Flying pig premonitions

I saw it all happening in slow motion. No, really. I did. In the kitchen, while I was packing the tray with the plates and the pork tonnato, I imagined Vince handing it up to me, he on the terrace, me on the roof - that's how we get picnics up there - and I imagined the pretty antique porcelain plate of pork slowly sliding, sliding off the tray and splash! - hitting Vince in the face. And in my little domestic day dream, as I finished assembling the soon-to-be-transported tray, I laughed, because Vince had tuna sauce all over his head.

That's not exactly how it happened, 30 minutes later. But as he handed the tray up  to me it teetered and then the plate tipped and slid the way I had imagined it sliding and smashed onto the gravel below. The tuna sauce covered the fall anemones, not the Frenchman. The cat, safely under the stone-top table, looked pleased. I think I yelled, loudly, Oh, shit! Vince sat down.

I found him there on the chair when I finally made my way down. The terrace smelled fishy. Vince was stricken. The plate was shattered. The pork medallions lay neatly in a heap on top of the mint and creeping jenny. And I laughed. Because it was not a surprise. It had already happened in my head. Yes, it was a wonderful plate that I had recently found, but a thing is a thing and the pork was safe. Who cares about a mint leaf or two?

So we scooped it all up, hosed down the anemones, re-plated the pork with the extra sauce in the frigde, scattered more capers across its surface and did it all over again.

Our bubbly was sipped gratefully. A good break from prosecco, a Spanish cava (Castellroig,  look for it). The red sun came out from behind high clouds and dipped down over New Jersey, lighting up the sails of the yachts in the harbour. The cat begged for tidbits.

The apricot cake, once we got to it, was still warm from the oven.