Looking back.

Before I was married, I had a cute little house in a cute little neighborhood in Indianapolis.  It was a two bedroom, one bath bungalow.  Good size basement for my glasswork, nice finished attic for a spare bedroom/storage.  Former carriage house turned into a garage -- fenced yard, brick carport.  It was mine and it was just a complete slice of heaven.

In this little house, I used to host a party every Valentine's weekend for friends.  Specifically single friends, as I found that most of us needed an excuse to not wallow in our own self-pity (or, well, I needed an excuse not to wallow).  Guests were asked to bring a bottle of wine, while I made dinner.  Generally a big salad, a lasagne or two and some sort of dessert.  It was work, no doubt, but always made those Valentines Days a little better, or at least, a little more hungover :) 

Some of my best memories involve friends, laughter and fun -- but perhaps the most striking one in my memory is when I invited a guy I'd been dating (NOT seriously -- like we'd been out on two dates, maybe), as well as a coworker.  What I didn't know then was that he was dating both me and the coworker and hadn't bothered to share that information with either of us. 

Well.

That made for a most interesting evening, as he attempted to avoid both of us in this tiny little house.  Unfortunately for me, I ended up getting food poisoning from my lunch that day (part of my preparation always included lunch out for me, since I was cooking all day, I wasn't making my own lunch too), and he thought that the reason I was sick was because he was dating my coworker. Talk about ego!  You might imagine (correctly) that both I and my coworker dropped him like a hot rock after that night, so Mr. Stud Muffin was left to date no one. 

Most mornings-after the party found various sleeping people all over my house due to the excessive amount of alcohol consumed.  Although guests were asked to bring one bottle of wine, most brought two, and two bottles per person = big drunken fun times.

Ah, the "cupid's got a bad aim" parties.  Miss 'em.