Yar.

I have a whole bunch of tiny bruises running up and down my right arm and my left shoulder hurts like the dickens.

I guess it could be worse.

G-Love pointed out a Dracula read-it-as-if-it were-being-blogged-live thing a few weeks ago and I've since discovered another.

WHich makes me wonder: how often has this been done? Are there other books which lend themselves to this re-writing format (i.e. in epistolary or calendared format and in the public domain)? And where might I obtain a complete list?

Anyway, my point is:

I need coffee.

This elevator goes . . . up?

Today for lunch, I discovered there's a Pizza Schmizza very close by. So close in fact, I could have gone there twice in the hour I had. There had been a Schmizza in Tukwila for about a year, but they had a bad location with little foot traffic and closed a few months ago. Since then, my craving for alfredo sauce-based pizza had gone unfulfilled. Until now.

Sort of.

You see, I am not a tomato fan. In fact, if you were to say that I have an anti-passion for all things tomato and tomato-based, I would say that's a fair assessment. I do love pizza, mind you, but the one thing I've always sort of worked around is that every pizza comes with a layer of tomato sauce. Which is just...bleh.

But, enter Pizza Schmizza. You can get any pizza with alfredo sauce instead of tomato sauce as a base. Genius!

I was there in a jiffy.

Sadly, the Schmizza I went to today only had one kind of alfredo pizza ready to go: onions and garlic. For lunch? I had to pass on it, and instead did the next best thing:

I got a slice of Extreme Veggie 'za and an order of dipping sticks with alfredo sauce. Then I spread a layer of alfredo on my pizza. It was good.

For dinner, I collected some suggestions from some folks at work, and decided to go to Manzana in the Pearl District, which sounded promising.

I was hungry early, so I went to the bar and took advantage of their happy hour. Bonus: Not much traffic and I found the place really easily. I had a mostly cake-based meal: some crab cakes, and some potato cakes and their soup of the day, which was . . . tomato basil.

I know, I said I am anti-tomato.

Here's the thing:

I read an interview of (or article by, I don't recall) Jeffrey Steingarten, food editor of Vogue and author of The Man Who Ate Everything. In it, he talked about how when he got the food editor job, he wanted to be able to talk about food without his ingrained preferences for particular tastes skewing his judgement. So he ate and ate and ate, especially the things he didn't like, so as to at least inure himself to the flavor/texture/whathaveyou, and be able to see why other people liked it.

This makes us rounder as human beings.

In so many ways.

In other words, I got the soup because I hoped to be able to catch a glimpse of the deliciousness that other people find. Sort of how sometimes your friend is going out with a butterface girl (her body is hot, but. . .) and you are just appalled at the situation, but you're hanging out and for a brief second, she smiles a certain way and a light bulb goes off. *ding!* You may never see it again, but that's what he sees all the time.

It totally didn't work this time. I had about two spoonfuls and decided to just have my cakes instead. Tasty. Northwesty. Crisp-ity and fried up right.

(Though now that I see that they also have a Manzana in Bellevue, I feel a little ripped off on the PDX experience. On the other hand, the potato cakes were really delicious and now I can get some close to home. Yay!)

. . .

So I'm staying at this hotel. It has kind of a weird euro-suite thing going on and the thing is . . . there is a lot going on in this room.

I have two TVs, four chairs, a loveseat, four lamps, two tables, and seven pillows. The bathroom has two sinks, a shower, and separate bath, and a knob for the TV volume control.

However, the door to the balcony is a door/window. The front desk lady said, "It's European style".

By that she meant, "It's impossible for you to get open. Ever."

Turn the handle 90 degrees and it open like a door, but turn it 180 degrees and it louvers like a giant tropical window. However, if you fail to get the knob in the exact position, you won't get it open at all. Turn the knob 176 degrees? Sorry. How about 91 degrees? Nope, you're screwed.

It's a good thing there's no mini-bar in here. It could drive a girl to drink.

More.

Hey, even more food

After work today, on the recommendation of a friend, I went to go check out a tiny plates place called Navarre.

It was tiny (like the plates), but the food was quite enjoyable, and since they were tiny portions, I got to sample a fairly wide swath through the menu. And since they stapled my receipt to the menu I selected, I can recall the miniature wonders I partook of, in no particular order

They were:

Olives: A bowl of assorted olives, swimming in a perfumed press of their brethen's oil. I particularly like the smaller brown/purple-y ones.

Mushrooms: MMMMMmmmMmmm. God, I love mushrooms.

Ken's Bread: Annoying that they charged for bread, but it was moist and tasty and perfect for sopping up delicious leftover sauces. And it was only a dollar (but then, why charge at all?), and I got more than enough. Also, who's Ken?

Country Pork pate w/Prunes: This came with hot mustard and cauliflower, not prunes. Unless they were hidden somewhere. It's possible, I suppose. The pate was more like a slice of cold terrine, and it was good, but not what I was expecting, exactly. It had a flavor I couldn't quite put my finger on, but it was a porky, familiar flavor of my childhood.

Potato Pancakes: These were like fat little hashbrowns. And you know how I feel about hash browns. Crispy heaven.

Trout baked in Parchment: Tender, and simply prepared. As the name implies, the trout was just seasoned, wrapped in parchment and then baked and/or broiled. Tender and good. I was unhappy that the skin stuck to the parchment int he baking process, since I could not partake of the crispy skin goodness, but overall, this dish was pleasant. I don't think I'm a big trout fan, though.

Italian/Spanish Cheese: A few ounces of varied cheese. One was a salty soft cheese with tasty mold shot all through it, one was brie-like one, and one was a smoked harder cheese. Regrettably, I do not recall what they were called or even which were Italian and which were Spanish.

Pain d'Epice with Goat Cheese and Honey: This was a dessert of spiced bread. Good, good stuff. They crisped out the edges of the slice in the broiler and spread the chevre on top and then drizzled honey over that. It was amazingly good.

. . .

In other news, Google Maps is incredibly poor at giving logical directions in Portland. On the bright side, I'm getting quite adept at U-turns.

Food, food, and PDX

There are only a couple things I dislike about travel. The one I am thinking about right now is that when you wake up in the morning, un-caffeinated and starving, you probably have no frakking idea where the food's at. This isn't an issue if you're staying in the middle of a major metropolis (San Francisco and New York come to mind), but when you're off on the "scenic" side of town, there's more "scene" than "hash browns" if you know what I mean.

And I think you do.

The weather looks like it'll be rainy but warm all week, which is just Portland's way of pointing out that it's not perfect either and I've only loved it because it's been sunny and inviting. Now that I can see how it is on crappy days, will I still feel the same?

You betcha, sweetcakes.

Speaking of sweetcakes, I really do need to find a good map of the city or something (there is probably a bookstore at the mall, or if I can figure out how to get downtown (instead of just driving around it), I can obviously go to Powell's.

In addition to the brewery map, they should also have a delicious food map of the area.

Going to the South Side

So I did go to the "COIN-OP LAUNDROMAT" yesterday, and it was pretty busy. I kept thinking, "Oh my god, everyone can see my underwear," and "Why do I have so much pink underwear? I'm not a pink underwear girl! How did this happen? Oh, the folly."

Luckily, I brought the lappy with me, so I got some stuff done while I was waiting for my stuff to get done. I got maps, directions, and all kinds of crazy information that will be useful during my stay in PDX. I've never been there more than 12 hours, so it'll be a bit weird to just BE THERE for days on end.

At the very least, I know I won't run out of breweries to visit, and some will definitely get knocked off the list. Hoo-ha.

I talked to Guillermo this morning, who is embarking soon on a grand journey to Merry Olde England shortly, and he (of course) had mucho advice on places to see and things to do while south of the border. Sometimes I think that boy loves Portland more than I do.

Or at least, he loves Fabric Depot more than I do.

. . .

Today is going to be a pretty busy day. There are more things to be done today than on a usual lazy Sunday (when you wake up in the late afternoon), but the day has not been overbooked, which is good. So far on the plate are the Street Fair, some hanging on the South Side, a work meeting, and starting the southbound drive.

Since I am planning to be done with my day in about 12 hours, I think that I have plenty of time for all this. Yay for boundless optimism!

(Of course, the last three things are crammed into a 4 hour window, so, um...)

(I might have to revise some of that optimism.)

(And figure out where one gets coffee at 4 a.m. in Olympia.)

Bits and Pieces

Grease Monkey coffee:



Finally got the oil changed in the car, in preparation for my upcoming trip to Portland. The guys at the Renton Grease Monkey apparently all hail from Hawaii, so they were able to give me good directions to the L&L and I got some most delectable island grinds, including, but not limited to: pork lumpia, musubi, bbq beeff & chicken, laulau, and kalua pork.

MmmMmmmMMMm. Tasty.

. . .

I must say I am also most pleased with the hotel that was selected for my business trip. It looks great.

Whenever I am at home or staying with friends & family, I always use my mobile phone as an alarm. It's really great, except when you have a Daylight Savings switchover (grrrrr). However, whenever I stay at a hotel, I use the wake-up call. It's super awesome. Am I the only one that feels that way?

. . .

In home and garden news, the tiny pears on the pear trees are getting bigger. We'll have to keep an eye on them to make sure the bunches don't get too heavy for any one branch. We may have to cull some, which make me sad, but losing an entire branch under the unbearable weight of juicy pears would make me sadder.

The maple trees have leaves now! When did that happen?

The tomatoes and bell peppers out front look like they're having a grand old time, but the tomatoes in the shade are doing better than the tomatoes in full sun. I thought tomatoes loved sun? This bears looking into.

At any rate, as I was coming up the front walk last evening, I was breathing (as usual), and caught the most amazing smell. Then I realized it was a combination of the cedar from the new fence and the moist earthy smell you get when it rains after it's been hot for a long time, along with just all the fragrant leaves from the peppers and tomatoes and whatever that bush is over by the car.

It was so good and so refreshing.

. . .

Work is work, which means it's delightful and busy and full of joy. There's so much always going on, there's no way I'll ever remember it all, especially the funny things people say. Although, they probably think I say some pretty funny things too, not always intentionally, such as:

"Hey, have you seen my giant box? Check out my giant box! It's huge!"

Yeah, I know. Snicker, snicker, right? To be fair, I did have the world's biggest cardboard box delivered. It really was amazingly large.

Or the time someone came to the back and I was having some words about something with someone else (I really don't remember what it was about, unfortunately) and he said, "Mary, why is it that every time I come to the back, we are talking about your testicles?"

It's sad, but true.

. . .

I have to go to the laundromat today to get my clothes clean so I can pack them. Oh, the indignity of it all.

I always worry that someone else has washed their super-skeezy underwear right before me and I'll get super-herpes or something from it. Impossible, I know, but there it is. I never claimed to be completely sane.

Light pollution=bad

I wish there was a place out here where you could sit in the dark and think. Someplace like Makapu'u Point, where it's quiet, and the stars hang over a restless sea; where moonlight catches on the foamy crests of waves as they roll in to lap and crash on the rocks below your feet, mimicking the crunching of thoughts in your own brain as you tumble through the things that catch on your neurons.

There exists no such place in the Seattle area that I know of.

The ocean isn't nearby. The Puget Sound lays there, sure, as do lakes large and small, but that's not the same, is it? And even if the sea were to rush in and lay claim to Western Washington right up to Seattle's doorstep, there would still be no peace. Why?

It's just too big and busy and luminous of a city to ever afford that kind of escape. You can drive out for miles and miles and still see the big pink and orange glow of the lights, rising above the landscape and obliterating the stars.

Last June, there was crazy sun activity that caused the Northern Lights to be seen as far south as Tennessee and Texas. We drove out in the dark of night, looking for a place where we could perhaps spot them too, heading up Highway 18, since it seemed the "darkest" of the major roads in the area.

But the clouds never broke and we never got our view.

I bring this up, because although we drove quite far from the city, its glow was persistent, even over the mountains, reaching up and waving hello, like some sinister radioactive halo. And on the other side of the mountain was the glow of another city, Issaquah, a.k.a. The Quah.

Sure, I could drive up and over the mountain passes to Eastern Washington , where surely the landscape spreads out far enough that people start to spread out more, and their lights don't congregate at a high enough concentration to reach pollutive critical mass, but that's a little far, isn't it?

And there are no moonlit seas in Eastern Washington. That much is patently obvious.

What is there to do about this seemingly unsolvable problem?

Days go by

Yesterday was a day of infinite trial and infinite triumph.

It started by waking up to cat puke on my leg and got worse before it got better. I'm not going to dwell on this, but why do all my delivery drivers have to take a vacation at the same time and leave poo-flinging simians to deliver my things instead? Are they vacationing together in the Bahamas? Who knows.

But it started to get much better around the time that fabulous Diana dropped by a magazine with an article she thought I'd be interested in. It was (get this) an interview of Chip Kidd by Jonathan Safran Foer. If you know anything about me, you know that this was like literary pornography. I totally savored it on my lunch.

One complaint: That article was way too short. It whet my appetite and then left me hanging.

On the bright side, the magazine was ID, so it had a bunch of other interesting (mostly design related, duh) articles to engage, including one about a new tool called a Fubar that I really really really want. Three times the destructiveness of a regular hammer! Plus a pry end! It's amazing and you could insanely wreck shop in approximately three seconds with one of these things.

Imagine. For the cost of ten lattes, you could be destroying things more efficiently than ever before!

. . .

Also, I bought the most fabulous skirt today.

The Saga continues

In the realm of things grown-up, I accomplished a lot today — well, one big thing, anyway — took a long lunch and headed down to The Fed to sign scads of papers with Dragons. Today was also the first day I actually saw the numbers, and while I haven't really been thinking about it, the numbers look good. I'm really glad about that.

I also have an appointment to get the alignment looked at on the front end of the car tomorrow. Hey, that's two grown-up things in two days! I'm really on a roll here, except I'm not.

I did a few exceedingly non-grown-up things today. For example, my boss made a joking comment to me and I countered with "No, your mom (insert blah blah here)." I also threatened to stab two people in the jaw (I was kidding, of course! You believe me, right?).

But yeah.

There isn't a lot I can say about work right now, because the only things I can really share are things that would bore the living crap out of anyone who doesn't do my specific job. No even people who I work with closely on a daily basis are even remotely interested in what I do. They just take it on faith that I know what I'm doing and say, "Great job there!"

I mean, I am exceedingly good at what I do, and I take great interest in it, but it can be a mite lonely sometimes to only be able to talk to yourself to have someone who knows what they're talking about. I suppose I could call or e-mail other people with my job across the region, but hell, they have crap to do, you know?

But, I've said it before and I'll say it again: I love the work I do. I love the people I do it with. They're a more than fabulous group of people that I am pleased to know every day. And I have craploads of fun each and every time I go in. There aren't a ton of people who can say that sincerely, but it's true.

. . .

Speaking of work (and how much I love it), one of the things that's a small bonus is that of course, I can bring in my own music to listen to everyday. I have a small portable mp3 player, as one might expect, and it is filled to the brim with songs of passion, songs of rage, and songs of disco. To the delight of my co-works, it is not filled with rap, although I have a few select rhythms of joy that I've tossed on there.

To the vast delight of one of my co-workers, I have eight songs from a particular band that he is completely mad about. He has a production company he named after one of their songs, even. His love is so crazy, I am convinced he is part Canadian.

Or something.

But here's the thing: I enjoy their music on occasion. I am not in love with their music, nor do I particularly care to hear it day in and day out. That's what shuffle is for. It should come up maybe as often as twice a day. Possibly.

But what actually happens is that every time I leave the room, this band magically comes on. It's getting to jaw stabbing stage.

Today — and this is classic — I was up on a ladder, moving a shelf. This involved me eventually moving into a position where I had one foot on the top rung of the ladder, the other foot foot on a shelf, with another shelf lifted into balance on my shoulder, while in my left had I was positioning a brace, and my right hand was wielding a rubber mallet. Hard to picture, I know, but imagine something truly awkward where people are coming by every two seconds to ask if I might need some help. The answer, by the way, is yes, I probably do need help, but there is really hardly enough room for me up here, let alone another person.

So, just as I move into this horrible position, which incidentally causes the arch on my foot to cramp up, Band Lovin' Boy (or BLB for short) — yep, you guessed it — makes a move and changes tunes. Again. Arg. Plus, he does that thing where he gets tired of a song after the initial chorus and skips to the next one, which is just pure agony for me.

Jaw-stabbing. I tell ya.

Lucky for him, I am pretty forgiving when I have cupcakes and coffee in my belly. Also, I just can't be that mad because he just does not for the life of him understand. I have explained my reasoning a zillion times, but he just doesn't get it. And I really don't think he will. Sometimes you really do have to give up and let it go. A lesson in Zen, learned daily.

I do the best that I can.

Naptastic

I've been feeling a bit rag-tag tired lately, probably from not catching enough Z's on a nightly basis. Stupid rock n' roll lifestyle. (that was clearly a joke)

Caught an after work nap on Friday with the help of my friend Bourbon, to slightly refresh myself for Cinco de Mayo dinner and Die Bierstuben drinking ala Russ and Morgan.

And then I slept all day Saturday, with the exception of when I woke up in the early afternoon to go shopping for a couple hours downtown. I did buy a fabulous skirt on clearance, so I'm not too broken up about the lack of 200-ish more minutes of sleep.

After more extended nappage, I had to get up again to go to Big Gay Keith's wine party in West Seattle, to which I wore my fabulous new skirt.

Whenever I go to one of these shindigs, I am always so full of the Dread of standing around awkwardly because I don't know anyone and am intensely afraid that everyone will find out I'm a giant boring loser. Luckily, it was a wine party and it flowed freely, so the awkward stage only lasted about half an hour until I found out there was a UPS trainer and a DHL driver in our midst.

And do you think I cornered them and talked about shipping all night? Maybe a little smack-talk about FedEx Freight? Perchance to gossip about subcontractors and government regulations and airbills and how things can magically appear in Italy by noon the next day when you shipped it at 5 p.m.?

There's some pretty good odds on that.

Now, why would I worry about being giant boring loser again?

A list of phrases I utter far too often:

• Dude, that's frickin' awesome.

• What was I doing now?

• I'm really excited about that.

• Whattywhonow?

• Oh, don't even.

• And that's not even the crazy part.

• Tuh fuh?

• I practically died. (worse, because I do, in fact, practically die about 3 times a day. so accident prone!)

• I was attacked by . . .

• Ok, and then . . .

• It's too complicated to explain.

• Where did I put that?

• Oh, please, my pretty pumpkin. (when I am cajoling a computer to pull through on a task)

• I need more coffee.