Random Day Stuff

It was a particularly beautiful day in Boston and vicinity today. This was the skyline view from around 7:30 this morning (I think it was 7:30. I don't really remember as I got about two-and-a-half hours of sleep last night. Some things are foggy today) I don't know if it comes through in the photo but I found the pink morning mist over the city a bit romantically sci-fi. I love that kind of thing. 

Pete and Nate have been touring as members of the band, Van Hayride, the countrified Van Halen cover band. They've been opening for the band, Puss N Boots. If either band comes to your town I highly recommend seeing them. 

Pete, Nate, and the incredible Daria Grace

Rod (far left, sorry, Rod, I don't know your last name) Pete, the obviously amazing Jack Grace, Daria (far right)

The women of Puss N Boots are forces of nature. They have a seriously entertaining, POWERFUL thing going. Plus they're really irreverent and funny. I cannot tell you how much I wish I could sing like any of them. In fact I was too stunned by their awesomeness to remember to take a picture of them. 

I got to hang around with everyone backstage last night after the show for a while. I ended up not going to bed until 3 AM. Rock 'n' roll. What are you going to do? 

The best thing was how really lovely all the people were. Everyone was so kind and inclusive. It was a family atmosphere, lots of love and fun in the room. Norah Jones is my new favorite famous person. (Did I have a designated old favorite famous person?) Sasha gave me a delicious cookie. Most importantly everyone was really nice to my boys, Pete and Nate, and I love it when people are good to the folks I love. I also picked up a great tip for dealing with a certain indelicate process (okay, farting - without naming names) that I'm definitely going to use later. Very worth the sleep deficit. 

In other news I signed up to take a yoga class tomorrow morning at the (new to me) local yoga studio in Union Square. I got a two-week unlimited trial pass too. I'm irrationally excited about this. I have never signed up for a yoga class on my own steam before. These days I'm all about trying new things. Billions of people go to yoga classes every day. It's not a big deal. I'm acting like it's some big adventure. Well you never know where something's going to lead...

This Was All Before 8:45 This Morning

Uhm, I am wearing flip flops and I have coral color painted toenails and I LOVE everything because I went running this morning.

Here are some things I saw today:

A sea of jasmine

A beautiful view

Fuzzy, red, banana-looking flowers

A spacious view that came with a delightful-feeling headwind.

An almond croissant that my mom brought me.

Mom also put lilies in my room and they smell great! Thanks, Mom!

Yesterday I got in the hot tub. No doubt I will again soon. Not only that but I had an entire row to myself on the plane over! How often does that happen?

Today we will be celebrating Mom's birthday. It's a bit early but today we're celebrating. This means there will be cake. Dang good.

Spring Night

Hey me, remember this: the first night in spring in Vermont when the frogs woke up that day and the Peepers are peeping and you're hanging out of the bathroom window looking at the fuzzy full moon behind some light clouds and feeling the warm spring breeze blow.

You Cannot See

Today is the kind of day where you're walking down the street and your glasses channel the wind directly into your eye. Your eye then shoots out a stream of tears. You close said eye to disengage the tears (and to keep the wind out of it) and it immediately freezes shut. Yeah!

Make Do Christmas

My in-laws live in Florida. It's a blustery Christmas Eve here today. Pete and Marc have spent a pretty good amount of time outside today. They even went swimming in this ocean:

Me? I'm attempting to make bourbon balls.

I, crazy nut that I am, went to the first market I could find today (I don't really know where anything is in this town) It was bonkers in there with people doing their last-minute holiday emergency shopping. People were very nice though. I was able to park sooner than I thought I'd be and the folks milling around in the market were full of holiday cheer. Everyone was wishing everyone else a merry Christmas. None of this hippy-dippy "happy holidays"crap in Florida. Hey, I was raised in the Christian tradition so I'm not offended. I wished 'em all merry Christmas right back. Why not?

Then I went back to my in-law's rental condo where we're staying.

It can be funny to try to make things in other peoples' rental condos. Often times you can't find the equipment you need. I wouldn't dare to try to make cupcakes here. Marc couldn't find a frying pan here yesterday. No way there are muffin pans.

Bourbon balls do not require baking or any sort of pan. They aren't chemistry like real baking. You just grind up cookies and pecans and mix them with powdered sugar, bourbon and Karo syrup, wad 'em into balls and roll them in more powdered sugar. So I've been told. This is the first time I've tried to make any.

I used the blender that was really intended for mixing daiquiris to chop up my cookies (took forever) and my pecans (no trouble.) I found a large, plastic bowl to mix everything in. Miraculously I even found dry measuring cups (I'm completely shocked!) and measuring spoons. I got everything successfully processed and mixed. Then I ran out of time. The dough will have to sit for a while (which isn't bad - the flavors will meld better that way) until after Christmas Eve fancy dinner. Bourbon balls for breakfast? Could be. Midnight snack? Also possible. With picklebacks? I wouldn't put it past us, sadly.

So I'm getting a quick post in before I get fancypantsed-up. That could be interesting (to me) too - I packed the morning before we left after three hours of sleep. I don't know if my fancy duds will pass muster. Well, I brought what I brought and that's all there is to it.

Come to think of it, I should start getting ready now. We're expected at Pete and Marc's parents' in 35 minutes. Pete and Marc are still outside getting blown around in this weather. Perhaps we'll be late?

This is not your storybook Christmas. It's great though. We're all half-assed. It's nice that we agree about it. Hitting all the high spots and letting everything else slide. Ha!

Since I live in the politically correct U.S. northeast I will wish you all very happy holidays!

Andouille Sausage, Bean and Kale Soup

Today looks like this:

So I'm glad I have this for lunch:

Andouille sausage, kale and bean soup that I made yesterday before breakfast. I had already soaked and cooked the dried beans a couple of days ago. I'd saved a good amount of the bean cooking liquid too so all of that was ready to go in the morning.

I just cut up the sausage and cooked it with olive oil in the pot (andouille isn't very greasy so I added extra oil) while that got started I chopped up some carrots, celery, onion and some boiled potatoes I had lying around and put them in the pot too.

When they were soft I added the beans and their liquid, some extra water and a few teaspoons of chicken "Better Than Bouillion." I let it all cook for a bit - 20 or 30 minutes. I wasn't paying attention. I decided it was cooked enough, turned the heat off and stirred in the prepped kale. Easy peasy.

When you make sausage soup the sausage does all the work. Get good sausage. Some barley, rice or other grain would probably be good in there too.

Marathon-y

My big plans for today were to go downtown and get myself a new fleece from the Patagonia store and to get new pants to wear to work. I've been running enough that my old pants are all too big. Or else their seats are worn out and you can see light through them when you try to put them on. Classy.

HOWEVER, the Red Sox won the World Series (Go Sox!) and today is the big parade. All over town.

I'm keeping track of public transportation via Twitter and things are a mess. It actually sounds worse than the usual marathon crowd. They're closing T stations (and re-opening them) to control crowds. I'm feeling a bit thwarted. I wanted to get an early start and I was foiled. Oh well.

With uncanny luck, I'm supposed to meet Lisa downtown, just like we tend to do on Patriots Day. We're meeting at 1:00 so hopefully things will have wound down by then. Come to think of it, maybe I should leave now so I'm sure to be there on time.

The weather is fantastic for this kind of thing though. Sixty-ish degrees and sunny, not too windy. A lot of people I know are down by the parade route soaking in the jubilation. I'm not feeling jubilant I'm afraid.

Actually, this morning I checked in with my friend - I don't know what to call it! Our friend whose husband (who is also our friend) is dying. What do you call that? Dying Friend Family? Pool of Pain and Misery? Ouchland? @#$%$&*-ville? (And of course it's not all bad - there are levels of beauty and grace and love to it too but it still HURTS LIKE @$^#%*& and is really, really hard - I mean I don't want to oversimplify) She asked me what I was doing today and everything I could think of to say felt so stupid and trivial and like I should just go over there and take her kid out to play.

So I don't know. I guess I'll just go outside and see where the day takes me. I can get a fleece tomorrow if I need to. I could just order one online if it comes to that. Sigh.

Good luck to you today, however your day goes.

I'm Gonna Be Late For Work. Sorry Bob.

What's going to happen today?

It's supposed to be very windy out today. I LOVE wind.

It's also November first, the first day of NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo, neither of which I have signed up for. Words! Glorious, luxurious words! I want to cocoon myself in words, sweep them around me like a cape on this blustery day! I want to dive in and swim in a warm sea of words! Everything sounds like a stinkin' overwrought cliche though. Oh well.

So I'll move on to pictures.

All that's left of Mr. Loaf: the scalp. I'll have that for lunch at work today. With a salad, of course.

Halloween party pictures of people you don't know:

Steffi and Yukari being photobombed by Selena and Nate

Vampire Melvis

Random Yukari, Quinner and George

Jill, Jim and Jamie with a sneak Quinner in the background

Standard Halloween party photo

Hijinks with Steffi and Angela

Insufferable Preppy Bastard and crew

Jeff and Melvis being photobombed by vampire Nate

John, Linda and Alma

Aftermathish

The party went pretty well. The Red Sox won the World Series. The meatloaf was tasty, as were the pickled beets. No one had a martini but me though.

Party tip: Cheetos really brighten up a dreary bread plate.

I think I'll wear a dress today (with tights) so it can blow around in the wind.

It Has Been a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG Time

I am in a really great mood today and it has been a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time since that's been the case. Long time.

I think it might be the weather. It was forty-five degrees in Cambridge yesterday morning and forty-five again this morning in Vermont. I, myself, am absolutely shocked by the improvement this makes in my mood.

I know I hate summer. I've never liked it, now I hate it. I know this. I just didn't realize how demoralizing it is to me. Joie de vivre completely eludes me in the summer. Without my being aware of it, day to day life becomes about endurance.

That sounds so dramatic. It doesn't feel dramatic when I live it, it just feels like ordinary life. Until it stops and I feel like a bird released from underneath a black plastic tarp. Glory! The sky! The air! I can soar again!

How often do you go through your day wondering "why am I like this?" I do it all the time. (Not just about summer.)

I am very excited about today. I'm going to do laundry and make stuff in my studio. Then I might garden and I might dye my hair. No doubt I will wash the kitchen sink. Maybe later I'll drink some blackberry moonshine and have a fire in the fire pit. These are not exciting things and yet I am so excited.

I hope you all have a wonderful day.

Rumbling

 I had a very helpful dream just before I woke up.

I was trying to catch a train. I was about to get on one of the cars when this dumbass dude tried to hijack the train with me as his number one hostage.

He came up with a gun and was giving me ultimatums. "You can either come with me now and blah blah blah or you can..."

I wasn't listening to him. I was looking at his posture and his gun and thinking, "I can take this guy."

I grabbed his gun and got it away from him. Everyone on the train platform was staring at us. I yelled, "hey, can somebody tackle this guy please?"

Nobody moved. I thought, "honest to God, what is wrong with you people?" I didn't say it though.

Meanwhile I felt the gun become warm in my hand. The dumbass dude said "the gun's getting hot now," as if to imply it was still a dangerous weapon that he could use against me.

I didn't believe him. I didn't care. It was only warm. I didn't know what it would do but I sure as hell wasn't giving it back to him.

Then I woke up.

Waking up exasperated is far better than waking up sad or disappointed or depressed. Exasperation is an active emotion. You do what you want when you're exasperated because you just don't care what the outcome will be anymore.

Raincloud

I am in a bad mood today. Quite annoyed with myself.

I'm tired of monitoring my behavior. I'm tired of having an opinion about things I've said or done. I do not want to analyze and grade myself, my thoughts, my actions all the time. Gah! Annoying.

Maybe I'm just doing it today. I'm giving myself low marks. Some days are like that. Those days that you only remember the stupid things you did. Those days that you just want to put yourself in storage in a closet somewhere for twenty years or so. Just turn yourself off and take a break for a while.

These are the days when the escape fantasies kick in. Here's what appeals today: I catch a bus to Tucson, change my name, magically become a twenty-eight-year-old brunette with long wavy hair, a hot bod and the ability to tan, get a job as a sassy waitress and smoke and cuss in the alley behind the restaurant on my break. I'll get big, elaborate tattoos on my right ankle and my left shoulder. No clue what they'd look like though. Incomplete fantasy. I'd drink a lot of tequila.

I think that fantasy appeals today because it's forty-something degrees and rainy here in Vermont today. That's getting old. At least I can do the tequila drinking part now if I want to.

So much for my new attitude.

Boston Area Winter Plus A Note From Vermont

I drove out to Wellesley today to go to my sister-in-law's Stella and Dot open house. While driving on Route 2 I was amazed by how ashy everything looks on a day in January when it's supposed to snow but it hasn't started to yet.

When I left Wellesley I took the Mass Pike from 128 to Prudential Center. As I drove under the city I looked at the gritty, blackened, concrete ceiling above me and thought "By God I love this filthy town." I really do. It's filthy and freezing and I really love living here.

Meanwhile, Pete is in Vermont, warm and cozy in his studio, looking out the window at an owl hunting:

Photo by Pete.

City Stuff

I am hearing the unmistakable braying of a beagle in the parking lot behind our apartment right now. I love that sound. Beagles are the most awesome pain in the ass dogs you can get! Noisy, unruly, escapey and adorable. Love that sound. Not a breed I'd choose for this urban an area but then I don't know everything.

It reminds me of a couple of other lovely city experiences I had in the last couple of days.

Sunday was No Pants Day on the T. I got on at Davis Square as I normally do. Things proceeded as usual until we pulled into the Harvard Square station. I spotted a couple of people on the platform who weren't wearing pants. They weren't completely naked from the waist down - they had tiny short-like things on - but they were less dressed than the usual T patron.

Odd entertainment stuff happens occasionally in Harvard Square - it could have been a dance troupe or some street circus performers, you never know. A couple of guys got on our car and the train moved off. Then the guys started taking off their shoes, taking stuff out of their pockets, fiddling with their belts. They were seated on the same side as me so I could see them reflected in the car window - you know, city style, so you're not looking directly at anyone.

The woman across from me started looking a tad bit uncomfy. She was across the aisle from them, looking straight at them. She'd had her back to the station when we pulled in so she hadn't seen the no pants people on the platform. I smirked at her to ease her mind. She got it. She could see I was watching in the reflection.

The dudes took their pants off and put their shoes back on. One guy listened to his iPod, another started reading. When we pulled into the Central Square station there were a few more no pants people on that platform. That's where I got out. The no pants guys from our car got out too. Not much of a T ride if you ask me. If I was going to ride no pants I'd want to get a bit more mileage out of it. But then, I don't know everything.

Today it was sixty degrees out. It's mid-January. This is not normal. You don't get beautiful, warm, sunny days in the Boston area in January. Only you did today. So I took a walk over to Porter Square to do some errands.

They're doing some construction at St. James Episcopal Church. I happened to notice that stretch of sidewalk because they had rented some "Rent A Throne" (or something) brand porta-potties and the name amused me. Then I saw a handsome dreadlocked guy coming towards me from the other direction, listening to his iPod and grinning a beautiful grin. The sun was shining, it was a pleasant city moment. I kept going into Porter and hit the drugstore, the hardware store and the craft store.

On my way back, on the spot where I'd had that pleasant city moment on my trip in, I had to step around a fresh vomit stain. It was just a damp stain - someone had cleaned up the bulk of it. I thought how glad I was that I had missed the incident when it had occurred. I was glad that someone had been thoughtful enough to clean up the mess. All in the forty-five minutes that had elapsed since I'd passed that spot. Another series of events that you wouldn't experience in the country.

That's what I have for you today. LIfe is a wonderful thing. You never know what it will bring.

A Lovely November Day

I went out seeking adventure today. Not shopping, just adventure. It was a beautiful, warm autumn day. Some things I saw/did:

A frightening number of porta-potties in Davis Square. What does this mean? They reeked of cherry lollipop. You could smell them down the block. Whatever they're there for clearly hasn't happened yet. A horde impends.

I tried on cool shoes at Fluevog's on Newbury Street. The "Fluevologist," Peter, who was helping/enabling me thought these would go well with my tights. As you can see, he was right. I didn't buy them though. Yet.

You don't see abandoned sake bottles on the street every day around here. Exotic!

Know-it-all Bossypottamus

You know that post I wrote the other day about how to paint a portrait? How I think it's a good idea to work over the whole surface as you go and how at times your painting will look great and sometimes it will look crappy and then it'll look great again and be done? Well the process of painting a portrait is an example of the creative process in microcosm.

A painting, a drawing, a story, a film, an artistic concept, the development of your body of work as you make more and more pieces, your artistic career, the events that make up your whole life, all follow the same mysterious ATV ride of a path.

Like I said in the earlier post, you don't start with nothing then get progressively better when you're making a piece. You start with a goal to shoot for. Sometimes you progress smoothly, sometimes you screw up. Sometimes you make a mistake but you step back and notice that your mistake had a pretty cool effect: it suggests a better direction to take your piece in or it adds another layer of meaning to your initial idea. Sometimes part of the piece looks great but it doesn't work at all with the rest of the piece and so you have to get rid of the part you like.

Sometimes you're convinced that everything you're doing is a complete disaster and you'll never get this piece to where you want it to go. You're a crappy excuse for an artist and you'll never do anything right. You put something in and it sucks so you take it out. You do it again, twice. You work on a different area then go back to the tough one and it still won't work.

An hour later or the next day or six months later (after you've gone and done something else for a while) you find that it wasn't all a disaster after all and you can work with some of it and now you know exactly what to do. Or you decide to take the whole canvas (or construction or story etc.) apart and piece it back together in a different order, or make the thing into a different object entirely.

In short, you set off to find your goal, you skip along, you wander blindly for a bit, you skip some more, you fall off a cliff, you get discouraged, you find a different route to take, you see a neighborhood you didn't know existed, get lost again, leap over a fence and find an awesome party, wake up with a hangover and can't do anything right, you wander wander wander wander, find the on-ramp to the freeway and all of a sudden you're there and your piece is done. Usually your goal looks different than you'd expected it to when you get there.

If you took the crazy path where you tried new things, took risks, made mistakes, pulled off amazing feats, failed miserably, worked hard and had fun, your end product encompasses your goal but also includes more content. It's richer with elements you hadn't imagined it would have. Or else you ended up someplace entirely different but better suited to your true needs. That is the artistic process.

It's exciting, it's fun, it's educational, it hurts like hell, you want to beat your head in with a rock, you feel like you're flying, it's amazing and you NEED TO DO IT AGAIN.

So on a bad day I might complain about what a loser I think I am. In the long run, big picture- wise, I know I'm really fine. Life and art are wild rides with some doldrums thrown in. Disasters are good, successes can be deceiving. As long as you're learning you're winning. As long as you keep going you're winning. You only lose if you stop and let the bastards get you down.

Sunny Day After Stormy Night

I made more ebelskivers this morning. They're much prettier with practice. Photo by Pete.

The old lady is resting.

Yesterday we had a nor' easter. We didn't get any snow where we are though. Lucky us. Today it's beautiful and sunny (also windy and cold). Fay's got her wheels on and she's itching to chase some cars!

I Felt Pretty Lucky

Today I bent to look at a dead caterpillar on our walkway:

As I stood up again a reflection in a puddle on the walk caught my eye. It's very subtle:

A rainbow:

I've seen iridescent spots around the sun before  but this rainbow arced away from the sun. That's something I've neer seen.

More Garden Turbulence

When I returned home to Vermont the other day, I encountered this sorry mess:

Yes, this is one of the risks of mail-order gardening. These tomatoes arrived shortly after I left for Long Island. I asked Pete to put the box in the garage for me (the garage stays cool) Clearly I should have asked him to take the plants out of the box as well. They frigging rotted in there! Total loss.

This is one of those little things that Life is pissing me off with. If there weren't other, larger things going on as well then maybe this wouldn't have been quite so irksome. Maybe.

I have such gardening guilt. I try to talk myself out of it. So often I've had to be away at key gardening times. Still, I keep trying. I'm not a complete failure at it, I just wish I could do better.

This morning I woke up before five AM after dreaming that my mother and I were homeless. Funny thing, I couldn't get back to sleep. Maybe because I couldn't stop pondering the reasons why the dream was not entirely far-fetched?

It's been hot lately so I figured I might as well get out there and finish watering the roses and weed out the lettuce and see if I could find the pea vines which still need to be given supports.

So that's what I did and boy did it make me even surlier. First I was cursing myself for never being around. I was also cursing the many, many weeds sprouting up in my lettuce and in the paths between the beds (The beds looked more like paths than the paths did) I also cursed the lettuce that had already bolted. I did find the pea vines but it wasn't easy. 

I got three mosquito bites through my bug shirt. I worried that it was getting too hot and that the lettuce would dry up and expire because I'd unsettled it. It was ten AM and already too hot for me to do any more. I didn't get the pea supports set up.

I dumped a little water on the lettuce beds and hoped for the best, then I went in and had second breakfast.

That, to me, is a great color to look at when you're feeling pissed off or down in the dumps.

The front walk looks pretty nice. I've never had pink lupines before. I love lupines.

I love garden photographs because it's so easy to make them look so beautiful: just don't put the bad stuff in the photo. Also, all the green stuff kind of looks alike. The weeds just blend away into the verdure, as illustrated below:

There are some big honkin' weeds in the front of this photo but even if you click on it and see it in a larger size the weeds are hard to spot.

I wasn't planning on posting this photo. I just took it for myself two days ago to have a record of the peony. It's called "Paula Fay." (I'll buy anything with "Fay" in it) 

It did delight me this morning when I was fortunate to see it wide open, its bright, golden anthers contrasting beautifully with the deep pink of the petals. Then along came a giant bumblebee to roll around in there and make it look useful and even prettier.

It got to be over ninety degrees today. Those kind of temperatures make me furious - not that I needed any help with that. The sun's setting now though and things have cooled down. I'll probably put my BuzzOff clothing on and have a Cuban Mint Julep on the patio. I cooled myself down earlier by going out and getting three pints of ice cream. No, I didn't eat them all. I did have plenty though!

But it was so hot, look what it did to those peonies pictured above. These are the same flowers but this photo is from this afternoon:

So bleached out. It looks like a completely different bloom. Still pretty though. The deep pink bloom that opened today is a better example of the color it would normally be.

Also, I went and checked the lettuce. One bed has some survivors, the other is pretty much decimated except for the lettuce that bolted. Go me! Oh well, what's done is done. It's supposed to be in the nineties again for the next two days. Maybe when it mellows out I'll plant some more lettuce. Or maybe I'll move on to some other plant. I wonder if it's too late to buy some zucchini pants? I've never grown them.

Amagansett, June 1, 8 AM, 2011

It seemed foggier to me at the time than it does in the pictures. Probably my glasses were just fogged. If only you could hear the birds that were singing.