Most of the day will be recovery mode, I think. Kev had some deadlines this week too, so we have four days of dishes piled up in our kitchen. We have plants that need serious care if they're to survive the week of neglect. (Plants like water. Who knew?) We are down to an inch of milk, no bread, and two eggs. I'm really looking forward to being domestic for a bit. When you revise a scene, you think you've made it better, but you're not really sure. When you wash dishes, those dishes are washed, incontrovertibly. You have struck a blow for order against the forces of chaos, and even if chaos is going to win in the end, you don't have to think about that for a bit because you have bright sparkly clean dishes.
Speaking of sparkly, my dining table is covered in crystal. See, one of the minor downsides of not getting actually married is that you don't get to register for china and crystal and silverware. Kevin's mother gave us her wedding china (she has her mother's china, as well her husband's mother's china, so we did not leave her with a china shortage). But I was pining for lack of crystal, because I love the way it goes 'ting' when you clink it. Also because on special occasions, it's all sparkly and light catching. So at some point a while back, I poked around the net, and found incredibly affordable crystal at Overstock.com. So we bought it, and it arrived yesterday.
It's not the kind of crystal you buy if you're a wine connoisseur. Apparently then you want very thin crystal, no faceting, as large as possible, to let it breathe properly. If you are extra-picky, you probably want a Reidel Sommeliers glass, but at $55/glass, this was not for us. I might get Kevin one glass for his birthday next year, if he is very good. But the thing is, I am not a wine connoisseur. I pretty much know red with red meat, white with everything else. And I'm not sure that's right. I tend to drink white in the summer, because it's good chilled, and red in the winter because I think it's usually tastier. But when it comes down to it, I care more about my crystal being sparkly in the candlelight than about it perfectly enhancing the bouquet and flavor of the wine. And this is very sparkly, and it goes 'ting' beautifully, and it probably won't even break in the dishwasher because it is quite thick and solid, so I am happy.
Now I just have to find an equally good deal on silverware. :-) Kevin doesn't think we actually *need* real silver, but how can I play queen of the castle with stainless steel? I think it's not so easy to find inexpensive silverware, though, so we may have to end up just choosing a pattern and then asking the relatives to give it to us for birthdays and Christmases over the next several decades... They can never figure out what to get us, so that would solve two problems at once. :-)
Yes, I think real silver is wonderful.