Here I am with my friend Rocco, at his house in North Scott$dale for Greek Easter:

                               

"Greek Easter" refers to the fact that the Greek Orthodox calendar is different than the Roman Catholic calendar, which - regardless of how unPope-ular the Mother Church might have been during the Reformation - remains the basis for most Western church calendars.

Rocco's wife, Harriet (not her real name :) is Greek Orthodox - along with (of course) her mother, who was there to celebrate with us.You celebrate Greek Easter with boiled colored eggs - just like you grew up with - except there's a procedural differnce; you actually grab your egg, and attempt to hit and break somebody else's egg with it (those Greeks are naturally competitive - that's why they invented the Olympics). Then, after everybody breaks everybody elses' eggs, you have Antipasta (well, they are a Greek/Italian couple - what can I say?) ...Antipasta is an Italian word that means "go ahead and loosen up your belt, cause it's gonna be a long day, gastronomically speaking":

                                               

I can't name everything here, but the yummy looking stuff in the upper left is Spanakopita- Spinach Pie, on fila dough. To the right you'll see alternative slices of tomato and what I believe is feta cheese (I can't say "feta cheese" without thinking about making a bed; once my mother was visiting, and as Ethel was doing laundry that day, Momma took the opportunity to point out that she really hated feta cheese; she thought that the Devil invented feta cheese. It took a bit of repeating and parsing before we were able to un-Alabama her accent enough to understand that she was saying "fitted sheets" :) and then there's ham and other cheeses (that didn't come from goats) - and, of course, a LOT of olives :)

The main course was shiskabob (chicken and steak) and grilled corn, and then we had baklava for dessert (baklava is sort of like spanakopita, except with more sugar and fat, and no spinach :) and we ate baklava and drank coffee by the pool.

It was a wonderful visit; perfect weather, perfect company, excellent food. Harriet's mother (she was "mama" to everybody by the time that we left :) told us stories of the old days in Greece;  Ethel and I were fascinated the whole time. She'd come up short for a word, and then repeat the context, and we'd make a suggestion - yes, that's it! and she'd take that word and keep talking :)

We were supposed to go to Rocco and Harriet's house for Greek Easter last year, but it turned out that that was the week that we were moving into the Chocolate House, so it didn't happen. That's right - it's been a year today since we bought the Chocolate House. My, how time flies when you are making mortgage payments!