Ready, set, barbeque! No, no, no! You can’t just start barbequeing. You have to plan it carefully. This won’t take long, you will only need a week, although two would be better. Now I’m not talking about throwing a couple of steaks on the grill for dinner. I mean a real barbeque where you have family and friends over, even a couple you don’t like. This is about grilling, drinks, games and music. This is a backyard full of screaming kids (and probably your brother or sister-in-law) falling over each other and spilling kool-aid on the deck you just pressure washed.
So where do you start? First you have to select a good day, preferably a Saturday, to hold the event. By holding it on a Saturday, you give yourself all day Sunday to clean up. Once the date is selected, take a nap. Yep, you have to be well rested for the rest of this. While you are napping, have your significant other, prepare the list of attendees. I know! She’s going to invite someone you would rather not see. Well it’s going to happen anyway, so you may as well just get it over and avoid the battle which will surely ensue if you make the list yourself. Always be sure that the neighbors within 100 feet are invited, whether you think they’ll come or not. If they were invited but decided not to attend, they will probably be less inclined to complain about the noise.
Once you are refreshed, grab a drink and sit down for the planning of the meal. In order to do this correctly, you’ll need the list of attendees. The number of burgers, hot dogs and chicken pieces should be as follows: number of hot dogs equals the number of kids over four, multiplied by two; hamburgers equal the number of adults, minus one third, times three; chicken pieces are equal to the one third you subtracted for the hamburgers, multiplied by two if they are breast or thigh pieces and four for legs and wings. Steaks should only be considered for groups of 10 or less or in a case where you foolishly invited your boss.
Plastic ware, paper plates and Styrofoam cups should be in abundance. You can always save them for later if you have too many. However, if you come up short, I guarantee someone is going to go into the house to get a plate or glass. Once they are seen, others will do the same. Sooner or later one of the guests are going to break something. Besides that, there will now be dishes to wash and guess who’s going to get stuck with that?
Salads and sweets should be left to your better half who can ask the attendees to bring something. Snacks, on the other hand, are your responsibility since they are directly related to a barbeque by way of the hamburgers and hot dogs. So go with the basics and you’ll be OK. Some pretzels, potato chips, cheese curls and corn chips, along with a couple of specially selected salsa and bean dips should do the trick.
Drinks should be carefully selected to please everyone except that loud mouth neighbor. Be sure NOT to buy what you know he likes. That way he’ll get fed up and leave early. Stick to kool-aid and soda for the kids and make sure there is some diet stuff for the ladies. The guys will drink beer, period. No hard stuff, it just complicates things trying to figure out what every likes, not to mention all the mixes you would have to get as well.
Everyone has a radio or boom-box, along with a horse shoes game and badminton. So there is no need to go out and buy new stuff, except for a whiffle ball and bat for the kids. If it’s the 4th of July, you’ll have to get some simple fireworks that won’t shoot over to your neighbors pool.
Other than that you should be good to go. We both know that all Americans have a grill and keep charcoal and lighter fluid on hand, so no need to mention that. Right?
If you need some additional ideas for preparing your BBQ, go to www.BBQ.TellMeAboutThat.com. You’ll find some articles and recipes as well as some gear and gadgets for later events. So there you go, have fun and let me know how it turns out.
We all think of the 4th of July as a celebration in remembrance of proclaiming our Independence from England. The actual legal separation from England took place on July 2, 1776 with the Declaration of Independence being approved on July 4th. Still, most of the congressional delegates didn’t sign the declaration until August 2nd of 1776, but that just doesn’t sound right as a holiday.
July 4th not only sounds good, but and it’s in the right place on the calendar for a good BBQ and fireworks holiday. Yep! We really declared July 4th a national holiday because we needed something between Memorial Day, the unofficial start of summer, and Labor Day the unofficial end. We have Father’s Day in June but that’s not really a grilling, drinking, fireworks kind of day. That left two whole months until Labor day and that’s too long without a good excuse for a summer party. July 4th is right there in the middle and it coincided with an important American event, so there you have it.
Now, the 4th is normally associated with parades, parties and fireworks and I found that to be true no matter where in the world I happened to find myself. When I was growing up, there was always a party for the 4th somewhere nearby. Most years we spent the holiday at one of our relatives homes, while others were spent at the beach, lake or park. No matter where we wound up, it would be a day full of food, drink, conversation, jokes and many activities. As you would expect small firecrackers were tossed all day long and someone always had something new. In addition, there was the usual procession of familiar relatives and somehow always one or two that I’d never met before. As nightfall came, the BIG fireworks would come out. These were usually something that one of the adults had kept hidden until it was “time”. Depending on where we were, there might be a huge public fireworks display as well, especially at the beach or lake. If we were at a relatives house, we would sometimes go down to the Delaware river to watch the display that was fired from a barge in the middle of the river.
In Panama they celebrated the American holidays as well as their own, and they had plenty. Of course the Panamanians were always looking for an excuse for a good party and the 4th was no exception. They would even throw a party when the college students demonstrated because the price of rice went up. When I was stationed there, I looked forward to prices going up in Panama because they really know how to party.
Even in Saudi Arabia, when we were there for military exercises, there would be great barbecues and wild consumption of non-alcoholic beer (I hear that if you drink two cases of non-alcoholic beer you will get a buzz). If you have never eaten an MRE (Meal Ready to Eat) off the grill then you haven’t missed a thing. They were terrible in any form. There is a good reason they put little bottles of hot sauce in every meal. If you put enough hot sauce on anything, it will hide the taste. Anyway, even the Saudis and other allies would join in the celebration. I think they were just using us as an excuse to “let go” for awhile.
When I was a project manager in Iraq on a civilian contract, I had 260 Iraqis working for me. On the 4th of July some of them brought me various local dishes, which their mothers and wives had made for me so I could celebrate the 4th. As was my habit I sat on the floor during our lunch break and shared the food with my workers, as they had done for me on other days. On this particular occasion, there was so much food we could not eat it all. With their permission I put together several plates of food and delivered it to our troops guarding the gates of our compound near Camp Victory. Naturally, it was well received since they were tired of eating MRE’s everyday.
Now that I’m back home with my family, we have our celebrations with friends from various parts of the country and world. My own family is in Philadelphia and my wifes’ in Panama. Here in South Carolina, the local Air Force base puts on a public demonstration at a nearby park. When I watch it and think of other displays I’ve seen over the years, I’m reminded that during the celebrations overseas, the only thing missing from the celebration was the fireworks.
So now that you know the real reason for the 4th of July holiday, go to my site at www.4thof July.TellMeAboutThat.com to find more information, articles and links to help improve your celebration.
Posted by Tom S on Oct 13, 2008 in
Home & Family,
Special Events Weddings have a long history, which over the years, have spawned (is that the right word) a long list of traditions. We have the Wedding party, bachelor party, ring, bouquet, best man, bridesmaid and oh yes, the honeymoon. There are probably more traditions involved with planning a wedding than any other event we will attend in our lives. Some are very touching and yet others seem extremely silly.
Tying shoes to the bumper of a car? Where the heck did that come from? Well as a matter of fact, at one time the brides shoes were seen as a sign of authority and possession. After the wedding the father of the bride would take her shoes and hand them over to her new husband. The husband would then tap her on the head to show her that he was now the boss. I’ll bet some of you ladies could tell us why this never caught on. Instead the tradition changed to tying shoes (his and hers) to the bumper of the car. Oh Yeah!! The honking of the horn came from the ringing of bells and exploding firecrackers to keep the evil spirits away from the open carriages the brides would travel in.
For you guys we have the “Bachelor Party” which was started in the 15th century among military men. The comrades of the groom, would get together and provide him with a sendoff in the form of a feast with lots of toasting going on. Of course, as with most traditions, we’ve managed to change a few things so that some bachelor parties are, shall we say, more entertaining than others.
In the beginning weddings were actually pretty simple events. The only requirement for a wedding was for the bride and groom to “consent” to taking each other as spouse. I guess that became rather boring and throughout the years other things were added to liven things up a bit, not to mention make some local merchants wealthy in the process.
So what we have now includes; special garments, invitations, cakes, gifts, rings, veils, bouquets, and much, much more. Well you better get started. There’s a lot to do. You have plans to make, designs to select, money to spend and spend and spend. But take heart!! By going to my Budget Weddings site you can find all the latest articles, auctions, ads and videos that will help you plan the perfect wedding. Take a look and bookmark it so you can come back often. When you’re all set, don’t forget me, I’m not doing anything that day.
