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SAY, IT'S BEEN A WHILE SINCE I dropped a salmagundi in your lap, Reader Dear. Here comes one now,* and please don't act as though I didn't warn you:

First off, here's what got dropped into my lap--it was the job of serving refreshments to two hundred people. Refreshments, I said (I see you turning pale)--Finger foods only. Just a little something after Sunday's morning church service--not a sit-down meal! (Although, I can't pretend I didn't quake just a little, nonetheless.) So, on Saturday I backed my U-haul up to the door at Costco. Well, actually it was just a cart; but it was a haul--four kinds of fruit and big fat muffins and loaves of sweet bread. The muffins were of such a generous size that I planned to cut them into fourths...and the loaves into twelve servings each. I figured one bag of oranges would do it; I counted about thirty-two inside the mesh, and I'd cut them into eighths...that would be two- fifty-six; and let's see, not everyone would eat a slice, some would eat two. But what about the pears? They were giving out samples, slurp, slurp...and, oh, they were quite delectable! One bag of eleven...hmm. Well, you can see, Dear Reader, my brain had the bigger job here, while my muscles got off easy. Eventually, however, calculations were complete and the haul got hefted to the trunk of the car. And then out again. And finally to the serving table. (Skipping over numerous steps in the interim...in which I took The Yard Man with me to unload it all at the church on Saturday night, and then coerced him into stopping at the grocery store so as to pick up a few more pastries of some sort, and maybe a big bunch of bananas, because, well...what if I didn't have enough?!)

Fortunately, it was all quite sufficient. In fact, what I had was an overabundance--a surplus, indeed--of oranges! On Sunday morning, as the line of partakers had moved down along the serving tables, the oranges, so gorgeously red, were overlooked for grapes and pears. They were passed by for bananas, and passed by for pastries. They appeared to be little pariahs.

Everyone mistook them for grapefruit! I'd surmised. After all, hadn't I gotten that very idea myself, with a shock, when I'd cut into the first of the oranges and found it delightfully ruby-colored? But, still......I puzzled over this as I cleared up the leftovers. The oranges were so yummy...didn't word get passed along? Every scrap of pear was consumed, and just a few bananas and grapes survived to the end. But the oranges...at least half lay uneaten.

"Yeah, they thought it was grapefruit," my Yard Man agreed, when the big job was over. He was helping me load into the car the pumpkins and flowering plant I'd used for decoration."That must be it, cause they sure were good oranges!"

"Yes, they were!" I said. And then I accosted a friend walking by, "Don't you think the oranges were good?!"

"Actually," she said, and she looked a little sheepish,
"I didn't eat any."

"What?! Why not?! Did you think they were grapefruit?" It was just so puzzling. I know she's fond of oranges.

"No," she responded. She was hesitating; something told me the mystery was about to be revealed!

"Then WHY didn't you eat any?" I begged to know.

"Well," she said, "I couldn't set down my plate, and I couldn't take the peel off the orange slice with just one hand, so I didn't take any. "

Ah, Dear Reader, thus shone a very large light! This was the lesson learned: Holding a plate of finger foods and eating them, too, should not require the use of more fingers than a person possesses!




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*There was a glorious sunset this evening. But the sun went down before I got this salmagundi fully concocted! I'll have to add more ingredients another day.

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