Three Beautiful Things 11-29-2022: Sleep Challenges, Ed Shovels for Us, Marquette Levels Baylor

 1. I slept a lot, again, today. At night, right now, I am sleeping in 60-90 minute snatches and then I'm up, needing to hydrate, frustrated that my sleeping periods don't last longer. These short stretches of sleep feature weird dreams. I'll be very happy when this pattern ends.

2. Ed knew I that I am too sick to shovel the walks and came by this afternoon and did it for me, a huge help.

3. I watched some men's college hoops, but didn't have much endurance and turned off the television before UVA defeated Michigan, thanks, I read later, to blocking a Wolverine shot late in the game. 

I watched a lot of Marquette's resounding and, to me, shocking thumping of Baylor, 96-70. I was watching this game, thinking ahead to the Gonzaga/Baylor game coming up on Friday. My only thought was that I've never seen Gonzaga's defense disrupt and dismantle a high ranked team the way Marquette discombobulated Baylor. I'm not sure about this, but playing the kind of disruptive defense Marquette played tonight doesn't seem to be a part of Gonzaga's team identity. 

I am curious and eager to see how the Zags/Baylor game works out. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-28-2022: Fingers Crossed for Travel Plans, I Hope to Shovel Soon, Dryer Back On Line

1. My hope is to leave Kellogg on Thursday, meet up with Hugh (and others?) in Spokane Valley, spend the night there, and drive to Portland on Friday for two nights with the Turners before heading to Eugene on Sunday. 

What could get in the way?

I started coughing persistently on Saturday night and definitely have some kind of bug. I'm hoping it will be done with me by Thursday.

I also hope that driving conditions will be at least pretty good on Thursday and Friday.

2. It bothered me all day today that I felt too weak and tired to go out and shovel our sidewalk and Christy's. When I'm feeling healthy, I try to have the walkways clear ahead of our mail carrier's arrival. I couldn't do it today, though, and hope that I might be able to on Tuesday.

3. The venting apparatus for our dryer has needed to be redone for a several weeks and today Ron D. dropped by and got our dryer back is operation again, a great relief.  

Three Beautiful Things 11-27-2022: Purdue is Powerful, Two Breathtaking Games, Zags Win and I Have Some Thoughts

1. Today I barricaded myself in the Vizio room to watch men's college basketball. Today was the third and last day of the Phil Knight Invitational/Phil Knight Legacy tournament, featuring men's and women's games in three venues in Portland.

The first game I watched featured Purdue, the best team I saw all weekend. Today, Purdue dispatched Duke, 75-56. 

In the end, much like Gonzaga on Friday, Duke was hardly a match for Purdue. Yes, Purdue's versatile and mobile 7' 4"center, Zach Eden, presented Duke with all kinds of problems, Not only is he agile in the paint, capable of creating high percentage shots for himself with a combination of deft footwork and a soft shooting tough, he's also an intelligent passer out of the low post, eager, I'd say, to find open teammates and those teammates of his are superb marksmen. 

In addition, Purdue plays intelligent and physical team defense, making it difficult for their opponents to find open shots. Furthermore, Purdue is deep, able to substitute in fresh players who play superbly off the bench.

If for a minute, I thought Gonzaga's loss to Purdue was because Gonzaga didn't play up to its abilities, watching Purdue dismantle Duke led me to believe that Purdue is the superior team to both Duke and Gonzaga, at least at this early stage of the season.

2. The Purdue game featured the Boilermakers' surgical dissecting of Duke, but it wasn't a very exciting game.

But two games this afternoon had a ton of drama. 

First of all, the tilt between Alabama and North Carolina remained undecided until the end of a fourth overtime. Both teams pushed and pushed themselves to conquer the other, answering each other blow by blow, until finally, in the fourth OT, Alabama managed to eek out a 103-101 win. 

Although Michigan State and the Univ of Portland did not go into overtime to decide their game, Portland ended regulation with a miraculous comeback. The Pilots outscored Sparty 13-2 in the game's last three minutes -- in fact, the Pilots scored 8 points in one 30 second stretch and had possession of the ball for a last second shot near the rim that rolled off the tin, allowing the Spartans to escape with a 78-77 victory. 

3. Gonzaga played a very good Xavier team for third place in the Phil Knight Legacy tournament.

Gonzaga was a house on fire in the game's opening minutes and rushed to a 17-4 lead. 

I remember thinking early in this game, as I had thought early in the Purdue game, that I wanted to see Gonzaga put the hammer down and stretch this lead.

But the Zags didn't.

In fact, late in the first half, Xavier cut the Zags' lead to three points. Thanks to a Gregg three with six seconds to go, Gonzaga led by six at half time.

I thought, once again tonight, Gonzaga made a lot of careless ball handling errors, turned the ball over too much, and -- I'm not sure I'm reading this correctly -- the Zags seem almost casual in their play rather than playing with urgency.

Sure enough all of this caught up to Gonzaga in the second half and Xavier crept ahead, holding an eight point lead with six minutes left in the game.

Gonzaga, then, suddenly got hot. Rashir Bolton hit a three. So did Nolan Hickman. Before long, Julian Strawther scored two three point shots in the clutch and Gonzaga regained, it seemed, control of this game.

But, the Zags missed the front end of a couple of one and one free throw opportunities. Anton Watson committed a most unnecessary foul on a Xavier drive. to the tin. 

Gonazaga could have sealed this victory in the last couple of minutes, but kept opening the door a crack for Xavier before finally salting away this win, 88-84.

For basketball fans who think the Zags are overrated year after year, my guess is that when the next polls come out, the Zags will drop out of the top 10. 

The ESPN commentators were quick to say, all tournament long, that Gonzaga is a work in progress, that they are in the process of finding themselves, that they had some huge gaps to fill on this team with the departure of Chet Holmgren and Andrew Nembhard. 

Fair enough.

What do I hope this work will result in?

I'd like to see the Zags stand around less on offense, especially when Drew Timme has the ball down low. Maybe, though, given the room he needs to operate and amount of time it takes him to generate his next move, this isn't possible. Along these lines, I'd like to see Zag players cut hard to the basket more often and pick up more points driving downhill to the tin. Yes, it was great that Gonzaga came back and beat Xavier, but that comeback depended on several three point shots and relying too much on the trey can be risky. 

I'd like to see the players express a bit of emotion while playing. Again, maybe it's not possible with these particular players, but it's the players' impassive faces that lead me to say they aren't playing with a lot of urgency.

I'd like to sense a stronger sense of collective identity on this team. This might very well come with time. The experts on tv say teams with a strong collective identity are connected to each other on offense and defense. Maybe Gonzaga is more connected than I think they are, but I'd like to see clearer evidence that are bonding as a group. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-26-2022: Breakfast at the VFW, An Hour (or so) at The Lounge, Quick and Delicious Dinner

 1. I vaulted into the Sube today and blasted up to the VFW Hall in Osburn for breakfast. I used to go often to this breakfast, but today I reckoned it had been nearly three years since I'd gone. The VFW serves breakfast once a month on the fourth Saturday of the month and it's a great spread. For just six bucks, diners choose between sausage, scrambled eggs, biscuits and gravy, French toast, pancakes, and huckleberry pancakes. The VFW sets out orange juice, milk, coffee, and water and it's an all you can eat affair.

I had a biscuit with gravy accompanied by scrambled eggs and I returned to the service counter and had asked for a few more scrambled eggs with gravy on them.

2. Later in the day, I bolted up to The Lounge and met Ed or about an hour's worth of yakkin' and I enjoyed a Pulaski porter and one pour of 1910 Pendleton Rye. 

Things were mellow at The Lounge so I got to yak with Cas a bit and Ed and I managed to solve all the city, county, state, national, and world problems in the mere hour we sat at the bar.

I hope you noticed how harmonious things are in the world when you woke up this morning. 

3. Back home, I boiled some rigatoni pasta and made a sauce to go over it consisting of diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, garlic, fennel, and onion. It was a simple and satisfying dinner. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-25-2022: Working at This and That, Chillin' at The Lounge, Zags Have Problems

 1. I committed myself to getting some loose ends tied up around the house: pay a couple of bills, upgrade my bed with a new mattress pad and blanket and clean sheets, sweep up cat litter, spiff things up in the bedroom. It was a relief.

2. Debbie and I headed up to The Lounge late this afternoon and had fun yakkin' with Cas and Tracy and seeing other people we know. The joint was not really hoppin', more like skippin', and it was fun to drink some Pulaski porter and some 1910 Pendleton Rye Whiskey. 

Back home, after a stop at the liquor store, I made a simple syrup consisting of water, brown sugar, anise, cinnamon, maple syrup,  coriander, and butter (wish I'd had a lemon to squeeze into the mix). I let it cook for about ten minutes and then put it the bottom of a mug with some Meyer's dark rum and boiling water and it was close to the perfect drink on this chilly night.

3. Speaking of chilly, after a pretty good start to their game against Purdue, the Zags shooting went cold, Purdue's heated up, and the Boilermakers waltzed to an 84-66 victory. 

I can't quite put my finger on it, but something's missing, something is awry with the Zags in this early part of the season. I hope this team can figure itself out. It has problems to address, both on offense and defense. I can see the Zags coming out of their pre-conference schedule with three or four, even five, losses.

The Zags play Xavier, a favorite team of mine, on Sunday and it'll be interesting to see if they work out some of the things (that I can't specify) during their Saturday practice time and play more consistently and energetically and with more self-assurance. 

We'll see. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-24-2022: Fixing Thanksgiving Side Dishes, Our Thanksgiving Dinner, Zags Trample Portland State

 1. Christy assigned Debbie and me two dishes to bring to Thanksgiving Day dinner: a cranberry dish and a side featuring squash or sweet potatoes.

I told Debbie I'd take care of this assignment. That meant her job was to buy dinner wine.

I wanted to try out dishes we'd never had before at Thanksgiving and ended up consulting the very reliable New York Times online for recipes.

The first recipe to catch my eye featured couscous, one of my favorite pastas, and dried cranberries. I immediately fired off an email to Christy and Carol, hoping that using dried cranberries would be all right. Normally, we have cranberry dishes made by boiling raw cranberries or use cranberries out of a can.

I got the A-OK from my siblings, so I moved forward with the recipe entitled, "Couscous Salad with Dried Cranberries and Pecans". 

I had pearl couscous on hand. They are my favorite kind of couscous so I didn't use wheat couscous as called for in the recipe.

I cooked up a batch (very easy) and once it cooled I put the couscous in a bowl and added dried cranberries, roughly chopped pecans, grated carrots, a bunch of green onions chopped, olive oil, fresh squeezed lemon juice, and coriander. I combined all of this and refrigerated it over night and today I set it out and when the bowl reached room temperature, I added chopped parsley and sage. 

I subbed yams for the sweet potatoes in my other dish called "Sweet Potatoes Baked with Lemon". 

It also was simple. Once I boiled the yams for about 30 minutes, let them cool, and peeled them, I chopped the yams into disks about a half an inch thick.

In a saucepan, I combined water, light brown sugar, about six inches worth of lemon peel, cinnamon, and nutmeg and simmered it for about ten minutes and then added butter to this syrup. Once the butter melted, I took the pot off the burner and added lemon juice. 

I used half as much brown sugar as the recipe called for. I should have, then, also reduced the water. Then the sugar/lemon/butter mixture would have been thicker, been more of a syrup.

Next time! 

I greased a baking pan, arranged the yam disks in it, and poured the "syrup" over the yams.

I refrigerated it over night and today let it reach room temp and then put in the oven for about twenty minutes at 425 degrees. 

I have concluded, now that we've finished eating dinner, that my yams would have worked better had the liquid I poured over them been a thicker syrup. 

BUT, I also think that the liquid I did make would make a great simple syrup and, mixed with rum, make a superb hot drink. 

I need to get down to the liquor store -- and get over to Yoke's. I think real maple syrup would also be good in this syrup. 

2. Our Thanksgiving dinner started with a tray of vegetables that Molly and Zoe arranged to look like a turkey complimented with Christy's Harvest Punch. We had some pre-dinner conversation in the living room and then moved to the dining table where Molly, Ryan, Christy, Carol, Paul, Zoe, Debbie, and I sat down, bowed our heads when Paul said grace, and then began passing the food around.

Carol and Paul roasted a turkey and made mashed potatoes and gravy. We had dinner rolls from a local home bakery. Christy prepared the dressing. The dishes I made were on the table. Zoe had requested cranberries out of the can. We also had pickled beets. 

For dessert, Christy made a pumpkin cream cheese slab pie and Zoe baked a pecan pie. 

I can't eat a lot of food at any one sitting. I had small samples of everything at the table, but wisely only had one small piece of pecan pie. 

After dinner, Debbie and I had considered stopping in at The Lounge for a nightcap, but I had some business to take care of at home and, once we were in the house, we decided to stay put. We plan to go to The Lounge on Friday. 

3. I stayed up to watch the 9:45 (or so) tilt between Gonzaga and the Portland State Vikings.

Portland State's squad, to its credit, played with high energy, tenacity, and aggression, but, really, to no avail.

Gonzaga's players are superior to Portland State's and Gonzaga had little trouble moving the ball, getting open shots, and hitting a high percentage of them.

In essence, to me, at least, Portland State was defenseless and so Gonzaga could showcase the many ways their players can score, especially against lesser players.

I watched this game to the end. Gonzaga hit the century mark, winning 102-78.

Gonzaga's Malachi Smith transferred into the Zags' program in the off season from the Univ. of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Last year, he was the Southern Conference's Player of the Year and tonight he seemed right at home against the PSU Vikings, leading the Zags' scorers with 23 points. 

It was great to see Smith perform so well against PSU, and it would be a major boost to the Zags if Smith can also score, say in double figures, against better competition. 

I'll be very interested to see how much he plays and how he performs against Purdue in Friday evening's game. 

If he is emerging as a significant contributor to the Zags' efforts, this will be huge for Gonzaga.

I'm keeping my expectations moderate and will wait and see. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-23-2022: Relaxed Thanksgiving Preparations, Ballo Makes My Jaw Drop, Watching *D.O.A.*

1. I associate cooking on Thanksgiving Day here in my childhood home with high anxiety. I might be wrong, but my memory is that Thanksgiving preparations were never relaxed in the past here.

Consequently, I prefer cooking for Thanksgiving Day on Thanksgiving Eve.

It's much more relaxing and I give myself plenty of time to recover if something goes haywire.

Christy assigned Debbie and me to prepare a sweet potato or squash dish and a cranberry side. 

Since I prepared dishes unlike any we've ever had on Thanksgiving before, I want what I made to be surprise to Christy, Carol, and any other family member who might read this blog.

I'll go into what I did tomorrow when I write a post about Thanksgiving Day.

I will say this: I had fun preparing food today and didn't not experience one moment of anxiety, just as I hoped I wouldn't.

2. I also had fun watching Arizona and Creighton face off in the Maui Jim tournament championship game.

Arizona led much of the game, but Creighton kept coming back, coming back, falling back, and coming back. Creighton put on a heroic push in the games last couple of minutes, but that final comeback fell short.

Arizona prevailed, 81-79.

For me, the most compelling aspect of this game was watching Oumar Ballo. Ballo originally committed to play at Gonzaga and was seventeen years old when he was redshirted and sat our a season in Spokane.

He played infrequently for Gonzaga his freshman year. Ballo was tall and took up a lot of space,  but he was not very mobile.

He left Gonzaga after the 20-21 when Tommy Lloyd left the Gonzaga staff and became the head coach at Arizona.

Ballo played more his sophomore year, averaging about fifteen minutes a game, and showed signs of maturing physically (slimming down) and of becoming more agile.

Today (and earlier in the Maui Jim tournament), Ballo was an astonishingly improved player. 

He looks more sleek, he's very physically strong, and his agility has increased a lot.

He's no longer a big teenager, but at twenty years old, is growing into a mature adult and did it ever show today.

He scored thirty points, pulled down thirteen rebounds, and was a nearly unstoppable force inside. 

It was easy, just two seasons ago, to joke about Ballo being a big galoof, but not now.

Watching players grow and mature is one of the aspects of college basketball I enjoy most and although I was pulling for Creighton to win this afternoon, I loved seeing all the progress Ballo has made and look forward to watching him continue to improve and give Arizona great strength in the paint this season.

3. This evening, I switched gears and watched D.O.A. (1949-50). On Facebook, Jay G. recently posted that a remake of D.O.A. has recently been completed, featuring John Doe as Frank Bigelow -- John Doe of the punk band X. 

I really want to see John Doe in this role, but first I wanted to watch the original movie featuring Edmund O'Brien as Frank Bigelow.

What a dark, nihilistic plot. 

If you don't know, Frank Bigelow is small town accountant who takes a vacation to San Francisco only to discover he's been poisoned and, in the short amount of time he has to live, works feverishly to uncover who poisoned him and why. 

The movie's many dark streets, labyrinths of stairways and hallways, and ever looming shadows correlate perfectly with the movie's convoluted plot and its many twists and turns as Frank Bigelow plunges deeper into the dark details of how and why he was singled out to be murdered.

I'll leave it at that. 

Film noir expert Eddie Muller claims that this movie, because of its frenzied pace and loopy story line is not to be taken seriously.

I think I understand his point, but I, being who I am, took it very seriously and experienced it as an existential exploration of how Frank Bigelow is almost energized by knowing he's going to die and lives his last days not only doggedly searching for truth, but relishing much in life he had been taking for granted. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-22-2022: Shopping for Candy, Chicken Curry Dinner, Creighton Hoops and *Poetry Break*

1. It won't last long. It never does. On occasion, I get a strong hankering for candy. Today, when I went Thanksgiving dinner shopping at Yoke's, I also purchased a bag of sour gummy candies, a large Mr. Goodbar chocolate and peanut bar, and a bag of Dove dark chocolate with caramel and sea salt squares. I had fun gnawing on these delights throughout the day. I'm glad I left some for tomorrow.

2. For dinner tonight, I made a yellow curry sauce packed with broccoli, green beans, tiny Yukon gold potatoes, white onion, dried lime kaffir leaves, and ribbons of sautéed chicken breast. Debbie and I ate this sweet, salty, moderately spicy, lime-y sauce over jasmine rice. For me, it was a perfect warming dinner on this chilly November evening.

3. Over the past few college basketball seasons, I've enjoyed watching the Creighton Blue Jays as much as any team in the nation. They play an up tempo style of basketball and, in the past, have featured some awesome shooters like Mitch Ballock and Marcus Zegarowski. Last year's team featured a fifth year transfer who had been the Division II player of the year, Ryan Hawkins and I loved seeing how he helped solidify that team and made such an excellent transition from Div. II to Div. I basketball.

This year's team has a solid core of returning players: superb point guard Ryan Nembhard, his versatile guard mate, Trey Alexander, a blossoming forward, Arthur Kaluma, and a nimble and shot blocking center, Ryan Kalkbrenner. Once again, Creighton picked up a senior from a lesser level of college basketball, but at South Dakota State, Baylor Scheierman was the Summit League Player of the Year. In Creighton's win over Arkansas today, it looks like Scheierman is making a smooth transition to playing against tougher opponents and is fitting in well with his new teammates. (And, I'll add, he's a threat to score anywhere from one to forty+ feet from the tin.) 

I watched the second half of Creighton's win over Arkansas and it was a thrilling half of basketball: physical, fast, hard fought, intense, and superbly played. Creighton defeated the Razorbacks, 90-87, setting up a monster match up on Wednesday between Creighton and Arizona. 

Once the Creighton/Arkansas game ended, I gave my full attention to Bill Davie's Poetry Break. I don't know if he knows it, but, like Bill, my early experience enjoying poetry was greatly enriched by the work of James Wright and I thoroughly enjoyed the Wright poems Bill read. 

(One vivid memory returned: Phil Eaton read "A Blessing" to the Core 150 class and after reading the closing words, "Suddenly I realize/That if I stepped out of my body I would break/Into blossom", he let loose, without constraint, with his ecstatic and immortal words, "That's incredible! Ohhhhh! That's just incredible stuff! Man that's good! Ohhhh, my!" 

Phil Eaton introduced me to expressing spontaneous bliss at the conclusion of reading a poem and it has stayed with me for the past forty-five years or so.)

Bill not only put me back in touch with one of my favorite poets, he read some poems by a poet I'd never heard of named Crysta Casey. Her work was powerful, far ranging, imaginative, gripping, and authentic. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-21-2022: Gary's Funeral, Potluck and Celebration of Life, Short Reunion Meeting

 1. Around 10:30, Joni and Stu swung by and picked me up and we bolted uptown to the funeral home to pay our respects to Gary Sieverding (KHS Class of 71) who died a week ago and to support our Class of 72 classmate, Wanda, who had been married to Gary for nearly forty-nine years.

The room was packed. Gary lived in the Silver Valley his entire life and knew a lot of people and has numerous relatives here and elsewhere. Gary's sister, Patty, eulogized her brother and told several stories about Gary not only being accident and injury prone, but some of the creative ways he dealt with stuff that happened to him. Once he pulled his own tooth when he had a toothache. He treated cuts with super glue rather than get them stitched up. He had a badly infected toe that he made better by soaking in some kind of solution day after day, refusing to let a doctor treat it. 

Gary was a wizard working on cars, fixing them, rebuilding them, restoring them and Patty spoke most sadly about the fact that after he suffered a stroke a few years ago, all of his know how about cars and trucks vanished. It was a grievous loss for Gary.

The service featured a slide show focused on pictures of Gary throughout the years, from the time he was a little boy right up to his final years.

2. When the service ended, I piled into Diane's son-in-law's Dodge Charger and she and I rocketed out to the land on the Coeur d'Alene River, just north of the Pine Creek/Pinehurst trailhead on the Trail of the CdAs, that Diane and one of her sisters recently purchased and we walked to where Diane plans to park a trailer once the weather warms up. It's a nice chunk of land with a lot of trees and places to be near the river. Diane is stoked about spending time there relaxing.

We then made our way up French Gulch a short ways and attended the post-funeral potluck and Celebration of Life for Gary. 

Gordon and Sheila Milholland hosted this reception in a good-sized shed on their property. I sat at a table with other members of the Class of 72 and had a great time talking with Stu, Jim and Sue, and Mitzi. I drank a couple of Miller Lites while we visited and enjoyed being a part of such a warm and fun get together, a fitting tribute to Gary's enjoyment of fun, food, friends, stories, and laughter.

3. I wrapped up this Kellogg High School-focused day by going to the monthly All-Class Reunion meeting at 6:30. Because the different people who have been assigned tasks have been doing their work, we didn't have much to talk about. Lori summed up what has been done, addressed a few things involving money, and by around 7:00, we didn't have anything else to talk about and the meeting ended. 

Back home, Debbie filled me in some on her day of conferences with her students' parents. 

She has fewer conferences on Tuesday and then will have Wednesday through Sunday off. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-20-2022: ZOOM Time, Great Early Season Hoops, The Mystery of Gonzaga

1.  Bridgit, Bill, Diane, Colette, and I met on ZOOM today. Early on, our conversation centered on Bill and Diane's visit to their adopted grandson's classroom at the private school he attends. Henry's fifth grade class is learning about epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, and aesthetics. We marveled at Henry's superb learning environment and what, if the conditions are right, can happen with children at a young age in their education. 

We also talked about the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday. For all of us ZOOM friends, Thanksgiving will be bittersweet because of  family division, deaths, dementia, and Alzheimers disease, but each of us will be having dinner with loved ones, emotionally aware of people missing at the table, but grateful for the company we will share the table with. 

2. I am thoroughly enjoying that so many superb college basketball are playing each other this early in the season rather than playing far inferior competition. Today, for example, the last two women's national champions played each other. South Carolina, the defending champions, defeated Stanford in OT. I didn't get to watch it, but loved knowing it was happening and that the game was so titanic.

Two powerhouse programs in men's basketball played at noon when Virginia and Illinois engaged in an intense tilt. Both teams played their guts out with great defense and hustle. In the end, UVA's defense, in my opinion, prevailed and the Cas won it, 70-61.

Baylor had more firepower than UCLA and two of their guards, LJ Cryer and Adam Flagler, were absolutely on fire and the Bears defeated the Bruins, 80-75.

The last game tonight featured the tenacious defense of the Houston Cougars against the banged up Oregon Ducks and the Cougars' disruptive deflections, steals, and general defensive mayhem prevailed and Houston beat the Ducks, 66-56.

3. I might jump off this train one day, but right now I tend to see basketball games in terms of resistance. Earlier in the week, I thought the Texas Longhorns mounted strong resistance against Gonzaga and made it difficult for the Zags to get into their offensive flow and to score in ways they wanted to. 

Today, Kentucky didn't seem to offer up much resistance to the Zags at all. 

The Zags got more open shots tonight than against Texas. Drew Timme had a lot more space to work in. The Zags prevailed on hustle play after hustle play. As a result, Gonzaga had a solid night on offense, weathered a second half Kentucky comeback, and ended up cruising to an 88-72 victory. 

I look forward after seeing Gonzaga look very different in back to back games how they will look as the season progresses. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-19-2022: Napping with Luna, Paul's Birthday Dinner, Chillin' at The Lounge

1. Every once in a while, I slip in a nap that is so blissful, so restful, so transcendent that I wonder why I don't just spend more hours of the day napping. I lay on my back, Luna hopped on my chest, I spent the whole nap on my back with Luna, and I fell into a deep abyss of oblivion and comfort. 

2. I woke up about fifteen minutes before we were due to leave the house to meet at 2:30 for Paul's birthday party, a get together that included Carol, Paul, Christy, Debbie, Molly, and I and the added bonus of Zoe and Cosette. Christy made a cheese ball appetizer. Cosette masterfully mixed us each an amaretto sour for a cocktail. Carol prepared clam chowder which we ate with Debbie's cabbage salad and brioche rolls that Molly provided and a couple of different wines. 

We retired back to the living room and Paul opened his gifts and Zoe served us the chocolate peanut butter birthday cake she baked for her dad. 

The celebration ended for Debbie and me when we returned home, but Carol, Zoe, Cosette, and Molly all rocketed up to Wallace and watched tonight's performance of Guys on Ice. 

3. Debbie was bushed after a week of work and the birthday dinner, so she didn't join me at the Inland Lounge. I called Ed, let him know I was going up, and he joined me at the bar. It was fun talking with Bob about Bob Dylan's new book and catching up on some other things. I enjoyed drinking a couple of shots of Pendleton 1910 Rye Whiskey and a pint of Pulaski porter. Ed and I had a good time yakkin'. The whole evening was relaxing and I was back home by eight o'clock, an easy day with family and friends under my belt. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-18-2022: Visiting Wanda, College Basketball Mini-Marathon, Again I Watch *The Long Good Friday*

 1. Ed picked me up around 10:00 and we glided out to Smelterville to see fellow KHA Class of '72 member, Wanda. Her husband, Gary, died on Monday. We had a good visit. Wanda's dad, Tom, was there. Wanda and Tom told some stories about Gary. I didn't know Gary collected toys like Tonka trucks and GI Joes and I didn't know he enjoyed putting puzzles together. As we left, another friend of Wanda's arrived. We'll see Wanda again on Monday at the service being held on Monday at 11:00 at the funeral home uptown. Afterward, Gordon and Sheila Milholland will host a potluck and celebration of life at their house up French Gulch.

2. The college basketball season is just getting underway and, for the first time, I spent several hours watching as much of four different games as I could: Xavier vs Indiana, Villanova vs Michigan State, Virginia vs Baylor, and Illinois vs UCLA. 

Some brief observations:

* Indiana's Trayce Jackson-Davis is a powerhouse player. He not only scored in a variety of ways, but blocked shots on the defensive end. He impressed me with his savvy and versatility.

*I can hardly wait for the Big East conference season to get underway. I would imagine that as they mature under  coach Sean Miller, in his second stint at the school,  Xavier will reduce their turnovers, continue to be strong inside, and will be one of its conference's premier teams.

*Unfortunately, I didn't see Villanova's comeback against Michigan State. I had to slip out and do a little shopping at Yoke's. Villanova is no longer coached by Jay Wright, who retired, and I'm curious to see how they perform under first year coach, Kyle Neptune. I didn't see a lot of this game, so I might be wrong, but it looked to me like Villanova needs stronger play from whoever their point guard will be but that Eric Dixon has matured into a dynamic force, both in the key and, at times, from the outside. 

*I thought UCLA was way too dependent on Tyger Campbell and Jaime Jaquez. I would imagine that as the season develops, they'll develop more trust in other starters and will continue to get bunches of points from David Singleton off the bench.

*Illinois has rebuilt itself into a superb team. Tonight, at least, Terrance Shannon looked like he might be the country's best player to come out of the transfer portal. It looked to me like Shannon has a highly athletic group of teammates. Freshmen Jayden Epps, Skyy Clark, and Sencire Harris all made significant contributions to Illinois' winning effort, as did their versatile big guys, Matthew Mayer, Coleman Hawkins, and Dain Dainja. 

*Virginia looked as springy and athletic as I've ever seen one of their teams look under Coach Tony Bennett. In particular, Armaan Franklin lit up a very good Baylor team with great outside shooting and athletic plays on both ends of the floor. It will be interesting to see if this performance was an aberration or if UVA will be not only the strong defensive team they always are, but a formidable offensive threat as well. 

Scores:

Indiana 81 Xavier 79

Michigan State 73 Villanova 71

Illinois 79 UCLA 70

Virginia 86 Baylor 79

3. Before the games came on, I watched a short video on the Criterion Channel featuring Criterion curatorial director Ashley Clark introducing one of my favorite movies of all time, The Long Good Friday (1980). In particular, Clark talked a bit about this movie's opening ten minutes when barely a word is spoken, but we see the events transpire that sets the whole revenge plot of the movie into motion. I wanted to watch this opening again and I did, remembering how perplexing it was the first few times I saw this movie and determined this time to sort out what I was seeing and how to to remember how it all gets clarified much later in the story. 

I did my best to commit the opening sequence to memory and then to watch Bob Hoskins' dramatic first appearance in this movie before switching to baseball.

When the games were over, I couldn't stop myself. 

I watched The Long Good Friday again for about the 15th time (at least) in my life. The movie's violence is brutal, sometimes nearly unbearable.  The story is superb. The acting is muscular, and, at times, tender -- especially Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren. The movie is not only a compelling study of the character Hoskins plays, East London mobster Harold Shand, but is a prescient study of England, especially in anticipation of what the Margaret Thatcher-led government will mean for England over the next eleven years. (She's never mentioned in the movie, but somehow she, or at least her vision for England, is always present in the movie.)

Three Beautiful Things 11-17-2022: Snow Tires On, Drinks at The Beanery, *Fallen Angel* Unnerved Me

1. Silver Valley Tire put snow tires on the Sube and the Camry and, just as I wanted them to, loaded the other tires in big plastic bags in the Sube. I stacked the tires in the garage, leaving plenty of room for which ever car we park there and I'm elated to have this task completed, especially with Debbie commuting out to Pinehurst and back daily. 

2. Because I had both cars at home, I blasted in the Sube out to Pinehurst to pick up Debbie at school around 4:15. She had a terrific idea: let's go to Beanery. We hadn't been out for a taste together for quite a while. I enjoyed a couple of pours of Jameson's and we had a relaxing time just yakkin' and giving Debbie a chance to relax after another intense day of working with third graders. 

3. I'd watched two other Otto Preminger movies fairly recently. Laura featured Dana Andrews and I noted that Preminger and Andrews teamed up for another film noir, Fallen Angel (1945).

I watched it this evening. 

I experienced a lot of discomfort. 

Andrews' character, Eric Stanton, is a con man and a predator. He stumbles into a small California town and immediately preys upon two women and teams up with a fraudulent spiritualist and helps attract an audience of suckers to watch the charlatan contact the dead.

This movie is pretty close, in my opinion, to pure film noir.

It's filled with deceit. A central character is murdered. As the murder plot unfolds, those involved both in the investigation and the commission of the crime are disgraceful characters, adding to the darkness and duplicity of the story.

The resolution of the movie's story didn't put my mind and spirit at ease. 

Like I said, it's pretty close to a pure film noir. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-16-2022: Excellent Laundromat, Zags Get Thumped, Shrimp Pasta

1. Our dryer works fine, but the venting needs adjustment and I'm not the guy to do that. Until Brock has time to rearrange it for us, it's just easier for me to take the washed laundry to the laundromat and dry it. It's so easy. I had two loads to dry and was in and out, with my laundry folded, within an hour. The laundromat is sparkling clean, has a welcoming environment, and is very convenient. 

2. After last night's Gonzaga/Texas game, the national sports magazine (online), The Athletic, ranks Texas has the best team in the nation. 

I don't care much about rankings, especially in the middle of November, but I watched the Zags and Longhorns last night and, to my eyes, Texas was the much better team.

The Longhorn's head coach, Chris Beard, demands that his teams play physical, swarming, suffocating defense.

They did just that against the Zags. 

It looks to me like Gonzaga has a lot of work to do shoring up their back court. Their guards seemed tentative, sometimes seemed overwhelmed, and my hope is they learned a lot from this loss to Texas about what they need to do to improve. I suppose the question will be whether they have the personnel on their roster who can make these improvements. 

I, for one, cannot say, especially this early in the season.

Texas, in its second year under Chris Beard, has recruited strongly from the transfer portal.

Tyrese Hunter, whom I saw have some stellar games last season for Iowa State, played superbly against Gonzaga. Over the last two years Coach Beard also landed these transfers: Marcus Carr, Dylan Disu, Sir'Jabari Rice, Timmy Allen, and Christian Bishop, all experienced and older players. 

I, for one, am happy to see so many older players playing college basketball. While I don't oppose the one and done approach, I enjoy seeing players who might have come into their own more slowly and others who will never be NBA players elevate the level of play in the college game with their age and experience.

I thought Texas' more experienced players, their depth, their enthusiasm playing in a new and noisy arena, and their togetherness made them a superior team to Gonzaga.

I have no idea what to expect this Sunday when the Zags host Kentucky in Spokane. I find these early season, pre-conference games to be unpredictable and I tend to wait until January or February before I assess any team's enduring strengths and weaknesses. That said, I think Texas exposed Gonzaga's vulnerabilities in the backcourt and demonstrated that they are much farther along in developing team cohesion than the Zags are. 

I am in a wait and see mode regarding Gonzaga. I hope for the best. I hope they'll grow as a team as the season progresses and work out the deficiencies I saw tonight.

If tonight's game dampened some observers' expectations regarding the Zags' 2022-23 season, I see that as a good thing. It might help quiet down some of the hyperbole and noise that always seems to surround this squad.

3. For dinner tonight, I consulted a simple NYTimes recipe and made shrimp pasta. I liked how the recipe called for a pretty good amount of garlic, a good measure of fennel seeds, and a moderate amount of red pepper flakes. As a result, the pasta sauce was pungent, a bit heated, and kind of licorice-y. The recipe did not call for tomato sauce and were I to make this again, I think I'd add some. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-15-2022: Putting the Sube to Work, Sara Imogen Smith on *Forty Guns*, My First Samuel Fuller Movie

1. To my surprise and delight, Debbie drove the Camry to work this morning. I use the Sube to take away stuff I don't want around the house. Yesterday I recycled cardboard at the transfer station and today I cleared the cans, plastic bottles and jugs, and newspapers out of the garage and took them to the recycle station across from the hospital.

2. I was clicking around on the Criterion Channel website today and decided to play a video featuring Sara Imogen Smith reflecting upon the movie Forty Guns, directed by Samuel Fuller and featuring Barbara Stanwyck along with Barry Sullivan and Gene Barry. After listening for a few minutes, I paused the feature (which is also available on the Criterion Collection disc of the movie) and decided to watch the movie itself. 

Am I ever glad I did.

3. Forty Guns is the first Samuel Fuller movie I've watched. It won't be the last. Forty Guns tells the story of a powerful land baron in the Tombstone, AZ region,  played by Barbara Stanwyck, and the forty men under her sway who ride with her, protect her, carry out her business, and enforce her wishes. Two of her "forty guns", however, need to be served federal warrants and Barry Sullivan plays Griff Bonell, who is a reformed gun fighter now working for the Attorney General, and he comes to Tombstone with his two brothers enforce these warrants. 

In the above synopsis, I have simplified what becomes a complicated plot involving lust, love, gun violence, power struggles, reckoning with the past, and moral dilemmas. 

The movie, shot in stunning black and white Cinemascope, takes the corruption, simmering sexuality, and moral ambiguities of an urban film noir and relocates them in what the movie presents as the last days of the frontier West. 

I listened to more of Sara Imogen Smith's analysis of the movie when I finished it. Most of all, I enjoyed how she illuminated Barbara Stanwyck's movie career, her acting style, and the way this movie was a kind of summation of the decades of Stanwyck's work that preceded it. Her knowledge and analysis of Samuel Fuller's filmmaking style and how he expressed his world view through this movie also impressed and intrigued me. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-14-2022: The Sube, Souped Up Soup, No Hero's Welcome in this Movie

1. I had the Sube serviced today and it's hanging in there. 

2. I cooked hamburger soup this afternoon and decided to season the ground beef with cinnamon and allspice. I thought it worked great.

3. I didn't quite finish watching The Blue Dahlia (1946) tonight, but, right from the get go, this movie plunges its viewers into a world of post-WWII adultery, betrayal, PTSD, violence, alienation, distrust, and uncertainty. In other words, it wastes no time establishing that in the world of this movie, at least, these WWII veterans were not welcomed home as heroes and soon discovered that they were returning home to a country shot through with corruption, deceit, and confusion. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-13-2022: Tom Courtenay in *Billy Liar*, Sunday Afternoon Ice Fishing Outing, Chili for Family Dinner

 1. As I remember, I first saw Tom Courtenay act in a movie in Dr. Zhivago, but I was too young to appreciate his work. It wasn't until I saw him play opposite Albert Finney in one of my favorite movies of all time, The Dresser (1983), that Tom Courtenay's work made its indelible impression on me.  I returned to The Dresser repeatedly, not only because  it's about a theater troupe performing Shakespeare, but to watch Tom Courtenay again and again exert every ounce of energy and emotion into playing the role of Norman, the assistant, or dresser, of a seasoned Shakespeare actor going mad during the Second World War, played shatteringly by Albert Finney.

A couple of years later, I assigned the novella The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner by Alan Sillitoe in the section of Survey of British Literature I taught at the U of Oregon and we watched the movie version, released in 1962.  Tom Courtenay brings alive a searing portrayal of Smith, a working class youth guilty of a petty crime who, in his time of detention, finds solace in running long distances. 

Until today, I had never seen any other movie featuring young Tom Courtenay. As part of its British New Wave collection, the Criterion Channel has made Billy Liar (1963) available for viewing.

Once again, Tom Courtenay entranced me. He plays a lackluster young man, Billy Fisher, unmoored, living at home, deeply dissatisfied with his work in a funeral parlor and disillusioned with his lot in life. He tries to animate his existence through his imagination, by picturing himself the ruler of his own country. His habit of living in a fantasy world intersects with his life in the world he actually lives in. 

Billy lies.

He lies about his family, he lies to women in his life, he lies about being hired to work in London, he lies to his employer, his fiancee(s), and on and on. 

Billy Liar is a painful exploration of the tensions in Billy's family and of the disaffection that inspires Billy Fisher to transport himself into other worlds and to compulsively lie to everyone he encounters. At the same time, it's fun to fly away with Billy, to join him in his fantasies. 

Ultimately, however, he must decide how to face the pressing and difficult realities of his unimagined life, of the real world, making this a most poignant movie.

2. Debbie, Patrick, Megan, and I blasted up to the Sixth Street Theater and Melodrama to watch the musical production, Guys on Ice, a fun tale about two Wisconsin ice fishermen sitting in their shanty waiting for a cable television crew to show up and interview them for a local fish and game program. 

It's almost as if Waiting for Godot were set on a frigid Wisconsin lake. Like Waiting for Godot, the two fishermen, Marv and Lloyd must figure out how to  pass this waiting time. They tell stories, drink beer, sing about their lives in Wisconsin, crow about the virtues of wearing a snowmobile suit, reflect on their love lives, and deal with their irritating friend, Ernie the Moocher, who pops into the shanty on a couple of occasions. 

My brother-in-law, Paul, played Marv beautifully and his two acting mates also perfectly brought their characters to life. 

I won't spoil how the story ends. 

I'll just say that these three actors and their piano accompanist, Joy Persoon, made a sell out crowd on this Sunday afternoon very happy.

3. After the play, the four of us joined Christy, Tracy, Carol, Paul and Molly for a post-matinee family dinner. 

Carol made a pot of chili.

I brought some toppings.

Molly brought Frito scoopers.

Christy made cinnamon monkey bread.

She also made a batch of awesome silo cookies.

Meagan and Patrick contributed wine.

Pre-dinner and dinner talk was vibrant.

Paul talked about his experience as an actor in Guys on Ice.

At the dinner table, we talked a lot about chili -- Skyline Chili and Sunnyside Elementary School chili.

We talked about imaginary families living in our houses.

After dinner, we had a rousing discussion of what we might do between Dec. 21 and 27 when Debbie has a birthday, Debbie and I have a wedding anniversary, Jesus was born, we have a Christmas dinner of Canadian food to plan, and I have a birthday. 

I think we are getting pretty close to deciding what we will and won't do and who will do what when.

Three Beautiful Things 11-12-2022: Chef Patrick in the Kitchen, Film Noir with Mike Hammer, Laughing Through *Get Shorty*

1. Patrick continued his take over of the kitchen and fixed a most delicious dinner. He combined four cheese ravioli with pesto and cherry tomatoes and grated hard cheese. There might have been more to it, but, no matter, he served us a superb meal. Debbie pitched in with a fantastic spinach and arugula salad complimented by some vegetables and dressed with a perfect vinaigrette, one of her many specialties. 

2. At the strong recommendation of Vizio University Honorary Professor Dan Armstrong, this afternoon I watched what many film scholars see as the climactic movie of the film noir period. I watched Kiss Me Deadly (1955) director Robert Aldrich's adaptation of Mickey Spillane's novel of the same name (but with a comma after Me). 

As this movie concluded, was I ever glad I had no idea what was coming. My experience makes me wary to say very much about the movie's plot. I will say that the movie is a Mike Hammer story and that Ralph Meeker plays Hammer as a violent, largely amoral opportunist, possibly out to enrich himself as much as he is looking to solve the movie's central mystery. 

Consequently, as you might expect from a film noir, this is a dark movie exploring varieties of human depravity and paranoia.  Mike Hammer moves through this world adroitly. He is mostly, but not entirely, emotionally unmoved by the terrible and even carnal things he experiences and confronts. 

I don't want to say much more. I read several articles about the movie after I watched it and gained a better appreciation for the movie's influence on other filmmakers and its importance as an exploration of the 1950s in the USA, a critique of what one writer called "America's vulgar underbelly". 

Okay. One more thing. I'll watch the first ten minutes or so of this movie over and over again. Not only is it an arresting and alarming start to the movie, it also features Cloris Leachman's unforgettable, if somewhat brief, first real role in feature film. 

It's chilling.

She's haunting. 

3. I wanted to watch another movie. Patrick and Meagan were on a jaunt to Coeur d'Alene. Debbie was resting after a week of teaching. 

I decided to leapt twenty years forward from Kiss Me Deadly and enter another corrupt, amoral, criminal world, but in a movie not as, well, deadly serious as Kiss Me Deadly.

I watched Get Shorty (1995). 

It made its Turner Classics Movie channel debut a few weeks ago and I recorded it.

I watched Get Shorty around the time it came out and my main memory of it was that it made me laugh.

It made me laugh again this evening.

Get Shorty is an absurd movie about the way the worlds of moviemaking and loan sharking intersect in wild and highly entertaining ways. 

For me, the movie worked because of the sharply written screenplay and the superb cast which included John Travolta (as good as I've ever seen him), Gene Hackman, Rene Russo, Danny DeVito, Dennis Farina, Delroy Linda, James Gondolfini, and an over the top cameo appearance by Bette Midler. 

I must really like movies about movie making -- Get Shorty gave me much of the same pleasure I felt when I watched The Player and, most recently, when I went out to see See How The Run. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-11-2022: My Radio Voice Immortalized!, Breakfast at Goose and Tree, Patrick Takes Over the Kitchen

 1.  I didn't listen to Jeff's radio show, Deadish, on Thursday night when Patrick and Meagan arrived, but this morning I went straight to the archives at kepw.org to catch his show and within 60 seconds I heard my own voice! Ha! I recorded a short intro for Jeff at his house while I was in Eugene. Nothing fancy, just me saying,  "This is Bill from up in Kellogg, Idaho and you're listening to my friend Jeff's show Deadish. Have a great evening!"

Way better than my little spiel was Jeff's show, a blissful hour of Zero at WOW Hall on Nov. 10, 1996 and an hour of Grateful Dead music from their Nov. 10, 1973 show at the Winterland Ballroom/Arena in San Francisco. Jeff played the Dead's awesome start of the second set that featured Playing in the Band --> Uncle John's Band --> Morning 

Dew-->Playing in the Band -->Uncle John's Band (this is known by some as the "Dew Sandwich") and it's stellar. 

2. I was trying to remember today when Christy purchased her new range at Watts Appliance because when Carol and I accompanied her that day we ate breakfast at Goose and Tree and I hadn't eaten there since.

Well, today, I broke the drought. Meagan, Patrick, and I had a splendid breakfast together, got in some premium yakkin' together, and then took a quick drive by Pinehurst Elementary School so they could see where Debbie teaches. 

3. Back home, I baked a batch of Morning Glory muffins and then Patrick took over the kitchen and made a very interesting meal for the four of us.

It's called Cheesy Broiled Sheet Pan Pasta with Vegetables. The idea is to have a meal that replicates a casserole's crunchy, cheesy topping -- without the casserole! It involved taking a ridged baking sheet and broiling some bacon. Then Patrick broiled chopped cauliflower and broccoli with fennel seeds. When the vegetables were nearly soft, Patrick added the pasta he'd boiled to the pan and added mozzarella and dollops of ricotta cheese. He then added more mozzarella cheese and a combination of bread crumbs, hard cheese grated, fresh thyme, chopped garlic, lemon zest, and a thinly sliced chili pepper. Somewhere in this process he also added chopped shallots. 

The last step was to broil these ingredients one more time and then squeeze lemon juice over the top of it all.

This was a superb dinner and fired up my imagination regarding the possibilities of broiling food on a ridged sheet pan. 

Want to see a video of this meal? Just click here. You'll see that it's a flexible recipe and that our meal was a variation of what's on the video. 

We relaxed the rest of the evening, yakkin, yakkin, and yakkin some more and enjoying Knob Creek Bourbon. 

 

Three Beautiful Things 11-10-2022: Laundry Emergency, Beer with Patrick and Megan, Tuna Casserole Nostalgia

1. Either Luna or Copper regurgitated food on the bed and possibly had other problems at the same time and I needed to launder everything. Our dryer is temporarily incapacitated and I figured with all the stuff I had to wash and dry, my best bet was to load up a basket and head to the laundromat and use a big washer and dryer. 

Well, when I arrived there I discovered the laundromat is closed on Thursday.

I asked Carol if her laundry room was open. 

It was! 

I washed one load at home, took the wet bedding to Carol's, put it in her dryer, and Carol volunteered to wash and dry the other load and drop it by our house later in the evening.

All I had to do was take the sewing machine and iron she borrowed back home and return the Cool Whip container she'd used to send leftover spaghetti and meatballs in after family dinner.

Luna and Copper both seem fine. It was just one of those things. 

The bedding is all fresh now and I've restored order to the bedroom! 

2. Around 7:30, Patrick and Meagan arrived at our house from Portland. They drove up to spend the weekend with us. 

They got settled in and began popping open Oregon beers they brought with them. I just don't do well drinking 16 oz cans of beer in the evening these days, so I was very happy that both of them were willing to share about 4-8 oz. out of their cans with me and I totally enjoyed these moderate hits of some very tasty Hazy IPAs. 

3. We also dove into the tuna casserole I made Wednesday night. Debbie declared it the best tuna casserole she'd ever eaten. (WOW!) Eating tuna casserole reminded me of a day back in September of 1997. I was at my computer at work and an email flew in from Debbie, inviting me to come to her house for TUNA CASSEROLE for dinner. I (over) enthusiastically accepted.  It was the first time I ate dinner at Debbie's house and she, without knowing it, offered me one of my favorite dinner dishes. It was fun this evening going back twenty-five years and remembering that dinner and the dizzying series of events that culminated in our wedding on 12-24-1997.  

Three Beautiful Things 11-09-2022: Western Swing and Nine Days Wonder on *Deadish*, Fixing a Tuna Casserole, YouTube Concert

 1. I'm sitting here listening to Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks play "How Can I Miss You if You Won't Go Away?" and thinking that Western swing is one of those styles of music that I love to listen to but that I always forget is out there. 

Odd.

This bit of musical amnesia is on my mind because this morning I listened to Jeff Harrison's stellar radio program Deadish. His shows are archived for two weeks after their Thursday night (9-11) broadcast on Eugene's KEPW-FM, 97.3 at kepw.org. Today I tuned into his October 27th broadcast.

A little back story. 

Recently the Bob Weir led band Wolf Bros. played at the Hult Center in Eugene.

The band included pedal steel guitar master Barry Sless, a musician Jeff has admired for decades.

Unfortunately, as the concert progressed, the band's sound was mixed in such a way that Jeff could rarely or barely hear Sless.

So, Jeff did what any sensible radio host should do: he dedicated the first hour of Deadish to Barry Sless's early 1980s Western swing band, Cowboy Jazz. 

It was an hour of divine musicianship and vocals. 

I loved it! 

Again, I wondered: why do I so rarely listen to Western swing music when it's so blissfully enjoyable?

The second hour of Jeff's Oct. 27th program was equally, if not even more, blissful.

Because Jeff and I would be attending the Pump, Pump benefit at Portland's Alberta Rose Theater on Nov. 2 and because one of the reunited 80s/90s jam bands that played that night was Nine Days Wonder, Jeff played the one album Nine Days Wonder made, Left of Center, and, quoting a Nine Days song title, listening to this album again was a shot of love. 

Bliss.

2. Since I knew Debbie and I were going to eat the rest of last night's chicken rice soup for dinner tonight, I also knew that this meant I'd need to cook something else so that Debbie would have food for her lunch on Thursday.

In addition, Patrick and Meagan will arrive from Portland on Thursday, so I decided to fix Thursday's dinner this evening and cook enough that Debbie would also have food for Thursday's lunch.

I waded into my Pinterest boards and found a link I'd saved to a list of New York Times casserole recipe and, to my delight, found a tuna casserole recipe that did not call for condensed soup. 

Ahhh! Great!! For me, the sodium level of condensed soups is too much and I love tuna casserole, so I put on my big boy cooking pants and got to work.

I chopped up and sautéed onion, carrots, and celery and later added chopped mushrooms and a clove of chopped garlic. I added thyme. 

While those ingredients got soft, I cooked 12 oz of elbow macaroni in the Dutch oven, and took the vegetable mixture off the burner. 

I drained the macaroni and, using the Dutch oven, melted six tablespoons of unsalted butter. I added flour to the melted butter, let it cook for a little while and then slowly whisked in milk and a cup of chicken broth. This was the base for the casserole's sauce. As it began to thicken, I added 8 oz of shredded sharp cheddar cheese, two tins of tuna, Dijon mustard, the vegetables, and the macaroni. 

I spray oiled two baking dishes, one bigger than the other, poured the casserole fixins into them, and topped them with crushed Town House crackers. I heated up the small casserole, about half of which would be Debbie's lunch, and I refrigerated the larger casserole and will heat it up tomorrow as dinner time draws near. 

3. I ended this day of grocery shopping, cooking, and taking care of other household matters with an hour long YouTube concert. I especially enjoyed listening to, first, Anderson East and then Elle King join Daryl Hall and his studio musicians on Live from Daryl's House and their rousing performances of "She's Gone" and "Ex's and Oh's". Then I left Daryl's House and listened  to two or three different live versions of Jethro Tull/Ian Anderson performing "Thick as a Brick" and "Locomotive Breath".

Three Beautiful Things 11-08-2022: Reunion with Luna & Copper & Gibbs, Cooking a Greek Soup, Bill Davie Reads Poems (and I Vote)

1. Back home. Back in my bed. Sleeping on my side with Luna next to my chest, all but her head under the covers. Copper pressed against my hip or thigh. It wasn't immediate, but once it registered to Copper and Luna that we were all back together, it's been a happy reunion. I'm very happy to report they were content under Debbie and Christy's care while I was traveling. 

I should also mention, as I rest my laptop on his back while he's on my lap, Gibbs and I also have had a happy reunion. 

2.  It's chilly, almost frigid, out and I decided Debbie might appreciate some hot soup when she returned home from school today. I shopped for a few minutes at Yoke's so that I had just what I needed to make a Greek chicken rice soup and a batch of (not Greek!) corn muffins. 

The soup was simple and I had a blast making it. I loved being back in the kitchen again, making sure dinner was ready whenever Debbie wanted it when she arrived home.

First, I combined two quarts of chicken stock, a pound of boneless chicken thighs, four celery stalks chopped into tiny pieces, and 3/4 of a cup of jasmine rice in the Dutch oven and slowly brought the stock to a slow boil and then turned down the heat a bit so the chicken and rice could simmer for about a half an hour.

While the soup bubbled away, I chopped about a half a cup of celery leaves and half a cup of cilantro. To these leaves I added the zest of a lemon and a grated clove of garlic and some salt. 

I set this leafy mixture aside. It would garnish the soup.

I juiced two lemons and set the juice aside.

After simmering for about thirty minutes, the chicken was cooked. I used tongs and took out each piece and, using two forks, I shred the chicken and returned the meat to the pot. 

Now I just let the soup stay warm until Debbie told me she was ready to have some.

At that point, I turned up the heat a bit, poured much, but not all, of the lemon juice into the soup and we each ladled ourselves a serving and topped it with the garnish. 

This would be a bright and satisfying soup without the garnish, but the combined flavors of the celery leaves, cilantro, lemon zest, and the raw grated garlic made this soup taste really good and it did its job warming us up on this chilly evening.

I also made corn muffins, using a pouch of Marie Calendar's corn muffin mix -- I just followed the package's directions. It worked. 

3. It's been about three weeks or so since I've tuned into Bill Davie's Poetry Break. It was a great pleasure to be back tonight. Listeners to the program sent in some excellent poems, Bill read his latest additions to his growing collection of "Old Manhood" poems, and he read two superb poets whose work is new to me: Leslie A. Fried and Kim Addonizio. 

Oh! I blasted up to our local polling place at the Elks and voted. I can't bear the tension of following results as they come in. I'll try to digest it all when we are as close to knowing the final results as possible and then check in on occasion with the contests that won't be decided for some extended period of time. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-07-2022: Leaving Portland Early, Listening to Bob Dylan and Lulu Miller, Back Home for Family Dinner

1. After struggling on I-5 Sunday night with visibility in a snowstorm as I drove from Creswell to Portland -- I had to pull over at a rest stop south of Salem and take a short nap to rest my mind and my concentration --, I made an important decision this morning. I would spend today driving from Portland to Kellogg and I knew that North Idaho and parts of Eastern Washington were under a winter advisory. I knew from looking on Facebook that the 4th of July Pass had been snowy, icy, and slushy in the morning. 

I had one goal: drive in the daylight. I figured that whatever conditions I drove into once I reached, say, Spokane, everything would go better if it wasn't dark.

So I left Portland around 7:30. I made several stops along the way for coffee and sparkling water and rest stops. To my great relief, the roads were never icy. From Spokane to Kellogg, including over the 4th of July Pass, the roads were wet, but not slick. 

I arrived home safely, in daylight, after an uneventful drive.

2. While driving earlier in my trip, I had loaded the audio book, The Philosophy of Modern Song by Bob Dylan on my phone and listened to it through the Camry's sound system. Today, I listened to the rest of the book.

I mean this is in a positive way: it's an unusual book. Dylan riffs in 66 short essays about 66 different songs and the singers (and sometimes the writers) of these songs. These are not what we would have called in school close readings. Rather, they are richly associative essays in which Dylan writes whatever the song makes him think of, sometimes expanding into commentary on culture and politics, sometimes writing things he knows not to be true. His essays are improvisational, wild, unpredictable. Dylan plays the role of chronicler, interpreter, provocateur, and trickster.  Parts of some essays outraged me, others made me laugh out loud, others moved me nearly to tears. Sometimes Dylan's essays traveled so far afield from the actual song itself, I had forgotten what the song was that the essay started with. 

Bob Dylan seems to have absorbed and remembered every one of the countless songs he has listened to over the years while also having detailed memories of books, operas, musicals, movies, classical compositions, news events, the biographies of countless performers, and much else. 

Because I was listening to this book, I couldn't absorb it all. Had I been reading it, I would have often stopped, gone back, reread passages, regained my bearings, and then moved forward. 

Listening to it in the car led me to want to do two things: 1) try to find ways to listen to recordings of the 66 songs Dylan discusses. I had never heard of or had never listened to a majority of the songs and 2) revisit this book again, whether on paper, on Kindle, or by way of the audio version and absorb again all that I kept up with in my first listen and to try to absorb all that I missed as my mind wandered or as Bob Dylan simply left me in the dust. 

Soon after the Bob Dylan book ended, I stopped at Country Mercantile to buy some coffee and sparkling water and I downloaded a book I read last summer and wanted to revisit today.

The book is Why Fish Don't Exist by Lulu Miller. I loved this book the first time I read it and today, for the three hours or so I listened to it from just outside Pasco all the way to Kellogg, I was once again mesmerized by Lulu Miller's deft storytelling gifts, her ability to combine biography, memoir, and scientific theory together into a single riveting story. 

You might know Lulu Miller as one of the hosts of the radio show/podcast, RadioLab or maybe you have listened to her other podcast Invisibilia. 

I love how her mind works and cherished her companionship on the last leg of my drive home today. 

3. Back home, I got right back into the swing of family life in Kellogg!

Tonight was family dinner. Paul's mother, Pat, is visiting and we all gathered at Carol and Paul's for a delicious dinner.

Christy got us started with a cracker, salami, cheese plate to enjoy as appetizers. Carol made mulled cider, a most welcome hot drink on this chilly autumn/winter day. 

Carol called us to the dining table. She had prepared a delicious batch of spaghetti and meatballs accompanied by a spinach salad with vinaigrette that Debbie made and the baguettes that Molly contributed. We topped of our dinner with Pat's Oreo Chocolate Cream Pie for dessert.

As always, we talked about thousands of things before, during, and after dinner. Debbie, Carol, Christy, and Paul are all working with children, educating them and encouraging their creativity and they had a thoughtful and energetic discussion of the challenges they face and the successes their students experience.

We spent some time remembering George White and I mentioned that while his memorial service was under way last Friday at St. Rita's Church, Terry, Roger, Dale, and I, the moment our beers came to the table, raised a toast to his memory and shared our admiration and respect for him.

Our family will be busy with dinners for the remainder of the month: this Sunday we'll have visitors in town and will eat after Paul performs in the afternoon; the following Sunday we'll celebrate Paul's birthday; and then, the grandaddy of them all, Thanksgiving Day, will be upon us. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-06-2022: Breakfast at Brails, Tea with Sparky, Talking Big Ideas with Rita -- Then to Portland

 1. I was up and at 'em early enough this morning and buzzed over hill and dale to meet The Troxstar for breakfast at Brails. The Original Brails. The Troxstar had just flown into Eugene after spending several days in Massachusetts visiting his parents. His visit gave us a lot to talk about as he reflected on his parents growing older and the challenges they face and that he is also dealing with. While away, The Troxstar bought me a bottle of Ce n'est pas La Fin du Monde. I haven't sampled it yet, but from what I read it's a fusion between IPA and a Belgian triple. Should be very interesting!

2. I blasted back to the tiny house I rented and checked out. Then I rocketed over to Sparky Roberts' house and we enjoyed a nearly two hour visit.  Sparky made each of us a cup of Chinese tea that definitely hit the spot. We talked about our many fun times in the theater, working together. We talked about people we've worked with whom we miss either because they've moved away or have passed away.  She told me about a couple of projects she'd like to put on. Sparky's partner, Joe Cronin, was also  home. He's recovering from a series of medical problems and visited with us for a while before going back to bed. Yes, he's shrunk some and has aged noticeably, but I thought his energy was positive, his mind is sharp, and I very much enjoyed talking with him. 

Sparky and I began working on things together back in 1992 -- she was in her late forties and I was in my late thirties and despite all the years that have passed, I felt like we were young again while we talked today and loved having so many great memories come flooding back. 

3. I ended my trip to the Eugene area by driving to Creswell and visiting Rita again. I started working with Rita in 1993. She was almost 50 and I was almost 40 and today we got back to talking about spirituality and philosophy just like we did thirty years ago when we started our team teaching project. Whereas Rita was in bed the whole time I visited her on Saturday, today she was up, she fixed herself a meal, and we sat at her dining table the whole time I was there. While Rita's physical being is declining, her mental capacity is not. As we talked about prayer and David Hume and the nature of God and other huge questions, she was as sharp and insightful as ever. It was a great visit and I hope to see Rita again in early December. 

I left Rita's and endured the rain, snow, wind, and darkness on I-5 and drove to Patrick and Megans apartment where we shared pizza together while they watched Get Back and I completed the series of things I usually do on my laptop in the morning. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-05-2022: Reading to Rita, Grateful Dead at the Movie House, NY/OR Double Hazy IPA

1. This afternoon, I drove back to Rita's house. She was tired, in bed, and asked me to read to her aloud. For this very purpose, on Friday, I had purchased two books, Ross Gay's Book of Delights and Aimee Nezhukumatathil's World of Wonders. Rita's heart is failing and she's lost a lot of mobility, but her mind is sharp and receptive. We engaged in thoughtful and insightful conversation about the pieces I read and brought our time to an end when Rita said she was fading and I needed to leave in order to meet up with Jeff in Eugene. I told Rita that I'd be back another visit on Sunday.

2. Jeff and I met up at what used to be the Bijou Art Cinemas. It's now the Art House. When Jeff and I walked into the spiffed up, remodeled space, we immediately smelled popcorn, the same smell that always greeted movie goers at the Bijou. We entered theater #1 and the first thing we marveled at were the new plush theater seats and the way the theater had been cleaned up and newly painted. 

We came to the Art House to be a part of the international Grateful Dead Meet-Up at the Movies. This year, on cinema screens in the USA and internationally, all of us who came out got to see the band play songs selected from their 04-17-1972 concert at the Tivoli Concert Hall in Copenhagen, Denmark, a show broadcast on Danish television. 

This Copenhagen show was part of the highly regarded Europe '72 tour. I particularly enjoyed this Grateful Dead lineup: Pigpen, Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, Keith Godchaux, Phil Lesh, and Bill Kreutzmann. Donna Godchaux was listed in the credits as a band member, but did not sing in any of the songs included in this movie, but we did see her dance behind the band. It was grievous for me to hear Pigpen sing and know that he would die a year later; likewise, I loved Keith Godchaux's piano playing, but he left the band in 1979 and died the next year in a car accident. 

The movie was uplifting and fun in spite of the grievous future that lay ahead.

I especially enjoyed the Danish television's camera work. Frequently the cameras moved in close on the different band members and while the band engaged in frivolity during the show with clown and other kinds of masks, when the boys were unmasked I enjoyed seeing how serious they were about playing and especially enjoyed the intelligence that radiated from Jerry Garcia's face.

3. Over the previous four days, I had been so busy that I hadn't yet visited 16 Tons.

After the Grateful Dead movie, I finally stopped in and was I ever glad I did.

On tap, 16 Tons had a Double Hazy IPA on tap, called Life Goals, a collaboration between Great Notion (of Portland) and Other Half (of Brooklyn).

Drinking this beer came as close as any beer has in the last year or so to drinking beer in New York. 

I enjoyed a couple 12 oz pours and bought two 32 oz mason jars of the beer, hoping it will hold up between now and when I arrive in Kellogg so that Debbie can join me in quaffing this splendid beer. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-04-2022: Wildcat Lunch, Visiting Rita, Longtime Regulars Meet for Coffee

1. Whenever I make a trip to Eugene and stay a while, I try to get together with Roger Pearson, Terry Turner, and Dale Bachman for lunch. Lo and behold, it worked out that all four of us could meet today at 11:30 at BJ's in Valley River Center. Roger, Terry, and I were on the Kellogg Wildcat basketball team together as seniors the first year Dale taught at Kellogg (1971-72) and he was our basketball team's assistant l coach.

We didn't really talk much about the old days of high school basketball. We learned, though, that Dale, who is over seventy-five years old, continues to play slow pitch softball and the team he plays for has won gold, silver, and bronze medals at the World Senior Games in St. George, Utah. Dale pitches and he also serves, when needed, as a substitute runner for teammates. Dale continues to bowl in two leagues and is hoping to get back to the golf course and play more. 

Our server at BJ's took group pictures of us. If I get any of those pictures sent to me, I'll post them on this blog so you can see how hale and hearty Dale looks and how happy the four of us were to be together.

2. Rita called me during lunch, hoping I could come to her house this afternoon. She was distressed. At first, I didn't think I could, but upon further reflection, I figured out that I could blast down to Creswell and so I went to see her. I brought a couple of books, World of Wonders and The Book of Delights, knowing that Rita would like me to read to her. 

As it turned out, for the time I was at Rita's, she was dealing with health problems that left her unable to listen to me read. We agreed, however, that I would return and the plan is for me to spend time on Saturday afternoon with her and read to her then.

3. For many years, Margaret, Jeff, Michael, and I used to meet about once a month for afternoon coffee and yak about all kinds of stuff.  We used to talk a lot about books, movies, our classroom experiences, our approaches to teaching, what was happening in our lives apart from our jobs, and a lot of other stuff.

We met today at a downtown tea shop, Tea Chai Te, and spent a couple of hours in rousing conversation. Margaret recently traveled to Ireland and has been continuing to make art and hike every week. Michael was especially happy with his guitar playing lately and he's been absorbed in fascinating books and been watching great movies -- as has Margaret. Jeff and I were both exhilarated about our nights out listening to live music on Wednesday and Thursday nights and Jeff and Michael had some splendid exchanges about Bob Dylan. 

As our conversation grew, I felt us getting more and more comfortable being back together and I loved how much we laughed together, especially during the last half hour. 

As is so often the case when I make these visits, I wished I could be back meeting with these longtime friends on a regular basis again. But, if I am able, as I plan to be, to return in early December for Linda S's retirement party, my hope is that the four of us can convene again and enjoy more of one another's company.

My plan today had been to go to a laundromat in the afternoon.

Therefore, I had my laundry with me all afternoon.

After we were done with our coffee meeting, Jeff invited me to do my laundry at his house and so when it was time to put my clothes in the dryer, I ordered us sandwiches at Cheba Hut, picked them up, and Jeff and I had a tasty dinner together. I also recorded a sound bite for Jeff's radio show, loaded up my dry laundry, and headed back to where I'm staying. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-03-2022: Invigorating Movie Discussion, Lunch with Linda, Pandita and and Terrapin Flyer

 1. After sleeping in and resting up after being out late Wednesday night, I supercharged my day by yakkin' with Dan Armstrong for an hour on the telephone. We spent a lot of high quality time talking about movies, especially film noir. Dan taught Film Studies at LCC for many, many years and I consider him the honorary dean of Vizio University. I could have continued this conversation for another couple of hours, but the time we did have was jam-packed with superb analysis, story summaries, and excited and positive evaluation of a number of movies from the 1940s and 1950s. 

2. Stoked after yakkin' with Dan, I then fired myself up even more by sitting down at The Paddock and having lunch with Linda Schantol, the administrative assistant of the academic division I worked in for many, many years. Linda is the most devoted Oregon Duck fan I know and I was happy that she is pleased with the Ducks' football season so far. We also discussed Linda's retirement. Her last day of work at LCC will be in mid-December and she's looking forward to having time to rest, enjoy herself, and not have to contend with the day to day problems she's faced all these years in her work. There will be a party for her on Dec. 7th and I am beginning to scheme and dream how I'll return to Eugene and attend the celebration.

3. Jeff and I went to Pandita, a taqueria with a twist, serving fusion cuisine. I ordered what I'd call a fusion of Mexican and Japanese cuisine.  It was a salmon tostada. The salmon and avocado and cilantro were served on won ton chips and seasoned with a delicious Japanese vinaigrette. I loved it. The flavors were creatively combined and delicious to eat. 

After we finished dinner, Jeff and I went to the WOW Hall to hear Terrapin Flyers, a Grateful Dead cover band. .

I hadn't been in WOW Hall since the July 22, 2017 Babes with Axes reunion show and I loved being back. 

The Terrapin Flyers show was a lot like a Grateful Dead show, only on a much much smaller scale. The audience consisted of people of all ages, with many adults around my age and older dressed in tie dyed shirts. Some even wore tie dyed pants. Nearly everyone (but not I) stood for the whole show and danced in various styles. Some swayed in place, others wove through the crowd, dipping, extending their arms and hands in various directions. I didn't see any spinners. What I did see was happiness and joy. I witnessed many people embracing one another, as if they were attending a reunion. 

I loved it. It took me back to when I used to dance maniacally during WOW Hall shows and also took me back to the mass of people swaying and dancing and loving the scene at Grateful Dead shows.

The best thing about the evening was that the band was superb. Their musicianship was stellar, their vocals, especially their harmonies, were clear and tight, and they played a superb variety of Grateful Dead songs, including, but not limited to "My Uncle and Me", Cumberland Blues", "Eyes of the World", "The Wheel", "The Other One", "Mason's Children", and several others. Their encore performance of "Ripple" was gorgeous and calming. 

It was a memorable and uplifting night.

Three Beautiful Things 11-02-2022: Resting Up for a Big Night, Circus Luminescence, Jam Band Revival!

1. After being out until past midnight on Tuesday night at Sam Bond Garage's Bluegrass Jam, I rested much of the morning and into the early afternoon before gassing up the Camry and heading out in the November rain to Portland for a benefit show for heart transplant recipient Jani March-Wright at the Alberta Rose Theater featuring Jam Bands from the 90s: Renegade Saints, Not Tough Mama, Everyone Orchestra, Calobo, Little Women, and Nine Days Wonder. 

I arrived at the venue about an hour before the doors opened. I hadn't eaten lunch or dinner, so I stumbled about a half a block down Alberta Street to T. C. O'Leary's, a casual, cozy Irish pub, and ordered a bowl of seafood chowder and soda bread with a pint of Guiness.

2. The doors opened at five for the six o'clock show and I was one of the first ticket holders to enter the one time movie theater now transformed into a music venue that is the perfect size. It's big enough to hold the mighty sounds of jam band rock n' roll but small enough that no matter where one sits on the main floor, the musicians are easy to see. It's almost, not quite, intimate. Jeff joined me at about 7:30.

Heart transplant recipient Jani's son, Eli, who helped mastermind and organize this event, is a founding member of a juggling and spinning troupe called Circus Luminescence. Circus Luminescence opened the benefit with their, I'd say, vaudeville-ish juggling of illuminated pins and balls, spinning of multi-colored hoops, and a death defying segment of knife juggling. They accompanied their juggling and spinning with outrageous patter, deftly balancing difficult physical feats with verbal goofiness.

3. Circus Luminescence soon gave way to the bands. 

Well over a month ago, when I read on Facebook that these 90s jam bands were reuniting for this benefit, I immediately knew I had to go to Portland to hear them, especially the two bands I was most familiar with from sweaty nights of exhilaration in the late 80s and early 90s at the WOW Hall and Good Times Tavern listening to Nine Days Wonder and Little Women. I once owned a Renegade Saints cd. I didn't know the other bands at all, but I trusted that if they shared a bill with the Saints, Nine Days, and Little Women, they were going to be awesome. These bands fully rewarded my trust.

I can't/won't run down the details of each band's performance. 

Here's what I can say. 

Listening to jam bands not only rock out on songs but open the songs up for the members to play exhilarating solos makes me joyous and fires up my adrenaline unlike anything else. The bands began playing at about 6:30 and for the next five hours, with short breaks to set up equipment, raffle off generously donated prizes, and for a return of Circus Luminescence, I was in seventh heaven as these awesome bands, all composed of superb musicians who played their hearts out, ripped through one song and one ecstatic jam after another.

There's nothing like it and nothing in life I enjoy in the same blissful way that I enjoy soaring guitar solos, rock solid drumming and bass playing, masterful keyboard riffs, and the driving powerful heartbeat of rock n roll, whether standard rock n roll, blues inflected rock n roll, reggae, or sounds and rhythms inspired by other cultures. 

Tonight had it all.

I especially loved listening to the woman from Calobo who played keyboards and accordion in the Everyone Orchestra, her band Calabo, and in the quickly assembled line up of musicians from all of the bands who joined forces for a fiery encore, led by Little Women's Jerry Joseph, to close out the night.

I don't know the keyboard/accordian player's name, but every time she had a break out on either of her instruments it was thrilling -- especially because I love the accordion and did not know when I walked in the hall tonight that I would get to hear anyone, let alone this splendid musician, jam on the keyboard, bellows, and buttons of a squeezebox, of a strapped on Steinway. 

Oh. By the way. I was not the only ecstatic member of the audience. Far from it. This benefit was like a jam band tent revival and the hall was filled with jam band lovers who were slain, quenched, filled, overcome, healed, and comforted by the spirit of home grown jam bad rock n roll. And we all answered the call to the altar of generosity to help buoy the spirit and ease the financial strain of Jani March-Wright. 

Three Beautiful Things 11-01-2022: Breakfast with the Turners, Awesome Dinner in the Better Living Room, Yakkin' with Jeff and the Sam Bond's Bluegrass Jam

1. I sprang up this morning and got myself cleaned up and made sure I left the tiny house I'd rented spiffy and tidy. I loaded by bags in the Camry and bolted down I-205, left the freeway, and wound my way to Harney Street Cafe in the Sellwood neighborhood of Portland where I met up with Terry and Nancy Turner for breakfast. 

We got in some very solid yakking about education and the Oregon elections and other stuff, said farewell, and I hopped back in the Camry and roared down to Eugene.

2. I did a little shopping and went through my usual morning routine on my computer over coffee until the tiny house I've rented in east Eugene was ready. 

I got settled in and drove to the Ninkasi Better Living Room where I met with many of the people I used to dine with on Thursday nights at Billy Mac's. We all wished Billy Mac's was still open, but Mike, Pam, Russell, Lynn, Ann, Kathleen, and I had a rousing time talking about a million different things. 

It was a great feeling being back with these friends. Those Billy Mac's nights were many of my favorite of all the great times I had in Eugene and it was all I could do not to break out and sing, "Hail! Hail! The gang's all here!" Well, mostly we were all there tonight and it was awesome.

3. After a couple hours of great conversation, I headed over to Jeff's house for more superb conversation. We had a great discussion about Bob Dylan and the Grateful Dead. Jeff told me about concerts he's been to lately -- two Dylan shows, an evening with Mikaela Davis, his great time at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in San Francisco, and others. We reminisced about the 06-23-1990 Grateful Dead show we experienced together on a gorgeous afternoon in Autzen Stadium in Eugene. We secured our plans to find each other at the Wednesday, Nov. 2 benefit show at the Alberta Rose Theater in Portland and both hoped Jeff would arrive in time to hear the Nine Days Wonder set. 

After our superb conversation, I headed over to Sam Bond's Garage, ordered one pint of Georgetown's extraordinary Johnny Utah Pale Ale and listened to the regular Tuesday night Bluegrass Jam. Babes with Axes bassist TR Kelley jammed for a while and I got to talk with her and Randy for a few minutes as they were leaving. I loved being back in Sam Bond's Garage, loved hearing the musicians work out one tune after another, and, when the jam ended, I just sat for a while staring into the half distance, remembering the many many great afternoons and nights of socializing and listening to live music I enjoyed over the years in this best of all neighborhood watering holes. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-31-2022: Walking for Bagels, Awesome Visit with Mike and Val, McMenamin's is Always Reliable

1. I needed a day to pretty much rest, but I wanted to take a good walk. I headed up to 82nd and Davis NE where a pod of food trucks reside because one of those trucks is Puddletown Bagels. I brought four bagels, a small container of cream cheese,  and a cup of (weak) coffee back to the tiny house and after I ate a sesame bagel, I fell into a coma sleep.

2. It took me a while to feel rested and refreshed enough to hop into the Camry and blast out to St. Johns to see Val and Mike. 

What a great visit! 

Mike and Val's house is perched on a bluff overlooking the spectacular St. Johns Bridge. The view from their back deck was breathtaking. Not only that, Mike is a dedicated and expert mixologist and he made each of us a hot drink, a combination of hot water, Plantation dark rum, maple syrup, simple syrup with anise star, cinnamon,  green cardamom, and a touch of homemade cherry liqueur. Mike topped the drink with a pat of butter. 

This cocktail was perfect, and I mean PERFECT, especially on a chilly rainy day.

Mike also prepared two plates of superb nosh: a variety of crackers, cheeses, nuts, smoked salmon, dried fruit, and, I'm sure, more.

Even better than the nosh and our cocktail (we got seconds) was our conversation. We spanned the globe, talking about movies, history, friends we have in common, Mike and Val's upgrading of their house and property, and more. 

Good thing I rested up for this visit. 

It was, in the best sense of the word, a real whopper!

3. Back at the tiny house I booked, I decided to drive just a few blocks away and have a bite to eat at McMenamin's 205 and enjoy a pint of HAMMERHEAD. The hammerhead was superb. I ate half of my dill tuna salad sandwich on toasted sourdough bread and boxed the other half and enjoyed my fries. 

When I finished, the bartender came to my table and asked if I want anything else. I said I did -- I asked her if they had a hot buttered rum. She didn't. No batter yet. So I asked her to use dark rum and make me a hot drink and I would trust that whatever she brought me would be just right.

And it was.

She made me a hot Meyer's Dark Rum mixed with lemon and apple cider and possibly something else I've forgotten. 

It was the perfect drink to close a day divided perfectly between rest and sleep, an exhilarating visit, and a relaxing hour or so with my favorite ale, a sandwich, fries, and a winter drink.