Bunko and Buffets

Monday was Labor Day so both Chris and I got the day off. Our only plans for the day were to attend a BBQ at the 'rents in the late afternoon. They were inviting their new neighbor, Dale, who just moved here two weeks ago and is our age. He's some sort of loan officer over at Wells Fargo and the 'rents thought it wouldn't hurt for us to meet him in case we wanted to look into refinancing for a lower interest rate. For the BBQ I made Zella bread and roasted asparagus with kalamata olives.
On Tuesday I had Bunko up in the boone's of Magalia. It was our 10 year anniversary so we had a potluck. I brought a autumn fruit salad. Fruit mixed with vanilla yogurt, mini marshmallows and peanuts. There was so much delicious food there it was unbelievable. One of my favorites was a polenta casserole. A layer of prepared polenta in the bottom of a 8x8 topped with a couple of cans of meaty Nally's chili covered in cheese and baked.
One of the gals brought a homemade coconut cake. The cake batter and frosting was mixed with pineapple and apricots.
As per usual I turned in a mediocre game and didn't win anything. This month there were a couple of prizes that included overflowing potted ivy plants. I would have liked one of those. I need to learn to cheat a little better.

Wednesday night was a girls night retirement party for Pam (our receptionist at work) at Sierra Nevada. She didn't want a big work party so a couple of us ladies kidnapped her and took her to dinner instead. Then on Thursday everybody brought food for her quasi-last day (her real last day is this coming Monday, but we weren't sure if she would really come in or not). Kari, Suzanne and I also decorated her desk with lights and crepe paper.
I brought lemon tartlets to the party (from one of my Pampered Chef cookbooks).
I had singing practice last night while Chris went and met our friend, Justin, at a sports bar down the street. Afterwards I went to the gym while Chris stayed home and dreamed up this culinary concoction as his evening snack.
Mini marshmallows on wheat crackers. He definitely missed his calling as a professional dietitian.

Even though Friday afternoons are my grocery shopping day, I didn't get a chance to get a list put together in time so I stopped at Holiday in P-town on my way home and grabbed enough to get me through dinner and breakfast. Today was my next to last Friday I'll be working. Starting October 1st my work hours have been reduced to 36 hours (along with the majority of my co-workers). I'll be enjoying three day weekends at least until the end of June, 2010. After that our union will renegotiate with the town to see if they're financially capable of restoring our hours back to 40. Otherwise we may have to go through a second year of it. On the upside, at least I have a job, right?