Oh, yesterday was good to us. Mikaela made lots of lovely food. First, the bread; she made a focaccia, which tasted splendid. It was quite compact, yet still fluffy and crispy, covered with olive oil, that was made in the village where Mikaela's father was born and raised. The sheer quality of the oil granted the colours to the bread, and basil added to the design and flavour. Second, the salad: made of two kinds of celery, also parsley, olive oil, lemon, salt and pepper, a sprinkle of goat cheese and pomegranates, that sweetened the salad. Third, the chocolate tart: due to us only owning a glass mould, the rich short pastry didn't turn crusty, but a little doughy, which didn't add to the rest of the tart, which was very lovely: 80% cocoa-rich chocolate which was wonderful.

The making of the food, plus three kitty-pictures (of Frederic's fat cat [the other's very thin]), is well photo-documented here.

We packaged the food and a couple of wines, a very nice Ernest & Julio Gallo Zinfandel, which is relatively cheap yet is quite deep in flavour, conserving the spicy, deep flavours like a good zinfandel wine should, my PS2 and SingStar, the karaoke weapon of choice.

Patrik was late, so we started eating and then watched the Swedish finals of the eurovision song contest. Well, first Mikaela tried a few opera karaoke tracks that Frederic had found on the web. Mikaela sang to them, and it sounded lovely! I'll make sure he sends them to me so that I can enjoy her lovely voce at home, frr! Anyway, the eurovision: there were actually a couple of good songs competing, especially noteworthy are Caroline Wennergren's "A Different Kind Of Love", that's a bossanova track. I think her singing quite a few false notes might have cost her the first spot: even if I doubt Sweden would hand the victory to a song that's 1) bossanova, which has (as far as I can tell) never been played in the Swedish final before and 2) sang by a black girl. Sadly. She was Mikaela's clear favourite, and the song's refrain really does dig itself deep down into ya hed. My favourite was Shirley Clamp who sang "Att à„lska Dig" ["To Love You"], a quite modern, electronic eurovision-shaped winner of a song. Clamp had the best voice of all, methinks. She sang the song as if she didn't have to work for it, and it's a good song, albeit somewhat tiring. I think she lost out based on one just-post-song-sentence: "Thank you, I'm already crying!" Makes you think of hubris, no? Anyway, an outsider won with a track that dwarfed himself, a Swedish model who tried to look and sound like Elvis. Really, that's a problem for anyone, but he didn't have one bit of the Elvis voice or charisma, which just ended up making his effort fall flat.

We ate, we drank, and we sang. SingStar allows the players to team up and battle each-other. Patrik and I sang against Frederic and Mikaela. I actually out-sang Mikaela at one time! Incredible. A little bit of luck, a great bit of skill, made Patrik and me tower over the rest. Ha! Hubris, have I used that word already?

Here are a whole bunch of pictures of the singing, drinking and car-driving, where I toyed around with the shutter speed. I love this picture, where Patrik sings his heart out while Frederic pets his (thin) kitty. This one, where Mikaela looks like Han Solo steering the Millennium Falcon out of the Death Star ready to explode, is a new classic.

I'm such a spoiled brat. Mikaela's making lunch, lovely meatballs with tomato-sauce, all made from scratch, and I'm not there, helping and petting her? (Well, she did tell me she wanted to do it herself, and she loves making food as much as I love playing the guitar, but I still feel guilty for not helping out) I'll go now and roll meatballs for her!