Saturday night, our friends Raylene and Doug threw a party to celebrate our marriage.  There were 16 invitations to our friends in the Topeka/Lawrence area, and everyone who was invited showed up.  Raylene and Doug are natural hosts, who love to cook and entertain and make it all look effortless.  Everyone has or had some connection with Washburn--some people we see regularly, others whom we hadn't seen in a while.

The first part of the evening consisted of tables full of various hors d'oeuvres and wine.  My favorite was a three-layer dish with a chicken liver paté as the center, but there were plenty of choices, many of them exotic, for the group.  After a couple of hours of mingling, good conversation, and indulging, the next part of the evening shifted from wine to champagne toasts.  I got to hold the floor for a few minutes, thanks to Doug's gracious introduction, to describe both the $5.5M gift to Washburn and the scholarship in my name that some of it will fund and the three-day trip to Iowa for our wedding.  Although almost everyone knew some or all of the details of our marriage journey, it was fun to put it together into a brief, but consecutive narrative.  

Even though we're having our first real heat wave of the summer, some of us repaired to the back deck.  In the spirit of celebration, two of the guys smoked cigars, and a couple of non-smokers decided they'd indulge in just one cigarette.  It reminded me of the old days in British novels when the men retired to the drawing room for cigars after dinner, except that we weren't only men, we certainly weren't British, and the 'drawing room' was full of the summer sounds of locusts and cicadas. 

The evening concluded with coffee and dessert--a flourless chocolate cake and/or Raylene's famous Italian cream cake and/or Doug's homemade bourbon peach ice cream.  One, two, or three.  I don't think anyone went for just one of the choices.  By 11, the party guests dispersed.  Mohamed and I were full and very grateful for the truly lovely and convivial evening, though we felt a tad guilty when we surveyed the tables of food, the empty plates, the glasses and cups with the remnants of wine, champagne, and coffee.  A tad guilty--but not enough, I'm afraid, to stick around to help clean up.  A very good time was had by all, and we're extremely thankful to Raylene and Doug for such a lavish but relaxed and happy evening.

With this entry, I'll hit 20,000 pageviews.  As I said at 10,000, it's not exactly going viral, but still, it's a very gratifying number, especially since when I began, I expected the blog to be short lived.  A special shoutout to the regular followers in Russia and Ukraine.  I don't know any details about international readers except that the difference between those who have just stumbled across the blog and read a few entries and those who keep up regularly is clear.  Here's to the next 10,000 views.