The Post that Never Was

I had a great, rant of a post brewing. It was going to be full of f-bombs, all typed in CAPS, and would have ended with my head exploding. Then the moment passed and I didn't feel like writing it anymore. You'll have to settle for the calmer version now that my rage has dissipated.

Back in September, my family was gearing up for a late, Rosh Hashanah lunch. 18 people were expected at my father in law's house at two o'clock that day. I arranged to meet the caterer at my FIL's at 12:30 since no one else was home to receive the order.

The food arrived, and I assisted the caterer in unloading the truck, and somehow managed to cut myself on one of the aluminum food trays. No biggie. I just turned on the kitchen faucet with the intention of rinsing off the minute amount of blood. No water. Hmmmm.

After about five minutes of pacing, I called my FIL's care worker, who was driving my FIL home from the synagogue. "Hi, S? It's me. I'm at your house, and there isn't any water supply. Do you know anything about that?"

"Hi. Yes, they sent a note saying that they had to turn off the water in order to do some water main repair work."

"Did they say how long it would be off for???"

"Yes, until six tonight."

Now this is about the time where you would have heard me freak out with all of those F-bombs that I mentioned earlier. As you can tell from the short time-frame, there really wasn't enough time to throw a post together as I had approximately one hour to call everyone to re-route them to my house, and actually get my house set up for the event. I did manage a facebook status update though!

Looking back for a moment at the beautifully set up dining room at my FIL's house, I proceeded to run all the food and beverage out the door and into my car, mentally figuring out which of my platters and serving bowls I was going to have to dig out of storage.

I was SO ANGRY on that drive home. Although there was a fair bit of chaos in the hour that ensued, I wasn't able to hold onto my rage because this turned out to be one of the better family events that I've ever quasi hosted.

Although my FIL's house is much more readily equipped to handle events like this, I'm not sure that I like the idea of catering a meal to the house where my late MIL used to slave away in the kitchen for everyone, especially when the rest of us have houses to host in.

In terms of my house being set up for the event, it just so happened to have been cleaning lady day! Huzzah! Also, my mom was already at my house taking care of the kids, so she was able to spring into action, getting a head start on the table settings. Believe me, she really does spring.

With my FIL's care worker helping, probably motivated a bit by her guilt, we put together a fine event! It was far from perfect, but no one expected perfection on such short notice. I think I actually had hero status for saving the day! Not only that, but I got the credit for contributing, without what would have been a week-long build up of anxiety and griping about having everyone over in the first place.

Now if only I could pull this off every year...