Oct
3
I am developing a love affair with La Tartine Gourmande. Reading this beautiful website reminds me that the parts of life that I tend to summarily dismiss as being appealing yet unavailable to me—the rich, delicious, simple pleasures I sort of associate with rural living, destroyed by city commutes and the brain-buzzing confusion of balancing work and home—are in fact always there, if only I make room for them. If I take the time to slow down and appreciate the moments as they come. If I elevate, instead of minimize.
Food is such a lovely thing. I hate that I so often make it a convenience, a something to stuff in the mouth without thought.
Speaking of food, I had an insanely good meal with my friend Ashley tonight. JB’s out of town and it seemed like a great time to call on our beloved babysitter, smack dab in the midst of a long solo-parenting weekend and all, so Luciana came over and I went pelting out the door at top speed to meet Ashley for dinner at Boom Noodle. Boom! Oh, it was SO GOOD. My plate of udon came with these crazy paperthin shavings of dried fish bits—what they describe as “dancing bonito flake”—and they curled and waved on the heat of the noodles like a living thing. Deliciously creepy, a salty little zombiefied carpet of yum. And it was such a wonderful mental cache-dump to be out and about with a good friend, no kids in tow, just bullshitting and peoplewatching and relishing our freedom.
The weekend is chugging along. It’s hard being on my own with the kids, but there’s a part of me that sort of craves hogging all those boysnuggles to myself. (When Daddy’s gone, I get to wear that gold medal for a little while. Silver’s not so bad, you know, but everyone loves being number one.) I feel like today was a little too heavy on the TV side of things; tomorrow I’ll try and . . . you know, elevate. Find something bigger to do.
The boys are asleep right now and the only sound is the dog half-snoring nearby and the muted click of my fingers, type type typing to you. It’s nice, and man, this is why those 6 AM wakeup calls are KILLING me—because I can’t stand to go to bed early instead of enjoying this time.
So hey. Let’s talk about food. Tell me, what’s the most wonderful thing you’ve eaten recently?
Sep
30
JB and I were watching some awful show called “Million Dollar Yachts” the other day, which featured, as you might guess, obscenely expensive yachts. One ship included copious amounts of the world’s most rare blue granite, another had custom-carved whalebone accessories, and one owner had built some crazy custom golf course thing that allowed him to send ball after ball flying into the ocean in an attempt to hit various targets, while his crew stood by in a separate giant boat in order to determine each player’s score.
Can you even imagine being that rich? I was all hung up on the golf balls, like wait a minute, isn’t that kind of environmentally fucked? Aren’t golf balls the ones that have a center filled with radioactive space dust, or something? Or at the very least isn’t it possible a marine animal could choke on one? Come ON, wasteful millionaire guy, think of the ball-gagging dolphins!
Every now and then when the Powerball gets up to some ridiculous, unlikely number like $184,032,682,931,085.14 JB and I buy a ticket and launch into a pleasant, meandering, days-long conversation about what we’d do with all that money. It’s basically the polar opposite of those grim Well We Still Can’t Reduce Our 15-Year Refi Loan Like We Had Planned Because the Seattle Housing Market Took a Big Steaming Poo and Thus Our Mortgage is Like Getting Reamed With a Giant Pointy Stick Each Month discussions which result in us combing through our budget yet again and wondering if there’s anything we can skim off the top, like maybe those expensive-ass children.
What would you do with a giant mega-mountain of cash? I mean, you know, aside from donations, helping out family/friends, savings, school tuitions, college funds, and all that responsible stuff. Here’s the big things from my list:
• Quit my job, pronto. Sorry, job. I like you, and I love my coworkers, but your commute sucks and let’s be honest, if I didn’t need the paycheck we probably wouldn’t have a whole lot to talk about.
• Build a generously-sized but not mansion-huge house in Oregon, with two-story log cabin-style front windows overlooking something beautiful.
• Have vacation property in Bend, and a beachouse somewhere tropical.
• Buy a super comfy motorhome, so our family could spend weeks at a time traveling around the US
• Hire an awesome trainer to kick my ass 4-5 days a week.
• Start a business.
• Find the perfect babysitter for a weekly date night and pay to keep her on permanent retainer.
What about you?
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