The Hospitality Trap

Here's another post by the lovely Tertia that I could've written word for word. My problem, like hers, is that I can't cook, and I desperately want to reciprocate for the dinner parties I have been to at K&R' s and M&E's houses. There is another one scheduled for next Tuesday at K&R's house. And to compound matters, A&C are also invited. So that makes 4 couples, and the 2nd dinner party held at K&R's house. Luckily, it's a potluck, and I'm going to make the ribollata (that's pretty close to her recipe) a la Rachael Ray. (God I love her!) I'm starting to feel really uncomfortable about this, though.

Not only do I not cook, I also don't entertain, plus I also don't have appropriate furniture. I know, it sounds stupid, and I should hope people would like me more than care about furniture.

Let me explain. When I moved out here, I had a dresser, a folding table, 4 folding chairs, a coffee table, a bookshelf, and a futon. Mark similarly didn't have much furniture. We've bought a few pieces here and there, and are especially fond of the dining room table. The problem though is that it's barstool height, and although it has a really nice leaf to make it bigger, we only have 4 chairs. Not really enough to go around for 8, or even 6 people. And we can never get any more because we got them as a special buy from the Home Despot. (I knew we should've gotten a few more!)

And our living room is dominated by a hulking entertainment center and 2 overflowing bookcases full of DVDs. These tend to pull the eye away from the other furniture that is in there: hand-me-downs. The first beauty is a blue velour-y type stuffed chair. Not very comfortable but will do in a pinch, although its primary function is to hold the mail I throw on it until I decide whether its immediately recycled or not. But the pièce de résistance is the Sleeper Sofa From Hell. It is :

• Covered in a lovely very worn floral print, ripped in many places, yet covered by a lovely "velvet" chocolate brown slipcover, but peeks out jauntily at the corners as the slipcover creeps towards the center crack. Ever see Crooklyn? You know how the missing dog is found in the sleeper sofa? I find myself never allowing the Manling to be left alone on the sofa lest we never see him again
• .Structurally deficient in the cushion area. Much like a bedgraggled grin on a jack-o'-lantern, the cushions will not line up in any semblance of order. The left cushion gamely tries to walk the line, the center is sucked into the pits of Hell (as noted above), and the right cushion sticks out, trying to kill itself and end its misery by plummeting to the floor below.
• Usually coated with a fine patina of dog hair (although, she too, to protect her from disappearing, is not allowed on the couch), my hair (I shed about a pound a day), baby spit, and food crumbs. Because despite our love of the dinig room table, we eat primarily on the couch.
  

The furniture issue, combined with the I'm a lousy cook issue, has given me anxiety. Here I go and make some friends, only to alienate them by not reciprocating their hospitality. I read the comments to Tertia's post with such great anticipation. I LURVE the idea of a barbeque, but that is a few months off.

And did I mention the deplorable state of the yard? I think we have Denver's version of Love Canal back there. It must be a Superfund site because despite valiant efforts on Mark's part, grass refuses to grow. We first seeded the lawn. Then we put in an underground sprinkler system. Last year we even laid (layed? where is my grammar nazi??) sod to no avail. That I'm not so worried about though. This year, we will attempt more sod, after reducing the area by some cautious and optimistic xeriscaping. Or as we saw at the Home and Garden Show, we will purchase fake putting green grass. It looked so real! Much better than the Turf Paint in vogue a few years ago. Ok, I'm kidding, but desparate times call for desparate measures.