a good way to end the holiday

had a group of friends over for dinner & 8th candle lighting.

I'd hoped it would be a bit of a reunion of Shulamis folks, but that turned out not to be.

When initially planning, I wasn't sure whether or not I'd try to feed people. (There was also a brief interlude of figuring I'd order Thai-across-the-street for all.) Then I got excited about cooking and made lots of food. Unfortunately it was mostly a collection of impulse-dishes*, so the overall menu was *strongly* slanted to the pale-brown starch & cheese. (I would have liked the one salad to have been three times its size, for instance.)

On the other hand, that's respectably traditional for this holiday, no? Starch + grease!

I had a great deal of help with the real-time food preparations, for which I am grateful.

We lit many candles, and sang brachot plus Maoz Tzur. Two people mostly-knew a tune to the "Haneirot Hallalu" that jw always recites. It had slipped my mind that one of them is a fellow lover of the "Mrs. Maccabeus" song. So we did a blazing rendition of that, much to the entertainment of the uninitiated.

And now to sleep, earliest time all week, I believe :-)