Ides Eve

We had our annual Ides of March extravaganza tonight. It's an interesting sort of event to host year after year. If I were someone more organized I would have chronicled its many iterations over the years, but the photo below is from the very first Ides of March party.

You probably know the story about how March 15th was Ronnie Horton's birthday - and Ronnie was our very dear friend. He had his quirks and he could drive us nuts - but we loved him and he loved us. He died probably 15 or more years ago now - seems like yesterday sometimes. He was in Spain, working as an orchestra conductor, and he had a heart attack. Phoebe and Harry were at BYU, so they went to the funeral in SLC to represent us. Unfortunately we were just not in a position to go.

Somehow it was decided that we'd dress as Romans and re-enact the original Ides of March from Shakespeare and Julius Cesar. I don't remember much else. It was at the home of Richard Hill's parents, where Rich and Katie were living while he was in law school at the U. And somehow it was decided that we'd always celebrate his birthday that way. But I don't really remember exactly when we started doing it once again, or doing it in its current manifestation. I do remember that at some point Harry cut out wooden swords for us. We sometimes used the Nativity costumes as togas. Harry abbreviated a script from Shakespeare. Over the years we have invited various and sundry individuals. Some are still coming. I should comb through my photos and see just often we have done it. I'm pretty sure we've done it every year for the past 20 or so years.

I don't know what we ate at the first one, but at some point we decided to order pizza from Little Cesar's and to have Cesar Salad. Tonight was break from tradition - and we did not have pizza! Since today is the 14th - Pi Day - we had many versions of pie and pi - Shepherd's Pie, Blueberry Pie, Apple Caramel Pie, Banana Cream Pie, Pumpkin Pie and a lovely Lemon Curd Pie from Ginger D. And we gave prizes to those who could give us the most digits of Pi!!

Some traditions are worth hanging on to!! And some are worth changing. Maybe we'll have Chicken Pot Pie next year - since Pi Day will always be the day before the Ides, we maybe have to continue to combine them.

Go here for more details and photos - and have yourself a Merry Little Ides of March!