This week I intended to prepare an Italian-themed weekly menu and to write about my favorite summertime Italian treat, limoncello. Witchin in the kitchen even published a great post with a limoncello recipe, exactly the recipe we used with great success last Christmas, and I was feeling all super cosmopolitan groovy mom set.

Then the funniest piece I’ve read in several years came my way through a Facebook friend, and it brought me back to reality. Fair warning: it’s full of profanity, so if that bothers you then you should give it a miss. If you can tolerate a bit of foul language, however, “The Awful Truth About Jogging” is good for a hearty laugh and a sanity check.

A few weeks ago my cousin, the one to whom I was probably closest growing up, sent a message letting me know how much she enjoyed my blog but adding that the weekly menu posts made her feel like she had failed in her Southern lady responsibilities.

Dear God in heaven, if I am headed down that path of sanctimonious wife-mother-career woman have-it-all preaching, please stop me now.  That’s so not the point of these Saturday dinner planning posts.

I make a weekly menu plan so we’ll have a guide to help us steer clear of the Chick-Fil-A drive-through. Some weeks go to plan. Some weeks go to hell. We’re not really a middle-of-the-road kind of family, so for us there’s not much in between.

The last two weeks have not gone to plan, despite what I thought was a simplified approach. So instead of an Italian-themed menu with homage to limoncello, this week you’ll find suggestions for take-out alternatives. Cook or don’t cook; at least you and I will both have a crutch come 5:00 when someone says, “I’m hungry.”

Sometimes things work, and sometimes they don’t. I’m going to keep planning, nonetheless, because even during crazy weeks I know that eventually the rudder will sync with a current. When it does, I’ll be ready. But even during the weeks when everything goes perfectly to plan, there’s always a chance a friend will show up unannounced, chilled bottle of Prosecco in hand, for a visit on the front porch. On that night, friends, we’re calling in for pizza no matter what the plan says.

Ciao.

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