Friday, December 23, 2011
Today was the day for our Christmas dinner. We had wanted to have it on Christmas day but since Felipe our park owner was buying the turkeys and the ham we deferred to his wishes. It was decided to have happy hour at 2pm and dinner at 3pm. The weather has not been very warm and there has been a cold north wind blowing most days so an early start was in order.
Keeping warm standing in front of the banyo. The concrete really holds the heat. Helene, Hal, Val, Jeri and Mary. That’s Dennis in behind with Sam’s rabbit ears.
We were setting up in the palapa just behind the main office and though it has a roof it is open on three sides and even though we started early it was quite chilly.
Connie and Marilyn….do they look festive or what! Jeri had brought an assortment of Christmas sweaters with her to give as presents and these are two of them.
Early in the day people trooped up front to set up their tables and hold their spot for dinner. Bright tablecloths with decorations and it all looked quite festive. Eric has been sick with a head cold/flu for the last few days and wasn’t coming so I decided not to bother with a table and just sit with anyone who had an extra spot.
I’d made my beet/red onion/orange salad on Wednesday as it could marinate and today I had to cook the ham and put together the romaine/orange/nut salad. Many other ladies were cooking turkeys, making dressing, gravy and cooking potatoes as well so everyone was really busy. Everyone else was baking and making an assortment of other yummy dishes.
We were to have just over fifty people eating and that included Felipe and his family along with the park workers. Arturo (front office) Genaro (general park worker) and Oscar (night security/garbage man) ate with us. Martine(general worker) was not here at dinner time. They are all hard working happy men who are desperately under paid and over worked. We try to be as nice to them as possible and appreciate the hard work that they do for us.
Frank, Manny, Arturo, Hal, John and Sam.
Dinner started at 3pm and I sat with Connie/Manny, Frank/Sandi and Dennis/Marilyn. I ran a plate of food back to Eric in the rig so he got to have Christmas dinner as well. The food was absolutely delicious and I couldn’t even manage seconds. However, I could manage desert.
The table set to eat.
There was a huge amount of food with a really good assortment of dishes and let me tell you “no on went home hungry!” Desserts were wonderful as well and I don’t know how anyone had room for them….but they did! By 4:30 everyone was full and happy and getting quite cold as the wind had really kicked up. Too bad but a good thing we started early.
Some people headed into the front office for a little party with Felipe but I decided to forgo the headache and head home.
Dishes done, fed and exhausted and watching TV by 6pm….not bad!
A great meal with good friends. Fun for all.
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