Surrogate Children

I took a break from work this afternoon to go speak with our across-the-street neighbor because she will be babysitting for us while we are on vacation.

Okay, so really, she'll actually just be watering the plants. But I don't think I've ever gone out of my way to line up care like this for something in my absence...and I can't help but think of the plants as E's and my children. We discuss them. We worry about them. We brought them to their current level of maturity together. We even (I wish I was kidding) have argued over the best way to treat them.

So, it was almost like giving the babysitter instructions when I walked our neighbor through the watering rules we follow (How many times a week should I water them? Well, we just keep 'em damp. Umm...you know, we just check 'em several times a day. We walk out there for breaks from work, breaks from life, just general breaks. Typically, we only actually hit 'em with the hose once a day, but sometimes, like this weekend when it reached 107F in the eaves, it's several times a day...)

Anyways, I'm going to get back to work now. Or perhaps I'll take a quick walk outside to check on the plants first...

Coming up for air

I'm in another one of those work-'til-you-drop periods again. It's actually been a while, and I've got a vacation coming up, so at least it's fairly well timed.

This time around, I'm trying to force myself to relax, let the work go for an hour or few at a time, and take breaks for things that are more important to me than work -- like lunch with friends, time with my visiting sister, my runs, and a birthday dinner party for a friend.

Fitting all of those things in, however, is stressful. I'm constantly feeling like I should be working when I'm doing the things I told myself were more important than working.

At least I'm actually doing them. Now I just have to get better about enjoying them more.

In other news, it got up to 107F at our house under the eaves yesterday and my short run was *very* sweaty.

Today, I've got 13-15 miles with E2 on deck, which is much less distance than last week's 20, but it's already 80F outside... so I suspect it's gonna be difficult.

Guess I should get out the door sooner rather than later.

Change

It's halfway through June. When did that happen?

It seems like just yesterday that E and I planted the transplants in the garden and tried our hand at growing okra from seeds.

And yet, here we are, 39-days post transplantation for most of the garden, and they are huge! All of the tomato plants have at least one green tomato that is in development, and many have more. (11 days 'til early girl is supposedly bearing her early fruit, and just a few more for the others. I can't wait!):



The herb box has been amazing. My success made me so excited that I purchased some herb seeds and planted those as well (cilantro, dill, chives). Predictably -- it was less of a success -- the dill sprouted, but died over memorial day when no one watered it. The cilantro is hanging in. And the chives, which the packaging swore were like weeds have not yet sprouted.

In particular, the basil is just kicking ass this year. I love it. Every week or two I trim the tops of all 6 plants for a huge harvest of the freshest basil available while forcing them to become even more bushy in their quest for sun.

In such a short time, despite many trimmings for meals, the herb box has gone from this:



To this:



And, much to our surprise, *all* of the okra seedlings. We actually had to cull some of the plants to prevent them from strangling each other. We're still not sure how much success we'll have in pots, but regardless, we've gone from this:



To this:



Plus, a fellow-tomato lover heard of our sunshine and asked if she could borrow some sun. She donated a yellow pear tomato plant that quick caught up with its friends and is doing very well. And as a thank you, she gave us a crook neck squash. This thing is out of control! When we got it it was maybe 2 inches tall with two leaves, and yet, here it is:



It's even starting to produce squash:



But, the biggest surprise for me has been the japanese cucumber plant. It went from this:



To this:



But what's most amazing is the structural supports this thing sends out. I swear, this plant has intelligence. It grows these long probes, which extend in search of things to support itself and when it finds supports, it attaches. And not just a little bit:



Amazing, I tell you.

I'm finding it so fascinating how quickly plants change -- it's a much needed reminder for me that everything is constantly changing. Every day, each of the plants are different from the day before. The squash, in particular, wilts without enough water, and then stands right back up when you alleviate the problem for it.

Yes, the best part will most certainly be the enjoyment of the fruits. But the care and observation of the growing is full of joy as well.

The latest book meme

This comes thanks to Magic Cookie.

I'd never heard of library thing, but it seems like exactly the type of thing I turn to when I'm looking for answers. A collection of geeks who are passionate about something... in this case, books.

I'd love to join, but, if I am honest with myself, I do not have the time, and, I am more passionate about my other hobbies than reading right now, so it wouldn't be a great place to divert my energy. [Speaking of diversion, I got up early this morning to finish some diligence, and yet, here I am blogging...]

So, here's the deal, you take the the top 106 books (why 106? I don't know) from the books most often tagged unread, then, you bold the ones you've read, underline those you read for school (like mc, I'm not gonna bother with this one), and italicize the ones you started but did not finish.

The ultimate hitchhiker's guide by Douglas Adams
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Anna Karenina (Oprah's Book Club) by Leo Tolstoy
The Illearth War: The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the… by Stephen R. Donaldson
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
One Hundred Years of Solitude (Oprah's Book Club) by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Vanity Fair (Penguin Classics) by William Makepeace Thackeray
The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien
Ulysses by James Joyce
War and peace by Leo Tolstoy
Madame Bovary (Oxford World's Classics) by Gustave Flaubert
Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 1) by Neal Stephenson
A Tale of Two Cities (Penguin Classics) by Charles Dickens
The Satanic Verses: A Novel (Bestselling Backlist) by Salman Rushdie
Middlemarch (Penguin Classics) by George Eliot
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
The Name of the Rose: including Postscript to the Name of… by Umberto Eco
(No title) by Mohammed
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Odyssey by Homer
The Canterbury Tales (Penguin Classics) by Geoffrey Chaucer
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (Signet Classics) by Victor Hugo
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
Tom Jones by Henry Fielding
The three musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
The Count of Monte Cristo (Penguin Classics) by Alexandre Dumas
The Iliad by Homer
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Emma by Jane Austen
Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
Sons and Lovers (Modern Library Classics) by D.H. Lawrence
Gulliver's travels by Jonathan Swift
The House of Seven Gables (Bantam Classics) by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
Dracula by Bram Stoker
Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
Oliver Twist (Penguin Classics) by Charles Dickens
The Once and Future King by T. H. White
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
Mansfield Park (Penguin Classics) by Jane Austen
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
Great Expectations (Penguin Classics) by Charles Dickens
Labyrinth by Kate Mosse
Tess of the D'Urbervilles (Penguin Classics) by Thomas Hardy
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond
The Corrections: A Novel by Jonathan Franzen
Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe
Underworld: A Novel by Don DeLillo
Ivanhoe (Penguin Classics) by Sir Walter Scott
The Grapes of Wrath (Centennial Edition) by John Steinbeck
Jane Eyre (Penguin Classics) by Charlotte Bronte
Count Brass by Michael Moorcock
The Gormenghast Novels by Mervyn Peake
The War of the Worlds (Modern Library Classics) by H. G. Wells
Jude the Obscure (Penguin Classics) by Thomas Hardy
The Origin Of Species by Charles Darwin
Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (Penguin Classics) by James Joyce
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
The Inferno by Dante Alighieri
Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
Swann's Way: In Search of Lost Time, Vol. 1 (Penguin… by Marcel Proust
The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel (Perennial Classics) by Barbara Kingsolver
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
The Portrait of a Lady (Penguin Classics) by Henry James
Sense and Sensibility (Penguin Classics) by Jane Austen
Silas Marner by George Eliot (57)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (Barnes & Noble Classics Series)… by Oscar Wilde
The Man in the Iron Mask by Alexandre Dumas
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
The Confusion (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 2) by Neal Stephenson
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
The Book Thief (Readers Circle) by Markus Zusak
Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
The System of the World (The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 3) by Neal Stephenson
Bleak House (Modern Library Classics) by Charles Dickens
The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and… by Brian Greene
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
The Known World by Edward P. Jones
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
The Mill on the Floss (Penguin Classics) by George Eliot
The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje
Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
Dubliners by James Joyce
The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan
Les Misérables (Signet Classics) by Victor Hugo
Infinite Jest: A Novel by David Foster Wallace
Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Persuasion (Penguin Classics) by Jane Austen


I like this list. It's got quite a variety and gives me plenty to turn to when I'm looking for a good book.

Now that's an accusation!


A Californian technology billionaire has been accused of feeding ecstasy to unwitting business associates, hosting orgies at a private drugs warehouse and building a secret party lair under his mansion that even his wife knew nothing about.


Looks like Broadcom's former CEO's life is about to get even more interesting.

Or less. Depending on your perspective.

Exhausted

We were guests at my second-cousin/childhood friend's wedding this weekend. It was gorgeous, wonderful, but poignant given all of my dad's friends who were there. Maintaining my composure while interacting with them stressed me out more than I realized. This morning, on the drive home, E & I took a detour to go visit Dad's grave and I broke down in heart-wrenching body-shaking sobs. I hadn't been physically sad like that in a long time.

At the wedding, I couldn't remember the names of some folks I went to high school with, and, even better, one of the bridesmaids I hung out with in Vegas. A month ago. I made a bit of an ass of myself by calling her the wrong name when trying to introduce E. I'd love to say it was at the end of the event, so at least I could blame it on too much alcohol. But no, it was the first time I saw her. Before we even sat down. Awesome.

If you are not cursed with the lack of name memory, you have no idea how much it sucks. But, trust me, it does. Every time I walk in a room full of people, I know I am going to encounter someone who knows my name, about whom I know plenty of life details, but, for the life of me, I will not be able to retrieve their name. What I need to learn to do is to stop trying. I would have been much better off if I managed the conversation without trying to remember this girl's name than I was when I *thought* I remembered it. I mean, Andrea sounds like Becky, right?

The best quote of the weekend comes from M, when E, M, lucky_girl and I pulled into the beachfront event center of our hotel where we wanted to take some pictures of the four of us all gussied up in our wedding attire.


Valet: Hello, are you here for the furball?
M: No. But it sounds interesting...


Lucky_girl suggested we crash the furball (we later found out it was a benefit for animals) after the wedding. But, sadly, we are old and we had no interest in going anywhere other than straight back to the hotel at the end of the night.

And now, I must go bury myself in work. If we hadn't gone out of town, I could have worked straight through the weekend and still would not have finished it all. But we did leave, so this should be a fun week.

Bacon, Chick-Pea, Carrot Stew

The title pretty much says it all, my friends.

I've been working too hard to grocery shop. When I get spare time on the weekends, I take the opportunity to hang out with E, visiting Bro & niece, or E2. So, no shopping.

Upon arrival home this evening, I was greeted with a grim sight in our fridge (those who know me well will ask whether the sight was any grimmer than usual -- and honestly, I could not say...).

So, as a much needed break in the middle of my 13-billable-hour-day (groan... 8:30-7:30 straight at work plus an additional 2 hours of billable work at home make BT something-something...) I cobbled together a healthy stew that we both enjoyed from the random bits in the fridge and pantry. If, for some reason, you find yourself with these ingredients, enjoy!

Clean out the pantry and fridge healthy stew

-1/4 lb bacon, left over from camping, chopped into 1/4 inch squares
-4 carrots, washed, peeled, and chopped into 1/4 inch rounds
-1/2 white onion, diced
-4 cloves garlic, diced
-3 T of "La Bomba" red chili flakes mixed with herbs and dried porcini from a friend who lived in Italy and brought it back as a present (R's little bro, the chef)
-2 cans chick peas (garbonzo beans)
-1 can stewed tomatoes
-1 box chopped Pomi
-1/4 box beef broth
-3 sprigs fresh rosemary from your herb box [insert happy I-love-my-herb-box-grin]
-2 sprigs lemon thyme from your herb box [repeat]
-4 sprigs Italian Oregano from your herb box [repeat, cautiously]
-3 longer sprigs majoram [okay, so the entire point of this post is to point out how happy an herb box can make you when you spend your entire life on the busy-busy treadmill of capitalist business support.]


1. Brown bacon on medium heat. Drain 3/4 of bacon fat into empty wine bottle. Watch southern husband scowl.

2. Add 2 T olive oil, garlic, onions, and carrots. Stir vigorously for a few minutes. Add "La Bomba" and cough at the red chili pepper flake smoke. Potent stuff!

3. Add tomatoes & beans. Lower heat to simmer. Add washed and minced handful of herb-box herbs. Note that no one is as impressed as you are by the herb-box herbs. Leave covered on low to simmer for 30 minutes.

4. Stir. Add broth (and water if necessary). Continue to simmer until carrots are the correct level of cooked (total of 50 minutes or so).

5. Remove from heat. Serve into large bowls. Enjoy. Serves 3 hearty appetites for dinner (or, more importantly in our case, happily serves 2, with enough to feel like a good wife when you look at what you're leaving for lunch for your husband for the next day).


Enjoy!

Tear-jerkers

When I get depressed, there is nothing I enjoy more than a movie, which is guaranteed to make me cry.

You will note that the previous sentence does not say,

When I get depressed, there is nothing I enjoy more than a movie which is guaranteed to make me cry.

You see, tonight I have learned that all movies make me cry when I'm sad. Previously, I suspected it was something about the dry eyes and the blinking at the screen, and the music. Or maybe it had something to do with planes, since I'm always crying at movies on planes. Or something. But I have realized that I'm just a movie crier. And the cheesier and more clichéed the plots are, the better.

Recent successful entrants in this category include:

-Secretary
-Water
-Under the Tuscan Sun
-Sweet Home Alabama
-Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

And some historical go-to favorites are:

-Rudy
-Playing by Heart
-La Vita è bella

But, tonight, I finally confirmed for myself that it really doesn't matter what the movie is. Tonight, because I was bordering on very sad, I didn't think the House of Sand and Fog was a good idea, so I plopped myself in front of the tube for 2 hours and balled my eyes out to Runaway Bride.

The 5/10 star rating on IMDB is *extremely* generous. It may be one of the worst movies I've ever seen.

And yet, it did the trick. I'm ready for some yoga and bed and then tomorrow will be a lighter, more carefree day.

Delta, revisited

Last time we spent memorial day on the delta:

-E2 had the smelly tent, and camped on the grass outside our rented trailer/mobile-home
-Dad drove to join us, and hazed E with entirely too many beers
-E tried to build our newly purchased cheap as shit BBQ, but drunk due to Dad's plying him with beverages, he failed, spectacularly, and fabulously.
-In reality, Dad hazed E 'til he had to be put to bed and then he played poker with us girls (J, E2, sis & me), and felt slightly guilty about E's early bedtime, as if, perhaps it was partly his fault (you think?);
-To cap off the night, J played the famous "5-6-7-8-8" poker hand
-I got too much sun
-Most of the folks got in the freezing water, but not me, not even for the beer-swim.

I had forgotten that it was *very windy* that weekend.

But, this weekend reminded me...that life changes, but not too much, for example, let's just say:

-I am sunburnt (and happy to have relaxed in the sun), again.
-It was windy, again. (The winds hit >25 mph tonight and I chickened out and suggested and cajoled our entire campsite home (with the pre-emptive strike of lucky-girl who'd intelligently pre-called an early departure)).
-Indulgence was the theme of the weekend, again, whether it was alcomohal, meat for the vegetarians, or just sleep. Of course, other than the sleep, the indulgence was toned down the order of magnitude you'd expect for the 5 years between the last visit. Somewhat disappointing, really.
-And finally, E2's new tent is gorgeous, streamlined for the wind, and not the least bit reeking of sour milk. (Prop's to P for that change!)

Overall, a good time was had by all. But I must say, I think I'll head E2's advice -- given the wind, perhaps Delta camping isn't a great idea...

Maybe I'll learn my lesson this time around. Anyone wanna give me odds? Or better yet, suggestions on locations for our next local camping trip?

Bountiful Spring Salad

Yeah, I spent the weekend in the city with my mom and sister, bonding and navigating the crowds of bay-to-breakers. We did it faster than the last time, 3 years ago, and I was very proud of my mom, who finished 248th in her age-group, an order of magnitude above where I placed my mine...

Upon arrival at home, I was exhausted.

I should have stopped by the office to pick up some diligence. Its review is due tomorrow by noon. But I just couldn't. I'd worked 5 days for more than 12 hours this week and 6 hours on Saturday. I needed a day off. Tomorrow AM is gonna suck, but them's the breaks. I did sign up with full knowledge...

So, trading today for tomorrow, I came straight home, met E at the garden, and we observed the plants with approval, and then, I fell into a deep-sleeping nap on the couch.

When I woke, I found myself facing a small around the house todo list including a fridge full of wilting vegetables from last weekend's spring bounty from the farmer's market.

After evaluation and some thought, I combined the greener portions of what was in the fridge with the first harvest from our garden -- BASIL! You can cut the tops off and encourage it to grow more fully as soon as it's sprouted several new leaves. What a gorgeous, delicious, non-complex, reproduction focused plant!

So, in celebration of the first spring harvest, I present the *greenest* salad ever made in our kitchen:

Spring Bounty Salad

-1 bunch baby asparagus spears, washed, trimmed of tough ends and wilted spear tops (if any), and chopped into 1 inch pieces.
-2 red potatoes, washed, chopped into 1/4 inch by 1/2 inch pieces.
-1 cup fava beans, shelled.
-sea salt.
-extra virgin olive oil.
-rice vinegar.
-1 bunch parsely.
-1/2 bunch dill.
-tops of 6 basil plants (approx, 1/2 cup fresh basil, chopped).
-1 T red pepper flakes.


1. Lightly boil chopped potatoes in salted water 'til tender (approx 15-20 minutes). Drain and top with cold water.
2. Lightly boil fava beans until bright green and floating (5 minutes or less). Remove the white skin and place in cold water.
3. Lightly boil asparagus spears until bright green and floating (5 minutes or less). Remove from water and place in cold water.
4. In a cuisinart, combine parsely, basil, dill, several times around the dish of olive oil, a similar amount (if slightly less) of rice vinegar, and pepper flakes. Pulse, clear the edges with a rubber scraper, and continue to blend until a nice evenly chopped pesto.
5. Combine all cold vegetables and pesto in a dish. Allow to sit for 5 minutes.
6. Serve cold, with sourdough baguette pieces to soup up the left-over pesto.

Enjoy!

Snap, Crackle, Pop!

Last night, around 10:30, we ran outside to the sound of firecrackers.

So had all of our neighbors. They'd beaten us outside and were standing around a huge tree branch from our tree that had partially broken from the trunk about 20 feet in the air and had fallen into the middle of our street.

Sorry, said the adorable neighbor kid. *Smartass*

We hung out with the neighbors in the street for a while, walking around the huge branch and listening to the groans of our tree. We analyzed the situation and agreed that it was likely that our tree would be tagged and removed, just like our next door neighbor's tree of the same variety.

We all commented on how the branch was so big that had E2's car been parked in it's regular spot, it would have been fine. Our neighbors even mentioned the make and color of E2's car, which made me realize how often she must be here. So, we hung out in the hot night air, with the branch still partially attached to the tree arching to touch down in the middle of the street.

One of our neighbors called the city -- apparently there had been a flyer about how our type of tree is often diseased and we should call if things appeared amiss. Seemed like as good of a time as any to call.

Eventually, two cop cars came, and they moved the branch to be parallel to the street, although still attached to the tree (blocking E's car into our driveway).

An hour later, the city sent a huge truck to chainsaw it down with a long-arm chainsaw that brought us back out into the street -- that thing was cool! I can't believe I've never seen one in a horror film.

Unfortunately, I didn't think to take pictures 'til this morning.

So, this is where the tree branch broke from the tree:



And, this is what is left of the fallen branch:



Do we know how to party on a Friday night, or what?

The Miracle of Life

Last night, when I arrived home in the dark, E greeted me outside with a flashlight and a huge grin.

He showed me this:



And This:



I realize that these look like buckets of dirt. But if you look very, very closely, you will see sprouts of green which made us very happy.

These would be the okra seedlings that we somehow managed to germinate from seeds. Despite failing to soak them prior to planting (why would you read the directions?) and despite some severe overwatering (read: standing water), we managed to coax several shoots of green to burst forth from the dirt.

Until recently, I was best known for my brown thumb and my ability to kill any and every plant with which I had contact.

I haven't grown anything from seeds since I was a kid (and my parents helped), but E really wanted okra and there were no seedlings. So, we acknowledged that it would probably fail but tried anyways. I'm so proud!

And, like a parent with child pictures, I present pictures of the rest of our garden as well, to show that I love all of my plants.

Tomatoes, 7 days post transplantation:



Herb Box:



Japanese cucumber, 7 days post transplantation:

I thought I'd seen it all

I had a bit of a Vegas habit for a while. Instead of flying, I drove out a few times, even, for the privilege of heat and sun and staying in cheap motels and finding the best bargains on food I could while spending my free money gambling at the lower table minimum and good craps odds locations.

Then I grew tired of the place and only went when invited.

My last visit was a long weekend of spending too much money, indulging in too much alcohol, and meeting Kfed (another story).

This past weekend, was almost the exact opposite of the last one, except I stayed in the same hotel and uttered, yet again, If I never have to set foot in another club in my life, that would be just fine with me..

Thus, I dub the past weekend The healthiest weekend I've ever spent in Vegas. No real excess in food, spending, or alcohol. Instead, I caught up with friends, and I went to the gym and hit the treadmill. As a huge shock to my system (I suspect my liver cringes every time I land at MacArran), the total number of drinks I consumed over the entire weekend was in the single digits.

And, finally, after all the jokes, I've now seen The Thunder. Even worse, I sincerely enjoyed it. Those guys work their asses off (literally) to put on a great show. And watching the sincere and heartful joy (and fear of heart palpitations) of the 50+ year old women at our table was the highlight of my weekend. No joke.

Such joy those young Aussies bring to the world.

Such givers!

The reality

Work exploded this week.

I've worked past midnight every night this week (past 1 AM for two). Although I've fit in some yoga, I have yet to run a single mile since my return. Every time it's planned, something gets in the way. I'm holding out hope for tomorrow AM (the same hope I had this AM, yesterday AM, the day before that...)

Every single one of my clients or the partners I work for seems to have an emergency and I can't help but feel simultaneously flattered and at the same time as if I'm failing to help them as much or as quickly as they need me.

I feel alternatingly guilty and stressed. Today was an a blizzard of phone calls with clients begging me to do their work while they waited on the line so we could discuss it, right then, right there...

But, I am busy because my clients give me issues to address that are exciting and it's so interesting! I'm learning a ton. I love my job. I just wish there was a way to decouple it from its cyclic nature.

Vacation was fun while it lasted!

This year's garden

Well, since last year's single Black Krim seedling brought us much happiness, and supplied about 1/2 of our tomato needs for the months it was bearing ripe fruit, we did the logical thing, and planted 6 tomato plants this year.

So, in order of predicted fruit-bearing, assuming we manage to keep them alive until they bear fruit, you can expect to see tomato recipes featuring:

• Early Girl -- 50-65 days from transplantation.


• Sweet 100 -- 65 days from transplantation.


• Better Boy Tomato -- 75 days from transplantation. And, the Guiness world record holder for weight of tomato fruit produced from one plant. I can't wait!


• Black Krim -- the favorite from last year returns again. 75-80 days from transplantation. But worth every one of 'em.


• Mr. Stripey -- 80 days from transplantation. I mean, really, with a name like that, how could we resist?


• Beefmaster -- 80 days from transplation. The logic from Mr. Stripey controls, clearly.

To go with these, we also planted an expanded herb box containing 6 basil plants, lemon thyme, rosemary, italian oregano, and marjoram.

In honor of our vacation, we're trying our hand at 1 Japanese cucumber plant.

And, in honor of E's southern roots, we planted okra, from seeds (but of course, we don't know what the hell we're doing, so we planted, literally, 10 seed-filled indentations with 1-4 seeds each, and it'll be a miracle if we manage to raise one to a fruit-bearing plant.) After the planting was done, E read the packet to see we were supposed to soak the seeds for 24 hours before planting. We decided post-planting soaking was the best way to remedy this mistake and watered accordingly. So yeah... I'll report back on that one. I'd say that at this point, one fruit-bearing plant would be a success, and none would not, necessarily, be a failure, since we couldn't possibly plant the whole seed packet and the winner might still be in there.

So yeah. It's good to be home. I'm excited about summer harvest.

About time

Finally, last night, after a long phone call with R and too much wine, I was able to fall asleep before 1:30 and sleep 'til 7:30 without waking up.

Prior to that, every night since our return, I'd had trouble falling asleep, and staying asleep.

I am shocked that it took me an entire week to get back on some semblance of the correct time schedule after being in Asia.

I have no idea how people travel to Asia on business on a regular basis.

Japan Reading and Listening List

We had a fabulous time in Japan. My experience was significantly deepened by several items I can recommend:

1. Pimsleur CDs. It took me almost a year to get through all 30 lessons on my commute to work. I'd repeat the lessons until I could do the majority of the prompted responses from memory. It helped enourmously. I can't wait to start the Spanish Pimsleur CDs (my next language!) and I swear, I will never use another learn by audio language program. Pimsleur is so superior to any other program I've tried.

2. Of course, Books. My favorite past-time.

• Lonely Planet Japan -- we referred to this for each city we visited. It had all the important stuff -- history, maps, background. A great reference to be supplemented with the Internet, advice from Friends, and books.



• Pictures from the Water Trade, by John David Morley -- a coworker gave me this book along with a book on how to read and write kanji. The next day he stopped by to apologize that the book may be, at times, a bit racey, and to ensure me that he did not intend to be inappropriate. It's literature! But how sweet is that? Anyways, this book was probably the most purely educational book of all of the books I read. The author is clearly a language lover after my own heart, and pages upon pages were dedicated to analysis of the sounds of the language, the affectation, it's rhythm and cadence and preparatory wrappings, soft endings, noises, and more. When he tired of language, he wrote of the underground -- the "water trade" or modern day bars where women are often available for entertainment (dancing, talking, and, of course, the oldest profession in the world). The difference in cultural perspective on the water trade in Japan was necessary to my understanding of gender roles in Japan. Similarly, he spends much time analyzing his outsider status vis-a-vis his growing command of the language and cultural norms, which is typically the means that the Japanese use to distinguish insiders from outsiders. While the plot is relatively non-existant, the observations and analysis is fascinating, and I highly recommend this book if you'd like to gain a better understanding of Japanese culture.



• Dave Barry Does Japan -- okay, I must admit. I made a mistake. I thought this was a Bill Bryson book when I bought it. How? Well, as I've told everyone who will listen, I'm *REALLY* bad with names. I just don't think they are important. I record relevant information to me, like *funny,* *articulate,* *travel writer,* and well...I'm lazy too. Anyways, E laughed his ass off when I admitted my mistake because he was surprised when I bought the book. It struck him as a wee bit too culturally insensitive for my usual tastes. But, I was pleasantly surprised. I thought Mr. Barry did an excellent job of reporting on Japanese culture from the American perspective. It was surprisingly well-researched (although, given that he's won a pulitzer, perhaps it shouldn't have been so surprising). And it was damn funny, too.



• Japanland: A Year in Search of Wa, by Karin Muller -- I think this book was the most relevant to my experience. It was the story of an American woman in her mid-30's who moved to Japan for a year to try to report on japanese culture, and did so by living with a traditional Japanese family. Much of her story is her strugge against the Mother of the family, which truly, is a wonderful metaphor for her struggle against/within the culture as a whole. I will be recommending this book to all of my Japanese-American friends who struggle against their mothers (that would be all of them, to my knowledge) because I read about so many of the arguments my friends have described, but they were explained through the eyes of a cultural anthropologist. It made so much more sense.



• The Teahouse Fire: A Novel, by Ellis Avery -- I picked this one up at SFO before we left. Set in Kyoto during the turn of the 19th century, it told the story of a young Franco-American girl from New York whose mother dies immediately after she is brought to Japan by her uncle, a Catholic Missionary. After a fire, she runs away, feigns ignorance of her origins to escape her horrid uncle and ends up working as a servant to one of the great tea-ceremony families. The cultural and historical details were breathtaking and the story was gripping. It's a great book, even if you won't be going to Kyoto while you are reading it. But if you are... you can visit temples, confectionaries where they make tea sweets, and Pontocho and imagine the world she describes so clearly as if it still exists.



• Kitchen, by Banana Yoshimote -- This book was a best-seller in Japan in the 1980s and the English version was received abroad equally as well after its translation. The lovely A recommended it (I believe), and I loved it. The main characters' voices were all simultaneously distant and honest, gentle, vulnerable, and yet resolute and obviously strong in a way that I have never encountered in fiction before. The stories were poignant, but simply told narratives describing the craziness of the major losses inherent in life, and the messiness of falling in love. Oh, and, of course, given the title, much of the focus was on food, its preparation and role in our lives, and all of that stuff, which we all know I love.



• Norwegian Wood, by Haruki Marakumi -- I ordered this book because it landed at the top of several searches I did on Amazon. I had already read his unique and fragmented Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World and I enjoyed it. It was a bit of work to get through, which I expected for this one as well, but it was worth it. Imagine my surprise to find Norwegian Wood to be quite the opposite of Hard-Boiled, and instead a simple, one-man story of collegiate life in the 60's in Tokyo and the loves of his life, how they conflicted, innevitable loss, and the decisions he must make in the wake of such loss. I was struck by how much the voice of the main character had so many of the same qualities as the main female character in Kitchen. Only, at this point, after reading so much about Japan, that respectful distance I recognized in their voices made sense. It was respectful. I liked it. And, I liked Toru, the speaker, despite the fact that I may not like some of the actions he took, because he was so open and unapologetic. He did things even he deplored and then examined them while being open with his rationale. How could I not like him, even love him, despite (or perhaps because of) his honest flaws?



• A Year in Japan, by Kate T. Williamson, I opened this book on the Shinkansen from Nagano back to Tokyo to realize it was an art book. And it wasn't painful, stretching, BT-gets-it-and-loves-it-because-the-tormeneted-artist-beats-you-over-the-emotional-chasm-with-their-ability-to-communicate-in-an-invented-but-understood-language-art. No, it was light, and cheerful, and cute, and understandable sketches from an artist's year of living in Kyoto along with hand-written explanations of the pictures, and lots of detailed drawings of plants. I found the pictures and explanations adorable, the plants reminders of my aspirations of a garden at home upon my return, and the majority of the urban scenes to be excellent reminders of the quirks I experienced in Kyoto and occasionally informative about things I had questioned as I quickly read them on our bullet train out of Kyoto to Nagano. At any other time in my life, had I opened this book, I suspect I would not have been in the correct frame of mind to appreciate its value and I would have skimmed and closed it without a second thought. And yet, somehow, I ordered it, transported it across the oceans, and opened it at the correct time such that I sincerely enjoyed it and couldn't believe my luck and timing. Talk about a blessing!



• Squeamish about Sushi and other food adventures in Japan, by Betty Reynolds -- Unlike a Year in Japan, which I did not know was an arty-book 'til I opened it, this book I purchased with full knowledge. Pictures of food with Japanese words describing it? Sign me up. I made E sit and read it with me a few times before we left. He humored me. I think I will donate it to Miss E's classroom now.

And now, I'm back home. 6 books that I would be proud to include on my booklist as books I read this year in pursuit of my approximately 20 book challenge. 1 travel book as a resource that I can't claim because I didn't read it cover to cover. 2 arty-books I could claim if desperate. I'll wait 'til the end of the year to see if I need to claim the arty-books to hit 20. For now, I'll content myself with the fact that I'm on book 9 without 'em and it's only 4 months in. And, of course, now that I'm back to work, I'll resume my regularly scheduled program of finishing approximately 1 book per month or so.

The unexpected overages of vacation

So, we're back.

The bathroom scale is, as I like to call it, wrong, again. See, I'm over my 10 lb. range. So, we'll be feasting on vegetable-heavy soups for a few weeks 'til I'm back in the happy zone and the scale gets right. But really, if you don't gain weight on vacation, you didn't do it properly -- that's what I always say.

I expected the weight overage. What I didn't expect were the other kinds.

I just finished entering my mileage into my running log and I was shocked to realize that the week of the marathon, thanks to all of the tourist walking, I put 53 miles on my feet. Since I started religiously keeping track of my mileage in 2004, I've NEVER done more than 50 miles in a week. In fact, I've done only 5 weeks over 40 miles in that time, and none of them were weeks when I did marathons (you know, when I was supposed to be tapering). So yeah, just another reason to consider a marathon run on vacation as an experience and nothing where you should be shooting for a PR.

If you are like us, when you vacation you walk EVERYWHERE. It's just the best way to get to know a city, the countryside, and the world. Plus, it's relaxing. But, apparently, it can add up, even when you think you aren't running as much as you should be.

Also, there's another hilarious story about unexpected overage from our trip that hails from our last night in Taipei. We were tired from a day of much walking: first from our hotel, to eat delicious xiao long bao at Din Tai Fung, then to see and make a small offering at the Longshan Temple, and then getting lost on our way to The Royal Bali Health Center on Kunming St. where, I had the best 90 minute whole body massage of my entire life.

This amazing massage was followed by a 40 minute reflexology treatment, which hurt, but did my marathon-battered feet and calves a world of good. I suspect I will spend the rest of my life in search of a massage to rival this one. The therapist spoke no English, and me, no Mandarin, so I couldn't even gather what style of massage it was, where he trained, how I could seek it out again, or anything -- it resembled the (now) second best massage of my life (floor shiatsu, from a very stereotypical Japanese man in Playa del Carmen, of all places) in many ways, but was on a table, involved just as much stretching, as well as adjustments, and more active massage and not just pressure points, plus it was through pajama like shorts and a wrap as well as a sheet, and he clearly had freedom to modify because he focused on my post-marathon IT bands instinctively, spending more time on my left, which, historically is my tighter side. Oh, my legs were so much better after he was done. Heaven, I tell you.

And, the institution did not appear to accept tips, which, sadly, I hope I correctly interepreted, because damn, if anyone's massage services were ever worth a huge tip, it was my buddy therapist #10, whose card I have, whose name I repeated when he gave it to me, but have since lost (and, of course, it's written in Hanzi on his card, so I couldn't tell you his name if I tried).

Anyways, after the full day of walking, we planned to do an easy quick dinner, close to our hotel, so we could return to the room, pack up, and sleep before getting into a cab by 6 AM to begin the long multi-modal trip home consisting of a cab ride to Taipei airport, a 3-hour 737 to Narita, a bus between terminal 2 and terminal 1 of Narita (that comes only once an HOUR between 1 pm and 2 pm! Japan, why hast thou and thy perfect efficiency forsaken me? I was so confused!), people movers, a stop at the connections desk in terminal 1 to check into our flight to SFO, a 9+ hour 747 to SFO, immigration, baggage claim, customs, bart to millbrae, caltrain, and then a 1.5 mile walk with our rolling luggage home. And, of course, to further fuck us up, despite the passed time and 3 meals, given the time change, technically, we arrived home 6 hours after we left the hotel in Taipei and just in time for lunch.

Life, however, had other plans for our night than the mellow early to bed option.

We ended up choosing a teppanyaki joint within walking distance of the hotel, and we were seated at one of the grills next to an empty seat with its own bottle of wine, and a woman and man enjoying teppanyaki. E surreptitiously pointed to the empty seat whispering in my ear, "I wonder who the tough guy is who ordered his own bottle of wine to go along with his tea?"

Later, tough guy came and sat at the grill, briefly joining the other two. They conversed in Mandarin. E and I conversed in English. It became apparent that the other man (the non-1-bottle-wonder) was an American-style speaker of English, but also spoke Mandarin. At one point, it became apparent that he was trying to explain my shirt to them (an inside joke T-shirt from law school designed by the lovely A).

I leaned in to laugh with E about being in a foreign country and being identified as foreigners, where they think they can talk about you without you knowing. But you always know, even if you don't speak the language. We smiled. We enjoyed our meal. I made some disparaging comments about my horrid soup and sent it back only 1/4 eaten (for me, a rarity), but I complimented the gorgeous dishes (Noritake, I was later informed).

Eventually, Mr. 1-man-wine-bottle left again, for the third or fourth time (I presumed he was a chain-smoker) and in his absence, the American-speaking man finally addressed us. We introduced ourselves to him and his female friend. We talked about the food. We talked about our common experiences -- his as an immigrant American educated in our country, ours as natural born citizens. They seemed shocked that we opted to come to Taipei on vacation (not business), and even more shocked that we found it more comfortable, culturally, than Japan. Finally, they were embarrassed when we offered to explain my shirt...

And then, sake arrived. It turned out that Mr. 1-man-wine-bottle owned the restaurant. You can imagine where this goes....

Thankfully, no one heard (or was rude enough to point out) my disparaging comments about the soup, and, when the American asked before the sake arrived and we knew that his friend owned the joint, I had truthfully reviewed the rest of the meal (and the gorgeous dishes) with honest appreciation. Boy, when he told me that he was best friends with Mr. 1-man-bottle-owner, and that the gorgeous woman to his left was the owner's wife, with a B.A. from University of Toronto and, thus, more than fluent in English, it sure made me think about how open I am with my review of food when I eat out and glad that the food in this joint was relatively good. It had, before that moment, honestly never occurred to me that I could be eating next to the owner of a restaurant, or his wife and best friend from childhood.

Over the next two hours, we chatted about Taiwan politics, evolution of the relationship with China, our impressions of Taipei, their upcoming visit to California -- all while the four of us (without Mr. wine-owner) shared 3 small bottles of sake on the house, including the last one, served over my objections, but much to the pleasure of E when the owner offered it with a smile as his "best stuff, gold label." During this time, the owner finished his first bottle of wine all to himself and then, much to our surprise, opened and finished bottle 2 solo as well. Finally, just before midnight, we watched him close up shop and following their lead, we left the mall where the restaurant was located through the service entrance, which involved us going through the men's restroom when Mr. 2-bottles thought it would be a good idea for him to just stop in and, you know, use the facilities. What the hell? We were very confused. Was this actually the way to the exit or just some elaborate joke that was being played on us?

But no, apparently, culturally, it's just fine to meet people, treat them to sake, invite them into your restaurant's restroom, pee within earshot of your wife and the female guest, and then heard them into your car. We could not turn down his offer to drive us to our hotel because the only way to leave was through the garage (or so we were told, and as visitors who don't know cultural norms and can't read, or speak, what did we know?). Thankfully, our hotel was across the street.

If the sake and wine-soaked stories are to be believed, they will all be here in California (meeting up again all the way from Taipei and Florida for the American) in 2 weeks. If they reach out to us, I suspect we will be hosting them to a long dinner and more amusing cross-cultural conversation and entirely too much alcohol. Stay tuned for more stories...

Truly, it's random experiences like these that are the types of things that make me travel. I think, in some ways, I learned more about Taiwanese culture, American culture, myself, the concept of the idea of "foreign" and humanity, and just how wacky the world can be with that one experience than I had in the entire year prior.

But, in hindsight, the funniest thing to me, was that during the whole interchange, I thought we could leave at any time. I was scared E's eagerness to accept the offered gifts of more sake were rude. I kept trying to thank the owner and be sure that no one thought we were overstepping our bounds, in typical American fashion. It seemed to me, that the wife and friend wanted to go, and that our acceptance of offered gifts might be impeding their departure. It was only after we left that I realized that after we paid the bill, the staff shut down the restaurant. For the next two hours, we really were there as guests, and sort of kidnapped, trapped, at the will of the owner of the restaurant, because the mall was closed, the lights were out, and there was no way to get out without the authorized access key, which, of course, we did not have.

Needless to say, the extra sake and awake hours did not help with the next day's early flight. But then again, it was worth it for the story and I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

Cheers to unexpected travel overage in all of its forms.

Things we will miss

Tomorrow is our last day in the country of Japan.

Technically, we've already waded away from the waters of Mainland Japan and, what feels to me, towards home by visiting the champuru island of Okinawa (I suspect this has more to do with the demographic of the bay area than any actual shared culture between the two melting pots, but I digress...).

I started to make a mental list of things I would miss because I can't get them at home and, if I could, would import. Then, I recruited E. Together, we came up with this list, in rough order of how much we will miss them:

10. Tiny dishes, ornately prepared. Never again will I ever encounter so many tiny dishes to present one meal. Of this, I am almost certain. Yesterday, for Japanese breakfast, E and I were presented with 12 small and unique (even our respective similar shapes had different designs) dishes on a deep maroon circular platter (with an edge flattened to line up with the table), plus a blue and white tea cup on a saucer with shiso tea and a glass water cup. The amount of time and effort that must go into the presentation of the minutiae of food is overwhelming. We were not stuffed. We ate it all and were pleasantly full and ready to snack again before dinner.

9. Pickles. You never know what you'll get soaked in vinegar in a little tiny dish on the side of one of your courses. But they're all good. Yes, we have a japanese grocery store nearby. We can get many of these there, I'm sure. But the variety and ubiquity is what I'll miss.

8. Pre-warmed toilet seats. Especially when you get up in the middle of the night. I mean, if you're going to be all energy consumptive, do it in a way that *matters.* Fucking brilliant. The pre-flushing noises to cover your business, on the other hand, just make me laugh.

7. Getto herb tea. This one is all mine -- E couldn't care less. Apparently, it's an Okinawan root related to ginger and not common in mainland Japan, so the likelihood of me finding it at home is quite low. Bummer. I love this stuff. That being said, the herbal teas I've had in Japan have been the best I've ever had and when I get home I may just start experimenting until I find something close to my favorite.

6. The option of entering the thankyou-loop. It's so funny to realize that you could just keep thanking the people who thank you, that they'd thank you back, and then... amusement available at every turn. Typically, we refrain, but occasionally, who could resist?

5. French pastries. I'm not sure why, but you can get much better quality French pastries in Japan, and here, in Okinawa, than you can in San Francisco. The default croissants at the train stations and breakfast shops are flakier, better, more frequently available, and much closer to their French counterparts than they are at home. A quick chat with our French waiter today confirmed it for us. He used to run a French restaurant in Tokyo and claimed that the pastry chef next to his old restaurant made the *best* mont-blanc in the world. The Japanese, he admits, do a very good job of making French delicacies. That's quite an endorsement from a Frenchman!

4. Japanese confections. Mochi and azuki-based sweets are my favorites, but I've loved most everything I've tried (including some delicious soba-based sweets). In Kyoto, which specializes in many of the types I love the most, E finally learned to pull me from the shops before I could purchase yet *ANOTHER* mochi-wrapped snack.

3. Okinawan Beef. We didn't make it to Kobe, nor did we purchase any of the super-expensive famous beef you read about on this trip. But, last night, we had Okinawan tenderloin at the teppanyaki place, and DAMN! When it came out we were impressed. So perfectly marbled. Thin white lines of saturated fat, just waiting to be seared to rare perfection on the 200C grill by a skilled local chef who added nothing but butter to the grill and salt and pepper to the meat. Both E and I agreed -- it was in contention for some of the best beef we've ever eaten in our lives.

2. Picture-ramen. How could you not love a method of food where you match up the plastic food price with the price on the machine, put in money, and then hope that the food you will be served will be more appetizing than the plastic? In all machine-cases, for us, it has been a cheap and delicious success. One time, at an actual counter, where we payed a human, I enjoyed my meal, but E informed me that he thought the ramen back home was better...

1. Cheap, ridiculously fresh Kaiten Zushi. Sure, it's kitschy, and not the true artisan experience. But it's better than anything you can get at home for the price. However, much to the disappointment of those who insist that travel is required for an authentic experience, at least on the freshness side of things, after doing a 5-sushi meal survey (including the obligatory Zushi-bar non-kaiten Tsukiji experience), we've decided we can get sushi of this quality and freshness at home, within walking distance of our house, in a restaurant where everyone speaks Japanese except us (and the lone Mexican waiter who speaks significantly more Japanese words than either of us do). But, in exchange, it's twice or three times as expensive and there's no rotating conveyor belt of happiness, you have to order it, which means we get worse service since at home than in Japan where the good stuff just gets made and goes on the belt and we can take it by sight, since at home we'd have to know enough to order it.

So... it looks like we'll miss the food the most. Shocking.

Nascient Thoughts From Japan

I have been making my way through a complicated culture, a language of which I maybe know 100 words, and one of the most complex social hierarchies in the world for almost two weeks now.

I have also been devouring the books on Japan and Japanese culture that I bought.

Combined, they have very much helped to put my life in perspective.

E asked me if I was going to blog about the crazy as he likes to call the daily wackiness we encounter and try to comprehend as we bumble our way through this society.

I explained that I did not feel up to the task.

How could I possibly explain what it is like for one born-and-bred and another adopted Californian to find themselves at one of the most beautiful, tranquil, amazing beach resorts in the world and then to realize that the couple in the room next to you are wearing wetsuits in their private jacuzzi. Guess we probably shouldn't hop in to our private jaccuzzi naked, huh?

How could I possibly do justice to the obviously sincere and amazing desire to help of the hotel guest services manager and my feeling of gratitude toward him and the eye-doctor he took me to (not to mention all of his waiting patients) who did their part to make sure I could have a "testu-rensu" that worked so I could run my marathon.

What about the random questioning from the police in the train station? The adorable old couple who ran the Nagano restaurant where we ate lunch, who made me write my name for them so they could make a sign and cheer for me at the marathon?

What about the rows of open-backed urinals (nothing but running shorts with straddled legs) and during the race, the lines of men, openly pissing off the road in full view, in a culture that, by all other measures, is so much more modest than ours?

And finally, how could I possibly give voice to what it was like to be such a visual minority that I am judged in every minute as an outsider, and people register surprise and usually gratitude when I speak even broken, miniscule, miserable excuses for their language.

In Egypt, as a woman, I was invisible. My status, especially if I wore a scarf an appropriate clothing, was one of sort-of belonging to a class within Egypt's greater society, even if I didn't like the class to which I was relegated. If I spoke the language it was attributed to the male with whom I traveled.

But here. Here. I exist. Women play a very gender-defined role, and there is much to think about that is wrapped up in that, but they all know (as do I) that am so different from that role. And they don't hate me for it or think of me as a non-person (although they probably do think of me as "foreigner"). They just recognize it for what it is and treat me according to their understanding of it, which generally, isn't that far off. They assume I speak no Japanese (not far from the truth). They assume E & I are American, which, conveniently, we are. And, they assume we don't fit. They expect us to fuck up. They expect us to behave like outsiders. They laugh. They smile. For the most part, they are nice.

Many of my day-to-day thoughts in life before this trip had been directed toward fitting in, structuring my life and my career such that they made sense within the greater cultural structures within which I must move.

Briefly living amongst and reading about this amazingly strong and distinct culture makes that analysis much more vibrant and interesting. After this trip, I suspect I will be more comfortable with my lack of ability to conform to what I perceive to be the dominant cultural overtones where I spend much of my time. Oddly, I have been more comfortable here, where everyone treats me as if I am different than I have been at home as of late. So perhaps I need to stop trying to be anything other than different and start trying to be more of myself.

After all, if there is one thing I have learned on this trip, it is that I come from a culture where it is not explicitly expected of me, even as an insider, to conform. Given that it is available to me, I might as well take advantage of that benefit, non?

Delicious Slime

Last night, for the first time in a long time, I enjoyed a meal where I couldn't identify many of the things I was eating.

While E, predictable Japanese eater that he is, opted for the Sushi set meal (His grand total for the trip thus far is 5 sushi meals, which sounds like he has exercised restraint. But, there are also 5 meals of ramen in the mix for both of us, so he's really just splitting his preferences unless I drag him somewhere where one of those is not an option.)

I went the adventurous route, and chose the ryukuan ryouri, a multicourse meal of traditional foods from the island of Okinawa. The meal focused on local ingredients, but was prepared with obvious influences from its complicated history of trade, war, and power relations with its larger neighbors (Japan, China, Thailand) resulting in a unique cuisine.

The first course appeared to be pickled greens on top of pigs ears on the side of some slimy textured blocks of deliciousness (some pickled root vegetables, some cubes resembling aspic). One cube, in one course, appeared to be some sort of textured root, but when I bit into it, was a tender, cold pork preparation that was unlike anything I'd every tasted -- amazing. Even E was impressed, and this is a boy who is picky about his swine.

Slime, in one form or another, was the base of most of the courses, including a gooey broth over fish, and a delicious slurpy, slimy, slightly spicey goo-based seaweed and rice soup that reminded me, vaguely, of a few of the ochazukes I'd sampled in mainland japan.

You'd think that slimy dessert would be hard to do well, but they pulled it off -- a starchy poi-like pudding with tapioca balls and a yellow jello-like substance that seemed to have the same flavor as the juice they served us at our arrival (Shekwasha, I believe) over fresh fruit. I was in heaven. Light. Acidic. Starchy. And nowhere to be found any cloying sweetness. Now that's how I like to end a meal!

After all of the carefully presented courses, I found myself pleasantly filled, and very healthy. It is widely reported (but I couldn't find a source) that Okinawa has the highest number of centagenarians, per capita.

Perhaps we all need a little more delicious slime in our diet.

Update: I found this link to help identify some of my meal. I am certain that one of the courses was some delicious tofuyo in a slightly spicy broth-sauce, I was trying to place its cheesy-like texture and flavor while eating it, so I was happy to learn what it was.

Lessons from the Nagano Marathon

My sore legs and tight shoulders conspired to wake me at 5AM this morning. Yesterday, you see, I ran the Nagano marathon. Slowly. And I got one of the worst sunburns I've had in quite some time.

I really should have reset my expectations for my performance earlier than I did (somewhere around mile 18). I certainly had enough reasons to think it might not go exactly as I had hoped.

First, two weeks prior to the race, there was the amazing weekend of wine and food, where I ate and drank with abandon and managed to put my long run on hold 'til the next week. That alone should have let me know where my focus lied. But no, I held on to the dream of the potential that my earlier training had created.

Also, as I mentioned, I've never gained weight while training for a marathon. Now, this time, I've done more speed training, and it certainly did change the structure of my leg muscle, so I attributed the majority of the weight gain to muscle. But, extra weight is extra weight for 26.2 miles, and I knew that. I just chose to ignore it. Well, until the reality oh-so-pleasantly set in on the second day of the trip when I squatted and ripped the inner thigh of one of my favorite pairs of jeans.

Originally, we planned to fly to japan, go to nagano, do the marathon and then take the remainder of our trip. That would have been preferable, from a training perspective. But, Golden Week would have been in the way and that increased to price of the vacation to an unreasonable level. So, we decided to arrive earlier and spend about 9 days in Japan before the race.

On the long run before the race, where I was scheduled to do an easy 8 miler, I found myself in Tokyo (not a very running-friendly city), and it was raining. I went to the hotel's gym to find that there were 2 treadmills and a long line of westerners waiting to use them. I didn't want to schedule the entire day around my run -- I was on vacation. So, we walked and toured much of tokyo, and I told myself that 10 miles of walking is just as good as 8 miles of running.

Over the next week, I comforted myself with alternating theories about each day's sight-seeing walks, namely that either (a) the walking was just as good as a day of scheduled rest and shouldn't affect my taper, or (b) the walking could replace the day's run. Yes, I now see the flaw in that logic.

One day 3 of the trip, I ripped my right contact. I cannot run in my glasses. Perhaps this was a sign that I should give up on the race? Oh, no. Not me. Instead, I called guest services, and between their best english and my best Pimsleur japanese and wild gesticulations, I magically found myself in an eye doctor's office, whereupon I was given a "testu rensu" (test lens). It worked!

Let's see, what else? Oh yes, my fuel belt grew some scary mold during the trip, so I wouldn't be having it on the race. I didn't pack any fuel and couldn't acquire any in Japan, so I'd be eating whatever they gave me on the race (cut up bananas, which worked perfectly, actually).

And, I forgot that I acquired a nasty cold on day 2 of the trip that I managed to fight off before the race with the help of an OTC combo including phenylpronanalomine (why-oh-why did the US ban this stuff? So wonderful!!). Sure, you can't get psuedoephedrine here at all, but who cares with the Phen of Fen-Phen at your disposal?

The weather forecast on the day of the race, of course, called for rain on the day of the marathon, and I hadn't packed any water-resistant running clothes. Still, not to be discouraged, I thought, better cold than hot! I also didn't bother to put sunscreen on my chest and shoulders.

The morning of the race, it was beautiful. Cloudy, slightly cool, but nowhere near the predicted 45F. Silently, myself and approximately 8,000 very serious japanese people (okay, so there were 150 foreign runners) walked to the starting line. Apparently, they thought a 20 minute walk from the train to the start was a reasonable thing to do before a marathon. What's an extra mile?

The first several miles went wonderfully. Faster than I expected. Easy. E cheered me on around mile 3 and was surprised at my pace.

Ganbate! Ganba-des! Fight-Go!

I remembered the lessons from my last marathon, and forced myself to take walk breaks, to slow down, to save some energy for the finish. But, it wasn't until mile 18 or so when I realized I should have reset my expectations entirely.

I was not in anywhere near the shape I needed to be in to hit my goal time. Plus, the promised rain had turned into gorgeous sun, and there was no shade on the course. I slowed further, took more walk breaks, and was very conscientious about throwing water on myself and drinking fluids.

At Km 32, I made a deal with myself. Run 1 Km, walk a minute, 10 times and you'll be done. And, that is what I did. Slowly, but surely.

I crossed the finish line about 10 minutes before the absolute cut-off time I gave E -- as in, if I'm not there by then something went very wrong. But, thankfully, nothing was wrong except my unrealistic expectations...

Overall, it was a wonderful experience, and by going slowly I was able to experience it more fully. Plus, now that I see the extent of my sunburn, I suspect I could have gotten into some serious trouble if I had tried to go faster.

Hindsight, friends. Don't try to run a PR on your first international marathon. Just do it for the experience, which will be amazing.

Observations from Japan #1

1. Damn. I really could use some lessons in manners. Everyone is SO SO SO SO SO nice here. Seriously. It's enough to make me re-evaluate how I treat strangers, my friends, and family. Definitely something to think about.

2. Cultural hegemony is the norm here. Even when people are trying to be different they do it in a way that fits in. It makes me, as a foreigner, feel very different, but also, amusingly, free, as if they know I couldn't possibly fit in because it's much too complicated for me to do it properly, so why should I try. In every other culture where I've been a tourist, I've always tried to fit in. Here, I feel very forgiven from the get go for my failure to do so and an encouragement to be myself.

3. Women often choose the non-pants option, even when it is freezing and/or raining outside, and the full separate leg-covering options would seem to make sense. Outside of the business districts, you see more women in pants, but they tend to be sturdy motherly types. Very few young women, or even professional women, wear pants. Instead, it's skirts and lots of hose and tights and sturdy, nurse-like, shoes. Younger women are quite fond of the knee socks and short skirts, or knee socks and short shorts options. This is surreal, if you are me, and freezing in your jeans. Why on earth would you choose to expose raw flesh between your hips and knees in this weather? And yet, they do. And they look at me and don't think, hey, those jeans look warm. Or if they do, they still wear the knee-highs, and you know I'm not the first women in jeans without a skirt over them (a popular option) they've ever seen.

3. For good cheap eats, head to the basement. At least in Shinjuku. Lucky_girl, her parents, E & I enjoyed drinks at the top of the hotel from Lost in Translation, but we didn't want to pay the Hyatt tax on meals. Lucky for us, the basement of the Park Hyatt tower was full of budget food, including the home-made udon shop where we ended up and had fabulous full set meals for under 1,000 yen each (approx $10). E's an addict and claims that he will only eat in the basement. We went on a tour of many local skyscraper basements today. We've scoped out some winners for the future.

4. Picture menus, like the kind I used to make fun of, at Denny's are about the greatest thing in the world when you don't speak much (or any) of the language. Speaking of which, Royal Host is one of the few places where you can find a Western breakfast in Tokyo that isn't priced well over 2,000 yen per person. We're fans.

5. Bacon in Japan is thinner than in the U.S. This also means it is easier to wrap around cherry tomatoes, stick on a skewer, and grill. Brilliant!!!! (As an aside, I Can't wait to get home and plant our summer foods!)

6. Asking for "fuel" in the Addidas Ginza store when you realize that you don't have Gu, or Cliff bars, or anything of that ilk is bound to get you into a hilarious Japan-glish confused conversation. I don't think this is much of a running town. Outside, we've seen all of one runner in Japan since we've been here, and we've spent most of our time walking, often on runnable trails. I will note, however, that when it rains, the walkways here are very slippery. Also, I was not thrilled to find myself fighting with the other jet-lagged early-rising westerners for the two treadmills in the exercise room at our very large hotel (2 skycrapers, 35+ floors each) -- for comparison, they have 3 err...equestrian exercise machines.

7. Today, we missed the entrance to the 6 story sex toy store because, as E said, I think we just missed the entrance because we were too busy discussing gender roles in Japan. Head. Exploding. From. Irony. Must. Seek. Ramen.

More to come.

Zazu, Michael Mina, (and Cyrus, vicariously)

Friday night, after fighting the traffic from Silicon Valley to Sonoma County, we had a delicious meal at Zazu, thanks to the recommendation of R's little bro, an up-and-coming sous-chef in the area, who acted as our culinary and wine guide for the weekend via cell phone.

We were meeting up with a hard-core group of east-coast visitors who'd been living in a rented house in Healdsburg and had been wine-tasting and restaurant hopping for 2-days straight by the time we arrived, so we deferred to them on the bottle of Brogan Cellars Pinot Noir to start.

Light, bright fruit, and playful on the palate, it was an excellent way for a group of 6 to wait for their table at the bar with nothing but bread. Plus, as we were sitting there, we could look straight into the kitchen, which caused D & C to point and say, That's totally Zoi from top chef.

It was. She even came out to say hi to the table during our meal, and she was quite gracious and nice. Given my recent exposure to Kaki's fame, I was doubly impressed with Zoi's presence and obvious sincere gratitude to her patrons.

Once seated, we enjoyed the antipasto plate that, in truth, was the star of the evening -- home-cured meats (including a paprika-spiced salumi that was to die for)... cheeses galore... olives... mmmm... what's not to like? We washed these treats down with a lovely Barbera and listened to the visiting group's tales of their amazing visit to Cyrus, which, according to some, is properly receiving better reviews than the French Laundry these days.

And, in keeping with the theme of the weekend, while we were close to satiated after the first course, we powered through entrees and desserts to fill out the evening (and our bellies). In an acknowledgment that it would be next to impossible to find a wine that would match the table's homey comfort food entree selections of steak, ribs, duck, and lemon asparagus ricotta lasagna we left ourselves in our server's hands and enjoyed a pleasantly versatile (if a bit hot for a pinot noir) Emeritus.

Saturday, after a day of wine-tasting and a picnic, we rounded up the troops to drive to San Francisco to check into our hotel, relax, and prepare for the final meal of the trip at Michael Mina.

But, somehow, one of the east-coast visitors made us stop at In-n-out on the way to the city. That's right! You're only in Norcal once every 4 or 5 years. Why not? So, of course, despite living here, and being full to a ridiculous level, I had fries. And they were good...

As for Michael Mina, I must say, I was pleasantly surprised. I'd heard mixed reviews, and in particular, I'd heard that many people felt it was overpriced and that the food really wasn't the star of the show, that rather it was about ambiance, tourists being able to say that they had been there, and the caché.

According to our visitors, Little-R was right, when he said that he expected Cyrus to out-perform Michael Mina. They said it did. But really, that's nothing to cry about. If people in Sonoma are arguing about whether Cyrus is out-performing French Laundry right now, and if you throw in price as a factor, and trust the descriptions from our visitors (Best meal of my life, I hate fancy restaurants and I felt welcome, plus it was some of the best food I've ever eaten..., they brought a whole plate of sweetbreads for me when I jokingly mentioned that I was disappointed with the few that were on my entrée -- and they only charged me $15 for it...) I would not be surprised that Cyrus is outperforming FL according to some -- with arguably equally caliber food, amazing service, and more flexible options for appetite and timing, all for less than a luxury car-payment... Let's just say Cyrus is very high on our to-visit list now.

Standing on its own, however, Michael Mina is no slouch. It is at the same price-point as my least favorite Michelin Two-Star Manresa, and better than Manresa in every way that I care about. In fact, it's definitely on the short list of best high-end restaurant meals I've ever enjoyed.

The service was slightly more stiff than I prefer, but given the location, I can understand that my more relaxed preferences may not be the same as the majority of their clientele, and I can not fault their execution -- it was precisely timed, knowledgeable, and polite.

The location is amazing (something locals may run the risk of forgetting): it's in a gorgeous historic hotel facing Union Square.

The wine list is extensive, and the servers and sommellier are knowledgeable, kind, and willing to recommend (politely) their preferences, even when they may be less expensive than the bottle you suggested. Specifically, the sommellier recommended we go with a lower priced Merry Edwards Pinot Noir than the one we had selected, and the table enjoyed two bottles of his recommendation (the 2005 Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir) with joy (although I opted for white wine by the glass to pair with my very light fish-based meal selection, I tasted the Merry Edwards and found it to be lightly earthy-on-the-nose, light balanced fruit, and a pleasure to drink that would have been wonderful with the majority of the table's selections).

The trio approach to serving food is fun. I liked the idea of three variations on a common theme all in one plate. I've seen it done occasionally on some menus, but I've never seen an entire menu based on the concept (with a few classic options for those who wanted to opt out). I found it clever, and I know it takes more time and effort to do 3 well-prepared approaches to an ingredient than 1, so I also found it technically impressive, and a great way to educate my palate about variety in food.

The trio welcome platter was an excellent way to start a meal. And the pinnacle of the triangle immediately focused the group on a lively conversation -- it was a small cup of uni panna cotta, topped with uni suspended in a gelée, and a sprinkling of dried seaweed and toasted rice pearls. Immediately, people had opinions. Many people made a face at the strong flavors. I found it to be one of the best flavor/texture combinations I've ever had. And, I was very impressed with the bold move of offering fish-pudding to start. That takes confidence!

Perhaps part of the reason I loved my meal was that I was in the mood for something lighter and I went the fish route. I have since learned that Mina's rise to excellence was partially as the co-founder and conceptual developer of Aqua, so perhaps my desire for seafood was a wonderful coincidence.

Regardless of why or how it ended up in front of me, the tropical crudo trio was one of the best (if not the best) preparations of raw fish I have ever enjoyed. The fluke, well, I didn't expect to be wowed, but I was. Kampachi, I expected to adore, and I did. But, in particular, I was amazed at how much I enjoyed the spanish mackerel, which typically, I avoid in sashimi form, due to what I perceive to be its overly fishy flavor. The quality of all three types of fish was divinely fresh, the servings were larger than I would have expected, and each collection of 3-4 slices was perfectly plated on a 3-grooved long plate, with gorgeous mini-cubes of the selected accoutrements and colorful glazes of sauces below, that when eaten together in the same bite with the fishes made me *very* pleased.

I very much enjoyed my salted, seared, and poached presentations of cod as the second course as well. And the white burgundy the server selected for my pairing was one of the best flavor pairings between wine and food I've ever had.

The cheese plate was amazing, as evidenced by my ability to eat all of the cheese and many of the selected side-flavor presentations despite my need for perfect posture due to the expansion in my belly from the day's picnic, wine-tasting, in-n-out, not to mention my growing self-preservation sense that after the last 36 hours, I should really avoid all food.

All-in-all, I was very impressed with the restaurant, the service, the food, the wine, the location, and, how they handled our large party of 7. All courses were served French-style at exactly two perfectly timed moments (women, then men). Dishes were cleared unobtrusively. Wine was poured appropriately and politely. They added a gratuity of 20% to the bill, which while some may find presumptuous, in our case was somewhat of a blessing because it effectively killed all discussion of gratuity (unlike the occasional discussion that an added tip on top of 18.5% for the group can incite) -- because the service had been impeccable for 3.25 hours, we were more than happy to pay 20% and no one felt the need to ask if the others were tipping more. And, they accepted 4 credit cards and divided the bill into 1/7, 2/7, 2/7, and 2/7 without a lifted eyebrow.

Sonoma Wine -- Hanna, Stryker, and Verité

Hanna was just as beautiful, but less impressive than last time. They have a low $5 tasting fee (refunded with purchase), which is nice. But, I had my heart set on buying their reserve Sauvignon Blanc, and they no longer make it. So, I was sad.

Their larger production wines are solid, and reasonably priced for the region. But, overall, they have moved away from some of the smaller production wines I loved them for and even at the winery, it feels much more like a solid business winery (nothing wrong with that) than a local operation.

Their standard sauvingnon blanc is, as always, a great pleasure to drink, but at $18/bottle, it's not a fabulous value (just a good one), so we bought a couple of bottles, but on our next visit, we may skip them, since we can get it at Safeway (and I will the next time I feel like rewarding myself). Their Bismark reds are good, so we bought one or two bottles, but we left much more in love with the setting and the pictures we took than the wine.

From there, we headed to Stryker to eat our lunch in what has to be one of the most beautiful picnic settings in the world. Our visiting friends had purchased quite a selection of cured meets, cheeses, breads, and tabouleh, so we feasted in grand style with a glass of the 2004 Stryker Rockpile Merlot (at $36 plus a discount for a promotion, this wine was quite a value -- and we brought another bottle home to lay down).

And finally, thanks to little-R's recommendation, we found ourselves at Verité for one of the best wine-tasting experiences I've ever had. We were greeted by a friendly Wine Educator (how cool is that title?) who explained the layout of the winery and the grapes used to make the wine before she escorted our group of 12 to a formal dining-room like setting where we learned she was an advanced somellier who would be leading us on a wine-class-like tasting through the 6 pre-poured glasses of heaven for 90 minutes.

At $25 to taste, it was not cheap. But, I've paid $80 for similar-length wine-tasting classes taught by professionals with her credentials, and she conveyed just as much useful knowledge as they did during those courses.

Unlike many wineries, Verité does not refund your tasting fee with purchase. However, their wines are amazing and their price point is quite high. During the class, you taste and could finish six 1/2 glasses of their great Bordeaux-style stuff while you are walked through comparisons between what is in front of you and the various styles in Bordeaux that the winemaker/vigneron is trying to achieve.

The discussion made me nostalgic for my days in La Rive Gauche when I first learned to drink wine. How spoiled I was...

Given the nostalgia, I was a marked sucker, and while I didn't fall prey to the aged offerings, I did buy the most expensive bottle of wine I've ever purchased. But, it was heavenly now, and the older versions had aged so wonderfully, that I felt compelled to act and store it for a special occasion. Perhaps our 5th wedding anniversary.

Plus, I did the math and determined that given what the sell the bottles for, the value of the tasting in the glasses was way more than the nominal fee they charge (as in, to buy the bottles and replicate the tasting for 12 would have cost $75.83 per person). And, on our exit, the wine educator gave us 4 half-bottles of wine to enjoy when we reached our hotel, which had they been for sale in 1/2 bottle units, would have cost at least $250.

So, upon leaving, I didn't feel like I'd been swindled into spending entirely too much on wine. Rather, I was giddy and filled with expectation of great things to come. So yeah. Verité winery. An amazing local Bordeaux-inspired experience. And it's cheaper than going to France...

Can't move...digesting

We just got back from a ridiculous Sonoma food and wine weekend, and I'm finally almost done reading the appropriately titled, The Man Who Ate Everything.

I'll break the rehash of the amazing weekend into mini-posts, but suffice it to say, my priorities are thus: When Sonoma with out-of-town guests goes up against marathon training, Sonoma wins.

Saturday's long run of 12 miles did not happen. Not Saturday. Not this morning. And, despite my opting out of drinks at the bar this afternoon, not even this evening, because while I had hoped I could fit it in before nightfall, I'm still too full to run.

So, now I'm looking forward to tonight's healthy recovery of yoga and maybe some broth, followed by early sleep and 12 miles of running at sunrise, before my 8 AM conference call.

Then several days of light food, easy runs, and preparation for the big trip, where we'll be heading to a country that coined the word Kuiadore, roughly translated as To ruin oneself with food, or eating to surfeited collapse.

Right up our alley.

Feminist Soba

Lately, I've really been struggling with womens' role in the business and legal worlds and sexism.

Also, I've made some amazing meals.

If no other good comes of these struggles (which, I must admit, despite torturing E with my descriptions of why I think it is important for womens' issues to be addressed I've managed to neither fully convince he nor myself...),

At least there was the good soba discovery....

Feisty Soba

-3 bundles of single-serving soba
-1-2 Tbsp red curry paste
-3-4 Tbsp fish sauce
-3-4 Tbsp soy sauce
-1 head garlic, minced
-1 bag haricots verts (12-14 oz.), frozen
-sesame oil

1. Heat wok to high, add sesame oil. Watch smoke. Realize that you knew sesame was a medium heat oil and feel embarrassed. Turn heat to medium and remove wok from heat, swirl 'til it stops smoking. Add tons and tons (1 head?) of minced garlic to the wok and toss fervently. (While no one is looking, boil some water and boil the soba. Drain the soba quickly and rinse under cold water as soon as it is al dente. Chop into 2 inch pieces with kitchen scissors).

2. Add 1 bag frozen haricots verts (each haricot can be chopped into two or three pieces if you like) to the wok.

3. Stir fry the beans, garlic and oil on the wok and discuss.

4. Add fish sauce, thai curry paste and soba....

5. What's not to like....(except burnt toasts, but we wouldn't dare...)

April Fool's

Toasts for soup? Or charcoal? You decide: