A few things to remember when having friends over for dinner

I had a few friends over for dinner on Monday night. It was great to see them (not that I hadn't seen them in a while), and everyone enjoyed the food - Adam Roberts' Roasted Chicken
with some hearty white-wine-and-olive-oil roasted vegetables (turnips, parsnips, carrots, yams, brussel sprouts, etc), slow-cooked cranberries with wine and oranges, and for dessert - pecan pie with whipped cream. Alan brought some butternut squash soup that became a lovely first course.

Still, keep some things in mind when you're throwing one of these things:

• Make sure you don't break the meat thermometer on the side of the cooking dish. At least it was just one of those alcohol-based thermometers instead of the mercury ones. My chicken could have been inedible! Especially if I hadn't found the tip.
• Make sure you ask if everyone wants the delicious soup that one of your guests brought, lest everyone stand around for 5, 6, 7 minutes waiting for you to heat and serve it.
• And just a negligible thing, but let people know you're going to whip the cream. One of my guests thought I had the garbage disposal on for five minutes!