Ganesha and the Guru

A week ago I attended a conference for meeting planners. I hadn't originally intended to go to this one, but someone asked me to speak as part of a panel on food and beverage planning ... it's more tedious than it sounds... yes, extremely tedious. Since I detest all of the budgeting, selecting, ordering, revising, revising again, again, again, and ultimate complaining about food and beverage at meetings, I usually avoid personal responsibility for this area.

This ability to have a someone else deal with the tasks one hates is one of the few benefits of being a lead planner, but one still does have to understand it in order to be ultimately responsible. So I fought the instinct of asking the requestor if she had called me by mistake. I agreed to the engagement, guessing they might still call me in a few weeks and, with appropriate embarrassment, explain that they meant to ask someone who actually does food and beverage planning as a primary responsibility. To my surprise, when I told my contact I would speak, she became effusive, excitedly lauding my abilities and proclaiming her relief that they'd gotten me of all people to speak. I knew at that moment they were absolutely confusing me with someone else.

The Killing Frost

My former urban life didn't include much notice of the first big frost. The landmark weather event of my year was usually the first big sleet. This sleet storm would traditionally be observed by putting a pork roast in the oven with squash and potatoes along with a small apple pie then curling up in front of the television to watch a movie. The fireplace, if I had one, would be ablaze and I'd be wrapped in a blanket. At the end of the night I would watch the traffic and weather report, just to remind myself how crummy it was outside of my cozy little home. I might bring a potted plant or two off of the patio, but that was the extent of my winter preparation.

The first sleet here in the country was followed within hours by snow. Indeed it was observed in the ritual fashion by an impressive menu:

Broiled Chuck Steaks with a Toasted Spice Vinaigrette

Roasted Cherry Tomatoes and Quinoa Salad (from my head)

and

Harvest Baked Apples and Granola

The menu was driven somewhat by the need to clear the tomato plants quickly before the sleet started in earnest and the fact I had just been given apples from a co-worker's trees that day. Despite making up the  quinoa recipe on the fly the meal turned out to be a first rate Sleet Observance Dinner.

However in the new reality of country living the first sleet/snow is only the precursor to a more important event for which we have been planning for weeks: the killing frost.