WE DINED OUT TONIGHT

A little over 20 years ago my brother and his partner created a mob they called the Dinerians. I was one of the elect and duly dined with them in their back yard over the years as the children came and grew and their friends multiplied like rabbits. Anne Bonney and I recreated that here in MetroParkCentralis and tonight we were joined by 13 friends who spent 3 hours enjoying themselves at yet another restaurant. It was a fun and enjoyable night that all were reluctant to leave. Part of the discussion at my end of the table was how to make it possible to hear and talk to all of them.

My parents knew how and they did it like nobody else. They had a hundred of their friends over for Saint Barbara's Day every year (Patron Saint of Artillery)  and the Cold Duck flowed like champagne and the very best steak on earth was served up perfectly cooked on the grill in the back yard by Watash.

I remember they got a note of apology from a couple that spent the night because. We used to put luminarios out to light the way to the door for those that parked down the street. He was promoted to general and threw a toga party for their closest 200 friends living in New Jersey. He meant to get the Roman breastplate at the costume store in Dover but one of the colonels beat him there so he just fastened leather thongs to two of our decorative trays and wore them over his sheet toga.

As you grow into the 20th Century you accept that your parents are weird but when you think of who was having toga parties in 1980, one doesn't think of a bunch of Army colonels, their wives and your parents.

There was much discussion about how to host the next dinner and maybe, just maybe, we'll just have it  @ our house. We only have four outside chairs but my sister lives next door and she used to be somewhat notorious for actually having more chairs than my parents. As I recall, she had 64 of the damned things.

I remember my grandfathers as serious men. One was an MD and a Rotarian and every soul in Carlisle knew him by name and the other was named Horace..........King.........Lastname and was Class of 32 at West Point and ran for Congress and known by all of his friends and cronies as Honey. Still, neither one of them would have hosted a toga party.

So, toga party, backyard, next time, with the dinarians.

Anne Bonney claims she never saw Austen Powers or Animal House. I owe it to her to broaden her experience.