Three Beautiful Things 10-30-2024: I Finally Take Pictures Again, Stamina, Nostalgic Tofu Comfort Food

1. After a long slump, dry spell, hiatus -- after being paralyzed by a long bout with inertia, I took my camera out into the world today. 

I don't know if I've ever developed a photographic style. 

So many people from around here post so many pictures of autumn colors, waterways, and other sites that I find myself hesitating to do the same myself, especially if my pictures look pretty much like everyone else's. 

I decided today to put that concern aside. I decided I would take fewer pictures, not fall back into a former habit of taking numerous pictures, figuring something would turn out. 

Are the pictures I took today in any way unique? Is anything about them unexpected? Is there a style evident? 

I don't know.  

I'll put up a few of them at the end of this post and you can get a glimpse of how I saw things on a section of the Trail of the CdAs between Pine Creek and Enaville. 

2. My other reason for heading out on the trail was to put my physical stamina to a test -- not a very demanding test -- but I want to build up more stamina, especially if my trip to Eugene in a month works out. I enjoy walking in Eugene and I'd like to build up my strength to be able to do some strolling there (especially if the weather happens to cooperate). 

I felt pretty strong today. 

I spent about 35-40 minutes on the trail, a reasonable test, and I definitely still had gas in the tank and could have walked some more. The trail was level. That helped. 

3. Tonight I fixed Debbie and me a genuine throwback meal, an entree that goes back about forty years for me and that was a favorite of Adrienne's back in 1997 and the ensuing years when Debbie, Adrienne, Patrick, Molly, and I started our life together under one roof. 

I'm going to say it was 1984, but it might have been 1985, when I was a graduate student at the U of O, living on the stipend I earned as a grad student writing instructor. It was definitely in 1984 that I started eating as a vegetarian at home, but was more than happy to eat meat on the road -- at restaurants, if invited to someone's home, at Mom and Dad's house, and so on. 

I may not have the details of this story perfectly straight, but I'm pretty sure Christy knew that I was adapting this approach to cooking and eating at home. 

I'm not sure if it was a Christmas or a birthday gift, but around 1984 or '85, Christy gave me the cookbook American Wholefoods Cuisine by Nikki and David Goldberg, which, along with Mollie Katzen's Moosewood Cookbook, and one or two others, became my treasured guide to vegetarian cooking and dining. (In fact, I totally wore out the copy Christy gave me and a few years ago bought a new copy to replace it.)

It was also when what I now call my Tofu Awakening occurred. 

As I experimented with tofu, soft and firm, it wasn't long before the Goldbergs' recipe for Tofu Stroganoff became a favorite of mine -- and, later, became such a favorite dish of Adrienne's that on one or two of her birthdays, she requested it as her birthday meal.

On my trip to Trader Joe's on Monday, I bought a block of tofu. Late this afternoon I suddenly had the urge to go back to my early days of tofu cooking, to go back to Adrienne's birthdays (her next birthday, by the way, is coming right up), get out American Wholefoods Cuisine, and whip up a pan of tofu stroganoff.

So I did. 

What was different about this dish in 2024 than back about forty years ago when I first started cooking it?

Well, we have an air fryer and so the tofu was crisper than we've ever had it.

It turned out that today we were out of plain yogurt, but had plenty of sour cream, so our dinner didn't combine yogurt and sour cream -- and, I'd say, back in graduate school , I made this dish with yogurt only. Nancy's yogurt. 

I didn't have cooking sherry on hand, so I subbed dry vermouth and that worked really well.

Instead of noodles or brown rice, I served this stroganoff over Garofalo pasta -- and that worked really well. 

For me, this was a perfect dinner: delicious, warming, comforting and awesomely nostalgic.

My gratitude for my good fortune is immeasurable.  

Here are three of the pictures I snapped on the Trail of the CdAs:

 

Three Beautiful Things 10-29-2024: A Jumble of Pills and Masks and More, With Organization Comes Peace, Dreaming of a Shrimp Stir Fry

1. I think it's common, after a major surgery or during a prolonged illness, for people (like me!) to set up a card table to serve as recovery central. In the early weeks after I had surgery, our kitchen table was my center of operations, but Debbie and I wised up at some point and set me up with a card table in the room where I sleep and Copper spends most of his time. 

So much of my life over the last six months has centered around my transplant binder, bottles of pills, a pillbox, a thermometer, a blood pressure cuff, masks, vinyl gloves, sunscreen, sanitizer, cleansing foam, sunglasses, Kleenex, pens, scraps of paper for notes, grooming tools for Copper, books, and on and on.

Taken together, these things, thanks to my benign neglect,  have created quite a jumble on my card table. 

2. Today, I'd had enough of the jumble.

I organized all these things, along with my camera equipment,  and my efforts gave me a peace of mind I didn't realize I'd lost. 

3. These days it's no contest. 

My current favorite cooking utensil is the wok.

While I was unjumbling my card table, I began to imagine a shrimp stir fry.

With Thai wheat noodles. 

Ah! A yellow curry.

I dreamed of a small risk: I would dare raising my potassium level in my blood and cook one small cubed potato in the curry sauce. 

Red onion.

Yellow squash.

Sliced mushrooms. 

Broccoli. 

Red pepper. 

Frozen peas, a first! 

Kafir lime leaves and cilantro.

Peanuts. 

I made this sweet dream come true later on.

And, I'm happy to say: It worked! 

Three Beautiful Things 10-28-2024: Positive News at Sacred Heart, Bebopping in Spokane and CdA, I Miss Beer -- But.....

1. Rather than being pitch black with mighty rain like last Monday, today's 5:45 sky was zinc gray, affording me much better visibility as I launched the Camry, without incident, from Kellogg to Spokane. 

This morning I had blood work done and then had an appointment with the transplant team. 

After Angela drew my blood, I sauntered down to the Outpatient Health Center's coffee shop for a parmesan bagel and a cappuccino and my lab results began to pop up on my cell phone. 

Result after result looked solid to me and, indeed, when Dr. Samer Abdulkhalek arrived in the examination room, he immediately expressed that my labs looked very good. 

A couple of results were pending. 

Before long my blood will reveal whether my dosage of Tacrolimus is still right where the doctors want it and we'll know if my immune system is continuing to keep the BK virus at bay. 

If the BK virus isn't a problem, I'll have labs done in two weeks. If the virus is making a comeback, I'll do labs next week. 

I will have another ultrasound on November 25th when I return for appointments with the transplant team. 

It's been twenty-four weeks since the surgery -- about six months. 

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that my recovery and the function of my new kidney continue to progress so positively. 

2. For the first time since the transplant, today the clinic had a surge of appointments and everything was running way behind time. 

It turns out that recently the surgeons have performed more transplants than usual. 

I didn't mind the wait at all and it only had one very minor negative consequence. 

When I arrived at Great Harvest, the bakery had sold out its supply of Harvest Blend bread. It's Debbie's favorite. 

I bought a loaf of the awesome Dakota bread instead and settled in for a relaxing couple of cups of coffee and one of Great Harvest's peerless Morning Glory muffins. 

Relaxed and sustained, I dropped in at Trader Joe's for a quick bit of fun items shopping. 

I stopped in Coeur d'Alene, checked on the status of whether the technician who works for Camera Corral has made progress on my prime lens (he hasn't), purchased a Cappuccino at Starbucks, fueled up at Costco, and bought a carton Nancy's kefir, a bag of Cravens Earth and Sky coffee, and a superb bran muffin at Pilgrim's Market.

3. If this most enjoyable gallivanting around a bit in Spokane and CdA were happening pre-transplant, I'd be working a beer or two into my day, possibly trying out breweries unfamiliar to me in both cities. 

For the time being, though, I'm abstaining. 

In place of stopping for beers, I'm enjoying cups of coffee and trying out espresso drinks.

It's relaxing. 

My taste buds thank me. 

I don't have to gauge whether my driving is being in any way impaired. 

My world of coffee enjoyment continues to expand a little bit. 

Do I miss those visits to breweries and taprooms? 

YES! 

I miss the pleasure of how different beers taste. I miss the atmosphere of tasting rooms and taprooms. I miss the vibes I enjoyed while in the company of other people who enjoy craft beer. I miss yakkin' with my beer enjoying friends over a brew. 

But, as much as I miss it, right now because alcohol might interfere with my anti-rejection medicines, I'm going to play it safe, abstain, and assess this situation as I move into my next six month period of recovery, as my new kidney is more and more accepting of its new home and as my body becomes more accustomed to having had this new resident move in. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-27-2024: I Stay Home During Family Dinner, I Finish *Washington Black*, The Soul's Journey Out of Bondage

1.  As it turned out -- I hadn't planned this -- I didn't go to Christy's for family dinner this evening. Carol texted me with the news that she and Paul had both caught colds and had (or had had) sore throats. 

The message the transplant team repeats to me is that I can branch out, do more things out and about, but that I am to avoid the company of people I know are ill, especially if I can't wear a mask or establish distance from them. Since we can't eat with a mask on and since I was going to be fairly close to Carol and Paul, physically, if I joined family dinner, I didn't join in. 

I played it safe, stayed home, and enjoyed the Pert Woolum 94th birthday dinner (may Dad Rest in Peace) of Swiss steak, dinner roll, canned green beans, green salad with Sunshine Inn salad dressing, and oatmeal cookie (I had to turn down the mashed potatoes, much to my disappointment) when Debbie brought it to me at home when she, Christy, Carol, and Paul wrapped up their fun time together. 

2. I also hadn't planned on finishing Esi Edugyan's mighty adventure/fantasy/coming of age quasi-historical novel Washington Black, but I did. I joined George Washington Black, a teenager who escaped the brutal Faith plantation in Barbados and, for reasons I won't divulge, traveled to Virginia, the polar regions of Hudson Bay, Nova Scotia, London, Amsterdam, and Morocco. He confronts mortal danger, experiences romantic love, nourishes and puts into practice his prodigious talents and genius, and makes agonizing decisions at crucial moments in his young life. 

As I read Washington Black, I kept having Charles Dickens' stories pop in my head because Edugyan has a gift for creating singular and memorable characters with deft concrete and often peculiar physical details and endows these characters with manners of speaking that are, again, singular and memorable. 

In fact, I felt compelled to pull out Great Expectations during a break from Washington Black and as I read  the first chapter, I felt like Dickens and Edugyan, while not cut from the same cloth, had similar gifts of creating vivid and detailed physical worlds, unique characters, compelling and surprising plots, and great sympathy for their central characters. 

3. In 2022, Washington Black won the annual Canadian "battle of the books" contest, Canada Reads. (By the way, Esi Edugyan grew up in Calgary and studied at the University of Victoria and is now a resident of Victoria.) As part of the run up to Canada Reads, Edugyan was interviewed on a video by former Canadian Olympic swimmer Mark Tewksbury. Tewksbury would be the champion or defender of Washington Black in the competition. 

Tonight, I watched this video.

Both Tewksbury and Edugyan made salient points about the book. 

I greatly appreciated Edugyan reminding viewers that epic adventures like Washington Black's are thrilling external journeys into strange and challenging places, but that these epic journeys are always also inward journeys, journeys, she implied, of the soul. 

What's most compelling about Washington Black's travels is how they contribute profoundly to his maturity, to his psychological growth, to his leaving childhood behind and becoming an adult.

He also journeys into freedom. Even as he escapes the bondage of slavery, Washington Black continues to live in other forms of bondage within himself and he must confront those things within him he remains enslaved to as he travels from place to place, country to country, climate to climate. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-26-2024: Friendly LCC Ghosts Visit Me, Reading *Washington Black*, Meeting My Physical Needs

1. Friendly ghosts kept visiting me today. 

I have no way of knowing, with a few exceptions, if these friendly ghosts were phantoms of the living or the dead, but they had one thing in common: they were students in classes I taught at Lane Community College, starting in 1989. 

I welcomed their visits today. They took me back to memories I cherish. 

I had been a community/junior college student at NIC from 1972-74 and those two years, especially thanks to superb, generous, and very supportive instructors and academically motivated classmates, changed the direction of my life.

I suddenly realized, in late summer of 1989, when the LCC English department hired me part-time, that I could begin to extend to the students in my classes the kind kind of generosity, knowledge, understanding, and support the NIC faculty I worked with extended to me. 

I worked at LCC for twenty-five years. That entire time I continued to draw upon the influence of my experience at a two-year school (as well as my experiences at Whitworth and the U of Oregon). At NIC, I especially enjoyed being in class with students older than I was -- many were military and Vietnam veterans, others were making changes in their lives, others had come to see the value of going to school later in life.

Now, starting in 1989, I got to work with these older students as an instructor, got to do what I could to help these older students and the fresh out of high school students work together, learn from each other, come to appreciate each other. 

These friendly ghosts visited, but didn't speak to me today. 

They appeared to me looking not like they did as many as thirty-five years ago, but came to remind me that they had aged, that while some of their faces might be frozen in my mind as what they looked like decades ago, those eighteen to twenty year olds were in their fifties now, some of the older students were, just like me, seventy years of age and older (one former student, Jane King, just turned 101), and I marveled at how many years had passed and wished I could remember all of the students I'd worked with. 

I recall vividly what we studied together, what kind of writing I assigned.

But I was working with anywhere from forty-eight to a hundred and seven students per quarter.

I can't remember them all, but I sure enjoyed the visitations of the ones who floated into my memory and visited my consciousness today.

(On the mournful side, these ghosts also moved my mind to think about the fact that so many of the instructors on the English department staff that I worked with starting in 1989 have died -- and I felt once again the appreciation and warm feelings I had for them, along with my past students.)

2. Whoa! I look back at what I just wrote about ghosts and I left out a lot. I could write almost daily in this blog about the uplifting memories I have daily of the many people, still living and dead, I loved working with at Lane Community College and all of the students, too, from 1989-2014.

So why today? Why so many friendly ghosts, so many memories and loving feelings today of so many LCC staff, fellow faculty, and students? 

I don't really know.

But, these intense experiences today could have been inspired by the book I'm reading.

Esi Edugyan's Washington Black is the story of a slave in Barbados who comes under the care, as his assistant, of a scientist and abolitionist who takes Washington Black off the island of Barbados, away from the sugar cane plantation.

An adventure and coming of age story ensues, narrated by Washington Black as an adult looking back on these adventures and on his passage from youth into adulthood. 

It's a coming of age story. 

I'm about half way finished with Washington Black. 

I don't know yet how these adventures will conclude. 

But, I do know that what I call ghosts (the book doesn't) from Barbados continue to visit Washington Black, especially the ghost of a slave named Big Kit -- she was still alive when Washington Black escaped Barbados.

I wonder if reading a novel about a grown character looking back, of having figures from his past visit him through memory, also spurred my mind to invite or -- I'm thinking of the surprise ghosts -- to accept  the many friendly ghosts who popped into Kellogg today.

3. Yes. This was a largely metaphysical day.

But, I cannot live on ghosts and memories and feelings alone.

I have physical needs, too.

Today Debbie told me she'd take care of dinner and early in the day she made a comforting, thick, delicious, warming cheeseburger soup and we dipped into it all through the day. 

It was a source of great pleasure and sustenance -- and kept me grounded in the physical world, a world I frequently seem to depart from as I read, entertain ghosts, negotiate with memories, and commune with the world of spirits, both divine and of the human and animal sort. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-25-2024: Christy and I Have Lunch with Kenton and Gerri, Bool Kogi Stir Fry, "Jupiter" and My Dreamy Feelings

1. Kenton Bird and Gerri Sayler popped into Kellogg today. 

Yesterday, Tony Teske had brought some historical Bunker Hill Company materials to me at home and my job was simple: give them to Kenton today so he can take them to the U of Idaho library. 

That happened. 

Even better, Kenton, Gerri, Christy, and I met at Radio Brewing for a nearly two hours of conversation and food. 

We had a lot to talk about: what's up with mutual longtime friends and mutual acquaintances, what's happening in Kellogg with Bunker Hill and with specific buildings, books, kidney transplant (zzzzz), the Kellogg Public Library's challenges and what its future location might be, and more. 

It was a rousing time together -- and along with great conversation, we executed the business at hand and those materials are on their way to the University of Idaho library. 

2. On one of my after Sacred Heart trips to Trader Joe's, I bought a package of marinated Korean beef called Bool Kogi. I've been itching to try it out and the stars aligned today and I made a dinner using it. 

More specifically, I made a stir fry.

I started by warming up a couple packets of Trader Joe's indispensable Thai Wheat Noodles. 

I sliced up the Bool Kogi into smaller pieces and stir fried it in the wok along with red onion, red pepper, mushrooms, zucchini, broccoli, cilantro, and kafir lime leaves. 

The flavors were terrific. I thought the beef pieces were a bit tough. If I buy Bool Kogi again, I'll experiment with ways to make the beef more tender. 

But, the somewhat tough and chewy beef was not a deal breaker.

We loved this dinner and I'm a little embarrassed to say we couldn't stop eating it until all the food I prepared was gone.

No leftovers tonight! 

3. Once again, this evening, I had the experience of hearing a piece of music that set a complex of dreamy, stare into the great beyond feelings into motion. It felt like those feelings ought to be connected to specific memories, but, once again, I couldn't call up those memories and so I was feeling, feeling, feeling, but not remembering what happened in my past that made those feelings come over me so strongly. 

What was the piece of music? 

The "Jupiter" movement of Gustav Holst's larger composition entitled, The Planets. 

I'll just have to accept that my feelings are strong, but my memory is less so. 

 

Three Beautiful Things 10-24-2024: Travel Possibilities?, Mesmerized by Bach's "Sheep May Safely Graze", Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich

1.  Despite finding it easy to be content staying home many days, I also know that I lived nearly thirty-five years in (or near) Eugene and I dearly miss the many people I used to teach, socialize, worship, take pictures, and yak with. People very important to me also live in New York and Virginia and I loved living in Greenbelt, Maryland and roaming around Washington, DC and other places in the eastern USA. 

I have an appointment on Monday, October 28th with the transplant team. 

On October 26th, it will have been six months since I received a kidney transplant.

How close am I to being able to fly, say to Baltimore, relatively safely? How about in March? Or mid-April? 

It seems to me that a drive to Oregon in early December shouldn't be a problem.

After all, I drove to and I spent three nights at the Wildhorse Resort just three weeks ago, protected myself, and didn't contract any illness.

I think that's a good sign.

I'll see on Monday what the pros at the Providence Sacred Heart Kidney and Pancreas Transplant have to say.

2. As I've played Bach Radio on Spotify, from time to time a piece of music comes on that stops me, mesmerizes me, and calls up feelings that I think should be attached to specific memories, but I can't seem to locate the memories.  It's a vocal piece, but I've been moved by a rendition arranged for piano, without a vocalist. This gorgeous composition comes from Bach's Hunting Cantata and translates into English as "Sheep May Safely Graze". 

If any of you reading this post recognize this tune and can tell me if it was part of a movie or television soundtrack or accompanied something else I might have heard it on, I'd be most appreciative. 

3. Debbie called me from Radio Brewing late this afternoon and wondered if I'd like her to bring home dinner. I was poised to make Korean rice bowls for dinner, but I kind of liked the idea of taking a night off from cooking and I said, "Yeah. That would be good." I'll build the rice bowls on Friday! 

She brought home a Philly Cheese Steak sandwich with a pasta salad for us to split and it hit the spot. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-23-2024: New Bedsheets, I Revive an Old Pleasure, Night Music - Another Revival

1.  After a couple of fun-packed days going to Spokane and Airway Heights, I spent today at home and focused on getting my laundry done. After doing a bedsheet inventory last week and deciding to donate two sets of perfectly good sheet sets that I bought as an experiment and decided I didn't want after all, it was especially good today to launder the two sets of sheets that I ordered online and that arrived over the weekend. 

2. I returned to a former pleasure today and yesterday that I'd almost forgotten about. 

It's simple. 

I heated up milk in a saucepan and fixed morning cups of coffee that were about half coffee and half hot milk. 

It's as close as I can get to a cafe au lait. 

3. I've returned to another former pleasure that got away from me over the last, oh, fifteen years. 

When living in Eugene, I used to have music on all through the night. Sometimes it was the Grateful Dead channel on Sirius/XM. Other times I played Eugene's classical station, KWAX, through the night or I'd play jazz programming from KLCC. 

Recently, I brought our wireless speaker in the bedroom and Copper and I have had music on all through the night, mostly via Spotify. Recently, I've been playing jazz as presented on Chet Baker Radio and to classical music as curated on Bach Radio. 

I play the music quietly all through the night and day. At night, it doesn't hinder my sleep. When the music does wake me up, it's not as a hindrance -- it's because, say, a classical piece I have a long history with and a deep love for, has come on and something inside me wants me awake to listen to it. 

I'm not very good with the names of classical pieces and I don't always even know what composer's work I'm listening to. But, I guess you could say I'm good at feeling how these pieces get to me and it's a pleasure to feel the happiness, sadness, nostalgia, love, and other emotions that rise up inside me and to have memories I cherish come back to me, even if in fragments. 

 

Three Beautiful Things 10-22-2024: Relaxing with Ed, Nurse Jenn Says Labs Look Stable, Sandwiches for Dinner

1. I'm not comfortable writing in this blog about other people's medical matters, so suffice it to say that today Ed had an important meeting with a doctor in Coeur d'Alene -- it was a very productive session -- and as a way to relax after it was over, we had made a plan on Monday to head over to the Spokane Tribe Casino.

Ed and Nancy returned to Kingston, I picked up Ed, and we rocketed over to Airway Heights. 

Our first order of business was to go to the Caesar's Sports Book and each make a wager on the World Series. I like betting on underdogs, so I threw my modest bet down on the Yankees. 

We both wore masks in the car. Ed's had a mild head cold lately and volunteered to join me wearing a mask.  I left my mask on in the casino, wore vinyl gloves, and spent my entire session in the non-smoking section. 

So, I felt like I protected myself well.

Had my luck only been as good!  

I had one of those sessions where I just never got anything going. 

Darn. 

2. When I read my lab results on Monday, I thought the numbers looked stable and solid.

This afternoon, Nurse Jenn fired me a message telling me that the team saw my numbers as stable and solid, too. 

My creatinine increased a tad, nothing big, and that moved Nurse Jenn to remind me to stay hydrated. 

I agree with her. 

I think I've been slacking a bit in this area. 

I'll focus more on drinking plenty of water. 

3. Late in the afternoon, Debbie texted me with a request: please cook a couple stips of bacon.

That meant one thing: Debbie was going to fix herself a bacon and tomato (no lettuce) sandwich for dinner. 

I fixed myself another kind of sandwich, more in keeping with my current dietary restrictions.

It was simple: Trader Joe's egg salad with fresh basil and cucumber on Great Harvest's Harvest Blend bread. 

It worked perfectly. 

Three Beautiful Things 1021-2024: A Dark and Successful Drive to Spokane, Making the Rounds, Pork and Squash Dinner

1. I just said to myself: "Okay. I'll deal with it!"

What was it?

As I blasted out of Kellogg this morning, I faced dark and rainy weather and stretches of standing water.

Visibility was limited -- it improved some once I arrived in CdA -- and when cars or trucks passed me, they splashed a blinding amount of water on my windshield. 

But, I knew what the deal was. 

I accepted it. 

I maintained a moderate speed, no matter how fast some of my fellow drivers decided to drive. 

I focused on what was in front of me, didn't really care what other drivers did as long as things seemed safe (and they did) and I arrived in Spokane, parked in the outpatient parking garage, checked in, got called into the lab, rolled up my sleeve, and the always friendly and competent Angela drew the blood that Dr. Murad ordered. 

The lab posted results on my patient portal within a half an hour and I was happy with every result I saw. Creatinine: stable. White blood cell count: firmly in range. Potassium and magnesium: firmly in range. Glucose: in range. My urine was clear and all the tests results expressed good news. 

Why do I drive to Spokane for labs, even though I could have them done in Kellogg?

I like knowing the results really soon. That's one reason. 

In addition, for some reason, when I go to LabCorp in Kellogg, there's always a billing hiccup I need to tend to. The billing at Sacred Heart is never a problem. 

And, lastly, I enjoy, even in dark, rainy weather, driving to Spokane. 

No kidding. 

2. Moreover, I really enjoy what I do in Spokane after I visit the lab.

I rocketed up Grand Blvd and east on 29th and pulled into the Great Harvest parking lot, walked in, and bought a loaf of Harvest Blend bread and loved sitting quietly and enjoying a Morning Glory Muffin and a couple cups of Cravens Earth and Sky coffee.

After a peaceful stop at the bakery, I shot a ways further east on 29th and strolled into Trader Joe's and had a great time stocking up on chicken tenders, a variety of pot stickers and dumplings, nuts, a Greek salad and a chicken lunch for Debbie to enjoy at school, and other fun purchases.

I ended my trip to Spokane by dashing downtown mostly via Southeast Blvd and picked up the last two books I bought online in my most recent Auntie's Bookstore order. I now have all the books on Leah Sottile's list and will continue to work my way toward reading all the books her list recommends. 

3. Debbie had requested pork and butternut squash for dinner tonight. 

No problem. 

I peeled and cut the squash into pieces just a bit larger than bite sized and baked them alongside a garlic and peppercorn pork tenderloin I purchased a couple of weeks ago at Trader Joe's. 

It worked!

 

Three Beautiful Things 10-20-2024: My Reading Gone Barbados, Autumn Themed Family Dinner, Former Oregon Duck Sparks the NY Liberty

 1. I have started reading another book on the Leah Sottile list. Entitled Washington Black, written by Esi Edugyan, so far it's the story of a teenaged slave in Barbados named George Washington "Wash" Black. He works the sugar cane fields on a plantation named Faith. The aged master of the plantation dies and a horribly cruel nephew of the original cruel master inherits the plantation and imposes a reign of ultra authoritarian terror. This new master's brother visits Faith and the brother takes Wash into his care to work as his assistant in his scientific explorations, observations, and experiments. 

The brother, named Titch, is benevolent and so, at least in the book's early chapters, Wash's life takes a turn for the better, much better. 

2. Tonight Christy, Carol, Paul, Debbie, and I met at the Roberts' home for a proper autumn dinner. Well, I'm not sure the appetizer I brought, smoked salmon bits atop a lemon chive cheese spread over a rice cracker was much of a fall offering, but Carol's pot roast and vegetables, her gluten free biscuits, and Christy'a autumn salad were all befitting the change in season. 

Our discussions roamed all over the place:  television programs, stereotypes, the upcoming World Series, life at Pinehurst Elementary School, and more. 

It was a delicious, comforting dinner with good vibes all around the table. 

3. While we ate dinner, the NY Liberty and the Minnesota Lynx were playing the deciding game of their best 3 out of 5 championship series in Brooklyn. 

I quietly checked the score from time to time, but as the only person genuinely interested, I kept my yap shut about the game, even as it went into overtime. I didn't say anything when the Liberty triumphed either. 

Trust me, if you were a follower of women's basketball and couldn't check in on this game and I told you the Liberty's 67-62 victory was significantly fueled by a player who played for the Oregon Ducks, you would surely, for very good reason, assume I was talking about Sabrina Ionescu.

But, no! 

Ionescu had a terrible night shooting -- but contributed solid assists and rebounds -- and the former Duck who sparked the Liberty's victory, off the bench, was Nyara Sabally. Injuries riddled Sabally's playing days at Oregon and, hurt, she sat out her first seaaon in the WNBA. She played limited minutes this season for the Liberty, but tonight she more than rose to the occasion of this championship game, scoring 13 points and snaring 7 rebounds and had a key steal, a crucial blocked shot, and a significant rebound in the overtime period.

I didn't see the game, but I read all about it and, within myself, not out loud, I let loose with a great big GO DUCKS!

I hope Nyara Sabally can build upon her great contribution tonight and get more playing time, stay healthy, and become a solid player in the WNBA.

Three Beautiful Things 10-19-2024: Donations and Ears Lowered, Petco and a Riveting Email, Costco and I'm On the Wagon

1. I had fun with the whirlwind today. 

My bebopping around began with a drive to Osburn where I donated the clothes and bedding I cleared out of the closet yesterday to St. Vincent's and I stopped at Capparelli's Espresso stand for a latte for the drive to CdA. 

I glided into CdA and went to Supercuts where I was the only customer.  Robin went right to work and had me out the door in under fifteen minutes. 

2. I decided, just to do something different, to blast up to Petco and check out the cat food situation. All I was looking for, really, was variety and that's just what I found, so I bought two thirty-two packs of wet food. Each pack had four varieties of styles, some fish, some meat. 

I probably care more about this variety idea than Copper does, but I had fun thinking it matters to him! 

I then sat in the Petco parking lot for a while and read a riveting email from Scott Shirk. I had written him a kind of long email thanking him for giving me the book A Month in the Country, one of his touchstone books, and I told him about working my way through the Leah Sottile list of book recommendations. 

Scott's response made me very happy -- he told me about reading he's been doing, his recent plunge into the music of King Crimson, and he sent me two gorgeous pictures, one of Cate (his wife) with their daughter Aarabella and one of Arabella alone, and, whether or not he intended to, made me wish I were going to New York City soon -- and to Brooklyn, where he and Cate and Arabella live.  

Scott and I have done some awesome roaming in Manhattan and it's been twelve years since I visited the Shirk family's residence in Brooklyn. 

Immune system willing, I'm ready to be leavin' on a jet plane and get back to New York (and Washington, D. C.) again as soon as possible! 

3. I indulged in a really fun shopping trip to Costco. (No sarcasm. I always have a blast in Costco.) 

Once I gassed up the Camry, I made sure that we'd be set for the next couple of months or more with ground beef, chicken wings, shrimp. try tip steaks, dishwasher pods, oatmeal, olive oil, paper towels, and maybe some other things. I also took care of making purchases so that Debbie and I are all set to make our Sunday family dinner contributions. 

I popped into Pilgrim's Market after Costco to buy more Cravens Earth and Sky ground coffee and snagged a morning glory muffin out of the bakery case. On my way to the freeway, I snuck into Union Roasters and treated myself to a latte for the road.

Whew! 

Pre-transplant, this was exactly the kind of trip to CdA that I used to enjoy topping off with delicious craft beer at any one of CdA's fine breweries and tap rooms. 

But, for now, I'm abstaining. 

Maybe I'm being too cautious, but so what! 

I want the medications I take twice a day to keep my body from rejecting my new kidney to work and if there's even only an outside chance that alcohol could interact poorly with those medications, you'll find me on the wagon! 

Three Beautiful Things 10-18-2024: Inward and Outward Restoration, Sorting and Tidying and Cleaning, Delayed Trip

1. I thought a lot today about how J. L Carr, in his novel, A Month in the Country, parallels the external with the internal. The novel's main character, Tom Birkin, works on the restoration of a long grimed and painted over mural in an old church in Yorkshire. We see that this external restoration gives us a visual, metaphorical picture of the restoration of his soul, of his inner life, he's experiencing while doing this work and living in the country. 

2. I realized today, when I thought I would put flannel sheets on my bed, that Luna (RIP) had torn up the fitted sheet of my flannel set. I saved the flat sheet and pillow cases, but I didn't have a full set to put on the bed. 

This discovery energized me to get to work.

I cleared a bunch of clothes and two perfectly fine sets of sheets I don't want any longer out of my closet. I'll donate these items. I turned my mattress. I laundered what bedding I have left and ordered two sets of sheets online. 

The room I sleep in and where I spend many hours reading and being with Copper during the day is tidier and cleaner.  I always enjoy crawling into bed when the sheets, blanket, bedspread, and pillow cases are freshly washed and dried. I'm grateful for this burst of sorting and cleaning energy that possessed me. 

3. Today I had planned to blast over to Costco and Supercuts and possibly drop into Pilgrim's Market, Kohl's, Petco, and who knows what else. 

But, because of my sudden burst of energy to tidy and clean up the bedroom, a burst that lasted much of the day, I'll delay my trip to CdA and gallivant another day.  

Three Beautiful Things 10-17-2024: Money Review, Going Off Script at Yoke's, Steak Dinner!

1. Every six months or so, I jump on the laptop and join a financial professional or two who work for the company where I've invested in a retirement account. Today, one of those pros and I talked about medical things to get warmed up, reviewed my account, addressed a few questions, and signed off. 

We'll talk again in April. 

Things looked fine. 

2. I had a few items on my shopping list at Yoke's today. Once I put those in my cart, I drifted over to the meat case, wondering if something might jump out at me that I hadn't thought about for dinner tonight. 

Small, thick tri tip beef steaks called out to me. 

So did a package of bacon. 

I answered the call and began to imagine just what I might do with bacon and these little steaks to make a (I hoped) fun dinner. 

3. I let the steaks and the bacon warm up to room temperature. First I fried three strips of bacon and poured some of the grease in our cast iron skillet for cooking the steaks. I took the bacon out of the pan and made a mess of onion, mushrooms, French green beans, and corn -- and once it all was cooked, I added broken pieces of bacon back in the pan.

I kept this side dish warm and seasoned the steaks with Trader Joe's garlicky and spicy seasoning blend called Aglio Olio. 

I didn't want to overcook the steaks. At the same time, in my post-transplant life, I am supposed to be sure to cook meat through and through. 

I'd say that I cooked these steaks right at medium rare. I hoped they were cooked enough not to make me ill. (So far, no problems!)

We had some bean salad left over and I put out that container and that was your meal: steak, vegetables with bacon, and bean salad. 

It worked! 

Three Beautiful Things 10-16-2024: Ahhh! A Retreat Into the Green World Via a Novel, Double Checking, A Surprising and Perfect Dinner

1.  Back in July, I started reading the list of books Leah Sottile posted in response to a NYTimes list of the Best Books of the 21st Century.

Sottile's recommended books are, without exception, dark, often chilling, always unsettling. 

I've taken a few breaks from her list and wouldn't you know it! The books I've read that are not on her list have been -- well, dark, chilling, always unsettling. 

That changed this week. 

As a good luck with your recovery gift, Scott and Cate Shirk gave me two books. One is a collection of P. G. Wodehouse stories -- I know that anytime I want to read the best in comic upper class British nonsense, Wodehouse is always nearby. I love reading him and really loved the Jeeves and Wooster television series from the early 1990s. 

I either hadn't heard of or had forgotten about the other book they gave me.

It was published in 1980, written by J. L. Carr, and its title is A Month in the Country. 

I'm an old hand at reading, and back in olden days, teaching, books set in the country, in forests, in what many refer to as the green world. 

The green world, in contrast to the busy rush and feverish pace of urban areas, is portrayed in these books and plays and movies as a place of retreat, refreshment, healing, a place to slow down and gain a better perspective on life. 

So, was A Month in the Country such a book?

YES! 

In short, it features a traumatized WWI veteran whose marriage is collapsing (or has it collapsed?). He leaves London to take a job in a North Yorkshire church restoring a medieval mural that exists underneath centuries of whitewash, candle smoke and grease, and other forms of grime. 

So can meeting people in a rural setting, doing a painstaking job in a church, drinking in the smells and visual beauty of the Yorkshire countryside, and uncovering a beautiful mural provide solace, help heal a broken heart, restore happiness to a damaged soul and more?

The book is very worth reading to find out -- if you are into this sort of thing! 

2. I'll double check later in the day on Thursday, but I'm taking it as good news that I haven't heard from the transplant team about the blood work I had done on Monday. I'm assuming that my medicine dosages should remain the same and the team, as I was, are pleased with how stable my numbers were this week. 

I definitely will be double checking as to whether I am to stay on the once a week blood draw schedule so I'll know if I will be going in next week so I can have blood work done and pick up another book that's come in at Auntie's Bookstore and enjoy some good things at Great Harvest and Trader Joe's and maybe more.... 

3. On her way home from school, Debbie picked up a pack of four delicious sausages. I heated them up and, at the same time, sautéed a mixture of red and white rings of onion and added leftover basmati rice to the onions. We had bean salad in the fridge from a couple days ago. 

Both of us added some Trader Joe's Chili Onion Crunch to our rice serving, giving it some heat and texture. 

What a winning combination! Sausage, rice and onion, Chili Onion Crunch, and bean salad. 

We'd never had this meal before and we were stoked as we dove into it! 

Three Beautiful Things 10-15-2024: I Slowed Down, Obits and Happy Memories, Stir Fry Again -- with Variations

1. After having such a full day, starting when I got up at 4:30 a.m. and lasting until I went to bed after 10 p.m., today my pace was much slower. I had some cleaning up left to do after Monday's family dinner. I napped some. In slowing down, I also had some restful and contented time with Copper. 

2. I also had some happy memories stirred by learning about two people who died recently. 

A local man I never knew named John Thompson died recently. His daughter, Phyllis, has been a wonderful help to us at Kellogg Insurance. 

There are also further connections between John Thompson and Debbie and me that I hadn't really put together until today, even though I think Phyllis explained them to me when we first moved to Kellogg. 

If you read John Thompson's obituary, you'll learn that starting at 12 years old, John became a part of Warren and Ailie Van's family. Warren and Ailie's son's name was Mike Van. 

As an adult, Mike Van lived in Eugene. He taught art classes at South Eugene High School and he showed his own work in Eugene and elsewhere. I never knew Mike, but his wife, Maron, was a deacon at Eugene's Resurrection Episcopal Church. I can't remember if we ever met, but I worshipped once in a while at Resurrection and was aware of her dedication to the Resurrection parish and to the Episcopal Church at large. 

Mike and Maron's daughter, Kim Still, managed the Saturday Market main performance stage in Eugene. She and Debbie were closely acquainted. Debbie not only performed at Saturday Market, but Kim also scheduled children Debbie worked with musically to perform on that stage. It was a thrill for the kids and their parents and a delight for the audiences. 

And that's not all. 

Kim's son, Victor Schramm, was a student of mine at LCC -- I think he was in a World Literature course I taught in winter term of 2005, but I might have that wrong.

And, there's more. 

Periodically, I read through the obituaries in Eugene's city paper, the Register-Guard. 

The connection between John Thompson, the Vans, Kim Still, and Victor Schramm moved me to look through Eugene obituaries today. 

I learned that Denise LaCroix, a theater director who, thanks to AnnMarie Maurer, invited me to replace an actor who left the cast of a 1995 local production she was directing of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, died in August. 

I loved being in that play. 

I deeply appreciated, as a very inexperienced actor, how Denise took several moments to pull me aside and give me encouraging comments about how I was doing as Polonius. 

I also got to work with some of Eugene's finest actors who were dedicated to their work in the play and were also a lot of fun, along with being fascinating people to get to know off stage. 

Learning of Denise's death saddened me and, at the same time, awakened memories of how much I enjoyed being a part of that cast and performing under Denise's direction. 

One more thing: in a rehearsal very close to opening night -- was it the night before? -- a terrible accident occurred as our original Claudius fell while carrying our original Ophelia, played by Denise, off the stage. The accident disabled both actors, confronting Denise and our cast with a mammoth challenge. I was deeply moved and impressed with how our company overcame this terrible event. Our run of plays kept growing and improving. Eventually, Denny and Denise recovered from their serious injuries, but not quickly, certainly not in time to return to the cast. Denise, however, shouldered on as our director -- I thought her efforts were heroic. 

3. Debbie and I enjoyed our stir fried dinner on Monday so much that I made another one tonight featuring a combination of chicken, red onion, green onion, cabbage, bok choy, yellow summer squash, cilantro, fresh basil, and peanuts.  Instead of noodles, this dinner featured basmati rice and we poured leftover green curry sauce from last night over the top of it. 

It worked! 

I mean, it REALLY worked!

Three Beautiful Things 10-14-2024: Blood Work and Gallivanting, Fixing Food for Family Dinner, A Pet Gate! and Good Yakkin'

1. I left the house at 6 a.m. this morning, excited to have blood work done at Providence Sacred Heart and then gallivant around Spokane, Spokane Valley, and Coeur d'Alene for a little while. 

As I write this entry on Tuesday morning, I haven't heard from the transplant team yet regarding my blood work. I've studied it and I really like about 95.7% of what I see and the one result I have questions about might not be that big of a deal. I'll know that it's not a big deal with the team if they don't address if when they message me later. 

I read many of my test results on my phone at Great Harvest as I blissed out on a Morning Glory muffin and a couple of cups of coffee. To my surprise and delight, Great Harvest was selling bread on a buy one get one free special and I purchased a loaf of Harvest Blend and a loaf of Dakota bread. 

I then popped over to Trader Joe's to pick up a few items related to family dinner tonight and some other fun things.

I left Trader Joe's and wound my way downtown to Auntie's Bookstore and picked up two books I'd ordered and they were holding. 

Kenna Morgan spotted me in the store and stopped me to say hello. We chatted for a few minutes and, as I got into the car, I thought of at least two things I wanted to say -- so I'll send her a message. 

I was actually so shocked to hear someone in Spokane, not at Sacred Heart, call out my name that my mind went kind of blank when we visited. 

Outside of the hospital complex, when I roam around Spokane, I never expect anyone to know who I am. And, until today, no one has known me! 

I blasted onto I-90 and after several miles glided on to Indiana Avenue in Spokane Valley and made a quick stop at Barnes and Noble to purchase a paper fold out, old-fashioned, but current, street map of Spokane and vicinity. I've been wanting to get some details about Spokane's layout and roadways clearer in my mind and I find the paper map is far more helpful than looking at maps online. 

I ended my string of stops at Pilgrim's Market in Coeur d'Alene where I bought more produce for dinner, a bag of ground Craven coffee like they serve at Great Harvest, and a few other items. 

I enjoyed all my stops, maybe more than a reasonable person ought to!, and it was time to rocket back to Kellogg and get family dinner preparations underway. 

2. Back home, it was time to spiff up the house a bit,  focus on chopping vegetables, thawing chicken tenders, fixing a green curry sauce, and, a bit later, getting out the wok and preparing tonight's noodles and stir frying the chicken for our dinner. 

For dinner, I steamed three different kinds of gyoza, potstickers, and dumplings. I also stir fried a variety of vegetables in the wok and added fresh basil and cilantro to the stir fry and blended in the chicken and noodles. 

I made a Trader Joe's dipping sauce and Trader Joe's Peanut Satay available to dip the potstickers in and Debbie, Molly, Paul, Carol, and I could choose to use the dipping sauce or the green curry sauce I made as sauce for the stir fry. I also put out peanuts for the stir fry. 

I love fixing food in the wok and I love experimenting with stir fry sauces so this was a fun dinner for me. Luckily, the rest the family enjoyed it, too. 

We missed Christy, but for the best of reasons: she has been away in the woods of North Idaho, staying at a rental cabin, resting, relaxing, retreating, and recharging her energy.  

We also missed Brian who had important matters elsewhere to tend to. 

3. As I've mentioned about 70 million times since Debbie put it up in July, we've had a game changing pet barrier up to make life more peaceful for both Gibbs and Copper. 

As an instrument of peace and contentment, it's worked magnificently.

One problem: Debbie and I have had to climb over it for the last nearly three months.

A few weeks ago Debbie said the magic word: ENOUGH! 

She purchased a pet gate. 

After dinner, Paul installed it. 

What a difference for Debbie and me! No more anxiety about falling as we climbed over that barrier. We can walk through the gate. 

Not only that, but conversation tonight that ranged from Tina Turner to pet care to teaching challenges to family news to care of the soul to life at Kellogg's latest food and wine and oddities joint, Nocturn -- where Molly is the manager -- was fun. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-13-2024: Nitty Gritty on ZOOM, Mural Restoration in N. Yorkshire, Superb Chicken Dinner

1. I joined Bill, Diane, and Bridgit on ZOOM this morning for a somber and often intense conversation largely focused on the complications that develop when a death occurs in a family. I involved myself in this discussion by listening and occasionally asking a question as the others talked about tensions between family members, financial complexities, thorny dilemmas, estate difficulties, grudges, settling old scores, and the exhaustion of taking care of business after a parent or a sibling dies. The discussion left me divided between feeling sorrow and frustration for my friends' trying circumstances, past and present, and feeling gratitude that my sisters and I navigated our mother's death so well.  

2.  Today, I started reading a book that is, so far, without assault, without violence, without a court trial.  It's a small book. Its title is A Month in the Country. It's about a physically and psychologically damaged WWI veteran who has taken a job in a small North Yorkshire village painstakingly uncovering a church building's medieval mural that has layer upon layer of paint and other obscuring materials hiding it. 

I'm not a hundred percent sure where this novel is going.  I'm not even ten percent sure. In fact, I have no idea.

3. Debbie fixed dinner again tonight. She dreamed up a way of baking chicken with surprising seasonings and made penne with red pepper pesto and a bean salad to go with the chicken. The chicken, pasta, and salad worked together flawlessly. Dinner deeply satisfied me.

Three Beautiful Things 10-12-2024: I Finished *Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil*, I Enjoyed the Movie, Delicious Canned Salmon and Pasta Dinner

1. I finished reading the intriguing book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil first thing today. I only had about twenty pages to go. 

This book came out thirty year ago. I left it wondering, knowing that many of the principal figures in the book (but not its author) have died, whether the commitment to preserving itself, whether adamant resistance to change continue to be a prominent social value in Savannah. 

I didn't have this question on my mind at all in 2016 when I traveled to Savannah. My mind was mostly on the task of officiating Scott and Cate's wedding. In 2016, I wandered in the historic district one day, took some pictures, but I didn't have an understanding of what I was seeing or of the history of the place. 

If I discovered a book or an article examining Savannah in the 2020s, looking at the similarities and differences between this city in the 1980s, when most of this book took place, and now, or even the last ten years, I'd read it.

2. I was very curious to see how Clint Eastwood, as director and producer, in collaboration with the movie's screenwriter, John Lee Hancock, adapted the book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil into a movie. 

I'm not going to, nor am I able to, say which is better, the movie or the book. 

I'm more interested in the adaptation itself. 

I think what Hancock/Eastwood did tells viewers, especially those who've read the book, what Hancock and Eastwood see as making a movie work. 

First of all, there is the challenge of time, of the movie's length.

Hancock and Eastwood condensed and rearranged episodes in the book to tighten up the story. Otherwise, they would have had to make a season or two worth of hour long episodes, that is, make a series out of the book.

Therefore, the movie had fewer characters and changed some characters' names. The book featured four trials, three in Savannah,  the last one in Augusta, and the movie condensed them into a single trial in Savannah. The movie created a lukewarm love interest, an addition to the story. 

Tighten. Rearrange. Add in some kissing and hand holding. 

The movie took us inside some of the vintage homes/mansions, brought us into Savannah's black cotillion, took us into a graveyard at night (the garden of good and evil), but, did not extend the movie by taking us to several locales the book did. 

The trial was, to me, the center of the movie.

Savannah was the center of the book. 

Trials make better movies, but the book's exploration of Savannah's quirkiness, spirit, and darker dimensions were perfect for the book. 

I enjoyed both, but I cannot compare them -- can't say if the movie "lived up" to the book. 

The movie was its own work, based on, but not wholly dependent on, John Berendt's book.

Again, I enjoyed both.  

3. Debbie made a superb dinner tonight that featured canned salmon, pasta boiled in chicken broth, garlic, green onion, sour cream, and maybe other ingredients into a spaghetti dish that we both loved. When I eat canned salmon, I don't compare it to fresh salmon. They are two different food items connected only by both being a kind of salmon. Not comparing canned to fresh opens the way for me to enjoy canned salmon for what it is for me, a delicious, versatile, and convenient food item that always works. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-11-2024: Wealth and Justice, Voodoo and Psycho Dice, Jazz Is Just Right

1.  Any contact I have with wealthy people almost always only happens through reading about them. 

As I near the end of the book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, I'm reminded page after page that the wealthy, yes, can possess and I think, at times, they might even enjoy, copious luxuries. 

Their wealth can also have a sizable impact on the courtroom, primarily because the wealthy can afford to spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, and spend some more on mounting a defense when indicted for a crime, spend, spend, spend spend, and spend some more on appealing each and every guilty conviction, and, can afford to keep a court case continuing for years.  

The wealthy can afford to run out the clock. 

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil is about more than Jim Williams' lengthy effort to be acquitted of murder. It's also about the social goings on in, oh, let's say the 1980s, in Savannah, GA, the eccentricities of the wealthy and the peculiarities of those who aren't wealthy at all, and about grudges, petty spats, power struggles, sexual mores, hypocrisies, and secrets, racial realities, and other aspects of life in Savannah.

But, this book would have come to a much earlier conclusion if Jim Williams were of modest means. Instead, it covers a span of nearly ten years because Jim Williams can afford to be tried repeatedly for having killed Danny Hansford. 

I have about twenty pages left to read and the trials are not over, nor do I know what the future holds for Jim Williams. 

2. A dimension of this book that I find fascinating (from afar) is that Jim Williams seeks help in the midst of his trials from Minerva, a woman living in Beaufort, South Carolina, who practices voodoo. The book's author, John Berendt, takes us into Minerva's world of voodoo, her world of roots, powders, rituals, incantations, graveyards, and more.  

Not only does Jim Williams seek spiritual aid from voodoo, he is also certain that through mind control, through sustained mental concentration, he can bring about results he desires in his life. He practices this commitment by spending hours playing a game of his own creation called Psycho Dice in which he exercises his mental concentration to bring about the dice rolls he desires.

3. While I've been reading Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, I've had the Sirius/XM station Real Jazz playing at a low volume in the background. Mostly, I don't really hear it, but somehow it's perfect, even if at a subconscious level, as accompaniment to this book. Every once in a while the music pulls me away from the book. Say Dave Brubeck's combo is playing "Take Five". Or say the station suddenly features the vocalist Samara Joy. I surely do not know if jazz music is popular in Savannah, but in my little world of reading and having jazz music on, the fit is just right. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-10-2024: Hold On Partner, Things Darken in Savannah, December Trip -- Maybe

 1. Every day this week, until today, I seem to have forgotten that I had quite a bit of laundry to wash and dry. I was all set to leave the house this morning when suddenly the laundry lightning bolt struck me. 

"Hold on, partner!" I uttered to myself. 

Then over the next few hours, I got my laundry done. 

2. While my clothes spun and tumbled and dried, I met a few more eccentric Savannahians in the book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and began to get more and more peeks at the corruption in many of these wealthy people's lives. Violence began to rear its ugliness and suddenly, at the of the book's Part One, a murder occurred. 

I'm fascinated to see where things go from here. 

3. I'm not sure how public the news I received today is, so I'll keep it vague. 

I'll just say that the news gives me a really good reason to travel to Eugene in early December.

I don't think it's a very good idea, just yet, to fly.

But if I continue to recover from the transplant well, if my immune system seems to be improving, and if the weather is decent (safe for driving), I definitely want to drive to Oregon soon after Thanksgiving weekend and be a part of the event I learned about today. 

I'll discuss it with the transplant team -- see what they think. 

On the positive side, I'm happily encouraged by not having any problems after the birthday party at Trout Creek, MT, gathering with people at Don Knott's Celebration of Life after the service, and spending three nights at the Wildhorse Resort. 

My hopes are high.

Three Beautiful Things 10-09-2024: Mandated Flu Shot, Cardboard Out, Eccentric Citizens of Savannah

1. My recent visit to the transplant clinic, on September 30th, included this conversation. My white blood cell count had been low and I wanted to make sure I didn't do something dumb. 

Me: Should I go in for a flu shot?

Dr. Murad: Yes! Absolutely! As soon as possible. But wait a couple of weeks or so after the flu shot for a Covid shot. Contact us before you go in for that shot and we'll review your blood work and tell you if the time is right for it. (Note: I have a clinic visit on Oct 28th. I'll discuss the Covid vaccination then.)

Me: Sounds good. 

I was leaving for the Wildhorse Resort the next day, so I didn't call the clinic uptown until Monday and made an appointment to get a flu shot today. 

It was easy and I was especially happy that the woman who vaccinated me was learning her job, so I got to be a part of her education. I always like being involved in sort of helping new professionals gain experience. And learn.

2. The cardboard had begun to pile up just a bit too much in the garage and so I loaded up the back of the  Sube and blasted out to the transfer station and tossed the boxes and other pieces in the cardboard bin. It is always a relief to me when I make the garage a bit tidier. 

3. As I reached about the halfway point of Chapter 6 of Part One of John Berendt's book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, I realized, in kind of a duh! moment, that Berendt devotes each chapter in Part One to a different eccentric Savannah resident. 

It's fun. 

Through his descriptions of and stories about these citizens, his portrait of Savannah itself fills out. 

My sense is that he is setting the foundation for a more dominating Savannah story to come -- maybe it will develop in Part Two of his book. 

I'll soon find out. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-08-2024: Blood Work and Ultrasound and Results, Blueberry Muffin and Hustling Back Home, Dreaming of a Return to Savannah

1. I hopped into the Camry at dark o'clock (6 am) this morning and soared into the metropolis of Spokane for another visit to the Sacred Heart Outpatient lab for bloodwork and, a bit later, to the Radiology department for an ultrasound of my new kidney. 

The blood work encouraged me. My creatinine levels continue to inch down, my white blood cell count is back in range, my potassium and magnesium levels stayed in range, and everything else, with one exception, was stable. 

Later in the day, my tacrolimus results parachuted into my smart phone. The transplant team would like to see the levels of this immunosuppressive drug be a bit higher in my bloodstream, so they made a small adjustment to my dosage. 

I'll be interested next week to see if or how much this slight increase in my tacrolimus dosage brings down my white blood cell count. My fingers are crossed that the white blood cell count will stay in range. 

The ultrasound results were positive, overall. The only small concern is with the pressure on my artery in the transplant area is.  When I take and log my blood pressure twice a day, if my systolic number consistently goes over 150, the team wants to know. So far, over the last twenty-one weeks since the transplant, this hasn't happened.  I'll have another ultrasound in a month as a way of keeping an eye on this arterial pressure. 

2. I left the Sacred Heart complex and roared straight to Great Harvest for a muffin and coffee. For about two seconds it dismayed me that Great Harvest wasn't selling Morning Glory muffins today, but, my slight disappointment gave way to joy when I saw they were selling Blueberry Oat muffins instead. 

Bliss. 

While out and about, I got word that Keith would be swinging by some time today to blow out our sprinkler system. I let him know I'd be back in Kellogg around 1:30 and then I hustled into Trader Joe's and grabbed a few items -- I didn't poke around like I often do -- and then rocketed downtown and picked up Fire Season,  a book I'd ordered from Auntie's Bookstore. 

I fueled up at Costco in CdA and arrived home ahead of Keith swinging by, which he did about an hour later, and our sprinkler system is ready to hibernate. 

Everything worked out just right. 

3. I'm very happy that I'm not getting distracted and that I'm moving further and further into Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. I officiated Scott and Cate's wedding in Savannah back in 2016, in October, and this book moves me to want to go back. Thanks to John Berendt's book, I would see Savannah and its many squares with more informed eyes and it would be fun to trace the footsteps of this book's forays into Savannah. 

I enjoyed Savannah a lot in 2016,  even in my ignorance. Today, I can imagine travel scenarios that would get me there, especially because Debbie's cousin has a vacation condo in Hilton Head, SC, not far from Savannah. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-07-2024: Buying More Books, Business Day, Fun Chicken Tenders

1.  Update on reading through the Leah Sottile book list: Right now I do not have any of the remaining books I will read from her list in my possession. I ordered them all today, buying every book I could from Auntie's Bookstore in Spokane and the other two from Better World Books. Since I make regular medical trips to Spokane, I'll pick up the books I order from Auntie's, all but one were not on their shelves, at their store. 

While I wait for these books to come in, I'm sticking with Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil  by John Berendt, a book I've started about three times before getting distracted by who knows what! but I can tell that I won't back down this time. 

It's what's called a non-fiction novel. It's set in Savannah, GA. So far, Berendt portrays Savannah as an eccentric city. It's fun early on.

2. I bore down today and took care of some business: flu shot appointment -- as ordered by the transplant team --, appointment for sprinkler system blow out, and some money matters. It's always a relief when I don't procrastinate and just jump on this kind of stuff. 

3. A week ago, I bought a package of Trader Joe's Sun-Dried Tomatoes and Basil Chicken Tenders and gave them a try tonight with broccoli and brown rice. 

It worked!

Three Beautiful Things 10-08-2024: Mickey Haller Must Cross Examine Himself, Family Dinner at Sam's, Braving the Excellent US Movie *Girl with a Dragon Tattoo*

1. If you've seen the movie, The Lincoln Lawyer, you know that the central character, Mickey Haller, must face troubling ethical questions about the nature of his work as a defense attorney. In the book, The Fifth Witness, he has to confront similar unsettling questions. In my opinion, to lay out these questions in this blog post would also give away the story. So, I won't dig into these questions -- only to say that I found the book absorbing and very enjoyable. 

2. Paul and Carol had a jam-packed weekend and were also scheduled to host family dinner. To make things a bit easier on themselves, they hosted dinner down the street at Sam's, Kellogg's diner. Carol, Paul, Christy, Debbie, and I sat around a table. We were not lively. Ha!  It was a good idea to let Sam's do the cooking for our tired selves. At the same time, eating away from home served as a reminder to me of how much I enjoy preparing meals at home and enjoy the meals Christy and Paul/Carol prepare for family dinner.  

3. I returned home eager to finish reading The Fifth Witness and did so. 

Upon competing this book, I thought I'd be ready to call it a night, but I wasn't and so I decided to watch the US movie version of The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo. 

I had misgivings about watching this movie because the story includes acts of violence I did not enjoy in the book.  I dreaded seeing them played out in the movie. These scenes were skillfully executed in the movie and they unnerved me.

Here's why I went ahead and watched the movie:  I've enjoyed whatever I've seen Daniel Craig act in and the rest of the cast looked very solid. I also anticipated that the movie's frigid, snowy, sometimes bleak atmosphere would work for me (and it did) and I was curious to watch Rooney Mara take on the titular role of the girl with the dragon tattoo, the troubled savant Lisbeth Salander. 

To my great pleasure, the casting of Craig and Mara worked superbly and the entire cast in support of these two leading roles was also superb. I thought it might be this way knowing that Robin Wright, Christopher Plummer, and Steven Berkoff played key supporting roles along with a cast of actors who were also compelling but not as familiar to me. 

Lastly, and I didn't expect this at all, I loved it every time Lisabeth Salander jumped on her motorcycle and  raced it in the movie. 

I am about to make a list of movie motorcycles I have loved -- remember when Maud swipes the police officer's motorcycle with Harold seated behind her? 

That's a good start! 

Three Beautiful Things 10-05-2024: Mickey Haller's Roller Coaster, Produce Shopping, Wah Hing to Go!

1. Now that I'm back home after a three night jaunt to Pendleton, things settled down comfortably. I spent much of the day riding the roller coaster of Mickey Haller's life in and out of court in the book The Fifth Witness as he faces a formidable prosecutor and a strict judge in the courtroom and, outside the court, deals with family, Hollywood movie makers, thugs, and the difficulties of his temperamental client and a scammer who wants to make money off of her story. 

Honestly, never a dull moment! 

2. I mean this was a really quiet day. 

Debbie enjoyed herself getting some work done at school and the most exciting thing I did was take a break from reading and blast over to Yoke's to replenish our supply of produce. Now I have plenty of vegetable to use for salads. 

3. Debbie had told me earlier in the day that she had a dinner planned for tonight. Then she texted me from school, told me she was going to drop in at The Lounge for a little while, and buy an order to go at Wah Hing. That definitely worked for me. The Broccoli Shrimp and Ginger Beef entrees she brought home boosted my already uplifted mood.  

Then I returned to reading Michael Connelly while listening to a soft jazz playlist on Spotify. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-04-2024: Leaving Pendleton, Returning to Kellogg, Enjoying *The Fifth Witness*

1. I sprang out of bed a bit early this morning to finish packing, take the car to the travel plaza near the resort to fuel up, do some word puzzles, and meet Ed and Mike in the hotel lobby. Back in April, we ended our time together at the Wildhorse with a delicious breakfast at Roosters Country Kitchen.

Our plan was to return. 

We arrived at Roosters this morning, however, they were closed because of a plumbing problem -- or so we heard that was the reason. 

Right down the street from Roosters sits a Denny's and we piled into a booth and agreed: our breakfasts were superb. I really enjoyed my fresh spinach, caramelized onion, mushroom, and Swiss cheese omelet. Ed and Mike ordered slams and were very happy. 

2. I enjoyed being away, talking with Colette, dining, relaxing in my hotel room, reading a Michael Connelly book (The Fifth Witness), taking a scenic drive to Meacham, and so on. I have decided to lay off alcohol for the time being -- I don't know if or when I'll drink it again -- and I missed having drinks at the steakhouse, drinking a beer or two at the lobby bar, and joining the guys for whiskey and b.s. in one of our rooms. 

I also enjoyed returning home. Copper has found a new source of contentment by curling himself in a laundry basket in my closet. Debbie fixed us a great meal of tilapia, yellow summer squash, and curry out of a Trader Joe's packet over rice. 

I enjoyed dining out while away, but home cooking is the best. 

3. Michael Connelly is an accomplished writer of highly readable crime stories, whether he's writing detective stories or legal fiction. As I move deeper into The Fifth Witness, I'm enjoying how chapter by chapter he introduces another complication in the case Mickey Haller has taken on and, in doing so, continues to add dimension to the characters involved. 

This is a murder story, so it's a dark story because of that. But it's not as dark and gruesome as, say, Lost Girls or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and I am welcoming the relief from the grisliness of those novels.

I will, however, be returning to Leah Sottile's book list when I'm done with this novel -- and the books I have left to read will be dark. 

I know that!  

Three Beautiful Things 10-03-2024: Lunch in Meacham, Gaming and Yakkin' in Ed's Room, Happy Hour Nachos and Generous Tipping

1.  After a morning drinking coffee, working word puzzles, and reading Michael Connelly's The Fifth Witness, I leapt behind the wheel of the Camry and drove Ed, Mike, and me out to Meacham, OR for lunch at the Oregon Trail Store and Deli. I ordered a terrific Patty Melt with a cup of homemade turkey soup. Ed and Mike loved their cheeseburgers and fries. We had a great time yakkin' with the deli's proprietor and talking amongst ourselves about this and that. Normally, we drive up to this off the beaten path gem of a diner for breakfast, but we changed things up today and we were very happy that we decided to have lunch instead. 

2. I decided to give the gaming floor one more try. I had some flashes of success, but never could build any momentum and, after a while, I retired, for this trip, from playing machines. Soon after leaving the floor, I joined Ed and Mike in Ed's room for some robust conversation while Ed and Mike enjoyed sipping a little whiskey.

3. After yakkin' for a while, Ed, Mike, and I moved our party to the Wildhorse Sports Bar for half price happy hour nachos. We continued our ongoing conversations and extended kindness and a nearly 100% tip  to our server who was friendly and sweet to us while working under very trying circumstances as part of an understaffed crew working a resort bar's happy hour. One of the things I really enjoy about joining my lifelong friends at the Wildhorse or when we go anywhere else is that all of us are generous tippers -- and all of us sympathize with and are patient with overworked servers and do all we can with kindness, patience, humor, and great (I hope) tips to try to make their work shifts less stressful. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-02-2024: Productive Day in My Room, Bookstore Run, Blackened Salmon at the Plateau

1. Along with being unlucky so far, my other reason for not spending much time gaming is that even with a mask on and wearing disposable vinyl (not latex) gloves, I am simply limiting my exposure to other people. 

So, today, I relaxed for quite a while in my room, doing my morning word puzzle routine, messaging with Stu and later in the evening, Alex, catching up on my blog, writing a bit to Colette about Leah Sottile's book list, enjoying a short exchange with Leah Sottile on Substack about her list (she gave me a book or two to add to it!), and preparing a document with the text of Saturday's Celebration of Life for Don Knott and sending it out to those who requested it. 

If you are reading this and would like a copy of the service (it doesn't include things said that weren't typed out), let me know. All I need is your email address. 

2. I knew that I'd neglected to bring a book with me to the resort, so I looked online to see if any bookstores were in business in Pendleton. An independent bookstore recently opened: Brett's Books. 

I decided it would be fun to drive into Pendleton and check out Brett's Books. 

It's funny. I had Michael Connelly in mind and quickly discovered that the store had quite a lineup of Connelly's novels. Almost randomly, I plucked one of Connelly's Lincoln Lawyer books off the shelf and I bought The Fifth Witness and read the first chapter before dinner. 

3. As is our tradition when we come to the Wildhorse Resort, Lars, Jake, Ed, Mike, and I sat down at a table at the Plateau Steakhouse. For the first time in the last many years of coming to the Plateau, I didn't order a steak. I opted for a delicious Blackened Salmon served on jasmine rice with a carrot puree and rosemary. I decided to go all out with eating fish and ordered a bowl of crab and corn chowder to start. 

It was a delicious meal and I enjoyed the table talk with my lifelong friends a lot. 

I ended this most satisfying day back in my room for a little bit of reading before dozing off for the night. 

Three Beautiful Things 10-01-2024: On the Road to Wildhorse Resort, Protecting Myself, Invigorating Thai Dinner with Colette

1. Adrenaline shot through my system around 5:00 this morning as I leapt out of bed in anticipation of driving today with Ed as passenger to the Wildhorse Resort near Pendleton, OR. Since the kidney transplant in May, most of my travels have been between Kellogg and Spokane, but I did take one trip to Trout Creek, MT.

I picked up Ed around 6:30 and we blasted over the 4th of July Pass on into CdA for a filling and delicious breakfast at the Breakfast Nook. We made a couple of rest stops and stopped at Starbucks in Ritzville for lattes. It was an easy, uneventful drive and our check in at Wildhorse went beautifully.

2. I spent some time on the gaming floor, protecting myself by wearing a mask, playing machines where no or few people were around, and by wearing disposable latex gloves.  My luck was mixed. After a fairly lucky start, my luck started going downhill, so I returned to my room.

I had some medical matters to straighten out and exchanged messages with Nurse Jenn. Everything is in order, is clear in my head, and I'm ready to return to Sacred Heart on Tuesday for labs and an ultrasound. 

3. Every time I travel to the Wildhorse Resort, I meet up with Colette Marie for dinner in Pendleton. We've been friends for forty-two years now, ever since the fall term 1982 Shakespeare course I taught at Whitworth. 

We once again met for delicious Thai food at Thai Crystal (I loved my Spicy Noodles with tofu) and we plunged right away into deep conversational waters. 

First topic: organ transplants. Colette's brother, Kent Klingman, has survived a complicated and experimental stem cell transplant for over twenty-five years and Colette told me stories about the transplant itself and what's happened in the years since, including when he met and became close friends with Mathias, his donor from Germany, in 2006. 

In addition, Colette's first husband's brother lives on as a heart transplant recipient. Colette and I had a fascinating discussion about how both Kent and her one time brother-in-law, Stuart, have been altered by their transplants. Kent, for example, now has food allergies he didn't have before, ones that Mathias has always had. Remarkably, Stuart's heart transplant seems to have altered his personality. It's as if along with his donor's physical heart, he also received some of her admirable personality traits.

I'll say, as a footnote to Colette's stories, that the only thing I'm aware of having received, in addition to my donor's kidney, is the BK virus and it is being treated and is barely detectable now, if at all. 

Second topic: Colette has read some of the books I've read as I make my way through Leah Sottile's book list. She's also worked with one of the writers, Sharma Shields (especially via Fishtrap) and she's heard Leyna Krow read and present. We had a great conversation about women writers and also talked invigoratingly about the book, All the Light We Cannot See. 

Colette has been working on a novel that she tells from five characters' points of view. We had a great conversation, then, about how much we enjoy books that not only have multiple narrators, but that jump around in time. 

I had been looking forward to this conversation, especially since I started reading Leah Sottile's list of books. 

Our time together was just the stimulating, even electrifying, time of talking and sharing insights and ideas that I'd hoped it would be. 

BRAVO! 

Three Beautiful Things 09-30-2024: The Post-Transplant Medicine Dance, Longtime Friends Dine at Capone's, Goodbye HelloFresh! (For Now)

 1. I was up and at 'em around 4:30 this morning and before long I vaulted into the Camry and popped over the 4th of July Pass, eased into Spokane, and nestled the car in the cozy confines of a Sacred Heart parking garage. 

I had blood drawn without incident and then, after a muffin and a latte, met with transplant nephrologist Dr. Haris Murad. Murad's main concern was my low white blood cell count. This problem is not related to anything I've done at home or on the road. It has to do with the drugs I take to suppress my immune system. He completely took me off of the immune-suppressive drug Myfortic, the latest adjustment to my medicine. 

So we'll see. Will the reduction in drugs that suppress my immune system  help raise my white blood count? I return to the medical center on Tuesday next week for more blood work and a kidney ultrasound, all in service to securing more information. 

By the way, none of this is unusual post-transplant. Finding the right balance between lowering my immune system so I don't reject my new kidney and keeping my immune system, at the same time, as vital as possible, is a dance common for transplant patients, especially, well, older recipients like me! We have to deal with how my aging system responds to medication and, as you can tell, the transplant team and I are keeping a close watch over things! 

Dr. Murad addressed the white blood cell matter and told me, as I thought he would, that everything else in my blood work looks superb -- not only that, he likes how my blood pressure is reading, liked the sounds of my lungs and heart, and had no concerns about fluid retention in my lower legs and ankles. 

Once again, a very positive visit! 

2. A small and mighty contingent of guys from the KHS Class of 72 met for lunch today, seated at an outdoor table at Capone's in CdA's midtown. I hadn't seen Steve Jaynes for several years. It was uplifting to see him today.  Steve joined Roger Pearson, Stu, and me for some solid food and great conversation. We looked back at highlights from our younger days and updated each other on our lives in 2024. 

3. I had meant to cancel this week's HelloFresh box, but forgot to. I decided, with Debbie's agreement, to cancel our subscription. So, the box I forgot to cancel arrived today and I decided to mix the two meals into one and made a mushroom penne with ground beef. If this is our last hurrah with HelloFresh, it was a fun and delicious one!