Come to this house, be one of us

Now to less serious matters. bunny_hugger has wanted to have a garden party for ages now. We've got a lovely backyard and not enough chances to show it off, given how many of our friends are online. But we have got a circle of local friends now, mostly through pinball. And we got a pinball machine just back in November. This formed the plan to host a party and the first Christian Marche Memorial Tournament. Marche did the backglass art for our, and many other, pinball machines. He's got this distinctive mid-century modern style that's not in great evidence on our table, but still, really defined the look of 60s and 70s games.

Getting the house ready for the party was a series of chores. Most of it's my fault. I'm not a very tidy person. It runs the family. I fill up horizontal surfaces with piles of things, and more piles, and then pile things across the piles. This all needed to be tidied up and put into at least organized, logical piles before we had people over. Or hidden; I admit I hid stuff in the guest bedroom where it wouldn't be focused on.

And the outside had to be fixed up too. Part of this was weeding the garden and planting annuals and doing all the work that makes the place lively. Part of this was replacing the crushed-brick cover for the patio. bunny_hugger had covered the patio in crushed brick that looks great, but something like a decade ago, and it's worn thin because somehow rock evaporates. And we've failed over and over to find replacement. Finally on what was then the hottest day in two years --- the last two summers were pretty cool ones, mind --- we went to the Van Atta's garden supply shop and bought ten bags of a bagged rock that promised it was slate/brick red.

So it was. Until it got wet, at which point it turned purple and grey. It got a little better when it dried out again, but it stayed noticeably different from the red of the main bricks. My father is confident that it will fade to something tolerably near the red of our main bricks. It's not really there yet and I'm just awestruck by how somehow broken rocks can be defective.

Anyway, some of that and some getting our rabbit into the best shape he can be in, and we were ready for the big day.

Trivia: In July 1914 Guglielmo Marconi was awarded an honourary Victoria's Cross for radio's assistance in rescuing survivors of the sinking SS Volturno. A month later he was an enemy alien. Source: Signor Marconi's Magic Box, Gavin Weightman.

Currently Reading: The World Within War: America's Combat Experience in World War II, Gerald F Linderman.