The Barefoot Spaz

Tomorrow I'm going to mess up a pork roast. (We're meeting at high noon behind the dumpster.)

Actually, I'm hosting a dinner party in honor of my mother's birthday and anticipating disaster, because that is what I do.

Now that I live in a grown-up house, I have grown-up obligations. These include:

• Cleaning out the lint trap
• Being neighborly
• Winterizing (what is that?)
  
• Hosting holidays.

On the one hand, I'm kind of looking forward to it. On the other: people could go home hungry or die.

The idea of cooking a meal for more than my immediate family members, a meal with expectations, chills me to the very core. I tend to get very spazzy when faced with simultaneous domestic tasks, or when I feel responsible for someone else's good time.

Honest to Pete, I can't boil water and answer the phone at once. How will I greet guests, keep an eye on the roast, and corral the V-meister and J-dog, who both conveniently came down with uber colds tonight?

I scoured the internet for idiot-proof, one-pot meals that don't completely smack of hillbilly, and what I finally came up with was a roast pork loin with fennel from the Barefoot Contessa. I'm going to throw some parsnips in there, too, because I could eat my weight in parsnips roasted with kosher salt and olive oil. But I'm already sweating the timing of the meat vs. vegetables because I haven't tested the recipe and I bought a bigger piece of meat than it calls for. That blasted roast is going to keep me up tonight.

Tomorrow we shall see who's tougher, me or the loin.