The Island Pork

I promised that I would write about Dennis and Merlin's dinner party last night. It turned out to be a real party alright. We had no idea that so many people were invited; virtually everyone who lives on this hill was there, plus some other friends. It was great fun to meet some of these people for the first time, and renew acquaintance with others.

It was quite the international group, too. There was the Dutch chef, the former up-state New Yorker who has lived here 32 years, several Canadians, another European (French?), islanders, Americans - some who have retired here, some who are just working here for a time, some here doing mission work. Very interesting, eclectic group of people. The conversation was varied and fascinating.

Merlin is a great cook and we enjoyed a real feast. The island pork was delish! It was falling off the bone tender, wonderfully seasoned. The breadfruit was interesting, not sure if it had been baked or fried (although not greasy at all) and had a texture sort of like bread, sort of spongy, with a very mild taste. She also had cooked bananas and several types of salads plus a platter of fresh pineapple and grapes. Kaleen and Kelly had made some of those yummy peanut butter kiss cookies.

It was just a perfect night for sitting out on the side patio, eating and talking, while savoring gentle breezes and moonlight.

As we were walking back down the hill to our house (and using our flashlight to watch out for both snakes and tarantulas), we heard the noise from another party somewhere below our hill. There was lots of loud cheering, like fans watching a football game, then later lots of noise like a multitude of very loud video games being played with yelling and cheering, and then later still, very strange techno-type "music" with a constant, persistent, annoying beat. All of this went on and on and on and on. We kept waking up. It was a cool, rather still night and sound carried very well. Sometime during the middle of the night, I got up and found my earplugs and popped those in - it lessened the sound but did not completely eliminate that annoying beat. Eventually all other noise stopped except for that spooky music. Don figured everyone had passed out and left the music playing. Finally, around 4:30 a.m., silence! Ahhhhhhh!