Tiny new things

Sweet Hubby and the kitties and I have been snowbound for almost a week, which has actually been kind of wonderful.  I'm still doing my best to do something new every day, but these have been small, cozy steps.  I've made new cookie recipes, watched new holiday movies (highly recommend "Klaus", an animated Christmas origin story), and have finished reading "David Copperfield", now starting on "The Red Badge of Courage", my first Stephen Crane.

I also tried something I've only done once before, because it is brutal.  I get a lot of migraine headaches, and fortunately have two different pills I can take to get rid of them.  But lately I've been getting more than usual, often several in a row.  Since both pills can cause a rebound effect (meaning cause more frequent headaches), I decided to see if I could break the cycle by not taking any medication, but simply letting the migraine pass in its own time.

It was a bad day, throbbing head, some nausea, no appetite, low spirits.  I was so lucky to have Angel and Bandy to keep me company, and SH to tend to me, fetching water when I was thirsty, bringing me an ice bag when I lay down, and taking care of himself for meals.  I read just a bit, but that was too much strain, so I mostly lay on the sofa and watched movies, often with a kitten in my lap and sometimes with a husband at my side.  If this truly does break the migraine rebound cycle for a while, it will have been worth it, and the timing was good, since the icy streets have discouraged socializing, so a lovely day to be inside.  My Fitbit told me I took only 330 steps the whole day, since walking intensified the throbbing. I'm eager to get back to exercising and to getting together with friends.

Pulling the kitty trigger

We did it.  Last night, we adopted two kitties, 22 week old sisters whom we have named Angel and Bandy.  Sweet Hubby and I are practically melting into puddles of joy and happiness.

Our sweet old girl cat Stachie died in 2018 and her darling brother Flow earlier this year.  We knew we wanted more fur babies, but also knew to wait long enough to get through our grieving.  We wanted to  let enough time pass that we would stop seeing Stachie and Flow around every corner, stop listening for their voices, stop expecting them to wake us up.

Last night we decided to go looking just to see who was available, not with a solid intention of bringing anyone home, although we had readied the house by cleaning the old litter box, washing all the cat beds, stocking up on food and litter and toys.  We were clear we wanted a bonded pair, so that they would have each other for company and comfort and so that we could both have a lapful.  We went to a place where we were allowed to interact with 3 pairs, and although we could probably have made an equally happy home with any of the darlings we played with, it was these two who won our hearts.

Stachie and Flow were 4 years old when we got them, and it was several days before they would let us near them; it took wary Flow a full 4 years before he got into our laps.  But Angel and Bandy, so young and un-traumatized, almost immediately began to frolic and eat and purr and let us pet them when we got home.  SH and I have both each had almost an hour today with them sleeping on our laps.  They're so cuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuute!  We're so in looooooooooooove already!

Our new couch was also delivered today, so we're keeping the kitties in a back room until we've had a chance to scratch-proof the corners (well, we can certainly dream that the kitties won't immediately scratch the hell out of the fabric we chose).  It's going to be different to have young kittens, with their sharp little claws and endless curiosity, in the house.  We all have much to learn about one another.  A new chapter begins, and we just could not be  happier.  

Surrounded by art

All right, I admit it.  Lately I have not been doing something new every day.  A lot of my time, almost all of several days in fact, has been spent writing and addressing holiday cards.  Since I don't give presents, I do like to send cards to the people who matter to me, and there are an awful lot of those.

I have also been working in an intense online training program for an organ donation center in Atlanta.  This program is designed to give Family Care Counselors a chance to experience approaching grieving families, both to help the family members through this most horrible time of their lives and also to broach the subject of organ donation.  That's a delicate kind of conversation which requires tact, confidence, knowledge, compassion, good timing, and the ability to talk about death without squeamishness.  I am playing a woman whose husband is alive but so brain damaged, he will never recover.  My daughter and I are presented with the necessity of choosing whether to place him in long term care, to live the rest of his life as a vegetable, or to "pull the plug" and honor his wishes to be an organ donor.  It has been an emotionally draining role, but so very satisfying.  I love doing this kind of program, using my acting talents in service to people who work in such an important, high stakes profession.

Anyway, today the program is on a break, so I took the day to do something that has been on my Someday list since I heard about months ago.  In an industrial neighborhood of Seattle, near our two sports stadia, is the Van Gogh Immersive Exhibition.  I wasn't even exactly sure what that meant, but I knew it sounded intriguing and unique, so I got two tickets and went with Sweet Hubby to immerse ourselves in art.

It's a wonderful exhibition.  I learned a lot about Van Gogh's short life, and of course there are many prints of his work.  But this installment goes beyond that, using projections and CGI to give visitors a feeling of being surrounded by and inside his works, in some cases seeing images in the paintings (a horse cart in a field, a boat on a river, etc.) moving, in others seeing paintings flow from one into another.  And there is music to add to the all around experience, including Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons".  

I'm not really describing it well enough to get across the sensory feast it is.  I found it inspiring, relaxing, stimulating, beautiful, and - I don't use this word lightly - awesome.  Nothing can truly compete with an in-person viewing of his paintings, but this exhibition does a great job of conveying not just the look but the feel, the emotion, of his works.  If you live here and can see it, or if you hear of it coming to your city, I highly recommend you give it to yourself or someone else as a very special treat.

The world around me

Today I decided to do something that doesn't seem like a big deal, but it struck me as a good challenge, one meant to give me the chance to breathe and be more present.  I went to a coffee house and sat with a cup of my new favorite drink, a hot chai tea latte - and here was the challenge - without reading or looking at my phone or in any way distracting myself.

This coffee house is inside a grocery store, and I sat myself so that I had a good view of the comings and goings of the staff and customers.  I was so tempted to pick up my book; I've been reading David Copperfield and was itching to continue, but instead I just sat and sipped and observed.

The playwright in me spontaneously made up little stories about the people who came into view.  That young Asian man with the glasses and his hair parted in the middle: he's studying to be a doctor but only because his parents urged him to; he'd much rather be a painter.  The brisk woman with the enviable ponytail: she's divorced and is enjoying her new freedom, although she's worried about her kids, who are becoming snarky teenagers.  The bald man with the limp wearing a Seahawks sweatshirt: he has been close to homelessness several time, but each time finds a way to bring himself back from the brink of poverty.  Now that he's getting older, he knows he needs forge a path toward solvency and security, but isn't quite sure how to do that.  His social worker tells him not to be too hard on himself, but he realizes he is paying the price now for his rowdy, self-indulgent youth.

My reward for not disappearing into a book or my phone was that I noticed when a friend passed by.  I called to her and we ended up sitting together having a nice chat.  So I guess I ended up distracted after all, but in a lovely way, and one I might have missed if I hadn't kept myself open to and interested in the world around me.

Squishy

I stopped on impulse at a Fred Meyers (think Target or WalMart, one of those stores that carries basically everything) with the idea of getting one of those coloring books that have intricate designs to fill in.  I looked through the entire store and found exactly one coloring book, one with fanciful, cartoony figures for kids.  But I bought it anyway because I think it might be relaxing sometime to sit and color, with nothing on my mind.

While I was there, I also bought myself a Squishy, which is a very soft stuffed toy about the size of a small pillow.  Mine is a bird in yellow and pale orange and green.  Bill says it's an angry bird based on the game Angry Birds, but I reject that connection.  My Squishy is happy and sweet.  I can imagine sitting on the couch holding it in my arms, sort of an upright cuddle.

I think it's time to get cats again.  I think my lap is feeling empty, and my hands are yearning for something soft to stroke.  Squishy will do in the meantime, and once we have cats again, Squishy will probably become a cat toy. 

What is a Seoul hot dog?

Sweet Hubby took me to a mall today, specifically to REI to buy me waterproof hiking shoes/boots so that next time I walk in slush and snow, my shoes, feet, and socks won't immediately become soaked and icy.  Today is my birthday and this was just one of his gifts.  

He has also hidden 71 cards around the house for me to find.  Each one contains money, anything from 1 cent to 20 dollars.  So far I've found 17 of them, most of them right under my nose.  I'm learning that I'm not terribly observant because, as I move through my day, I usually only see what I'm focused on and miss anything - even a colored envelope - that I'm not looking for.  SH is getting a day of laughs as he watches me, for example, pick up my daypack and completely miss seeing the yellow card under it.

Anyway, back to the mall trip.  As we were leaving, I spotted a shop called Seoul Hot Dog.  It didn't look terribly inviting.  There are boxes stacked up in the front window, and no seats or tables.  But in the spirit of  trying new things, I asked to go there for a small bite for lunch, and, in the spirit of giving me anything I want on my birthday, SH agreed.

These hot dogs are more like what we call corn dogs, meaning wieners or sausages on a stick.  But this place has variations on that theme.  Besides a meat dog, it's possible also to get a mozzarella stick, or a half and half.  Also, they asked if we wanted sugar on the panko crust, to which question, of course, we replied yes.  They offer several different dipping sauces.  I chose honey mustard for my half and half.  They also offer another variation of rolling the dog crust in potatoes bits.  We didn't go for that, mostly because we're going out to dinner tonight and want to be nice and hungry for that.

So that was my little impulse exploration of something new today.  I don't know that I'd go back to Seoul Hot Dogs, but it sure was fun giving it a try.  Happy birthday to me! 

The walk that wasn't

Yesterday I decided to take a long walk along the Interurban Trail.  I had some errands to run, and figured I would walk to and from, get my steps in, be out in the cold, crisp air, enjoy the snow.  This is a walk I've wanted to take for quite for a while, and yesterday was going to be the day.

Sadly, by the time I walked from my car to the trail, my shoes and feet were already soaked through.  The temp had warmed enough that the snow was melting and slushy and too uneven to walk in.  I had to bag the idea of this nice long walk, so I took a shorter walk with my icy feet, then drove to the rest of the errands. 

So the walk was a bust, but even so, it was kind of exciting for this California-born woman to get to be in the snow.  Despite electrical outage, despite cold feet, despite tricky driving, I just love living someplace where there are seasons.  It makes the coming holidays feel more holiday-ish.

A cold day and a hot drink

Sweet Hubby and I lost our electricity night before last, probably something to do with the snowstorm hitting this area, so yesterday was a hunt for warmth.  We went out for breakfast at a new place (stringy corned beef hash filled with fiery peppers), then tunnel flying, which is always fun, and a good workout, too.

We drove home after that, but still no electricity, so we went first to a coffee shop, where we sipped and read, and then to a library for more reading.  After that we met a friend to take him to dinner for his birthday (an excellent wedge salad).  Ever hopeful, we drove home, and although many of the blocks around ours had had their electricity restored, ours was still dark and cold.

We decided to treat ourselves to a night at a nearby hotel.  Not a top-notch place, but the bed was big, the heater worked, and there was hot water for a much-needed shower.  I finished the last half of a book I'd been slowly working my way through for several weeks.  Even with the so-so accommodations, it felt sort of luxurious and indulgent to be in a hotel mid-week and so close to home.  Definitely a new experience.

When we got home this morning, we found that our electricity was back at last, thanks be to the old gods and the new.  I unpacked and then set out on a walk through the snow to meet a friend at a coffee shop.  The Something New there was that I ordered a chai tea latte, which I'd never had before; I wasn't even sure what it was.  Usually I order iced tea, no matter the weather and temperature, but this just sounded really good, and was.

So yesterday was a whole day lived outside our routines, and because of that, was fun and even sort of exciting.  And I'm also very glad to be back home and warm and snug.  Oops, gotta run, meeting another friend at his condo to play Trivial Pursuit.  I love my life!

Snow day

It began snowing this morning, a light fluffy snow that didn't pile up much and didn't last, but still made everything look so pretty and wintery all day.  My only errand today was an appointment with a photographer to get my new headshots, but the session was canceled (Covid, not snow), so I suddenly had the day open.

Back in November I bragged about reading one day for more than one whole hour.  Today, I read all day.

Okay, not all day.  I did my Spanish lesson, did some workouts, watched an episode of "The Rings of Power" over lunch with Sweet Hubby, did some laundry.  But except for those life interruptions, I read all day.  

I can see that, especially on a day like today, it might be wonderful to read actually all day.  But that would mean giving up working out and Spanish and lunch with SH.  Laundry I can forego, but the rest I like to do.  So I guess today was as all day as I'm going to get.  It was glorious.

I taste my cookie!

Last night I did something that wasn't just new, it was practically revolutionary, in my life at least.  I took 3 of the Mint Chocolate Milano cookies Sweet Hubby had bought, and I ate all three of them very, very slowly, tasting every flavor, feeling every texture, sensing the cookie softening and the chocolate melting.

I'm a wolfer.  Without realizing it, I can power through a meal, and enjoy it but not be truly present to it.  So - when I remember to remind myself, which ends up being necessary about every three seconds - I'm going to do my best to savor my meals more, take more time, notice them more.

I can see that this blog is in large part about simply becoming more present to what is around me and inside me, becoming conscious of that which has become routine, to wake up to every part of my life.  This has become my Buddha blog.  About time I started noticing my life 

Cake and gratitude

After an excellent meal in an excellent steak house, Sweet Hubby and I decided to get dessert, which we usually forego.  The most interesting item on the dessert menu was Hummingbird Cake, which I'd heard of but never tried.  It's a three layer cake subtly flavored with bananas and pineapple, with a rich white cream cheese frosting.  So that was Something New.

But really the focus of this post is gratitude.  Given that it is the week of Thanksgiving, and to make the week about more than turkey dinner with all the trimmings and all the leftovers, I have made sure these last several days to communicate, either by phone or email, my deep appreciation to those people who have made my life better.

My first boyfriend, Tom.  He was my high school sweetheart and, for a short time, my fiancé.  I was fortunate to have him as my first love because he was and is a kind, intelligent man, and even though we were not meant to be life partners, we are still friends.  I am grateful for him.

My best male friend Bill, who has been my friend longer than anyone else outside of family.  He has an adventurous, inventive spirit and, when we lived in the same city, was constantly coming up with great ideas for what we could do for fun.  To this day, he continues to be able to make me laugh like nobody else.  Even living several states apart, we continue to stay in close communication, and next year already have a cruise to Hawai'i planned, another of his "Hey, let's do this!" ideas.

My girlfriends Christine and Teri, who have grounded and uplifted and consoled and encouraged me for more than 30 years.  I would not know my life without them.

The writing groups which have made me a better writer and a happier person.  My first group, when I and all of us were just beginning to learn our craft.  We were fortunate in our mentor and in each other.  We met regularly for 17 years, until I moved away from Los Angeles, and continue to be in touch, getting together when I go back there for a visit.  We cheer for each other's successes, critique each other's new works.  We have mourned the death of one of our youngest members.  I have no idea what kind of writer I might have become had I not had this group as my foundation.  And my current group, who bring insight, wisdom, humor, and collegiality into my life and my current work.

The group of women who came together when we all attended the same UU church, and who have stayed faithfully connected for many years now, long enough to have seen the death of one and the upcoming marriage of another.  These are my soul sisters, my sisters of the heart, to whom I can always turn for guidance and light.

Reflecting on these and the many other people who have meant so much to me, I could just about melt from joy and thankfulness.  How can any one person deserve so much goodness?  

Jeans, jeans, jeans

I really don't like shopping, especially shopping for clothes.  For some reason I'm comfortable shopping at a Goodwill or Value Village, but not in a 'real' clothing store. I often feel overwhelmed by all the possibilities, and am anxious that I won't make good choices. So it felt like a big deal when I decided yesterday to go to a mall and get some new jeans.  All of mine are tired-looking, some are stained, and I wanted to end the year with a fresher feeling about my closet.  It helps curb my shopping anxiety if I focus on looking at just one kind of item.  

I ended up staying in Macy's the whole time, tried on dozens of pairs of jeans, and finally came home with six new pairs.  Dark blue, light blue, burgundy, slim fit, relaxed fit, one with a floral design, and two pre-ripped.  I have always sort of secretly chuckled at people who wear pre-ripped pants, thinking "You're in such a hurry, you couldn't wait for them to rip naturally?"  And in a way, pre-rip is kind of a stupid idea.  In one pair, my toe kept getting caught in the ripped place when I tried them on, which, if that continued, would mean the rip would soon become a big, very unfashionable hole.  But I ended up getting a couple of pairs with the idea that I could sew on some colorful patches.  I wonder if I'll actually do that.

I hadn't taken into account that Black Friday is now a week long and so included yesterday, but fortunately there weren't any of the frenzied crowds famous for fighting and clawing and shoving one hears about the day after Thanksgiving.  And fortunately, absolutely everything was on sale.  Aren't I accidentally clever?

Almost too much chocolate

Today Sweet Hubby and I did something that I've been thinking about doing since I moved to Seattle but had never gotten around to.  There is a chocolate factory in town that offers tours, so we signed up and spent an hour or so learning about chocolate, eating chocolate, buying more chocolate, and generally having a splendid time.

The chocolate brand is Theo, a local company with excellent integrity.  The elements that go into making the chocolate are all organic and fair trade.  It was fascinating to learn, and see, how chocolate is made, from bean to bar.  I also like Theo because they put together some of the most interesting flavor combinations, such as a Gingerbread Spice, Fennel and Fig, and Turmeric Spice (which tastes sort of like Chai tea).

We tourists were given samples, of course, so right now I'm am so full of chocolate, I actually don't want any more - for now.

Happy Birthday!

When a local friend has a birthday, I like to take her to lunch and/or a movie or play, some kind of get together.  But when a friend who was recently widowed had a birthday, I wanted to make it extra special, so I suggested an all-day adventure.

We took a ferry to a nearby island and spent the afternoon having lunch at a wonderful and highly recommended Asian restaurant, went to the small, excellent art museum, and walked around the village exploring shops.  I am not usually fond of shopping, but I really got into it this day.  There were several high-end shops selling soaps and candles and candies and kitchenware and games and pot holders and all sorts of oddments.  I actually bought some soaps and jams and candies, four books that are on my reading list, as well as some cutie cute jar caps, sort of like shower caps for jars, a great green alternative to plastic wrap.

At the museum we discovered an amazing artist who works in more media than most: glass, metal, fabric, paint, wood, and she even incorporates virtual reality into some of her artworks.  I was blown away by this multi-talented woman, delighted to have been introduced to her.

My friend has vulnerable knees and back so we kept our outing to the main street of the village, but I'm now inspired to go back another day and walk further afield to explore more of the island, more of the stores and parks.  What a splendid, indulgent day, not the kind of day I allow myself very often, which I guess is part of what made it so special.

Small steps

I haven't been consistent lately about posting my Something News.  But that doesn't mean I haven't been shaking up my routines every day.  Because of this blog, I've been paying more attention to my posture, trying new kinds of fruits and vegetables, ordering different dishes at restaurants, changing up which foot or hand I do things with, taking new routes to get where I'm going, etc.  

None of these small steps have seemed worthy of sharing, though.  I feel as though I ought to be making bigger changes, trying more interesting SNs, being still bolder, exploring more.  I'll certainly do all that when schedule allows.  But in the meantime, I'm going to continue making those small changes that keep me awake and alert.

This morning I did something that for quite a while I've been thinking would be a good way to start the day.  I did a short aerobic workout to warm up, then some slow, deep yoga.  It feels so good to start the day that way.  I can only claim it as Something New this once, but intend to continue to make that my first-thing-in-the-morning routine from now on.

Feel free to share what SNs you've been trying out.

That ubiquitous pile of papers

Today I did something I've been meaning to do, wanting to do, needing to do for a long time.  I finally went through a pile of papers I've been accumulating for years under my desktop monitor.

What is on those papers are blog ideas, story ideas, bits of dialogue, possible play titles, reading suggestions, quotes, and poems.  I have always figured that I create stacks like this because I'm a writer and blogger and my fecund imagination never stops gathering and jotting down ideas.  But maybe everyone has some kind of stack of paper that gets out of hand.  

I've been putting off going through my stack because it didn't seem as important than everything else I can be doing with my time.  Also, I knew that I was going to want to keep a lot of those scribblings for later reference, at the same time recognizing that I might go to the trouble of typing them into a document and then never look at them again.  But I decided to get to the stack today because facing it every time I sit at my computer makes me feel unfinished, messy, lazy.  There is something about a clean space on a table or shelf or really anywhere at all that offers psychic space as well as physical.  I'm inspired now to clean up more of my office, gather and organize and review everything that's lying about.  I'll either rediscover useful gems of ideas or will do a lot of recycling or both.

And by the way, this morning I ate some of the chocolate persimmon I mentioned buying a few days ago.  I'd been waiting for it to soften, but instead it just started to get old and develop brown spots.  It never did get as soft as I have imagined persimmons are at their best.  So I ate a slice.  Didn't taste like chocolate at all.  Where did it get that name, I wonder?

Okay, I just looked it up, and supposedly a ripe chocolate persimmon has brownish flesh, which this one did not.  Was it not ripe?  Was it mislabeled?  Who knows?  It's one of those mysteries that are not in any way interesting enough to try to solve.

James Baldwin and me

Yesterday I did something that was so enjoyable, it practically felt wicked.  I sat down and read for more than an hour.

I'm pretty much always reading something.  Right now I'm halfway through "David Copperfield", and about a fifth of the way through Baldwin's "Another Country", which is what I was reading yesterday.  I love to read, have been a avid reader all my life.  But as an adult, it seems as though the times I read are either when I'm in bed about to fall asleep, or on public transportation, or in a waiting room, or at a restaurant eating by myself.  I almost always arrive early to wherever I'm going just so I'll have some time to read.  I truly can't remember the last time I just sat and read without being on the way to something else.

I guess reading feels indulgent because if I have time to read, then I surely also have time to do something more productive, such a housework, or running errands, or writing, or answering emails, or working out, or just about anything else.  Reading has come to feel like a luxury because it doesn't get me to produce any sort of tangible results, doesn't help the world or improve my home or blah blah blah.  It's one thing I do just for the sheer pleasure of it.

But when I think about, I'm not really being all that productive with my time when I'm not reading.  I do take care of the house and write and all that other stuff, but I also spend a lot of time at my computer just browsing around or playing word games or looking things up.  Surely reading is as profitable as any of that, and no doubt a great deal more so.  There are soooooooo many books I want to read, and I'm simply not going to get to many of them if I don't make reading a priority.

So I'm making reading a priority.  Which means spending less time in front of the computer.  Which I think is going to end up making just about every other part of life better and more sparkly. 

Snow White Who?

Last night at a Mexican restaurant, I ordered something I've never eaten before, a stew called molcajete.  It consisted of chicken and mushrooms in a strong, slightly spicy tomato broth.  Very good.

But the bigger news isn't really a one day Something New.  I have been working for a long time on a couple of my full length plays-in-progress.  Both of them are fairly serious, and I realized I needed a light-hearted break from those, so I decided to write a short play based, for no particular reason, on a fairy tale.  I used to write short plays almost exclusively; it's very easy to get them performed because there are so many theaters that produce short plays festivals.  The past few years I've been focusing more on finishing some of the full lengths plays I've begun, but it has been really enjoyable lately to work in the short form again.  Less to manage, no need for subplots, usually fewer characters.

It was a good challenge to decide on a theme (fairy tale) without already having a play in mind.  I don't know what made me think of Snow White, but once it came to me, my imagination started running right away.  This little play is about the moment when Prince Charming tells his father the King that he has met the girl he wants to marry.  The King isn't terribly happy when he hears that this girl has been living with seven male dwarves and has a vicious witch for a mother.  I haven't quite figured out how to end the play, but the body of it is coming along nicely.

New room, new fruit, and straight shoulders

For several years I've been leading a quarterly training program for UW journalism students.  The program is designed to give the students the experience of interviewing people who are going through a traumatic event.  Actors are used to play different characters involved in the scenario.  

From the beginning the program used the backdrop of an apartment fire, so that is the scenario I've been used to incorporating into conducting the training, but quite recently the circumstances of the scenario have been changed.  I led this new version on Zoom a couple of times last year, although of course Zoom is a pale imitation of face to face, in person, real life communication.

Yesterday I led the training for the first time in a classroom, in person.  But it was a different classroom than I had ever been in, so between having been away from in-person leading, and the new scenario, and the new classroom, which was bigger and therefore affected acoustics and intimacy, my confidence was even more wobbly than usual.  As often as I've led this program, I still always have a sense of dread when approaching the next training.  Once I get warmed up, I always have a splendid time, although, like most teachers, I seldom get to hear if the training had an effect on the students or was as powerful as I know it can be.

That was Something New for yesterday.

Today while I was grocery shopping I chose some different produce than I've had or even heard of before.  One is a chocolate persimmon.  I've never eaten a persimmon, having decided a long time ago, based on nothing but childish whim, that I don't care for them.  But in the name of trying new things, I thought I'd buy one, let it ripen a bit more (aren't they supposed to be soft?), and then eat it.  I asked the checker if it was called chocolate because the pulp is brown, but she didn't know, so I'm looking forward to finding out.

I also bought 3 new (to me) kinds of apples: Lemonade, Hunnyz, and Envy.  I do love living in the apple capital of the country, maybe of the world.  So many kinds to choose from.

Today's other Something New was to maintain good posture all day.  It was surprising to me that every time I thought to check my posture, I had fallen into either tightness or slumping.  All day long I kept pulling my shoulders back and keeping my head up and holding in my stomach, and then ten minutes later I'd find that I was once again either tense or slack.  I think I need to keep up this commitment to good posture for a while, long enough that it might become the habit. 

Ed Sheeran and voicemail

Last night I listened to a new Ed Sheeran CD.  I loved it.  I really wasn't familiar with ES's music, so I'm not sure why I decided to buy two of his CD's.  I was first introduced to him in the film "Yesterday", in which he plays himself.  I thought he was pretty gusty to take that role because in it, he acknowledges that he is not as good a song writer as the team of McCartney and Lennon.  I was impressed by that, and by the one short song he sings during the film.

I later noticed him in a small role in an episode of "Game of Thrones" in which he plays a soldier/minstrel.  He sang as part of that role, a period song, of course, so not very indicative of his own music.  But still, I could just tell that I would like his music, and I do.  He's one of those famous people, like Dolly Parton or Barak and Michelle Obama,  who seems as though he would be fun to be seated next to at a dinner party.  I can hardly wait to listen to the second CD, and will most likely get more of them.

Today's Something New was inspired by a book I bought recently on the advice of a very smart friend of mine.  The book is "Explore Every Day: 365 Prompts to Refresh Your Life".  I went through the book today and marked a lot of them that will help me keep to my commitment to do something new every day.  Today I recorded a new cell phone outgoing message.  It has been the same one for just about as long as I've had a smart phone, which feels like decades.  The new message isn't particularly inspired.  I recorded some versions in which I said "Leave a message unless you're a scammer, in which case drop dead."  But that felt too negative, so I kept it very simple.

I'm looking forward to taking on some of the other prompts in this book.  And now to listen to some more of my new ear-throb Ed. 

Is that my hand?

I've written already about a day when I made myself aware of how I routinely do things and then did them another way, using a different hand or foot.  On that day, which was loads of fun (not sarcasm), I gave myself a pass on writing and typing.

Today I tried controlling my mouse with my left hand.  Ack!  It was difficult and so clumsy for such a minimal movement.  The elbow on my right arm has begun to ache, so I'm wondering if some of that is the beginnings of injury from the repetitive motion of clicking.  So I used my left hand to click.

It was challenging even to figure out where to put the cords.  (My desktop mouse is corded but my laptop is not, in case you're  thinking Sweet Hubby has abandoned me in the Dark Ages of cords on, well, anything.  I'm sure he has offered to upgrade me to cordless, but I'm of the "don't change anything that I've learned how to do!" school of thought.)  It was so much more difficult than I had anticipated, which is what made it interesting. 

To quince or not to quince

Last time I went to the grocery store, in the spirit of trying something new, I bought a quince.  I've never had one before except in jelly and once as an ice cream flavor, and wouldn't have known what it was if it hadn't been labeled.  It seemed pretty hard, so I've let it sit for several days, hoping that, like pears and tomatoes, it would continue to ripen and soften.

It seemed as though sufficient time had passed, so this morning I tried to eat it.  But it was still so hard, I could barely cut it open.  I don't know if that's what it's supposed to be like, but it seemed to me it should have been just a little softer.  It was harder even than an apple.

I ate a bit, but ended up spitting it out.  Maybe it could be used to make pie, since baking softens fruit, but I think I'll just say that I gave it a try, didn't like it, and don't need to try one again.

And now I know why it is mostly used to make jelly.  As raw fruit, it's a solid yuck.     

Singing in a circle

Yesterday was another day of more than one Something New.  The first scheduled activity of the day was another nurse training program.  I played the sister of a man (played by a mannequin voiced by a man in a secluded booth) who is dying and does die during the scenario.  The idea is to give the trainees practice in taking care not just of the patient but also the patient's loved one.  I have done this scenario before and, by imagining my real brother in the bed, I'm always able to come up with a deep emotional response to the moment, which gives the trainees a lot to work with.

The training didn't start until the afternoon, but I like giving myself plenty of time to get there, so I took the train to a stop some distance away from the university where the program takes place and got some lunch.  Since I still had a fair bit of time before the program, I decided to walk through the neighborhood around the university.  I've been to some commercial destinations in this neighborhood, but was not familiar with its residential areas.  It was raining by this time, so I popped open my umbrella and walked and walked.

The neighborhood is somewhat shabby, lots of graffiti and litter, but it also has a certain charm.  It is probably one of the most ethnically mixed areas in the city, which was reflected in how the houses were decorated, what icons, symbols, or tchotchkes were in the front yards and windows, and in the people I encountered as I was walking.

The next Something New was in the evening, going to a song circle to which I'd been invited.  Song circles aren't completely new to my experience.  When I lived on the central CA coast for two years between Los Angeles and Seattle, I became part of a song circle in Santa Cruz.  A song circle is a gathering of people who get together to sing.  Pretty simple, huh?  The Santa Cruz circle mostly used a spiral-bound book titled Rise Up Singing, which contains the words and music to 1,200 songs: folk tunes, political songs, songs from musicals, pop songs from the 70's and 80's.  Usually a few of the singers would bring guitars or other instruments.  We went around the circle with everyone having chances to choose the next song.

When I moved to Seattle, I immediately went searching for another song circle as a way to connect with people in my new city.  I did find one, but the people in that circle sang folk songs so obscure that often only one or two people would know them, so I did a lot more listening than singing.

Last night's circle is being formed specifically around the idea of creating community.  The two leaders of this group had brought what they called paperless songs, which were very simple songs that could be taught to rest of us after only a couple of passes.  Every song was heartfelt and loving, songs of hope and possibility.  It was a very pleasant experience.  I do love to sing. 

Me and my achin' coozy

Well, this was different.  I've done lots of training programs for people in various professions, acting a character in simulated situations, but this evening was something brand new to me.  This evening, the job was to give nursing trainees a chance to do a pelvic exam on a real live person.

I really like doing this kind of work, which feels like a more substantial contribution than my writing ever has.  I've conducted a trauma program for journalism students, played a woman watching her brother die, played a family member being approached about possible eye/tissue/organ donation, played a parent giving a hard time to community college deans, etc.  For this job, I didn't need to play a role, but only submit to five consecutive pelvic exams and give feedback (which was sometimes "Yeeouch!").

I hadn't taken into account that, because of my age and being post-menopausal, my vaginal tissue is not nearly as flexible as it used to be.  And, as any woman reading this will confirm, the insertion of a speculum is always uncomfortable and, if clumsily handled, downright painful.  I learned after the first one to ask for lubricant, which helped quite a bit with the subsequent four.

For a while during this program, I thought I might bow out of the commitment I had made to another round of exams later this month.  But really, I love doing this sort of work.  The pay is okay, not much to speak of.  But I like doing something that I know is of value to medical professionals-in-training.  It's an honor, actually, to be someone they can practice their skills on before they are let loose to work with true patients.  Tonight not so much, but most of these trainings allow me to use my acting in support of something meaningful.  

Tomorrow I'm going to play the woman watching her brother die.  I've done this program before, and it is always emotionally rich for me, which makes it a deeper experience for the trainees, who are learning how to take care not just of the patient but of the patient's loved one.  All I have to do is imagine my real brother lying in a hospital bed taking his last breaths, and I feel a grief which goes beyond simulation.  This is one of my favorite jobs of this type.  And in this one, nothing bleeds.  

A new tunnel

Sweet Hubby and I are back from a lovely trip to Portland, OR where we saw a longtime friend performing in a play.  The play itself was the kind written as a catharsis for the writer, an unpleasant look at his childhood, which was dominated by a narcissistic, bullying mother.  Not much fun to watch, but SH and I enjoyed seeing our friend perform.  New play, new theater, so that's 2 Somethings New.

After spending the night at our friend's home, we went to the Portland indoor skydiving tunnel to try it out, something we've been wanting to do since it opened several years ago.  Something New #3.  We had brought our tunnel flying equipment (helmets, gloves, suits, etc), and let the tunnel staff know that we are fairly experienced after 12 years of flying.  The members of the staff we interacted with were all lovely and friendly.

It was different flying in this tunnel.  Although the tunnel itself is taller than the one we usually go to, the diameter is the same as ours.  But the air felt quite different from the Seattle tunnel.  Even the staff described the air as "mushy" near the netting.  And indeed, when I flew low, it was a bit of a challenge to rise up again. But that just became part of the experience, figuring out how to fly in slightly different conditions.  As we tunnel flyers often say, any flying is good flying.

SH and I enjoyed ourselves so much that we are planning to go to Portland again specifically to do some more flying in that tunnel, although, weather depending, we might also kick around the city again to see some of the sights.

All in all, an enjoyable trip, made more enjoyable by sharing it with SH.  And now I'm so glad to be home for a while.

So many talented friends

Two nights ago, I drove to a town 1 1/2 hour north of home to see our faux grandson play Brad in The Rocky Horror Show.  This is the tall, mop-haired, goofy, sweet young man who played my grandson in a series of commercials I was hired for in Boise last year.  He no longer has grandparents, so Sweet Hubby and I have sort of adopted him, or he's adopted us.  He's come over a couple of times for movies, and we took him tunnel flying once.  He's still young and unfinished, but he's going to make a terrific and admirable man as he matures.

This was my first time see Rocky Horror live, and it was quite the hoot.  More than half the audience were in costumes, and the theater handed out bags of props for those moments in the show which have come to call for them (squirt guns, phony coins, cards, etc).  Those member of of the audience also knew the show well enough to shout out questions at different moments of the play.  The costumes, both in the audience and onstage, were outrageous - a lot of bustiers, corsets, fishnet stockings, loads of cleavage.  (Too bad Sweet Hubby wasn't feeling well and couldn't join me.)  The cast members really threw themselves into their roles, totally committed.  It's hard to beat Tim Curry, though, for outrageousness and commitment to a role.  I actually met him once, and he seemed absolutely nothing at all like Dr. Frank N. Furter.  He was a quiet, modest English gentleman who loved to talk about gardening.  (Of course, I don't know what he's like in private.)  Anyway, this was a delightful, raucous evening.

Last night I went with friends to a town not quite an hour south of home to see one of our mutual friends in a very old (1923) play about a supposedly haunted train depot.  Our friend was terrific; we hardly recognized her when she first appeared onstage.  Too bad her character ends up sleeping through a lot of the play.  The actors showed different levels of skill, but it was an enjoyable enough evening.

Tomorrow SH and I are driving 3 hours to Portland, OR to see yet another friend in yet another play.  This friend is someone I met decades ago in acting classes.  Like me, she has never quite been able to create a sustained, successful acting career and, like me, she continues to look for opportunities to scratch that performing itch, which never seems to go away for some of us.

So those have been and will be my Something News for these few days.  New plays, new theaters, new experiences.  I do have so many talented friends, and not just actors.  Because of all the writers in my sphere, I feel as though I'm always reading a new or in-progress play, novel, essay or poetry collection.  What a treat.  I try never to miss supporting a friend's accomplishments, and not just because of course I love for them to support mine.

Back from travels

Here I am again, back home after an absolutely fantastic week of family and friends, old and new.  My niece's wedding was so beautiful.  The weather was cool and bright and windy.  I had written out the ceremony I wanted to lead, but found that trying to memorize it made me feel stiff and artificial, so I just made note of the points I wanted to touch on and then allowed myself to be in the moment.  There was much laughter during the ceremony, and also a lot of happy tears.  And best of all, my family is just wild about the man who became part of us that day.

There were loads of folks from my family, but fortunately a lot of friends and family of the groom also showed up.  It was delightful getting to know some of them at different gatherings throughout the several days.  That was pretty much my Something New for the week.  I was in a familiar place, with the familiarity of my family around me, eating at favorite restaurants, walking a coastline trail I've walked hundreds of times in the past.  The newness was meeting the groom's family and friends, having jolly, inquiring conversations, some of which went deep and some of which danced on the surface.

I find that I enjoy big hooplas, but also sometimes find them tiring, having to rise to a continuous flow of socializing, often having to speak loudly to be heard and strain to hear.  The smaller, quieter gatherings were my favorite.  Best of all was when another niece and her husband stopped by the house where Sweet Hubby and I were staying.  They are new parents (Baby was at the hotel in the care of her grandmother), so it was a treat for them to be able to be out without carrying baby and all the stuff stuff stuff that comes with her.  It was about 11pm when they knocked, and the four of us stayed up until almost 3am, talking and talking and talking.  I haven't had a lengthy conversation with this niece for ever so long, and this was my first chance to really get down with her husband, who I continue to fall in love with.  What joy to be with them in a private, quiet setting.

All in all, the week was satisfying, nourishing, exciting, fun, and best of all, I got to share it with Sweet Hubby.

Familiar and strange

It has felt so very familiar and also so very strange to be in Monterey and Pacific Grove again.  So much of my life has been spent here, but not for a long time.  I'm having to become reacquainted with the streets and stores and restaurants.  It has been interesting to notice which have survived through the years and the pandemic, and which have been replaced.

It was a day of many Somethings New.  My motel is close to a park that I and my family have driven past many x8 times, but until today I had never stepped foot in it.  It's a large park that encompasses a long pond, a cemetery, an astounding children's play area, and lots of trees and grass.  I walked the periphery until I got to the playground.  Then I gave in to the urge to have some fun on the varied and inventive play stations.  I slid down 3 slides: a curvy one, a spiral, and one made up of red rollers.  There was a maze path, and an arched bridge, and a suspension bridge, as well as a merry-go-round (not a carousel) on which were installed cages one could stand in and twirl on an axis.

When I told Sweet Hubby about this part of my day, he asked if any of the kids gave me the stink eye.  I said maybe a parent or two might have but that I hope they would just think this old lady is still young at heart.  The playground and the walk were wonderful fun, and I'd already gotten almost 8K steps on my  Fitbit by the time the next part of the day started.

My Santa Cruz friend Liz came to pick me up and we went into small, homey downtown Monterey to look for a lunch spot.  We ended up at a Thai restaurant, not exotic but new to us both, and after real food, finished with ice cream from a place famous for its odd flavorings.  I had a scoop of honey/cinnamon/quince ice cream, which tasted good and had a strange, grainy texture.  New thing #3 already.

After an afternoon of driving along and then sitting by the rocky shoreline together, Liz went back to Santa Cruz.  I read for a while (Brideshead Revisted), then took myself into Pacific Grove for dinner at a new (to me) restaurant.  I even ordered a salad with an ingredient I'd never heard of: lardons, which, it turns out, at this restaurant at least, are cubes of smoked salmon.  (The dictionary defines lardon as a piece of bacon used to lard meat.)

Tomorrow SH and lots of family members will be showing up in PG and the pre-wedding hurrahs will begin, probably involving many meals, many games, many, many conversations.  I'll check in when I can, but now must go practice the ceremony I've planned for my niece and her fiancé.  Let the fun begin!

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Traveling again

It turns out I do have access to my blogs when I travel, so here I go.  I'm in beautiful Monterey, CA to officiate my niece's wedding.  I've come a few days early because I used to live here and still have friends in the area.  When I left Los Angeles in 2000, I moved for two years to nearby Pacific Grove to live in the little beach cottage that had been my family's vacation home since my childhood.  After an intense romance with a bitter ending, I moved on a whim to Seattle, where I immediately felt at home.  Soon after, my parents had the cottage remodeled, modernized, and expanded, and this was their home 'til their last days.

Even though I was only in Pacific Grove for two years, I came away with some very close friendships. and am happy now to have a reason to come back to visit in person.  The wedding will take place in a park just across the street from what was our parents' home, which is now a vacation rental owned by others.  In fact, six of us in the wedding party will be staying at that house for the next few days, which will no doubt be both familiar and strange.  So much of my family's life was lived in that house; so many memories, mostly good, of holidays, vacations, honeymoons, gatherings of all kinds.  I'm feeling very nostalgic for my mom right now.

But on to Something New.  I have a confession to make.  I'm very disappointed in myself.  The day before I left on this trip, Sweet Hubby and I went to a new (to us) Chinese restaurant, a place so authentic, we barely recognized anything on the menu.  There were, on the back page, some dishes listed as "standard" Chinese food, meaning food Americans would recognize, and my confession is that I ordered from that page instead of daring some of the more, shall we say, ethnic and colorful dishes.  So I am determined that we will go to this place again and I will order one of the pig ear/beef tendon/black fungus/I've-no-idea- what-this-is dishes.  Most of them look pretty chili-fied, though, and my little white bread tongue doesn't always do well with a lot of spicy heat.  But I'm going to give it a try.  I'm so embarrassed that I didn't the first time.

Still looking for the new

It's been challenging lately to do/see/experience Somethings New because Sweet Hubby and I have been staying inside most of the time to avoid the smoky air.  I'm grateful not to be closer to the fires raging around us.  I believe this smoke is currently coming from Eastern WA.  It has been almost a month of bad air, which is a shame.  We missed a lot of the last of the warm days when it would have been good to be out on the deck, and it has been difficult to get in as many steps as I usually do because of not taking my nice long walks.

SH and I did venture out on our final couch-hunting expedition.  After sitting on many, many couches covered in many different fabrics, we finally found the one we both really like, as well as the fabric to cover it.  It won't arrive for several months because it is being custom upholstered.  This is the first time we've looked for and bought a brand new piece of large furniture together, so I'm counting this as Something New.

I've also begun writing a new short play, my first play based on a fairy tale (Something New!).  I've been slogging through a couple of difficult, somber full length plays and needed to take a break, so this new one is going to be light and funny (or so I hope).  It's about Prince Charming telling his father that he has met the girl he wants to marry (Snow White), and the king's reaction to learning that she has been living with seven male dwarfs.

I also went through, cleaned out, wiped down, and re-organized one of my desk drawers, the one which holds a  hodge-podge of brads, tacks, rubber bands, new pencils and pens, glue, head lamps, calculator, etc.  I discovered 8 thumb drives, some of which seem to be empty, some of which carry videos from early early tunnel flying sessions.  One has my photos from the trip to Palestine, and another is a video of a movie version of one of my short plays, starring Ed Asner and Barbara Baine.  (Sadly, not a very good movie, although it won a couple of awards at minor film festivals.)  I want to go through these thumb drives with SH to see if I'm missing content on the ones which seem to be empty.

And I bought a purple, almost black, bell pepper and a Japanese cucumber.  Neither of them terrible exotic, but still, I'd never tried either before because I tend to go for what I already am familiar with.  Both were quite tasty.

I'm setting out tomorrow on another trip to CA, this time to officiate my niece's wedding.  It's going to be a big family gathering, and I'm excited about it, but recognize that I may not be posting every day.  Still, I'll do my best to keep stretching and exploring and experimenting.

Home from travels

I was traveling for several days and didn't have access to my blogs, but I was doing many Something News every days while I was gone, and since I've been back.

I was in Los Angeles with the double intention of seeing a play of mine performed and catching up with some of the friends I left behind when I moved to Seattle.  It was an almost perfect stretch of days.  The weather was good, not too hot, not too smoggy.  The performances of my play were pretty good, good enough that I wasn't embarrassed for friends to see it.  And best of all was getting together with one of my best best best friends, plus good friends I haven't see in quite a while, plus finally being face to face with a writing colleague I'd only met online up to now.

It was my first time going to the theater that produced my play, even though this theater has been in existence for 60 years.  So that was new.  Driving the streets of Los Angeles was new because I was in an area in the San Fernando Valley I didn't used to frequent when I lived in Hollywood.  Even the car I was driving was new, my first time driving and parking an SUV.  It wasn't huge, but it did take some getting used to.  Happily for me and the rental company, no accidents nor dings.  All of the restaurants I went to for meals with friends were new.  (When I was on my own, I went to the Denny's across the street from my hotel.)

Since coming home, I've done several new things, including going to some consignment stores with Sweet Hubby to look for a new couch for our living room.  I have to say, I'm going to feel some sorrow when we move our old couch downstairs.  That couch was the first big piece of furniture I chose and bought all on my own.  I've had it for 20 years, and it has served me and us very well.  I like the way it looks (denim blue), it's comfy for sitting and for stretching out on for a nap, and it is by now soaked through with memories of me and SH sitting on it watching movies with cats in our laps.  We've found the new couch we want and are now in the process of deciding what fabric we want it covered in.  We're also on the verge of finding new kitties, so the time for making new memories is approaching.  Still, I love my old couch and will miss it when it's out of sight.

One other Something New: I tried a bottled drink, Honey Water with Ginger.  Yuck.  I drank it because both honey and ginger are supposed to be nutritious, but still - yuck.  Once was enough.

Another singer I've never heard of

Today I listened to a CD by an artist named Skye Dyer.  She's a lovely young woman with a sweet voice, sort of  Mindy Smith-ish sounding.  Her father is Wayne Dyer, an author famous for books about self improvement and self actualization, although that has nothing to do with her music.

This was a short CD, only six songs.  As I said, her voice is sweet and the songs are sweet, with a slight hint of country.  Listening to her got me thinking about why some singers (or artists of any sort, but I'll stick to singers) become famous and some, who have perfectly nice faces and voices, do not.  How is Skye Dyer different from, let's say, Dolly Parton?  What does Dolly have that Skye doesn't?  (This is not a set-up for a boob joke, by the way.)  For one thing, Dolly is, or was, a prolific songwriter.  And while Skye's voice is sort of blandly sweet, Dolly's is distinctively sweet, with a cute little vibrato.  Skye is pretty, and so is Dolly, but Dolly went farther with her looks, going to spangles and fringe and showy outfits, at least in the first part of her career.

So is it how they look and sound that has made the difference in the trajectory of their careers?  I do wonder, often, about what brings fame to some and not to others.  There's obviously a lot more to it than talent.  Is it more a matter of drive, ambition, commitment, unwavering hunger for success?  I have no way to measure that factor in these women's careers, but I do tend to think that drive may, or must, be the single most important piece of the puzzle.  I have talent.  I have persistence.  But I do not have drive.  Never have had.  I don't know that I've ever been 100 percent committed to anything besides my marriage.

Sometimes I wonder if my life has been too easy, and that's why I lack the ferocity that might have taken me further in my careers (writing and acting).  I just haven't had much to push against, and it's pushing against something (poverty, discrimination, abuse, bullying, tragedy, loss, fear, etc) that makes us strong.  I've certainly had my setbacks and difficulties.  There was a stretch of several years when I was paying my rent in chunks because I never had the whole amount at one time.  But I always knew that my family would catch me if I started to fall, and they did step in to help when I needed it most.  I was mugged about five times, but never harmed.  I've had illnesses and accidents, but none that caused lifelong pain or limitations.  I've had heartaches by the dozens, but very little actual grief.

Maybe this is where the charming myth about artists starving in garrets comes from, the fact that starving artists are more driven to succeed than the well-fed.  Or maybe that's bunkum.  Maybe circumstances have nothing whatsoever to do with one's success.  Maybe some become successful and some don't and there's no telling why.  But it is a fascinating subject to someone like me, who has nibbled around the edges of success without ever making a whole meal of it.

Pop songs and cold soup

This evening I listened to a CD by Tanika Tikaram.  It was one of the ones I had snagged at the library book sale.  I'd never heard of this artist, couldn't tell from the cover photo if she was male or female (female), didn't know what kind of music to expect.  But because of the exotic name, as well as the title of the CD, "Ancient Heart", I was expecting something international or meditative, maybe chanting and droning with drums, something along those lines.

Nope.  She's sort of a pop singer/songwriter, with a very ordinary voice, and not particularly deep, insightful, nor poetical lyrics.  It was for this sort of artistic experience that the term 'meh' was invented.  I don't mean to dismiss her too callously.  She did get a CD made, after all, and wrote all the songs herself.  But still, meh.

The other Something New today was a bowl of cold cucumber soup at a friend's house.  Probably very healthy, and the other friend at table seemed to really enjoy it and even asked for the recipe.  But for me, meh.  The rest of dinner was terrific, and the conversation as we dined was far-ranging and full of fun and deep thoughts alike.  And that made the evening very much not meh. 

I wonder how it tastes

Today after breakfast and Sunday paper, Sweet Hubby and I went to a Farmers Market.  I decided that today I would get some produce I've never tried before. 

These included an ivory pepper, a slightly smaller member of the bell pepper family, a lovely pearly color.  We had some slices of it on a vegetable sandwich.  Quite tasty.  I also got an 8-Ball zucchini, which is round with a speckled skin.  Had that steamed for dinner, along with corn on the cob.  Got to eat as much fresh corn as we can while the season lasts.  The 8-Ball has a gentle squash-y taste.

The most unusual of the new items was a clump of lion's mane mushroom.  It's a strange-looking fungus which looks sort of like solidified foam.  I hadn't the slightest idea what to do with it, so the vendor suggested tearing it into small pieces and mixing it up with egg and bread crumbs, like a faux crab cake.  So that's what I did, although I put some jalapeno relish in the mix, which rather over powered the taste of the mushroom.  I'm glad I tried it, though.  I'd seen it before and always shied away because it's so different from anything I've eaten before.  I'm enjoying this exploration into new sensation.

Also new today (which is now yesterday) was listening to a Lenny Kravitz CD.  I'd heard of Kravitz, of course, and knew he is a musician, but my exposure to him as been in his role as Katniss Everdeen's sympathetic, doomed costumier Cinna.  I didn't care for the first couple of numbers, which are harder rock than I usually listen to.  But I'm glad I stuck it out for the rest of the CD, which is more to my liking.  A talented man for sure, who wrote (writes) most of his own music. 

Jina langu ni nani

Sweet Hubby and I didn't leave the house today because of the smoky air from fires around us, so today my Something New was taking a Duolingo lesson in Swahili. 

Really fascinating to attempt to learn a language so very different from mine.  If I were going to pursue this study, I would have to review the first, most elemental, lesson, maybe a few times.  The lesson was all pronouns and whether someone is Kenyan, Tanzanian, American, or Dutch.  The title of this blog entry means "What is my name?"  Pretty much all I have retained is that 'ni' means 'is'.  I'm still not sure which of these words is 'name' but I think it's 'jinu'.  

I have friends who lived in Africa (can't remember which country) and became proficient in Swahili.  Maybe that's why I chose that over the other languages Duo offers.  Talk about a mind stretch.  I'm starting to wish I had infinite time available.  I am so hungry to learn, so hungry to read more books, learn more languages, listen to more music, visit more parks and neighborhoods and countries, write more plays.  I want to know at the end of my life that I said "I love you" often enough.

I still feel younger than my age, but I finally know for certain and for sure that my time is temporary, limited, finite.  I saw that recently all in a flash, that every summer will keep rolling over into fall and fall into winter and winter into spring.  I see now the inherent cascading of one year, one season, one day, one moment into another.  Time isn't speeding up for me so much as it is becoming clear to me the inexorable progression of seconds that make up my life, every life.

So yeah, Swahili.  Interesting.

In search of the perfect sofa

Today Sweeet Hubby and I continued our search for a new sofa.  This would have been rather tedious to do on own, since I'm not much of a shopper, but to have SH's company made the afternoon downright jolly.  We went to a consignment store with several levels of furniture to try out.  We didn't find the one that was just right, but the search gave us a chance to become even clearer on what we're looking for: the right size to fit in our little living room, 3 cushions not 2 so that I can sit next to SH without sitting on a crack, soft arms, high enough back, fabric not leather.

I love sharing these domestic errands.  Although I relish the affection and sex and security that coupleness provides, it's really the small moments, the shared ordinariness, the companionship which are the happiest parts of marriage.  I wouldn't have believed that when I was younger and juicy hormones were more important, but in the long run, Mom and Dad were right: marry someone whose company you delight in.

The Something New was going to a pizza café we'd never been to and trying a different kind of pizza, Chicken Tikka Masala.  Sad to say, it was yucky, but the salad was good.  I continue to learn that not everything new is fun and wonderful, but still, worth a try and now I know there's a reason Tikka Masala pizza doesn't show up on most menus.

Funnest day

Today ended up being about the funnest day ever.  First, as I was driving to meet some of my theater friends for a play reading, I listened to one of the new CDs I'd gotten recently.  (SN #1)  I thought the artist, David Wilcox, was new to me, but it turned out I'd heard and enjoyed several of his songs years ago on a mixed cassette tape (maybe more than several years ago) my brother and his wife made for me.  I really like this singer.  His music is simple and folksy and very personal.  I especially like his song about the woman in his life spilling blue paint on the kitchen floor and turning the spill into an artwork by letting it dry and painting a frame around it.

Then there was the play reading, spending a few hours with beloved colleagues reading aloud a Caryl Churchill play and then talking about what thoughts and feelings the play evoked, which became a wide ranging discussion about our lives and the country and climate change, etc.  Conversations like this are a true pig wallow for me, so stimulating, even if the subjects broached are sometimes disturbing.

This evening Sweet Hubby and I took the train down to Seattle's oldest neighborhood for a dinner theater performance.  (SN #2)  I know two of the actor/singers, which is what prompted me to go to this place, which I've heard about for years.  The theater part of the evening was sort of goofy and unwieldy and messy, a very very very loose adaptation of the Alice in Wonderland story.  Not really my cup of tea; I'm stodgy enough that I like my theater scripted and with a clear story.  But I enjoyed seeing my friends perform, and the dinner was, for the most part, pretty spectacular, each of the four courses served in an imaginative way.

SN #3 was taking a trolley from this neighborhood to another, then taking the train back from there.  I'd seen the trolley many times but was never exactly sure where it went and where it stopped, so it was delightful and informative to ride it from one terminus to the other.

All in all, such a good day, and I got to spend most of it with SH, which makes everything sweeter.

Nosing around town with Sweeet Hubby

Today ended up being so delightful, with several Something News.  The first was listening to yet another CD of someone I'd not heard of, a South African singer/composer/musician named Hugh Masekela.  Sadly, the music was too jazzy, too trumpet-y for my taste.  I'd been hoping for something more native sounding, African folk music, tribal music, ritual music.  So this one was worth a try but a bit of a bust.

However, later in the day, Sweeet Hubby and I drove to a small town north of us to go to a specific travel shop to look for a new suitcase for me.  I'm always so happy when SH joins me on a jaunt out of the house, and for this one he seemed genuinely interested.  It turned out that terrific travel shop had closed, but being in the main part of this cute town inspired us to look around, gazing into shop windows, noticing public and private art and a lot of bushes with fantastic, multi-colored leaves (kinds of coleuses perhaps?).

We even spent some time trying out sofas, since ours is old and doesn't give much support any more.  I love our old sofa, which is denim blue and long enough to sleep on.  It was the first piece of big furniture I bought new for myself, soon after I first moved to Seattle, so it holds a lot of memories for me.  It's faded now, and stained, and the kitties did some shredding business on it.  But still, I love it and will be ever so slightly sad to see it go.  I'm looking forward to SH and I together finding a new one we both can love and invest with new memories.

As we left the sofa store, SH spotted a pub, sort of run-down and folksy looking, the kind of place tourists might pass by but locals love.  Our waiter was just wonderful, the food and beer was good, and it was all in all a great and spontaneous find.  We followed that with some chocolate and espresso gelato.  What a nice evening at the end of a good day.

Nickleback

Today I listened to a Nickelback CD.  I'd heard of them, but had no idea what sort of music they make.  I'm still not sure how to categorize it.  The sound is hard-driving, certainly not as much as Megadeath, but forceful and powerful.  The lyrics, though, at least to the first three songs (all I've listened to so far), are full of yearning and regret, even nostalgia.  I gave up on Megadeath pretty quickly; it's really not my kind of music, and I am obviously not the intended audience.  But I'm going to continue to listen to Nickelback, go through the entire CD at least once, maybe twice, then decide if it's a keeper or not.

Okay, I've looked them up on Wiki.  They are a Canadian band, known for post-grunge, hard rock, pop rock, alternative rock, alternative metal.  That's quite a list of categories, which may explain why I had a difficult time figuring out what kind of music I was listening to.  Like Megadeath, they've been around for a long time and have at times been soundly successful.  

It's a bit strange to think of all the bands, singers, and composers who have been working during my lifetime, been very successful, and yet I've never come in contact with them.  I guess I have tended to stay with those soloists or groups I already know or ones I've heard and quickly recognized them as doing "my kind of music".  I'm really glad I've taken on this stretching exercise.  It's exciting to think of the discoveries ahead (8 CDs to go), some of which I may fall in love with, some of which will quickly go into the "nice try but no thanks" pile.  

Megadeath and me

Today was the last day of a book sale at our local library branch.  Today, instead of buying books individually, patrons were allowed to purchase a paper bag for $5 and then take as many books as the bag would hold.  I went for a lot of the classic literature I've been wanting to read.

And then I found the CD's.

I decided that today's Something New would be listening to music by artists I've either never heard of or never heard.  That's how we keep growing, right?  By exposing ourselves to what is unfamiliar.  So this evening, I listened to most of a Megadeath CD.

I don't like Megadeath.

I did my best to concentrate on the lyrics, and I understood some of them.  But most of the numbers ended up sounding like a lot of rhythmic, crashing, amplified noise that left my ears buzzing.

Oh lord, I sound like my parents did about the beloved music of my adolescent years.  "It's too loud and you can't understand the lyrics."  They were talking, of course, about Cream and Led Zeppelin and the like, and even the early Beatles.  They had no problem with the Joni Mitchells and James Taylors and  Carole Kings.

I guess the Megadeath members are accomplished musicians.  After all, Wikipedia has this to say about them: "Known for their technically complex guitar work and musicianship, Megadeth is one of the "big four" of American thrash metal along with Metallica, Anthrax, and Slayer,^[2] responsible for the genre's development and popularization. Their music features complex arrangements and fast rhythm sections, dual lead guitars, and lyrical themes of death, war, politics, personal relationships, and religion."  So they aren't just noise-makers; they are a popular band that has been around for 39 years, gotten platinum certificates for 6 albums and been nominated for 12 Grammys.

They just aren't to my taste.  I did try.  Truly I did.

Tell Me Without Telling Me

This evening Sweet Hubby and I played a game given to him by a friend for his birthday.  The name of this game, as you have probably figured out, is Tell Me Without Telling Me.  It is a hoot.  One person rolls a die, which dictates that clues are to be given either by acting out without words, or using one syllable words only, or using any words as long as they are not on the card.  That player then draws a succession of cards which show a person, place, thing, or trait, and tries to get his team (in this case, me) to guess as many of the cards as possible, using whatever means the die indicated.  This game will be a lot more fun with more than the two of us, but even with just us two, it was quite jolly.  

I grew up in a game playing family.  When I still lived at home, we regularly played Yahtzee or poker or Tripoli or Mexican Train or Trivial Pursuit.  When the family traveled, we played road games, such as spotting license plates from different states.  I introduced my family to a game called Encore, in which a word or theme it suggested and then everyone takes a turn singing a song that fits the theme or contains that word in the lyrics.  We once drove all the way from Las Vegas to Barstow coming up just with songs about the weather.   After we kids had left the nest, a game would come out as soon as any number of us got together again.  During my years in Los Angeles, a group of gay friends and I regularly played poker or Oh Hell.  Mom loved a two-person card game called Spite and Malice, and brought out the cards immediately when my sister or I came to visit. 

During the Covid years, a group of friends and I, scattered all over the country, started playing games online every Saturday, and my family now has the custom of getting together every other Sunday for games.  Thank goodness for Zoom, which makes this possible.  Playing games, for me, is the most wonderful way to socialize while also giving the ol' bean a workout.  Win or lose, I just love to play.  

An early Autumn day

It was a beautiful, sunny day, not too warm, and since the days are going to continue to get colder and shorter, I figured I'd better get myself out into the fresh air for a little play and exercise.  I looked up Seattle Parks and Recreation to find a new park to explore.  There were 105 parks starting with A to D alone.  Everything from little pocket parks, triangle parks, even some boat ramps designated parks, all the way up to our biggest park, a space full of meadows and forests.  I had no idea there were so many parks in this glorious city.  

Sweet Hubby joined me as we went looking for the park I had chosen, which turned out to be the securely fenced grounds of a country club.  I knew of another nearby open to the public so we walked through a neighborhood that was new to us, found the park and explored that bit, then went to a neighborhood store for a lunch of assorted salads.

Nice to know there is a lot more ground to cover next time a day is clear and bright and there's time to go to the park.  What a sweet, sweet day, made all the sweeter because it started with an online writing workshop during which I let my Inner Poet come out to play. 

We the People

Today, I read the Constitution of the United States of America.  It's a bit of a slog, what with archaic syntax and odd capitalizations.  I haven't read the Amendments yet, but am definitely going to tomorrow.  This document is fascinating.  What brilliant minds it was that came up with this vision of how to put together a government, and a country, from scratch.

They made their mistakes, of course.  Not limiting the tenure of Supreme Court judges, for one.  And they couldn't have foreseen how large and unwieldy this country would become, nor modern technology and the ease of international travel and communication and trade.  But they made one provision which, all by itself, shows uncanny foresight.  They provided for the Constitution to be amended.  

I'm quite certain that Donald Trump has never read the Constitution.  Just imagine, a President who has no idea on what principles his country was founded.  I remember him at one point in his term saying over and over, in interview after interview, "I have an Article Two that says I can do anything I want."  For one thing, of course, it doesn't say that at all.  But if it did, that would mean that every President, including Obama and Clinton, could also do anything they wanted to.  You didn't think about that, did you, Donnie?  I never heard anyone correct him or call him on his false interpretation of this article.  What an ass.

But anyway - I find the Constitution inspiring and grand,  I believe it's going to be worth rereading now and then, just to be reminded of what intelligent, committed, visionary people can create when they come together in shared purpose.  I have no desire to become a Constitutional scholar, but it does seem to me that it's important to know what it says and what it means, if for no other reason than so as not to take for granted the rights and privileges it bestows.

The not-junk drawer

I'm not up to much today.  I don't have a sore throat or bad cough, but my nose has been running non-stop for a couple of days and my energy is low.  I've had two negative COVID tests. so this is either just a mild cold or a reaction to the heavy smoke in the air the past few days.  But whatever it is, I'm feeling a little punk, and tomorrow might not be too much better, since Sweet Hubby and I got our third booster shots today.

Still, I didn't want to let my Something New project go, so I contented myself with going through a drawer in the kitchen that holds a hodge-podge of stuff.  You know the one I mean.  I don't like to call it a junk drawer because nothing in there is junk.  Certain of the oddments we use regularly, such as the scissors, bottle stoppers, chip clips, pizza wheel, cherry pitter.  But the rest of it is kind of a mess, and in all the years we've lived in this house, I've never once actually taken the time to see what else is there.

It's now a bit more organized, and I've pulled out some items: flat wooden spoons, butter spreaders (we already have plenty of those in another drawer), and some object I can't for the life of me identify.  Perhaps SH knows what it is.  It's got a hard black handle and a corrugated but not very sharp blade of some kind.  A weapon maybe?  Beats me.

Goa - good but not great

This evening I met a friend for dinner at an Indian restaurant.  Since the day had sort of gotten away from me, I decided I would order something I had never tried before as my Something New.  I love Indian food but tend to go for the same dishes, so this time I ordered the goa curry.  The description sounded so delicious, and a little bit different from other curries.

Well, it was delicious, but there was nothing particularly exceptional nor different about it.  Ah well, not every adventure is adventurous, not everything new is different.  I did enjoy the meal, though, and had a lovely time with my friend.

Oh, and I did not order garlic naan.  That, too, was Something New for me.  I loooooooooove naan! 

xkcd guy

This evening Sweet Hubby and I attended a talk and book signing with Randall Munroe.  From his bio: "He is a former NASA roboticist who left that job to draw comics for the internet."  His daily comic is xkcd.  Don't bother trying to pronounce it.  You may not know its name, but if you've seen its stick figure characters, you know which one it is.  Smart, witty, and clever.

This talk was in conjunction with the release of a new book, this one titled what if? 2.  In it, he takes on actual absurd questions, such as "What would happen if the solar system was filled with soup out to Jupiter?" from a 5-year-old girl.  And he sincerely tries to figure out the answer, which sometimes comes just from common sense and sometimes from very complex mathematical calculations.  Everyone in the completely full audience got a signed copy of the book.  (I know it was an actual signature because it was different from the one in the young man's book next to me.  We checked.)  I've looked through the first pages and it looks as though it's going to be a hoot, but not without substance.  The questions his fans, who are from very young to not so very young, are so imaginative, both when they are absurd and when they are born of true curiosity.

I loved being in the presence of someone so smart and so unpretentious.  He seems young, maybe late 30's, and spoke as though he was truly thinking about what he was saying.  I hope the questions he gets asked by his hosts on this book tour end up being varied enough to keep him stimulated.  It must be hard to have the same public conversation over and over, to be asked the same questions.  That may be why he took some questions from cards filled out by audience members before the show.  I guess that's what's going to keep these sessions fresh.

I loved seeing so many people of so many ages come out to practically worship at the feet of this intelligent, fun, good-looking man.  I love it when the eggheads become the heroes.  (Neil deGrasse Tyson is a supreme example.)  And I love it when kids take an interest in books and science and cartooning and social commentary and question answering.  It makes the future seem less dark.

The people-ness of waiters

As midday drew nearer today, I suggested to Sweet Hubby that we go out for lunch - to someplace new!  He knows what I'm up to and was very agreeable, especially as the place I chose is on the way to an errand he wanted to run.  (Full disclosure: Both of us had a very vague memory of having eaten at this place once before long ago, but the memory was so fuzzy, I'm calling this Something New.)

The restaurant had a faint, not terribly pleasant smell when we first walked in, but we inured quickly and it wasn't a problem.  Our waiter was a thin, pleasant man named Malik (I almost always ask a waiter for his name), who made direct eye contact when asking how our day was going.  So I asked him how his day was going and if people were being nice to him today, which apparently they were.

I have made it a practice to talk with my servers, unless they seem terribly busy or stressed.  I like them to know that I see them as people and take a genuine interest in who they are and how they feel about their work.  Same with cashiers and movie ticket sellers, etc.  The conversations very seldom have a chance to go very deep, so never get to what differences there might be between us, and instead allow us to address what we have in common: how our days are going, what kind of weather we're having, how energetic we are feeling, how tired we might be, what foods we like.  

I especially like engaging with someone who seems to be feeling sour or cranky or fed up.  I make it my secret agenda to see if I can turn her day around just a bit, give him a bit of a lift.  I can almost always find something to compliment sincerely (if it's not sincere, a compliment has no value), and sometimes just looking her in the face and asking "How you doin' today?", not as a toss-off but as a true question, can help someone feel seen.  And isn't that what most of us want?  To be seen as the full humans we are, as individuals with lives and pain and joy and fears and obstacles and histories.

I consider these interactions to be a kind of activism.  I don't have a lot to offer the world in a concrete way, so I see my being, how I move through life, as the way I will leave my mark and make a little bit of a difference.  It's not much, but my motto is that eventually, with enough drops, the bucket does fill.

Dear T

When I lived in Los Angeles, one of my core friendships was with two women I'll call T and C.  We had originally been part of a women's group, in which superficials were mostly dispensed with and all of us shared deeply, going to those levels of our selves where fear and vision are housed, looking to find and heal those places where we felt broken..  That group eventually dispersed, but T and C and I remained close.  

Our homes were far apart, so getting together took planning, and were almost always around occasions and celebrations.  Although we were often silly and full of fun together, our conversations always went deep, and there were always tears to complement the laughter.  The good kind of tears, the kind that keep the heart soft and vulnerable.  When I moved from L.A., it was hard on all of us.  Our sweet, intimate triangle was no more. We stayed in touch, of course.  A year later, after an intense love affair broke up in an ugly way, T and C immediately came to me to be my shoulders to cry on, my arms to fall into.  They were still cherished friends, but I was starting a new life, and they were getting on with theirs.

The thing is, T and I were closer to C than to each other.  C and I have remained very close, talk on the phone, have taken a vacation together, and I often stay at her house when I go back to L.A.  Our conversations, whether by phone or email, are still deep and personal.  

T now has cancer and has moved to another state, where she lives in chaos and disarray with members of her family, who seem to take no particular care of her at all.

I have reached out several times to T, including suggesting that C and I come to visit her in her new home.  She is not doing well and we're both concerned about her and very much want to see her, especially as her health is so tenuous.  T has stayed in contact with C, but all of my reaching out has been, not rebuffed, but not reciprocated.  There have been times I've thought "This isn't a friendship at all, it's not balanced, not mutual", and have wanted to simply close the book on her.

Still, she was an important part of an important part of my life, and I still love her and wish her well.  So today, as my Something New, I wrote her a letter, not with any agenda, not to ask anything from her, but simply to let her know that I still hold as precious the times we've spent together and that she is often in my thoughts and always in my heart

Nearly Dan

Today's Something New (it's past midnight, so technically yesterday's) was going to a rock concert with Sweet Hubby and friends to hear Nearly Dan, a Steely Dan tribute band.  And they were fantastic.  They didn't sound exactly like Steely Dan, but the musicianship and vocals were great, and the songs were, of course, just right.

I must admit that I didn't understand a lot of the lyrics.  I haven't when I've heard them sung by Steely Dan either.  But that didn't matter because the music was so rockin' and rollin'.  The best moment of the evening was "Reelin' in the Years".  At the first guitar chord, the whole venue caught on fire (figuratively), and I felt as though I could just about bounce out of my seat.  That song is one of the greats.  I do love the music of my youth.

I'd guess the average age of the audience to be in the late 60's.  This was not a concert for the young uns.  But a lot of the oldsters danced through the entire concert on a area just below the stage.  We were sitting in primo seats, the front row of the balcony with an unimpeded view of the stage.  SH surprised me by inviting me to go down to the main floor to dance with him.  I'd really wanted to join the dancing, but for some reason I was shy about going by myself, and I was so happy that he asked.  I was wearing clothes that were completely wrong for dancing: long, flowy black pants that came to the floor and shoes that were too sticky-soled to turn on.  But I didn't care, and fortunately I also didn't trip on my pant legs and fall, which would have been majorly embarrassing.  We danced with abandon and joy, loving being together, loving being among contemporaries who were also being joyful and full of energy.

I have never particularly been a Steely Dan fan, but from now on, any time I hear one of their songs, I know that happy memories of this evening will come back to me.

Bella Italiana

It is as challenging as I thought it might be to 1) think of something new to do every day and 2) find/make the time to do it.  Today I went with one of my fallbacks, learning a new language (the other two being exploring a new neighborhood or park, and trying a new restaurant).

Today, after my usual Spanish lesson on Duolingo, I took a class in Italian.  This being the first it was, naturally, incredibly simple.  boy girl man woman I you bread water.  I really enjoyed it.  It's not quite as much like Spanish as I had expected.  I love the sound of Italian, that wonderful rhythmic way of pronouncing words and sentences.  And so far it doesn't look as though this language uses accented letters, which can be a pain in Spanish lessons.  I think I may stay with it for a while, even though today will be the only time I can claim it as Something New.  I think I'd like to learn this beautiful, musical language, although I'm also sticking with Spanish, which is probably going to be more useful in the long run.

I wonder if my aging brain will be able to learn two different but similar languages at the same time.  If I think of this as staving off the possibility of dementia, then the lessons will take on a sort of virtuous glow.  I will need to be careful of my time, though, to be sure I'm putting it where it's most needed, which is, in the big picture, writing, taking care of my marriage and home, taking care of my friendships, and working out.  And reading should be on that list.  And cooking.  And submitting plays to theaters.  And responding to emails.  And blogging, of course.  Gotta stay on my toes and keep doing these Something News, after all, whether anyone else is interested or not.

A new neighborhood

I didn't post yesterday because it was Sweet Hubby's birthday, and on that day I turn myself over to him for whatever his heart desires.  It was a lovely day, including tunnel flying with a good friend, lunch at a swell seafood restaurant, and a cozy evening at home.

Today: I was invited to join a group of friends to celebrate a birthday (so many September birthdays!), and since we were gathering in a neighborhood I seldom visit, I decided to arrive early and walk around, not with any agenda but just to enjoy new houses and gardens, new streets, a new park.

One of the aspects of Seattle I most enjoy is that every neighborhood has a distinct character and flavor.  This neighborhood, Magnolia, is quite hilly, seems to be monied, at least on the streets I explored, and has a cute little 'downtown'.  Because of the hilliness (some people get trapped in their homes when the roads are really icy) and the fact that Magnolia is sort of isolated and not that easy to get to, Sweet Hubby and I didn't consider it as a place to live, but it's lovely to visit, and those hills do make for good, vigorous walking.