our dinner with al gore

We really wanted to celebrate Earth Day right this year, so we decided to invite a special guest to dinner. We'd never had a Nobel Prize winner in our home before, but we figured since he was going to be in the neighborhood we could at least extend the invitation. So we made plans. We figured that after appearing on "Oprah's Earth Day Event," he could hop on the 57 and drive down (we were sure he'd insist on driving a hybrid), and spend the evening with us. We usually eat dinner around 5:30, so he'd have to leave right after taping. We made a nice sign on recycled packaging paper and hung it on the sliding glass door, which we purposely left ajar so he could smell the compost pile in the backyard.

We made sure to wear the bamboo clothing we purchased at the clothes co-op this weekend (an amazingly versatile, renewable resource - but of course, we wouldn't have to tell him that!) and Zoe wore one of her cloth diapers - the cute one with the little prints of endangered species on it. Biff made wild Alaskan salmon while I cooked up some organic whole wheat pasta with homemade organic pesto and organic feta cheese, and we topped it off with a nice organic spinach salad. Very tasty and all cooked with energy from the solar panel we installed last summer. We figured we'd give him the special seat between the plastic recycling and the loom. When 5:30 came, we were all ready. Everything was perfect, except no Al. 5:45. Still no Al. 6:00. Nothing. What an inconvenience. Our food was getting cold and the guest of honor still hadn't arrived. Dejectedly, Biff took down the framed picture of Al at one of the screenings of An Inconvenient Truth and put it in his place. It just wasn't the same.

There was a somber mood at the dinner table, but we celebrated the best we could. We tried to console ourselves with thoughts of next year, but the Earth will be a year older and we never know what might happen.

Happy Earth Day.