this entry is mostly about food

For the wedding, Thrud and the other housemates gave us a Debauch in a Hassock.

This probably requires some explanation.

Basically, it's centered around the philosophy of some of the early French libertines, who held that libertinage was a philosophical state and a state of mind, so they'd go and they'd hold these debauches, in which they did not actually commit all the extremely explicit acts that society credited them with because they were too busy talking about the nature of the universe.

So a debauch, in this household, involves sitting around in pleasant company, eating tasty food, and discussing philosophy, in the full knowledge that we are all technically capable of, say, having an orgy, except that nobody wants to.

The one for our wedding came in a hollow hassock with a ribbon tied round it, and contained such things as the Really Large size of Godiva truffles, a box of Carr's water biscuits, a 1930s edition of Diderot's The Nun, what appears to be some really bad lesbian hentai, and so on ad nearly infinitum.

I quite thoroughly approve, because I noticed that for the past several mornings I have been getting up, stumbling blearily over to the refrigerator, smearing some goat cheese and some mushroom pate onto pane Toscana with my fingers, and then sinking onto the couch in sheer realization that this is the greatest breakfast ever invented. It took me a while to notice this, because I am not actually, well, conscious in the mornings, mostly. I am now vaguely afraid of getting used to eating breakfast in a fashion to which we cannot afford to become accustomed, but this is not enough to discourage me. Mmmm.

Also, pluots are the best thing ever. A pluot is an artificial hybrid between a plum and an apricot, and actually manages to combine the most delightful features of both-- sweet but not cloying, juicy almost to a fault, tarter near the skin and pit but not viciously so, and with a smooth melting texture that makes me want to eat them with a spoon. I am not altogether fond of most fruit, but these, well. My new favorite fruit by a truly astonishing margin. They aren't that much more expensive than standard fruit types, and Trader Joe's carries them, so I may just let myself become addicted on the grounds that I could stand to eat more fruit.

I suspect we'll be eating our way through portions of the debauch for at least a month, especially since for the first time in my life I had enough Godiva chocolate; I mean I had enough in one sitting so that I didn't want to eat any more of it.

Still don't know how they managed to fit this quantity of stuff into a hassock.