I hope all the Moms out there enjoyed their special day.  If you didn’t, well I enjoyed it for you, so that’s something.  I did have a pretty grand day of it.  For the last several years we’ve gone out to brunch with a large group, which I have to admit has always been fun.  But, you’ve got the hassle of travel, crowds, reservations, expense, etc etc.  This year one of our friends agreed to just host it at their house, and it turned out great.  As an added bonus, said house was one block from us so we just trotted across the street, packing our slow cooker.  Fun was had by all, and I think the food was better than anything we’d have gotten at a restaurant, especially the ones near us.  After we ate, everybody stuck around on the back patio and hung out enjoying the wonderful weather for the better part of the day.  Good times, hopefully this new tradition continues next year.  (As long as it’s not at my house, mind you…  That was a lot of people.)

Tonight marks a potentially dark day in my life.  I will be fixing spare ribs for dinner.  In a pressure cooker.  GASP.  Yes, it’s true, I’ve been reduced to this.  Hey, if you want to have ribs on a Monday night, what else can you do?  I can’t imagine it going well, but we will see.  My brain keeps being whisked back to that horrible, horrible day 20 years ago when I parboiled a few slabs.  I still feel dirty.  And to make it worse, if you ask Donette what were the best ribs I’ve ever made, she will without fail respond with that travesty of food preparation.  Sigh.  Well, I guess I just feel the need to try something different.  To date, I have not found anyone out here that takes any interest in spending a day sitting in the driveway feeding charcoal to a smoker.  They just don’t get it.  Or I don’t.  We’ll see how they feel about steamed meat.  Honestly, I am scared of the response.  First person to say “They taste just like they do on the smoker!” gets kicked out of the house.