Xmas is creeping

See

I am pretty much digging the new season of Nip/Tuck. I was not overly impressed by Season 4, as it seemed to wander all over the place and the organ harvesting storyline was a bit much, even for this show. But the move to Hollywood was a smart move on creator Ryan Murphy's part. There is so much new material to work with, and it seems to be returning to its "Let's keep getting a bit darker" roots.



I'm curious as to how Julia will get out of being a lesbian, and what will come of Kimber and Matt's meth addiction. It really does take place in Los Angeles!

Eat

Today for lunch some of my co-workers took me out for a belated birthday lunch. I got to choose the restaurant so I chose Agua Verde, the Tex-Mex Cafe and Paddle Club on Portage Bay. I decided to try the mango quesadilla that an old co-worker used to always get. I wasn't sure how mangos would pair with chicken, chilis and cheese, but...yum!

It's a great little place, especially in the summertime. I have yet to go there outside of work lunches, though, so I can't vouch for their margaritas.




We had a gay old time chatting the chat about work, restaurants, and after-work drinking habits. We decided to have a holiday cocktail party at work where we each bring the fixings for a cocktail and prepare them for the group. I think I'll go with my passion-fruit margarita conconction.

Drink


When I was at Hilo Hattie last month in, well, Hilo, I bought 6 bags of 100% Kona Coffee. Only 3 were for me and I'm about to use up my last one.


I don't think I want to go back to the 10% stuff you get at the grocery store. A cup of 100% Kona coffee is one of the great joys of my humble little existence. I love mornings, and there's no better way to enjoy them than with a piping hot cup of goodness.

Yesterday I received a promotional email from Cofees of Hawaii on Molokai, which I visited last December. Turns out they are offering 100% Kona bags for just $13.95. I think I will allow myself this one teeny extravagance.

Read

On Sunday, my parents dropped off several boxes from their storage area - boxes of weird stuff from my childhood, high school, and college years. My trumpet from Band. My collection of John Deer Tractors. College notes. Report cards. Class notes.

And then some pretty bizarre stuff.

This is a list of a group of friends I made up in my head. It includes their class schedules, school activities, SAT scores and cumulative GPA. On another sheet I even went so far as to include which colleges they were applying to and which teachers they had.

The really crazy thing is, I remember these kids! I made them up in my head so they were real to me. Kelly really wanted to prove herself as more than a cute cheerleaders so she thew herself into Life Sciences and Ecology. She later went to Western to major in Environmental Studies.

Am I really that weird?




Remember

In the same batch of memorabilia I went through last night, I found an envelope with little scraps of paper in it. Each had something nice to say about me. This was from Leadership Camp in high school:



Apparently I was considered a stud, popular with the ladies, and a smoldering James Bond. Good to remember on those days the mirror tells me otherwise.

Worry

On June 15, 2008 I will be getting married here:



So far we've sent in a signed contract and deposit for the officiant and are collecting referrals for photographers, bakeries, florists, musicians and caterers. We decided to plan the thing ourselves (with the help of this truly aloha woman who is marrying us) rather than go with the planning service.

We will have a meeting this weekend. I know that sounds weird, but we really do need to set aside time to make big decisions about invitations, readings, rings, etc. Getting married is a really big deal and can be incredibly stressful.

My goal: to make it something joyous, special and not full of neurotic energy. I am making my own vow to my wedding: I will not worry too much about you and ruin it.

Birthday

See

On Friday this arrived!



My very first dining room table! It all feels so grown up. I can't wait to have dinner parties and say important things after too many glasses of wine.

It's from the Metropolitan collection at Macy's, where we also bought our couch. I recently learned the difference between contemporary and modern design, and realized I prefer contemporary.

Eat

To celebrate my 33rd birthday (observed), Dan took me to Campagne on Saturday night for some sophisticated-yet-not-fussy French cuisine.



I started off with a cocktail that had rum, oranges, muddled cherries and bitters. We then shared the bacon-scallop appetizer that came on a bed of carrot foam. For my meal, I went with the fixed price option (a really great value at $45 for light entree/salad, main entree and dessert). I had the leeks with salmon roe and then the braised lamb shoulder. It came in a crock pot! I inhaled it, as after moving on to wine I started to get a bit tipsy and ravenous. For dessert, I attacked with equal fervor a twice baked chocolate cake with cherry coulis and vanilla ice cream. Like a warm brownie...yum! They also gave us some chocolate truffles with a candle for my bday.

Service, ambiance, food, wine all deserve the highest rating. Highly recommended.

And...as we were finishing up, who came in and sat down two tables over but the queen herself!

Drink

Since Saturday was my default birthday (it's actually today, but what fun is a Monday?), we got to do some of my favorite things.

After a trip to the Hawaii General Store for some Christmas shopping, we zipped over to Luau for some afternoon cocktails and snacks.



That poke was pretty incredible, and they serve the best mai tai in town. I've now tried almost everything on their food menu, including the famous Loco Moco. The service is always friendly and efficient, the food is consistently tasty and they have happy hour from Noon until 6pm! It's one of my very favorite places in Seattle.

Read

My birthday Saturday began with my favorite breakfast (eggs benedict) and a surprise gift from Dan:



We both fell in love with Chelsea Handler when her first E! show came on, and we've since been enjoying the latest incarnation, Chelsea Lately. She makes me laugh and she's testatment to being hot and funny at the same time.

I will be devouring this shortly, after finishing the Francine Prose book.

Remember

Yesterday my brother-in-law was at Mrs. Cook's in University Village to promote his product line, Gurgle Pots. It began as an idea he had after visiting France for a wedding, and now it's taken off to the point of having to quit his day job and enlist the help of his parents to fill orders. He is also busy coming up with new products. He visits China periodically, where they are manufactured (no lead!).

It's all very inspiring to me to see something really take off, and for it all to have happened inside a garage.



Worry

Today the writers and studios return to the negotiating table.

I guess this doesn't really qualify as a worry, though it does suck for the LA economy and for all the people who can't do their jobs.

My best hopes for a speedy resolution that will make both sides happy.

I need my full season of LOST!

Thanks

See

In September, I moved to Beacon Hill with my better half, to this wonderful house:



After living on Capitol Hill from 1995-1999 and then again from 2001-2007, I was ready for the transition to a quieter, even remotely suburban neighborhood. The house was built in 1954, has 4 bedrooms, a garage, huge laundry room and an actual dining room! I am most thankful to have this as my home.

The main drag of Beacon Hill is Beacon Avenue:



Here you'll find authentic Mexican restaurants, a dry cleaner, a fantastic little coffee shop, a grocery store, Filipino restaurants, a bakery, a library and a few other neighborhood jewels.

We also have one bar, the Beacon Pub:



I have only been four times since moving to the neighborhood, but it's a fun place to knock back a few and sing some karaoke (on Friday nights only, starting at 8:30pm). It is also a popular spot for this local celebrity

Eat

I am still full from yesterday's festivities. The brunch went swimmingly and there was more than enough food for the five of us. My favorite dish was the turkey bacon-gruyere quiche. I went back for a huge second piece.



Later, we went to Wallingford for the Dembiczak turkey dinner at my sister's house. She put on an impressive spread - and with equally impressive table scaping!



For dessert, I had a piece of cranberry-coconut-peach pie. Yum. I was so ready to explode, though.

Drink

My main contribution to our dinner last night was bringing 2 bottles of this wine.



It pairs nicely with turkey, if a bit sweet for my taste. I still much prefer Pinot Grigio as my main squeeze in the White department, but it was a pleasant off-roading experience.

According to about.com, "Gewurztraminer can be made in dry or sweet varieties and are generally best if enjoyed sooner rather than later post-bottling. Flavors qualities include: honey, pumpkin spice, cinnamon, apricot, pear, and rose."

I think it's the honey aspect that makes this wine a 2-3 glasses affair for me, as opposed to the 5-6 I can take of my preferred white with its crisp green apple flavors.

Read

Last night at the dinner table, my brother-in-law read an excerpt from this article on gratitude in yesterday's Seattle Times.

The highlight is below:

Gratitude has been called the gateway to the virtues. As Cicero put it, "Gratitude is not only the greatest of the virtues, but the parent of all others," opening the heart to deeper appreciation, compassion, repentance, forgiveness, generosity and wisdom. Giving thanks should be cultivated as a habit. It is a kind of therapy for the spirit.

It's worthy of a read. Being grateful is something I have been working on ever since returning from my last trip to Hawaii. Once you slow down, breathe and appreciate all that you have, happiness undoubtedly will follow.

Remember

There is a new boutique on Beacon Hill called Buggy, featuring new and used clothing for kids along with some toys and books. They will be hosting an open/house gift getting extravaganza the weekend of December 8th-9th and will soon be offering knitting workshops. Check this new small business out!



Buggy is located on the west side of Beacon Avenue, about a block south of Galaxie, and is open Wednesday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., Saturday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Sunday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.



Worry

Between carbo-loading meals yesterday, we went for a walk to both take advantage of the gorgeous day and walk off the ten bricks in our guts. After stopping at the Red Apple to pick up some tupperware, we were called "faggots" in the parking lot by some very young children in a car.



Yes, these are kids and it's not uncommon behavior. What is unfortunate is that these kids were racial minorities. Homophobia is disappointing all-around, but when it comes from a group that has suffered from the same blows of discrimination, it's incredibly frustrating. Dan made them own up to it by asking them to repeat the word and then telling them now rude it was. I think it made them a little scared, as it should.

Turkey Eve

See

This is my office. I've been spending 7-8 hours per day, 5 days a week (minus holidays and vacations) for the past 2 years and 2 months. It's a really nice office.



I'm really lucky in that I get it all to myself. That other desk you see is used for excess paperwork, boxes and an old copy machine I never use.

I often stop to gaze out my window:



Not a bad view. I feel really fortunate to be surrounded by so much beauty in my workplace. It makes all the emailing, number crunching and paper-pushing less monotonous.

Eat

Tomorrow morning we will be hosting a Thanksgiving brunch for the Garlingtons. Dan put together a menu that incorporates the tastes of the big feast:

sweet potato biscuits with turkey gravy
turkey bacon and gruyere quiche (made last night - and it looks wonderful)
turkey sausage
yam home fries
orange & cranberry scones
pumpkin bread
cranberry juice



My mouth is watering!

Drink

Each day at lunch (usually) I go work out at the gym on campus. When finished showering and back in my work clothes, I often stop at the little juice bar/cafe to grab some food to bring back to my desk. I'm often very, very thirsty. My love of all things sparkling led me to this new item:



What better way to refresh after a tough (or medium) work-out than with an all-natural, no-calorie soda that comes in a variety of interesting flavors. So far I've tried the tangerine-lime, black-cherry-apple and my favorite thus far, the mango-peach.

Each one also has different ingredients that give it that extra something to qualify for the name (ie, ginseng is in "Focus"). Similar to Izze, but a smaller portion/zero calories and, according to their website they "do good, too, with a commitment to social and environmental causes."

Read

I am now on Chapter 4 of Francine Prose's book, which I first mentioned in Monday's blog. Chapter 2 was all about words, chapter 3 was all about sentences and chapter 4 -- anyone? -- that is correct, is all about paragraphs.

Chapter 3 ended with a wonderful quote from Hemingway's A Moveable Feast, a great little memoir I read in my late twenties (or, uh, last night).

Sometimes when I was starting a new story and I could not get it going...I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, "Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know." So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there. It was easy then because there was always one true sentence that I knew or had seen or had heard someone say. If I started to write elaborately, or like someone introducing or presenting something, I found that I could cut that scrollwork or ornament out and throw it away and start with the first true simple declarative sentence I had written.

Pretty great words, huh? The author then brings up the interesting concept that Hemingway and others have consistently confused truth with beauty. In art, are they one and the same?

Remember

This year for Halloween I recycled a Daniel Boone costume, made by the talented and resourceful Daniel P. Garlington for one of his costume parties. I had just returned to the Mainland the night before my friends Jason and Jayson were throwing a combination Halloween/housewarming party at their swanky new pad in the up-and-coming South of Madison neighborhood (maybe it deserves to be called SoM?).

Here I am with my good friend Spencer, who went as an Ewok. After some champagne I told him he looked more like be belonged in a nativity scene. Without the mask, it would make more sense.



Worry

Sooner or later my luck with technology is going to run out. Yesterday my iPod nano froze up (this has happened before), but my beloved was able to fix it after I went to bed so I awoke to the familiar joys of a symphony at my fingertips. I wonder, though, if I'm hard on these things. I ruined one while running in the rain and this freezing thing has happened at least three times.



What next? Digital camera?

I must remind myself, especially now at Thanksgiving time, that these are simply ridiculous things to worry about. So I wouldn't have music to listen to while I run? Big deal. We have yet ANOTHER iPod in the house. So I wouldn't be able to take picture for a while. I could go take polaroids and scan them.

Sometimes I drift toward the increasingly popular idea that technology is only making our lives more stressful. But then, without it, I wouldn't be here.

"Icy Hot"

See

Last night's viewing on the Dembiczak-Garlington big screen was Deathproof, the Quentin Tarantino portion of Grindhouse. I now wish I had seen the whole thing in the movie theaters earlier this year, or at least have the opportunity to view the whole thing on one DVD. The Robert Rodriguez portion is #3 in my netflix queue.

It's a pretty simple plot about a guy (Kurt Russell) who likes to kill young, sexy women with his "stuntman" car. While it didn't come close to the brilliance of Pulp Fiction or Kill Bill, it was a really enjoyable ride. I enjoyed the second half better, with more believable and engaging characters, though the payoff at the end really was tied to the structure of the first half and it being so true to the horror genre.

That Tarantino sure creates some kick-ass female roles! Whatever people say about him in terms of violence/exploitation, I think it's more than evident that he loves women if you look at his body of work. With this movie, I also came to realize that Rosario Dawson is kind of interesting.



Eat

Looking for a low-carb, light and healthy dinner? Take one package of Caesar-Lite (salad-in-a-bag) and add shrimp, smoked salmon, tomatoes and avocado. Go light on the dressing and only use one tomato (two makes it a bit mushy). You can even throw out the croutons if you're feeling uber-Atkins. Serves two.



Drink

It being the season of all things cranberry, I've been in search of new ways to enjoy cranberry juice in beverages. I recently bought some cranberry-pomegranate juice and added it to unflavored Talking Rain sparkling water. Very refreshing - and - wow, non-alcoholic. Great for an Autumn brunch or if you're the designated driver or for your friend who's come out of rehab to visit for the holidays!



Read

I recently read these two memoirs from survivors of Hansen's disease. Both were exiled to Kaluapapa on the island of Molokai.


While both are worth reading, I found Henry's story more compelling and inspiring. It also seemed to have the benefit of a stronger editor/collaborator. Olivia's story was touching, but the timeline was jumpy and the tone was very angry. Henry was able to move past his diagnosis quickly, to make the disease only one part of his life while ultimately reaching out to educate so many different people (almost, it seems, by accident of his very giving nature).

But what is really striking is how both lived (and continue to live) such long lives, far surpassing so many of their loved ones after being given a death sentence at such a young age. Both were lucky (and unlucky) in love, were able to travel, learn, and grow old with such a remarkable perspective. And after all the confinement and mistreatment, both came to find that Kaluapapa would always be home.

I recommend reading both.

Remember

Last month when we were in Kona I attended my very first real Luau (the only other one I attended was in Vegas at a casino).

Here you will see two men unearthing the pig from the imu, or underground oven.



It is wrapped in banana leaves and has a smoky flavor to it. Along with the kalua pig, other traditional luau foods include lomi lomi salmon, teriyaki chicken and beef, ahi poke (or other seafood), poi (a paste made from taro root), and haupia (a stiff coconut pudding).

There is also an open bar with mai tai punch along with other beverages. After the food is served, performers take you all over Polynesia with different forms of dancing, chanting and costumery. It's a gay old time.

As you can see, we enjoyed ourselves.



Worry

Hate crimes rose by 8% in 2006. Read about it here.

Sometimes I worry about random acts of violence, especially around the holidays or surrounding some other joyous occasion. It's like that part in the movie where everyone is laughing and dancing around and then there's a knock on the door. "Oh, that must be Blank, late again, ha ha."

But it's not Blank. It's a man in a policeman uniform. There's been a shooting.

Stuff like that.

New format

See

On Saturday we bought this:




I'm a wee bit embarrassed for spending so much on such a monstrous television, as it has often been something I've snickered at in the past. But, alas, here we are in our thirties living dangerously close to the city limits. Basically, I love it and I can't believe we waited this long. We told ourselves we'd use our tax return for it and now it's become our early (and only) Christmas present to each other.

Eat

Yesterday I decided to make caramelized apples as a seasonal Sunday treat. It turns out it is very easy. You just slice up some apples (I used Granny Smith) with plenty of butter and then add in some brown sugar. We decided to get crazy and add vanilla, cinnamon and oatmeal. Then top with five times suggested serving size of Cool Whip and add more cinnamon. It's like breakfast!


Drink

On Friday night my friend Ruth came over and other Dan made her a Pumpkin Pie cocktail. I dislike the taste of pumpkin, but those who enjoy it seem to think this is a hit. It is made from pumpkin-infused vodka (homemade!) and amaretto. Shaken and poured into a martini glass.



I chose to drink vodka sodas and then way too many Coronas as the evening went on. I ended up singing Yaz's "Only You" at the Beacon Hill Pub's karaoke night.

Fun time!

Read

I received this book from my parents for my birthday and began reading it yesterday:



The author's point-of-view is that she finds the acamedic approach to literature disheartening and political. She dropped out of graduate school because she found that her peers didn't even enjoy reading books and felt that their job as students was to pick apart the Greats based on contemporary societal trends and politicial correctness. Instead, she wants to focus on the written word and the stories as they were intended by the authors.

So far, oddly, I'm getting waves of nostalgia for my college lit courses. We'll see how it goes. Not a bad read so far....

Remember

Saturday afternoon (prior to purchasing Monster TV) we checked out the new toy store on 12th Avenue on Capitol Hill called Izilla Toys.



The logo is right; it is fun for everyone! Apparently it had a previous location in Madison Valley and has now moved digs. The space is deceptively large and they are about to expand next door to include a separate book section. The owner is incredibly helpful. I told him I was shopping for nephews ages 2, 4 and 7 and he knew exactly where to take me, asking all the right questions and pointing out that their products are all made in safe conditions (not in China) with natural woods and stains.

I easily found 3 gifts, and spotted something very exciting from my own childhood: Smurfs are back! They look a little different, though, and it is cause for some concern as to how much my current stash is worth...but good to know the little blue guys are getting back in the game.

Worry

My right eye was twitching earlier, but now it seems to have stopped. The strange symptom that I thought was dizziness seems to be doing away.

Worried that soon I'll have something new to worry about as it's a somewhat low-anxiety day....