Weekend with old friends

MONDAY! I just spent an enjoyable hour visiting with my BFF, who's been in town for the weekend. We talked while I browned my drained-for-days tofu in olive oil and invented a yummy stir fry with broccoli, carrots, onion, celery, and garlic. Made up a random sauce with soy sauce, sesame oil, a drop of molasses, and black pepper. Then I threw in some walnuts just for good measure. And some frozen peas, why not? I'm eating it over quinoa, and it's very tasty! I love made-up food.

It was a busy and crazy fun weekend. I took the day off on Friday at a very inappropriate time of year to spend my BFF's birthday with her. We went shoe shopping, ate Lebanese food for lunch, and went to my favorite cafe. That night, we had dinner with our other BFF -- macadamia nut tacos over fried rice, shrimp tempura rolls, BBQ chicken pizza, plum wine, you name it!

Afterwards, we headed to a crawfish boil / karaoke party for our friend's rehearsal dinner, which was festive. At one point in the evening, my old friend and I headed to the most vile bar in creation because I thought my brother was playing there, but I was sadly mistaken. A frat boy took a giant handful of my bottom as I walked by. It was unpleasant but unsurprising. I should have known better than to set foot in that heinous place, where you get stuck in the crowd and end up fighting your way through the sweaty masses with a feeling not dissimilar to what it must feel like to stand in sewer. Not good! Overall, the day and night were great, though. It's just really good to be around people you've known forever, isn't it?

Saturday dawned, and I'm drawing a blank. I brought my friend who stayed with me to a brunch. Eventually it was time to get dressed for our friend's wedding reception, held outside on a terrace overlooking the river, and it was GORGEOUS. Beautiful bride, beautiful friends, beautiful night.

Yesterday, the BFFs and the cousin and I went to a coffee shop and had a non-shower for the friend pregnant with twin boys. We drank coffee and ate cake and gave her some gifts. It was nice to sit out in the sunshine together.

This is not very exciting, but my heart was very full this weekend.

I didn't eat cake because I still haven't cheated on my no-sweets-for-Lent resolution, which is shocking beyond belief. I finally sat down to watch the Battlestar Galactica series finale yesterday afternoon after basically resorting to a media blackout for two days. (No spoilers to follow.) All I'll say is that I'm so glad this show has been in my life for the past few years. In July of 2006, when I first started watching the show, I wrote, "Last night I watched the first 45 minutes or so of the Battlestar Galactica miniseries. When you can realize that greatness is unfolding not even an hour into a new show, it's pretty exciting. The cast seems solid, the premise is intriguing, and it's got heartache and comedy and sex and war and outer space and that's pretty much a perfect show right there ... it's going to be fun to immerse myself in this universe, I can already tell." Who knew the ride I was in for? I still marvel that my brother picked up the miniseries a few short months ago and flew through the entire series, Razor, and the webisodes in time to catch up before watching the finale this weekend. Talk about immersion! We agreed that we don't even really care what happened in the finale. We just feel like the show has been a gift.

I guess I have nothing else to say for now. Sometimes I wish all we ever had to do in life is sit around with those who speak the same shorthand language that we do and eat, drink, and be merry.