I ate uncooked alligator today and bought used vinyl

I attended a small dinner party tonight where alligator was served two ways (as ceviche and fried, topped with homemade pepper jelly), followed by wild boar ragu, followed by rabbit cassoulet, followed by strawberry shortcake. 

It was an evening of firsts! I had not eaten rabbit or wild boar before, and while I'd eaten fried alligator on a stick as a child, today was my first time trying alligator meat raw. (Well, sort-of "raw" anyway, because it was also sort-of "cooked" by the lime juice.) My life is broader for the experience, and I am grateful.

Now that I am home from the party, I am cleaning the cat boxes and playing the $3 Patsy Cline album I found at my next-door neighbor's garage sale. I played "Walkin' After Midnight" just a couple of minutes after midnight tonight.

I think I procrastinate very well, and I AM procrastinating a little as I write this, but I did reach almost all of my homework goals for the weekend. Just one paper left to write before Friday to finish the quarter properly. I am living as well as I know how to. 

HERE ARE THE PHOTOS

These are the records I bought! Six albums for under $20. Simon and Garfunkel's "The Sounds of Silence" is one of them, and Heart's "Dog and Butterfly," and an Al Green Christmas album, too! Willie Nelson's "Always on My Mind" (he covers "Whiter Shade of Pale" on it) and, heaven help me, I decided to buy "Sports" by Hughey Lewis and the News. Maybe I will throw a Patrick Bateman theme party someday? Although this was genuinely one of my favorite albums when I was a kid, it freaks me out a little bit nowadays, because it reminds me of American Psycho. But that's art, right? Art changing art.

The pink stuff is uncooked, cold alligator meat, made edible through the science of lime juice. It was delicious but unsettling.

This is the fried alligator topped with pepper jelly, which the party hosts topped with their homemade pepper jelly. I recommend it!

Here is a friend cutting the fried alligator with a knife and fork.

This pasta dish is the wild boar ragu. I appreciated it for being interesting and well-made. There was capsaicin in the sauce and it was too spicy for my weak mouth, but I ate about half of my portion and took the rest home to try again later.

This is the rabbit cassoulet! It was marvelous. I hope that the rabbit lived a comfortable life and had a very quick death, with minimal suffering. 

And there you have it! These are some photographs of my evening. And what an evening it was!