Encounter with a sleep thief

Shabbat evening I got to bed at a reasonable hour. Unfortunately, late that night (early that morning), there were some people walking down the street shouting. Sure, it's outside, so no need for "inside voices," but really, does anyone need to shout the conversation at 4 A.M.? The answer, for no reason I can discern, seems to be yes.

Except that this time, the noise didn't keep on down the street. No, they stopped outside the building next door, and kept shouting. I got more and more annoyed; being woken up like that tends to make me rather cranky. The shouting continued, and I got fed up enough that I threw on some outside clothes and went out.

Turns out that there was just one woman shouting, trying to get the attention of someone in the second floor apartment (I think). I pointed out to her that it was an unreasonable time to be doing this, and she said that once she'd gotten her friend's attention, she'd be quiet. Um, no. I suggested that I could call the police (no way for her to know I wasn't likely to call unless there were a serious crime happening, since it was Shabbat), and some other friend of hers (also in tight jeans and tall stiletto heels she didn't seem quite comfortable with, either) got out of the waiting cab and got her to shut up. Finally.

I couldn't get back to sleep, tossing and turning for an hour before giving up and going out to the couch to read. I read until dawn, and finally got tired/calm enough to go back to bed. Not surprisingly, I overslept services :-(.

Pesach food

I'm hosting four meals (so far) for Pesach: second day lunch, Shabbat dinner (at someone else's house), seventh day dinner, and eighth day lunch. The only menu I've decided on is for the first of these meals:

• matza, wine/grape juice
  
• olives, pickles
  
• chicken baked with onions, parsnips, and collard greens, plus a touch of cinnamon (I seem not to have any nutmeg for Pesach, which is what I'd wanted), hot paprika, and black pepper
  
• green salad with a variety of lettuces, kohlrabi, cucumber, scallions, and possibly mandarin oranges
  
• potato salad with pickles and beets (would have had carrots if I'd not forgotten and used them for Shabbat)
  
• applesauce with rhubarb
  
• almond-raisin chocolate clusters

I still need to add the rhubarb to the applesauce, and make the green salad (Wednesday), but otherwise it's pretty much done. I won't need to leave the electric burner on a timer, just the hot plate.

Thoughts for dishes for the other meals include: gefilte fish, baked Brie, fruit compote (possibly boozy, since I have dried fruit in booze from last year), cucumber salad, matza brei with alliums, matza lasagna, chicken soup/stew, spiced walnuts, salmon salad, pineapple baked with raspberry syrup, Shaker lemon pie guts, chard sauteed with ginger, something with grapefruit (roasted?), cranberry sauce, green salad with toasted walnuts and bleu cheese.