Tuesday, June 19, 2007
The Worn, the Wise, and the What?
I’m just tired, okay? We had a fun, fine weekend with the Portland relatives, including a delightful picnic with family (partly not mine) and friends (including one guy I am told I met a decade ago but neither of us remember it, and some nice random strangers who happened to show up with toddlers). Since then I’ve been working my ass off and there is no end in sight. So: I’ve decided to launch a couple of limp tepid balloons at the b’sphere and then give myself a bit of a breather. I need to get through the next week and a half, at the very least, without overextending myself other than at the occasional yoga class. Besides that, though, I think I’d be doing us all a favor if I just caught my breath, blog-wise, and let the creative juices well up again from wherever they originate, and whence they have lately retreated, leaving me in my work-worn state sadly parched of said juicy creativity. I’m sure that nothing could make me write a bunch of entertaining crap more effectively than telling myself I don’t need to for a while. Let’s see how that works.
Meantime, some parting gifts for our studio audience:
I’ve gotten into some new reality television, of a nature so lame and craven that I won’t even name names IRATE MASTUR KELS HITCHEN. I can’t even say that I learn anything from these pieces of televised gummy rat. It’s just brain-emptying entertainment. However, I do flatter myself that I watch Survivor in part because I find it educational. The last season ended months ago now, and for most of its duration I learned FLAT JACK SQUAT from it. Then, with a sudden pedagogic burst, I suddenly learned three cool things in the very final episode, and since you are probably too clever by half to have wasted your time watching all that dumbness to glean such a bare mote of wisdom, I’ve distilled it down for you:
The prior season had been touted beforehand because it began with four racially-separated groups. Would that impact the final results? Not really, it didn’t. The final three were a mixed bag – two Koreans who had bonded through common culture, of whom one was the leader and one was along for the ride, and one latino dude. The Koreans had gotten rid of the other Asians; the latino hadn’t formed any relevant bond with the others of his genitive ilk. It came down to a contest between the Korean and the latino, and the Korean won. The race card had been thrown away long before. So, this most recent season, there were two teams of mixed races, a good variety of skin types and nose shapes, and all three survivors in the final three were black. Lesson: race is no more relevant than you make it out to be.
One of the “final three” survivors had gotten there by being really nice and supportive. In the end she got no votes. Lesson: Being nice is not in itself enough a lot of the time.
On the final episode, ejected players get to ask questions of the remaining three who made it to the end. Many of those asking the questions were rude, confrontational, and barely coherent in their vituperation. Lesson: if you’ve used up 14 minutes and 30 seconds of your 15 minutes of fame, don’t spend the last half-minute you’ve got acting like a jerk.
Wow, wasn’t that enlightening? No? Hey, shut up, I’m still talking. And what I’ve got left will leave you wondering why they don’t demand a license before they let someone like me have a blog like this. I’ve been sensing an ultimatum lately, something that would force me to make some kind of choice. What is it? I can’t tell yet, but it’s had me working up the following list of “OR” ultimatums! Enjoy it, and I’ll see you here when I look here again!
OR-VILLE:
Fish or cut bait
Shit or get off the pot
Sink or swim
Kill or be killed
Publish or perish
Look or leap
Truth or dare
Shirts or skins
Pitch or catch
The lady or the tiger
Chainsaws or grappling hooks
Alien or Predator
Civilization or discontent
Whip or will
Funk or fied
Wright or Reddenbakker
What a relief. Later, dudes.
Friday, June 15, 2007
Earwigs and Onion Rings: What My Brain Does to Me
I’ve had a tune stuck in my head all morning long, and it’s pure torture. I’m really hoping I can move it out of my brains and into the Ethernet by sharing it here, so here goes:
Froggy went a courting, he did shout oy vey, gevalt
Froggy went a-courting, he did shout oy vey, gevalt
Froggy went a-courting, he did shout
Anthropoid amphibian freaks me out, gevalt, oy vey
No dice. Still lodged firmly in my thinkbone like a toothbrush shiv in Paris Hilton’s bony fist. So instead I’ll mouth off, blog-wise, about the Sopranos finale. And it doesn’t matter if you never watched a single episode, or if you memorized the damn thing and know every nuance and read every commentary on this significant, if not universally appreciated, moment of television – I have to share one point about that final scene.
For those who otherwise wouldn’t care, and there’s no spoilers here, the final scene takes place in a low-key diner. The Soprano family sits down to supper and starts eating onion rings. What do the onion rings mean? I’ve read that they are an analogue to communion wafers, but for the love of a fried bulb, that just doesn’t make any sense at all. I have my own theory, which might be best referenced by the song title “Zero to the Power of 10 (= Nothing at All)” (and anyone who doesn’t know that tune really is due a copy of Tull’s Minstrel in the Gallery, but that’s another story). But who cares.
My point is, damn, those onion rings looked good. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a plate of rings and I got a serious craving for them from watching Tony et al eat all of them. So when I found myself overwhelmed with lunch options yesterday, I just naturally gravitated to the Ferry Building and Taylor’s Natural Refresher. I waited ten minutes in line, and then fifteen minutes while my cheeboogi ‘n’ rings got fried up properly. By the time I sat down with my lunch tray I was pretty much out of lunch-hour time and very much ready to chow down.
So, here’s the thing: the burger was decent – not breathtaking, but good meat, well-cooked, reasonably garnished and possessed of adequate integrity (ie it didn’t collapse or disassemble as I ate it). And the rings were also okay, a basket of a dozen or 15 good-sized circles of caramelized onion in beer batter and plenty of cooking erl. The first three rings were really satisfying. But then I went and ate the rest of them. So long as they were in my mouth, everything was fine. But as soon as I swallowed the last of them and stood up to leave, the regret began. I was so laden with fried goo that I spent the rest of the afternoon wishing that I’d just resorted to my typical smoothie instead from City Kinetics just up my alley. I felt greasy and gross till I fell asleep.
The moral: The Sopranos may have been the best thing on television, or maybe it wasn’t; its finale may have been its finest hour or maybe it was a big rip-off. However, onion rings are definitely better on television than they are in my belly. Tonight I’m baking Tilapia and steaming some plantain and avocado, and maybe by the weekend I’ll feel like making pancakes for dad’s day. But they’re fried, so I’m still on the fence. However, it’s a deliciously maple-y fence, so I think I know which side I’m going to fall on....
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
One Month Later: Reclaimed Relaxation
I’m back, as if you cared, from a day at home precuperating from a cold I could tell I’d really get badly if I had gone to work. You like that, “precuperating?” Prophylactic rest to avoid future illness? You love it, admit it. Go on and use it. Don’t even give me credit. Why should you be any different than the rest of the world?
Ah yes, the bitterness of a man whose 65%-of-a-blog-post got erased when Windows decided to do an auto-update on me last night and erased an open and foolishly-unsaved screen. My delight boils over like scalded milk on a cast-iron stove. Today is to be chock-full of rigors and workosity, though I do fully intend to get out for my afternoon Ashtanga session at the Y. Plus I’ve got four budgets to read, three site visit letters to revise, and a handful of random humus to scatter to the fields of my labors. After which, of course, all I need to do is vacuum, dust, repaint, replaster, and probably re-roof my apartment in anticipation of the visit this weekend (starting Thursday) of my sister and her lovely family. Oh, I’m relaxed already.
So relaxed, in fact, that it’s time for me to hearken back to a time – was it only a month ago? – when K and Z and I ventured up to the north coast for a weekend away. I’ve got a handful of notelets about that weekend and I’m going to re-experience them now by sharing them with you. And you, my friends, being stuck here for the ride, are, to coin a phrase, ride-stuck. Next time make sure you get a window seat so you can escape at a traffic signal or something. Meantime, here’s what you missed when I left you for a weekend last month:
Accommodations:
* We stayed at a fun little cabin-cluster in Little River, the “Fools Rush Inn” (no really), where each residence had a name derived from a local landmark or town, in mostly alphamabetical order. We stayed in the “Gualala” cabin, and it rocked. It ranked a full step ahead of the Humboldt cabin, and just barely behind the Farallon cabin. It was even right across the drive from the Albion cabin, so that means we were basically even with #1, right?
* The cabin was heated by a gas-fueled fireplace with fake logs and a thermostat, so when the temperature dropped a hair below “cozy” (it was a remarkably balmy weekend, for sure) the fireplace burst automatically into flames with a cheerful “whoosh” of igniting fumes and consumed oxygen. Very cheerful, if not always calming or expected.
* The next morning as we drowsily broke our nocturnal fast, we were jolted into full wakefulness by the sound of footsteps pounding across our roof, small but heavy and fleet. Was it a raccoon? A vole? An iguana? Well, not likely an iguana, but we have no idea to this day what was using our roof as a footpath. We only know that it really seemed to know where it was going. I’d like to think it was a gnome, but I like to think a lot of stuff.
* I’ve grown used to getting soap at my hotels, but this time the soap was a bit more exotic: “Sweet Bouquet #3/4 Indian Face/Body Soap.” I wonder what a full Number 1 face/body soap would be like, because ¾ was not bad at all.
* The place was run by a guy who had a reputation from on-line reviews as a bit of a coot, and when he had returned my telephone call to make a reservation he announced himself to me as “CIA. And FBI. And IRS,” before admitting his true identity. I therefore feared for his being a true coot, or “troot.” But in fact, he was younger than I expected and only showed signs of preliminary cootness. I consider it a “prototcoot” sighting, both rare and wonderous. Good for me, eh?
Moving on to my notes on other places and personages on the trip:
* We drove several times past the Philo School of Herbal Energetics before I really believed what I read on their sign. I’m still not sure what they do there, but I’d have to say, the lower end of the Anderson Valley looks like a damn fine place for whatever it might be. For all the New Englandism of the Mendo Coast, the ol’ P-SHE really confirmed that this was Northern California.
* A few quick tidbits: Fort Bragg – unexpectedly and very pleasantly mellow and interesting. Booneville Hotel – lovely place, great food, and one of the nicest cats I’ve ever met in a public setting. On the wending road back home – a galvanized wikiup, which is a phrase I am aching to apply to something in my own life but the obvious reference escapes me. And finally, the glory of a deep coastal ravine and alluvial outflow that was shamefully tainted by my inability to overcome the giggles at the name, “Jack Peters Creek.”
Category three, which is the last one I’ve got – Activities:
* We had supper at a low-key diner one night, overlooking all of Mendo town and the cliffs and sea. Of course, Z basically wanted none of the food and nothing more than to play with crayons, which brought to my attention that crayola crayons are one hell of a lot more weirdly-named than they used to be. First, give yourself a crayon-name test, and then check the official site’s chronology of names. The bizarritude of these names was amplified by Z’s having received at the fantabulous Navarro Winery, a set of coloring pages and some crayons from the Quill (“So Fast, So Simple” – not unlike myself) Corporation. Those crayons had names like “black,” “blue”, “brown” and “red.” There were 8 different colors and I recognized every name. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I pick good. That’s why I’d have made such a great hobbit.
* While vacating, I availed myself of my vacation p.j.s – specifically, some purple paisley drawstring deals that make my lower extremities scream “relaxation” at full volume. However, as has been the case with too many of my clothes lately, a button seems to have fallen off of them while I was wearing them. The next morning Z gleefully sought to jam his tiny finger in my navel, as is his wont, only to find that the missing fastener had actually lodged itself there in my omphalos. It was, I believe, my very first honest-to-god belly button. I hope that it will be my last, but Z, who was delighted by his discovery, would probably cast his vote otherwise.
* On the way home, Z played with a book full of pop-up and tab-pull-motion figures of Elmo and his hairy monster friend Zoe from Sesame Street. By the time we stopped for snacks down in Cloverdale, we discovered that he’d removed all the moving parts of that book and basically filled the back of the car with shredded muppet. I had to congratulate him – I’d been itching to do just that for months, and he finally picked up the hint. Good going, Z-man.
Yep, that little trip down vacation memory lane was just what I needed. I’d better get back to some actual work now. If you’ve got some “instant vacation” snippets to share, I could definitely use them. I’m pretty sure I’m going to tense right up again within an hour or so.
