Spanakopita on a school night

I love spanakopita. More specifically...I love my friend Deb's spanakopita with her multiple layers of phyllo dough separating mounds of feta cheese and spinach topped with tons and tons (and tons) of butter. I am constantly on the hunt for it and recently became aware that Deb's might not be the authentic Greek version of the dish. "Look at this," I remarked to my husband with disgust," it only has the top and bottom layer...like a pie." Googling quickly, Brad showed me the translation of spanakopita:  "Greek pie." "No," I protested, with the righteous indignation of one surely in the right, "Deb's is more like a lasagna!"

Neverthematter, I love my friend Deb's spanakopita! Knowing this, my friend Geri was able to successfully coax me out (on a school night) for a professional development opportunity with the stipulation that we stop at the Greek restaurant that Geri had finally gotten sick of hearing me mention. So there I was, sitting in a cozy booth, sipping my root beer float (because I am an adult and can order a root beer float as my beverage for dinner if I want to), barely grumpy about being dragged to a professional development opportunity (on a school night) because I was getting spanakopita. "What are you getting," I asked Geri, not really caring because I was getting spanakopita. "Well, that sounds good," I replied to whatever she said because I wasn't really listening because I was getting spanakopita. And then she pounced. "Great...why don't we split our two orders then so we can enjoy both entrees?" Was she for real?!? So now I was stuck eating half of Geri's meal (whatever that was) and would only get to eat half of my spanakopita. Add that to the fact that I was heading to a professional development opportunity (on a school night) and my evening was fast becoming a real disappointment.

An eternal optimist, I bounced back quickly by deciding to look at my plate as half-full of spanakopita. Except my half-filled plate of spanakopita was taking a REALLY long time to arrive. My root beer float was (obviously) long gone and now I was stuck with, gasp, water. The clock was rapidly ticking away...Geri was now reporting the actions of the wait-staff with the urgent pace of a race commentator. "Our waitress just delivered two meals to the people who came in twenty minutes after us," Geri shared before continuing, "She is now re-filling coffee and offering dessert to the family of four who arrived right after us." Her voice was reaching finish-line pace panic, "The people who just got here already have their appetizer!" Still no meal, we dramatically began to pull on our coats. "I guess we'll take the bill," I said with uncertainty to our now-concerned waitress as we looked at our empty table. Five minutes later, we were heading to the car with to-go boxes, having paid only for our drinks. "How am I suppose to eat during our professional development opportunity," Geri howled miserably.

An eternal optimist, I preferred to think of our professional development opportunity as a way to catch up on email correspondence, review apps and snack on spanakopita once I realized that, for once in my life, I actually knew more that what the course offered. I was thrilled, though, to learn that the Google drive icon is known as a "waffle!" I have made sure to share that knowledge with practically everyone I know since then. So besides discovering that the pictured nine-squared number-pad thing-y that allows you to access your Google drive is named after one of my favorite breakfast meals, what else did I learn? I have learned that I should listen when Geri is ordering a meal. I have learned that I should not allow myself to be coaxed out on a school night for a professional development opportunity. And I have learned that I should just stick with Deb's spanakopita.