Or Julie's Big Adventure in SF!
Long story short, I had a hotel in SF for Thursday and Friday nights. Union Square, not where I would normally stay but it was a Priceline deal, so there it was. A fine room. And come on, to be in SF on Thursday when the Giants won the pennant? How cool is that? Well, I must say, very fucking cool. I had options. I picked option number 1: to be in the city by myself for that one night. I visited three different bars, drank 4 delicious Manhattans and watched the Giants on many TVs. The last was at the Taverna on Belden Place; everyone, the chef, the prep cooks, dishwashers, waitstaff, everyone was at the bar for the last two innings. It was frigging exciting, lots of yelling, lots of high-fives. Walking back to my hotel it wasn't as crazy as it was near the ballpark but it was loud and everyone was happy. Grins from ear to ear, on pretty much everyone.
Friday I left the hotel around 9:00 and walked. I walked for about 3 hours, through Chinatown, down to Battery and Sansome, near Coit Tower, down almost to Pier 39, back around to the Ferry Building and past, back up through Soma to Market and back to upper Union Square. Just walking, no dog, no agenda, just looking at the city. Sat outside at Cafe Presse, pretended I was in Paris (and why are all these people speaking English?) and had salad and two glasses of wine and Tarte Tartin. Watched large buses of tourists roll by, most of them trying to take photos or videos of what they should have been looking at. Temps were in the low 70's, it was beautiful.
One thing that struck me was how many people walk while looking at their phones, not at their route or the city or the people or the day. Just at their phones. They must have some inner radar because collisions are rare. But why not look up? Why not look at the people around you? The city is such a great place to watch people, why just look at a tiny device? It's an attachment I will never understand.
More tomorrow.
.
Monday, October 20, 2014
Sunday, October 12, 2014
How hot was it?
It was so hot the dogs wouldn't go for a walk. Not that I would have taken them, I am not foolish, but when I came home they ran into the backyard and stopped. Stopped and turned around and came back in. For a lark, I put their leashes on them and took them out the front door. They got to the sidewalk and, in unison, turned around and walked back to the front door. For creatures with brains the size of a walnut (or a small hazelnut, in Cooper's body), they knew it was too hot.
And hot it was. Driving home, the bank thermometer on Hwy. 12 at Mission read 116 degrees. Now, that particular thermometer is always dramatic. It reads really high and really low all the time but I have NEVER seen it read that high. So maybe it was 98. Still, that's friggin hot.
Here's the strange thing. I walked the dogs today 6:25 am to 7:10 am. The weather was fine, tiny bit chilly, good for walking dogs in the dark. (And this darkness, well, hello my friend. I am already lamenting the advent of the non-daylight savings time in a couple of weeks when it will be stupidly light and cheery at 6:25 am instead of the sultry and masked darkness we now have. Honestly, who needs DST any more? Can't we just give it up?)
However, after walking the dogs and then driving to Glen Ellen, I made a quick stop in Kenwood to drop off some leftover pizza at my brother's house (I know, TMI) and when I got out of the car I was slapped in the face by air that was at least ten degrees warmer than it was in Santa Rosa, a mere 12 miles away! It was shockingly surprising (redundant) and I actually said out loud something like "holy shit, what's this all about?" and then I moved on, to Glen Ellen, to work. I looked at the weather channel online, and I wasn't crazy! It was 53 in Santa Rosa and 63 in Kenwood! So bizarre.
Now it is 8:00 and it is still, according to weather.com 88 degrees in Santa Rosa and I can attest to that. Thankfully, we have some cooler weather coming, like in the 70's which isn't all that cool. OK, compared to 98 it is cooler. And one of the employees at the hotel today had the audacity to say something like "... oh and it might rain on my day off, that sucks." I wanted to slap that person and explain that rain = water and California needs water, isn't the word "drought" in your vocabulary?
I didn't. But I might, soon. Slap someone, that is.
Gosh, that's an entire term paper on today's temperature. But if you are reading this you should be rejoicing that I didn't report on my trip to Sacramento on Friday to see my Mom and how that went. Pee on the front seat of my car, that's how that went. I won't say more. Except for this: I hope I either die before I get old or I move to Oregon and get the drugs that will let me leave this world in a clean, simple, peacefull way. Old is not nice. Peeing your pants..... not nice. Not knowing who you are, not knowing where you are, not nice.
Go Giants.
.
And hot it was. Driving home, the bank thermometer on Hwy. 12 at Mission read 116 degrees. Now, that particular thermometer is always dramatic. It reads really high and really low all the time but I have NEVER seen it read that high. So maybe it was 98. Still, that's friggin hot.
Here's the strange thing. I walked the dogs today 6:25 am to 7:10 am. The weather was fine, tiny bit chilly, good for walking dogs in the dark. (And this darkness, well, hello my friend. I am already lamenting the advent of the non-daylight savings time in a couple of weeks when it will be stupidly light and cheery at 6:25 am instead of the sultry and masked darkness we now have. Honestly, who needs DST any more? Can't we just give it up?)
However, after walking the dogs and then driving to Glen Ellen, I made a quick stop in Kenwood to drop off some leftover pizza at my brother's house (I know, TMI) and when I got out of the car I was slapped in the face by air that was at least ten degrees warmer than it was in Santa Rosa, a mere 12 miles away! It was shockingly surprising (redundant) and I actually said out loud something like "holy shit, what's this all about?" and then I moved on, to Glen Ellen, to work. I looked at the weather channel online, and I wasn't crazy! It was 53 in Santa Rosa and 63 in Kenwood! So bizarre.
Now it is 8:00 and it is still, according to weather.com 88 degrees in Santa Rosa and I can attest to that. Thankfully, we have some cooler weather coming, like in the 70's which isn't all that cool. OK, compared to 98 it is cooler. And one of the employees at the hotel today had the audacity to say something like "... oh and it might rain on my day off, that sucks." I wanted to slap that person and explain that rain = water and California needs water, isn't the word "drought" in your vocabulary?
I didn't. But I might, soon. Slap someone, that is.
Gosh, that's an entire term paper on today's temperature. But if you are reading this you should be rejoicing that I didn't report on my trip to Sacramento on Friday to see my Mom and how that went. Pee on the front seat of my car, that's how that went. I won't say more. Except for this: I hope I either die before I get old or I move to Oregon and get the drugs that will let me leave this world in a clean, simple, peacefull way. Old is not nice. Peeing your pants..... not nice. Not knowing who you are, not knowing where you are, not nice.
Go Giants.
.
Wednesday, October 8, 2014
Coming soon to theaters near you
That would be a new post. It is here, in the dark recesses of my muddled brain. Muddled like an Old Fashion, sugar cube on the bottom, cherry on top of that, some orange peel, muddled with that wooden stick thing and then topped with whiskey, ice and a hit of sparkling water. That kind of muddled. Don't scoff. Don't make fun. Don't judge. Muddling, whether the drink kind or the mind kind, is tough business.
Results of muddling will soon be posted.
Or something like it.
Results of muddling will soon be posted.
Or something like it.
Friday, September 26, 2014
Laurie Colwin, yet again
It's funny, I know exactly who will read this blog and who probably won't. You know who you are. You, like me, love Laurie Colwin. Yes, her novels and stories were very good but her cookbooks..... well, not really cookbooks, more like cooking essays, are the best. Hands down, the best food writing. Ever. All the newcomers that are on the scene now cannot hold a candle to Laurie Colwin.
When I'm in a funk, when I feel like I need "home" even if I am sitting on my own couch, when I need to be soothed, I read some of her essays. I have given her two books, "Home Cooking" and "More Home Cooking" to several brides-to-be but I am not sure any of them really read these books because they are not the "1 tablespoon of this and a half cup of that and 3 jiggers of something else" kind of cook books. They are the kind of books that make you feel like you know what to do in the kitchen. Her books empower you. Her recipes, if you can call them that, are usually so casual as to make you think you came up with the thing all on your own.
So, in the last few days, I have been re-reading Laurie. She wrote for Gourmet Magazine in the 1980 and '90's, a crucial time for me, food-wise. She was reason to buy the friggin magazine, for goodness sake. She spoke to us. She told us to not be afraid, that simple, good food was the thing. We don't need no fancy food, we need good food. She was ahead of her time and she was right.
"There are times in life - usually after a spate of self-indulgence - when one's soul cries out for minimalist food: clean, plain, and non taxing. ... But there are other times, usually in horrible weather, when one longs for straight-forward, savory, down-home food, and lots of it. This is the sort of cooking people call "heartwarming" and there is no doubt about it - it does cheer people up." How can you argue with any of that?
So, to soothe my ragged soul right now, I am reading Laurie Colwin, yet again. If you have these books, put them by your bedside and read a chapter or two (they are short) before you go to bed. If you don't have these books, take them out of the library.... and then buy them. You will want them. They are like an old teddy bear, or a really good pillow. Reliable, worn in, comfortable and so, so useful.
"It always seems to me that cooking is like love. You don't have to be particularly beautiful or very glamorous, or even very exciting to fall in love. You just have to be interested in it. It's the same thing with food. You do not have to be a genius.You don't have to come from a long culinary tradition. You just have to go to a restaurant and eat a hamburger and say "This particular hamburger tastes swell." And then you have to say, "Could you please tell me what you did?" .... And then you say to yourself, "I will now try to do this in my own kitchen." And you do, and you are happy because you learned something and you cooked it and you made it yours and you moved on.
Oh, Laurie, thank you. You left us too soon but we love you so much.
xoxo
.
When I'm in a funk, when I feel like I need "home" even if I am sitting on my own couch, when I need to be soothed, I read some of her essays. I have given her two books, "Home Cooking" and "More Home Cooking" to several brides-to-be but I am not sure any of them really read these books because they are not the "1 tablespoon of this and a half cup of that and 3 jiggers of something else" kind of cook books. They are the kind of books that make you feel like you know what to do in the kitchen. Her books empower you. Her recipes, if you can call them that, are usually so casual as to make you think you came up with the thing all on your own.
So, in the last few days, I have been re-reading Laurie. She wrote for Gourmet Magazine in the 1980 and '90's, a crucial time for me, food-wise. She was reason to buy the friggin magazine, for goodness sake. She spoke to us. She told us to not be afraid, that simple, good food was the thing. We don't need no fancy food, we need good food. She was ahead of her time and she was right.
"There are times in life - usually after a spate of self-indulgence - when one's soul cries out for minimalist food: clean, plain, and non taxing. ... But there are other times, usually in horrible weather, when one longs for straight-forward, savory, down-home food, and lots of it. This is the sort of cooking people call "heartwarming" and there is no doubt about it - it does cheer people up." How can you argue with any of that?
So, to soothe my ragged soul right now, I am reading Laurie Colwin, yet again. If you have these books, put them by your bedside and read a chapter or two (they are short) before you go to bed. If you don't have these books, take them out of the library.... and then buy them. You will want them. They are like an old teddy bear, or a really good pillow. Reliable, worn in, comfortable and so, so useful.
"It always seems to me that cooking is like love. You don't have to be particularly beautiful or very glamorous, or even very exciting to fall in love. You just have to be interested in it. It's the same thing with food. You do not have to be a genius.You don't have to come from a long culinary tradition. You just have to go to a restaurant and eat a hamburger and say "This particular hamburger tastes swell." And then you have to say, "Could you please tell me what you did?" .... And then you say to yourself, "I will now try to do this in my own kitchen." And you do, and you are happy because you learned something and you cooked it and you made it yours and you moved on.
Oh, Laurie, thank you. You left us too soon but we love you so much.
xoxo
.
Sunday, September 21, 2014
More fucking life lessons
I knew if I put a swear word in the title, you would read it. If I just titled it Life Lessons, NO ONE would read it, how boring is that? But these fucking lessons of life, the ones you keep thinking you already learned? I am tired of them. I am tired of yet another one throwing itself at my face like cold water from a cup. Surprising me, yet again, with what I do not know. About anything.
I have nothing specific in mind here, just the crap we have to learn as new things pop up: what kind of diapers to buy for your parent, how to handle that subject delicately, (which always reminds me of the Wicked Witch in the "Wizard of Oz" saying to Dorothy "...these things must be done Delicately....") how to ask for time off when your job has no time off and how to act grateful when you get it,(without pay, of course, but in July that will be remedied, thanks to Gov. Jerry Brown) and how to grow up. That's the big one. We all think, at this age, we are grown up but I don't think that's the case. I don't think you are grown up until you really, really stare your mortality in its friggin face. And when you do that, well, pretty much you are on your way outta here, so what good did that growing up really do?
More fucking life lessons: thinking about not having enough money for retiring, getting that thing in the mail about fecal samples and pooping on the paper and putting some of it on a stick and mailing it in to see if your colon is working well or sabotaging you as you poop (oh, just you wait, youngsters, til that scenario smacks you in the choppers), listening to your knees crack every morning, having friends die, feeling helpless in your continued journey to old age, sharing grief, sharing despair, sharing depression. Simply acknowledging grief, despair and depression are lessons we learn, over and over, and they are new every fucking time.
But there are good life lessons as well, not to sound like a Hallmark commercial, but there is always hope, there is great joy in sort-of-grandkids ("Julie makes the best ribs" said Sam), the loyalty of dogs, a bit of solitude, of silence. Bach. Aaron Copland. Double rye whiskey, which always surprises me, again and again, thankfully. Kindness. Trader Joe's Coffee Ice Cream. The glorious beauty of the sunrise on an empty stretch of road. I could probably go on and on about these good things longer than the bad. And that's good.
So, nothing here that is profound, remarkable or memorable except that life lessons, as fucked as they often are, are also, now and then, lovely.
Sam, I will grill ribs for you any time, any day, just so you know. Just ask.
xoxo
.
I have nothing specific in mind here, just the crap we have to learn as new things pop up: what kind of diapers to buy for your parent, how to handle that subject delicately, (which always reminds me of the Wicked Witch in the "Wizard of Oz" saying to Dorothy "...these things must be done Delicately....") how to ask for time off when your job has no time off and how to act grateful when you get it,(without pay, of course, but in July that will be remedied, thanks to Gov. Jerry Brown) and how to grow up. That's the big one. We all think, at this age, we are grown up but I don't think that's the case. I don't think you are grown up until you really, really stare your mortality in its friggin face. And when you do that, well, pretty much you are on your way outta here, so what good did that growing up really do?
More fucking life lessons: thinking about not having enough money for retiring, getting that thing in the mail about fecal samples and pooping on the paper and putting some of it on a stick and mailing it in to see if your colon is working well or sabotaging you as you poop (oh, just you wait, youngsters, til that scenario smacks you in the choppers), listening to your knees crack every morning, having friends die, feeling helpless in your continued journey to old age, sharing grief, sharing despair, sharing depression. Simply acknowledging grief, despair and depression are lessons we learn, over and over, and they are new every fucking time.
But there are good life lessons as well, not to sound like a Hallmark commercial, but there is always hope, there is great joy in sort-of-grandkids ("Julie makes the best ribs" said Sam), the loyalty of dogs, a bit of solitude, of silence. Bach. Aaron Copland. Double rye whiskey, which always surprises me, again and again, thankfully. Kindness. Trader Joe's Coffee Ice Cream. The glorious beauty of the sunrise on an empty stretch of road. I could probably go on and on about these good things longer than the bad. And that's good.
So, nothing here that is profound, remarkable or memorable except that life lessons, as fucked as they often are, are also, now and then, lovely.
Sam, I will grill ribs for you any time, any day, just so you know. Just ask.
xoxo
.
Saturday, September 20, 2014
Mom, not dead, getting better, but.....
I realize that not many people want to read about my mother, so feel free to skip this. Today she moved back into her little apartment at the retirement home but we are all on high alert to see what happens, how she does. She is very weak but alert. She is cautiously mobile. She does not want to have another small stroke and hopes that if she has another stroke it takes her out. She is realistic. Sort of.
So much is involved in this process.... not just getting her in and out of the hospital and then the rehab place but getting her back into her apartment, finding a care person to help her a couple of hours a day, convincing her that she has to stop, breathe and wait before moving. And so much more, like finding a place for her here in Sonoma County, which is another kind of chore and journey.
But right now she is OK. She is sort of like the Mom we wished we had as kids. (At least Steve and I think that.) She is sweet and funny and self deprecating and sort of nice to be around for an hour or so. We don't know what will happen, but no one does.
If nothing else, this entire experience has made me really think about life, death and the yawning gap in-between. And about getting old and about not wanting to be in a "place" and the conversation I need to have with my kids (and siblings) about my old age scenario and about theirs. I think about my 4 brothers, three who are not married and no kids in the mix. Who are they going to depend on? But then, I don't want to depend on my kids, so maybe they are better off in that regard. And they (we) are not alone; our Baby Boom Generation has so many unmarried, unattached people who are just now starting to contemplate their old age future. It ain't pretty and as we all, all millions of us, get older and older, it will get even less pretty. The smart thing to do would be to buy a big house somewhere cheap, but close to a hospital, and eventually we could all live there, with a live-in nurse. And a kind, old gentleman like Dr. Kevorkian who would supply us with flavorful Kool-Aid. You know what I mean.
On it goes. But hey, every day I thank my lucky stars I don't live in Gaza or in Syria or in parts of Africa. How is it that some get born here, with perks like water, and so many others get born in terror, poverty, fear and crisis? It's the unanswerable question.
.
So much is involved in this process.... not just getting her in and out of the hospital and then the rehab place but getting her back into her apartment, finding a care person to help her a couple of hours a day, convincing her that she has to stop, breathe and wait before moving. And so much more, like finding a place for her here in Sonoma County, which is another kind of chore and journey.
But right now she is OK. She is sort of like the Mom we wished we had as kids. (At least Steve and I think that.) She is sweet and funny and self deprecating and sort of nice to be around for an hour or so. We don't know what will happen, but no one does.
If nothing else, this entire experience has made me really think about life, death and the yawning gap in-between. And about getting old and about not wanting to be in a "place" and the conversation I need to have with my kids (and siblings) about my old age scenario and about theirs. I think about my 4 brothers, three who are not married and no kids in the mix. Who are they going to depend on? But then, I don't want to depend on my kids, so maybe they are better off in that regard. And they (we) are not alone; our Baby Boom Generation has so many unmarried, unattached people who are just now starting to contemplate their old age future. It ain't pretty and as we all, all millions of us, get older and older, it will get even less pretty. The smart thing to do would be to buy a big house somewhere cheap, but close to a hospital, and eventually we could all live there, with a live-in nurse. And a kind, old gentleman like Dr. Kevorkian who would supply us with flavorful Kool-Aid. You know what I mean.
On it goes. But hey, every day I thank my lucky stars I don't live in Gaza or in Syria or in parts of Africa. How is it that some get born here, with perks like water, and so many others get born in terror, poverty, fear and crisis? It's the unanswerable question.
.
Friday, September 12, 2014
Lasering People at the Dentist Office
I visited the dentist today to have a small cavity filled. The doctor warned me that he would be using a laser to remove the decayed part and that it would be incredibly dangerous** but he believed the danger was outweighed by the swiftness of the process and the ease of the procedure. Ease for him, of course. Danger for the patient.
So it was with extreme trepidation that I sat down in the chair. He has new offices, obviously paid for by us, the gullible clients. (He calls us "guests" by the way. HA!) Before I could even ask a simple question like "How dangerous is the laser?" he had a swab with some drug on it jammed between my rotting tooth and my gum. Within a minute my gum and tongue were numb. I still was able to ask about the laser and he assured me that yes, he could totally vaporize anything with the laser. The rotting part of the tooth, the entire tooth if he so desired.
Foolishly, now under the influence of gum and mind-numbing drugs delivered on a Q-tip, I asked "Could you vaporize something bigger?" and he replied "Well, yes. Say you had a friend you didn't like anymore, so not really a friend and you wanted him gone, I could make that happen." He proceeded to tell me that he took appointments for very late at night, like midnight and he had a different dental assistant named Vinnie because the work was just too difficult for the girl assistants and that he had a room in the back, lined with plastic, and he could totally vaporize an entire body!
Of course, by this time, I was laughing out loud, with the swab still sticking out of my mouth, and he gave me some nice, salient details that made me laugh more. With a laser, depending on the size, you can cut through anything. Harken back to the movie "Goldfinger" when Bond, James Bond is tied to a metal table and the laser is inching up that table, dissolving it, getting closer and closer to Bond's junk..... that could actually happen and hey, that was like 50 years ago! So prescient, those Bond movies.
But back to today. After about 5 minutes, he shows me the laser and gets to work. It took about 5 minutes for him to laser out the bad part of the decay and he used a drill-like thing to smooth the edges of the cavity ("lasers don't smooth things out. Yet.") He lasered a little more and then he put in some new filling compound and cemented it in with another laser! I did the biting thing a couple of times and Done! The entire process took maybe 15 minutes (not counting the sucking on the drug lollipop which could have gone on for a while since it was obviously affecting my brain as well and I like that sort of thing) and it did not hurt one teeny bit and involved no needles! No shots! And there wasn't that smell you get when they drill and your tooth goes up in smoke. It was amazingly easy and tidy.
We chatted a few more minutes and when I left, the numbness in my tongue and gum were gone. Very, very impressive, especially for someone who has had probably about 80 trips to the dentist in my lifetime, just for fillings.
Along the way, we talked about lots of other things. This is a smart guy. Very into the science of the body, but not in a Sebastopol way, not all "here's what my urine says today" but just tuned into how the body works and how it changes every day. Plus he's as cute as a box of puppies with really good teeth, which never hurts.
So, laughing out loud in the dentist chair, that hasn't happened in a long time and it was greatly appreciated. And my tooth is whole, happy and lasered! I was going to ask for a discount because I avoided the really garlicky meatballs in my fridge last night for the sake of the dentist, but he made me laugh so much I forgot! Nice work, Laser-Man!
** kidding, he never said anything like that and the laser is totally not dangerous unless you aim it at the wrong thing. Like your knee or the window or a person. Just saying......
.
So it was with extreme trepidation that I sat down in the chair. He has new offices, obviously paid for by us, the gullible clients. (He calls us "guests" by the way. HA!) Before I could even ask a simple question like "How dangerous is the laser?" he had a swab with some drug on it jammed between my rotting tooth and my gum. Within a minute my gum and tongue were numb. I still was able to ask about the laser and he assured me that yes, he could totally vaporize anything with the laser. The rotting part of the tooth, the entire tooth if he so desired.
Foolishly, now under the influence of gum and mind-numbing drugs delivered on a Q-tip, I asked "Could you vaporize something bigger?" and he replied "Well, yes. Say you had a friend you didn't like anymore, so not really a friend and you wanted him gone, I could make that happen." He proceeded to tell me that he took appointments for very late at night, like midnight and he had a different dental assistant named Vinnie because the work was just too difficult for the girl assistants and that he had a room in the back, lined with plastic, and he could totally vaporize an entire body!
Of course, by this time, I was laughing out loud, with the swab still sticking out of my mouth, and he gave me some nice, salient details that made me laugh more. With a laser, depending on the size, you can cut through anything. Harken back to the movie "Goldfinger" when Bond, James Bond is tied to a metal table and the laser is inching up that table, dissolving it, getting closer and closer to Bond's junk..... that could actually happen and hey, that was like 50 years ago! So prescient, those Bond movies.
But back to today. After about 5 minutes, he shows me the laser and gets to work. It took about 5 minutes for him to laser out the bad part of the decay and he used a drill-like thing to smooth the edges of the cavity ("lasers don't smooth things out. Yet.") He lasered a little more and then he put in some new filling compound and cemented it in with another laser! I did the biting thing a couple of times and Done! The entire process took maybe 15 minutes (not counting the sucking on the drug lollipop which could have gone on for a while since it was obviously affecting my brain as well and I like that sort of thing) and it did not hurt one teeny bit and involved no needles! No shots! And there wasn't that smell you get when they drill and your tooth goes up in smoke. It was amazingly easy and tidy.
We chatted a few more minutes and when I left, the numbness in my tongue and gum were gone. Very, very impressive, especially for someone who has had probably about 80 trips to the dentist in my lifetime, just for fillings.
Along the way, we talked about lots of other things. This is a smart guy. Very into the science of the body, but not in a Sebastopol way, not all "here's what my urine says today" but just tuned into how the body works and how it changes every day. Plus he's as cute as a box of puppies with really good teeth, which never hurts.
So, laughing out loud in the dentist chair, that hasn't happened in a long time and it was greatly appreciated. And my tooth is whole, happy and lasered! I was going to ask for a discount because I avoided the really garlicky meatballs in my fridge last night for the sake of the dentist, but he made me laugh so much I forgot! Nice work, Laser-Man!
** kidding, he never said anything like that and the laser is totally not dangerous unless you aim it at the wrong thing. Like your knee or the window or a person. Just saying......
.
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