Pizza Week

Dearest Rachel –

After all the heavy stuff of this past weekend – and I’m not even going to touch on the stuff going on in the wider world, as that doesn’t really matter to us – I’d like to tell you about something a little lighter for a change. Granted, it doesn’t leave me lighter – quite the contrary, in fact – but that’s what happens when I can’t resist temptation.

I’d say things started in earnest over the weekend, but it could be argued that this really began a week ago today. You’ll recall that one chain that offers half-price pizza on Tuesdays; we used to get the gang together there back in the day when it was easier to do so. Ellen even announced about her new job while the six of us were at one of these places, if I’m not mistaken.

Well, it turns out that there’s a location not terribly far from the trail head that Lars and I start our walk; if our schedules coincide on Tuesday, that’s where we go for a reasonable lunch. It does mean that I bring home leftovers – Lars never eats his full half, and he would look askance at me if I tried to do so, as he still wants me to eat less as part of my weight loss regimen – which were still languishing in the fridge after a full seven days. More on them shortly, but I’m not sure that this initial purchase counts toward the current week.

Then again, the ‘current’ week starts on a rather odd place: this past Saturday evening. There had been a little bit of chatter within the group about possibly getting together this weekend. However, we being ourselves, there was no way to get us all to agree on a date that we would all be available. Ultimately the path of least resistance was to go with a day when all the girls could show up, but Logan had to be with his family; on Sunday evening.

On top of this, Daniel and I opted to go to church on Saturday afternoon to free ourselves up to get things a little more ready around the house (and to allow myself the morning to hang around at Dad’s bedside), so I basically took Daniel away from Logan for a couple more hours on Saturday afternoon. As something of a peace offering, I made sure to pick up dinner for us three guys on the way back; for reasons I couldn’t explain at the time, I was in the mood for Detroit-style pizza. There’s a place just up the road – and not all that far out of the way from the folks’ house (as I needed to pick up a few things that had been sitting in their freezer for far too long, including some ice cream that Erin had brought over on a previous visit that we’d never gotten to) – that offers a decent four-corner pizza, and that’s what we came home with.

Here’s where things start to go off the rails a bit. The plan was that the girls would be turning the house into a potluck supper of sorts; Ellen in particular was talking about bringing over a shepherds’ pie from Aldi – which I assumed she had just riding around in her freezer, waiting to be used. Turns out, that wasn’t the case at all – she just had a hankering for the stuff, and intended to get one to bring over at her earliest convenience.

However, it soon turned out that this was more easily said than done. I never would have guessed it, but apparently shepherds’ pie is a seasonal thing or something, because after visiting several Aldis and a Trader Joe’s or two, she wasn’t able to find anything like that. The closest thing she could come up with were individual pot pies – and while I’ve never heard of commercially available family-size pot pies, I guess I could believe they’re a thing – but in any event, that wouldn’t have sat particularly well with her attempts to limit gluten in her life. She did bring what she called an enchilada casserole as an appetizer, but I hope she manages to satisfy her craving some time soon.

Meanwhile, Kerstin and Erin stepped up to the plate, with… you guessed it, pizza. Now in fairness to the both of them, these were very different than those from Moretti’s or Jets’. Kerstin, out of respect for Ellen, had brought a cauliflower crust pie, while Erin brought a deep-dish spinach pie from Lou Malnati’s, which she proceeded to zhuzh up with a blanket of mushroom slices, as well as several cut-up chicken breasts (although she waited until the last few minutes to layer on the chicken, rather than have them dry out in the oven too long. Don’t worry, they have already been cooked, and were marinating in olive oil and herbs). Meanwhile, Ellen ultimately settled on a chicken and potato dish that had been floating around in her freezer – which I had assumed was the case with her shepherds’ pie idea, so, full circle – for the sake of variety.

You can gather that this was far too much food, but I managed to sample a little bit of everything (aside from Erin’s ube-flavored ice cream; I have my limits, plus, I was quite full by the time everyone was talking about dessert). I will say that I don’t hate cauliflower crust like I thought I might, but it does have certain structural integrity issues that leave one with an extremely flaccid pizza (to be sure, we had it in the over atop aluminum foil, rather than directly on the wire rack, but honestly, it looked like it was going to fall apart if we did that as instructed). Ellen was mildly nervous about the spice level of her enchilada dip, but it was fine; in fact, ‘mild’ certainly describes it well, which is to be expected, considering the source. And the plussed-up deep dish is something that can only go wrong in terms of the cutting and the serving; we put more than a few holes in the aluminum pie pan it came (and was baked) in. But all in all it was a lovely night together, and I wanted to make sure you heard about it amidst all this anxiety regarding Dad’s health and decline.

I only regret I didn’t think to take pictures to commemorate it all, but you know how some of the gang can be about that. Ironically, Logan came home while we were still all together, but since he’d already eaten at his folks’ (and why wouldn’t he have?), he was in no position to help us reduce the leftovers the girls would be taking home with them.

So that’s the two nights of the weekend in a row explained, and there’s likely several days of pizza leftovers to deal with, which I could spread out over the upcoming week, right? Well, about that… last night was the final full night of the Sparks club at church, as it so happened. And you know what the tradition is for that last night, don’t you?

That’s right; along with the ‘store,’ where the kids can but trinkets with the scrip that they earn from showing up, reciting their memory verses and bringing friends, there’s pizza brought in from the Costco more or less across the street (technically, it’s further into the mall parking lot than all that, but aside from the one street we’re located on, there isn’t any other actual road between it and us).

So that’s three nights in a row – and to top it off, I pre-gamed by polishing off those week-old Moretti’s leftovers (see, I told you I’d get back to those!), since I didn’t think there would be enough left after the kids had their fill for us leaders to make a meal out of. As it so happened, there was enough for a slice apiece, but that really doesn’t qualify as a meal.

Meanwhile, the fridge is still cluttered with the Jets’ stuff, so who knows? I might make it four nights in a row at this point, just to clear space out in there. I’m not entirely sure that I’m sick of the stuff just yet. Then again, a little variety wouldn’t hurt…

In either case, though, honey, I’d appreciate it if you’d continue to keep an eye on me, and wish me well. Whatever choice I make, I’m still going to need it.