I got up. The lump on my neck seemed to feel smaller. Then I got up and looked in the mirror. The lump wasn't smaller, just my whole neck had swollen up more. I decided to just wait a bit and see if things looked better.

I lay down on the couch, turned on the computer, and fell into the Manhunt vortex. Apparently George has recovered anyway. I ended up going to see a guy I had been talking to for a while. He claimed to be into BDSM, and unlike most guys that talk about it, he actually seemed to have some experience, and some idea what it is supposed to be about. Unexpectedly, we ended up in about a three and a half hour scene which was great fun, but which left me completely drained.

When I left his house, I had about two hours to get ready for the invitation today and get to Russ and Billy's house to ride up with them. Rich Shaw was having a card party today. He usually has one on Christmas day, and it is one of my favorite holiday things. He didn't have it on Christmas this year because he was out of town, but he had one on Thanksgiving that I missed because I was in Columbia, and then he was having one today.

I really, really wanted to go. I got home, ate a bit, and immediately lay down to rest for a half hour to see how I would feel. Well, tired was how I felt. I got up anyway, and started getting ready to go, but there was just no way. My body was saying "Oh HELL no." Part of getting better from this is that I have to listen to my body. I called Rich, declined the invitation, and apologized. I was truly very disappointed. I also sent a text to Russ and Billy telling them to go on without me.

Knowing that others are out having fun, and that you could be there, just seems to make me feel worse. I did sleep for a while this afternoon, and felt a bit better when I woke up.

I had gotten some potatoes earlier in the week with the thought of making home fries. But I also had my Christmas rosemary that Petal sends every year, and some cream I had gotten for coffee that had gone out of date. I decided to resurrect an old idea from a recipe I got from Gourmet magazine years ago.

The recipe was for roasted potatoes and onions cooked with rosemary and cream. It was delicious, but it was ridiculously labor-intensive. You had to pull the pan out of the oven to baste the vegetables with cream every 15 or 20 minutes for an hour or longer. But my mother makes skillet au gratin potatoes from scratch, and I thought this recipe would adapt well. It did. They turned out absolutely delicious. So I had a good dinner with loving from Petal in it, which made me feel a bit better; plus I used up random ingredients I had lying around, which always makes me feel good. I hate to waste food.