plotting

The kids headed out to school this morning, one by bike and one on foot, with stop #1 being the Metro bus at the bottom of our street. From there they go to the Metro and on to Vienna. The last step is catching the school’s bus that runs them from the metro station to the school’s front door. It was at the ultimate step that some confusion rained down; the two got separated at the end and L. wasn’t sure where the bus picked up the kids. She gave me a quick call and eventually made it to the bus safely but this is more a story about me than about her (or them).

There’s a small bus circuit the runs around Fairfax City (The CUE bus) and it’ll take you from the Metro to the school’s driveway; as long as you know its schedule and map. What I’d forgotten to do – unbelievably – was package up my normal, and overly detailed, guide material containing the bus map, time tables, a map of the bus shelter parking lot, and spare change for L. before the first day of school. (Yes, each item is highlighted and annotated.) X can vouch for my over-planning when it comes to journeys; but it’s good over-planning. The best example was when we met in Barcelona for a week and I showed up with a selection of restaurants, city maps, transit maps, country maps, transit maps, and other assorted items. One impressive bit – if I do say so myself – was our regional train ride from Barcelona to La Garriga for our night at Termes spa. We were catching our train from Placa Catalunya to La Garriga and I’d mapped out the line and times for departure…in laminated form. The stations in Spain – as with most of Europe – don’t necessarily have loads of English instructions laying about the place so you use your experience and trust the timetables even if you’re not sure what the train, or the announcements, say. Our train was leaving from track Red 3 at 3:41pm and arriving in La Garriga about 40 minutes later. We got to the track about five minutes early and when a train pulled in at 3:41, we boarded. I still remember us wondering if we’d done the right thing – what if we ended up Lisbon? – but we both knew it’d work out in the end; that's sort of our travel M.O. The next day we reversed the process from the small, single-track station in the country and simply boarded whatever train was passing through at our appointed time.

The reason I haven't told you this before is because it's not really a story.

chop, slice, score

Let me give you a quick story about filling out your cooking school knife/junk kit. You need a really good skimmer; you do loads of clarified butter and if you don't have a good skimmer you might as well go sit in the corner. You need a tourne knife because doing tourne potatoes is a skill that needs not only practice but good equipment. What else? Right, a good lemon reamer - I have a juicer at home but I'm not carrying that thing back and forth to class. I also picked up a French-built baller for doing Parisienne potatoes. The Parisienne cut is essentially doing a melon baller move; but, with raw potatoes they are an absolute bitch; my teammate and I sorted out angles, edge of table leverage, and cussing as we did our practice last week. Seemed to me that even though the angles will never change, a good, sharp baller would be solid gold. Oh, and I had to buy a new whisk since mine somehow disappeared last week. Along those lines, what I learned right quick from a guy on my team who works at a place in D.C. is this: tape your kit. Especially since we have 17 of us in the same kitchen with the same kit it's essential to be able to see and ID your stuff from distance. He'd white-taped his gear and I've now white-and-red taped my stuff - no issues from now on.

I have to take a second to throw in an Onion piece that is so very true. Here, go off and take a read. My favorite place when I was living out in Nevada was stocked with the coolest coffeemakers anywhere. The owner in Fallon always hired the most interesting crew and there was definitely one that fit the mold of "guys showing up to see her" barrista. (Actually, there were three or four over the years but one certainly stood out.) It's pretty funny to read this and not wonder at all about what the staff meeting was like when they came up with this idea. In fact, I never even knew her name. Is that misogynistic?

L. did her first day of school today and everything seems to have gone quite well. She reports that she's got only 8-10 kids in each class, her teachers are cool, and school isn't so bad - I can't ask for much more than that. After dropping her off, I wondered just how it is that I've been so lucky in life...that comes up often of late.

The funniest part of the day occurred while she was being "shadowed" by another student who came upon H. and stopped to introduce the two of them. H. immediately let her know that he already know, and in fact lived with, L. and had known her since they were four. I think the shadow thought it all a bit strange.

The Caps have won 8 straight (longest streak in a quarter century; and won 10 of 11) and look nearly invincible right now. Obviously, the playoffs are what count but they are gelling quite well right now and the (Spring) future looks bright.

L. and I, the 51, caught a very nice rendition of Rent at the Keegan over the weekend. If I can muster up the time for a review, I'll pass it along.

love to all.

t

a peep from a kitchen

I’m settling into my second week of culinary classes but still have a few fixes to implement: getting up earlier on Thursday and Friday mornings, using my Saturday afternoon dead-time (I have an 8-11:30am class and a 6-10:30pm class) to get a bit of work done, and sorting out travel. In case you’re wondering, I have class Thursday night (6-8:30pm) and Friday night (6-10:30pm) along with my Saturday courses. Last week we were working on knife cuts (yikes) and stocks, with mother sauces and soups on tap this weekend.

L. is settled into the house with her room in shape. We’ll probably try to paint the walls over the next few weeks in order to brighten it up. Honestly, the walls could have used a coat when we moved in a few years back. She has some sample card on the shelf and she and X will come up with a choice at some point.

We had a little scare on the school as they caught me out on paying for the semester up front. After some discussion between the headmaster, the finance person, and I, we managed to sort out a four-month plan that’ll be very tight for us but will work in the end. The third quarter starts on Wednesday so L.’s long(er) winter break will finally be over. She’s heading into D.C. this morning on the Metro to hit the museums again while the crowds are sparse this time of year.

Here’s my political input for the week: piss off, Ben Nelson. The senate election in Massachusetts has changed the landscape a bit – nothing I’m overly worried about in the long run – but at least with the Democrats having only 59 senators (or if they’d have had 61 before), ol’ ‘Dumbass’, Ben Nelson, can’t hold everyone in the country hostage to his whims. I cannot believe anyone would vote to re-elect him after his performance.

There was rumor of some snow today – and through the weekend – but it end up just spitting a bit this morning.

Maybe by Sunday you’ll get another update.

t

...has no grade-point average

We adults snuck out last evening and left (now) five children to their own devices. Actually, L. was watching the N. Park clan sleep and the boys were doing what monkey boys do at home.

Last night was the final night of the D.C. area restaurant week where a great number of chefs open their places to set-price, fixed menus that usually include three courses and wine for about $30-$40 per person. I guess it’s a chance to control prices whilst luring folks out to new restaurants they’ve never tried. I made us a reservation at Kora in Crystal City which is the new place run by our favorite chef/owner from Farrah Olivia. We talked about the results of this foray on the way home last night and I’ve considered the meal even more throughout today, and it’s only getting worse.

I have no idea what was the genesis behind the new place aside from him needing to close FO when the rent apparently skyrocketed at his Alexandria location. Kora is allegedly an Italian place but the set-price menu didn’t seem to offer what I might consider Italian fare – aside from tiramisu. It’s a bigger venue then FO but the design isn’t anything to write home about; certainly nothing like his last room. The wait staff that we encountered was clearly of the hourly sort, and by that I mean non-professional waiters. FO was full of the kind of waiter that knew the food, understand the menu, and could do more than ‘take orders’ and (maybe) come back. Our group was pretty amateur (the dessert order was lost) across the board. The food was below mediocre and that’s a pretty harsh thing for me to say. I had a seasonal seafood soup (salmon being the season) with bacon bits on top, a mushroom polenta for mains, and tiramisu for dessert. The soup seriously could have come from a carton with some cooked bacon pitched on top. The polenta was a horribly overcooked square that was rockhard on the outside and bit cold in the middle – I imagine someone ‘grilled’ it, but it’s a mystery to me. The mushrooms were a poorly sauteed and poorly seasoned collection chucked on top with a few cherry tomatoes halved around the plate. Dessert may have worked its way up to mediocre but I have a theory that says tiramisu is probably going to always be okay but rarely stunning – they met my theory dead-on. Both the WonderTwins opened with beet salad which at least got “it was good” reviews, and Corey had a lamb shank that he said may have been dead-and-gone for a very long time. I didn’t hear much on the other two desserts around the table but it wouldn’t be enough credit to move everything up to the “we’d go again” grade.

I just don’t get it. If he was going to move (forced to move) why not just re-open FO at the new place? Italian? His style doesn’t seem to even consider Italian as an option and now he’s opened a place (in which there is no way he was at the helm last night) that will not survive until summer, in my opinion. Considering our awe of his fool at Farrah Olivia, the great staff, and the lovely atmosphere it’s hard to believe it’s come to this. Even though the total was a reasonable $190 (w/tip and two bottles of wine) for four adults, Kora is an utter failure in my book. I’m pretty devastated by the whole thing. Word is that he’s looking to open up in the District and if it Farrah O. then I’ll be there, posthaste. If not, he’d have a hard time getting me in the door. For all my readers (!) that loved Farrah Olivia, as of now, it's a goner...

Ah, life.

We are back on for quiz night at the pub this evening. I’ll pass along results.

t

chop chop

Here’s a timely piece on culinary school (I start tomorrow night). What’s difficult to gauge, using my own hopes, is how hard it must be to pay for an education of any sort knowing that your job opportunities are limited, financially. As pointed out, there are loads of careers where you can just as easily work your way up through skill and practice but oftentimes that might entail starting even lower on the pay scale and spending years trying to get in the door. Of course, the paper doesn’t necessarily get you in any door, either, and that was made pretty clear at my orientation last week.

The massive difference for me is that I’m taking this on as a combination of my interests and a good dose of hope for down the road. I’m not paying anything for the time I’ll be spending learning the basic skills (which I don’t actually have right now) and my living expenses are covered as I continue to work in my career field. If I decide to give the food world a go in three years' time I won’t owe anyone anything, I’ll have my retirement pay and health insurance, and I can probably take a few steps without being overwhelmed. Those that are attending the full-time day program (I’ll be full-time nights) are going to be those who aren’t working and taking loans in order to pay for school and living expenses over the next three years. Coming out of a degree program with $60K in debt and falling into a world that pays you $25K per year is demented. When you break it down, what should be the norm – something like 12-15 months and <$10K in cost – would make much more sense. My friend, Todd, went to accelerated nursing school for 15 months and it ran about $25K – to be a nurse and to save lives. And here we’re talking about food and cooking? Hmm.

Regardless, my voyage begins and I’ve got a much more relaxed road ahead of me than most students – aside from not being home to cook three nights a week. If it goes pear shaped? The world will keep turning and I’ll still have money sitting around for other education, if I choose.

That's that. L. arrive tomorrow evening.

believe

Former Solicitor General Ted Olson has written a truly important piece on gay marriage rights in America. (Olson has joined David Boies, his nemesis in Bush v. Gore, in a federal lawsuit to overturn California’s Proposition 8 as unconstitutional.) Fortunately for me, he covers everything I wanted to say about gay marriage but didn’t possess the clear, legal, and logical opinion headmeat to write. You can read it here. (I’ve claimed my stake from an entry by Andrew Sullivan.)

One thing I want to add, and something that Olson addresses in the piece, is the idea we have that somehow progressed ages from other types of discrimination. I’ve given this idea a test run on X and some friends and I think it’s is important to understand. When you look back to Brown v. Board (1954) and Loving v. Virginia (1967) and really take the time to just process those dates – 1954 and 1967 – you’re more likely to believe that it took way too long to overcome segregation and discrimination; yet it's not been long enough to be fully destroyed. I use my parents as a measuring stick of time – not opinion – when I sort this out in my head. My father would have been a rising college junior when the United States finally decided that ‘separate but equal’ was unconstitutional. My father. Not my grandfather or some distant ancestor from the 19th century: my father. At a university, studying, planning a family (me included) when we decided as a country that segregation was illegal. It stuns me to think of what it would be like to be a 20 year-old man and living in a time when a country finally decided that blacks and whites must be allowed to attend the same schools. If you contemplate the amount of time that black Americans have had to grow and succeed in our country it's the smallest of eras: my father’s working life. Period. Yet, we somehow expect that we’ve solved all the racial issues of our country in a blink of the eye. As for Loving, I was two years old when the Court decided that blacks and whites could not be prohibited from marrying. Suddenly, we aren’t even digging back to some generation of my family that came before. It happened in my lifetime and I’m all of (nearly) 45.

What does it mean, to me? It means that when I look at the gay marriage issue and consider transporting myself back to when my father was 20, and putting myself in that time and place – knowing what we as a country now know, it would be truly embarrassing to live through the debate of integration. And if I can look forward in my life to when I’m 65, I’ll be embarrassed for the current me to have lived through a period where basic civil rights were ignored by so much of my country.

That's all I've got...

T

by invite only

We spent last night at a retirement party for the firm. I was the +1, which allowed me to sneak into the soiree with minimal problem and free valet parking. It was an event that gave insight into the folks that my love works with: each and every one in the small place are a type of Sitcom character. A load of smart and energetic lawyers who care for each other - even in debate - and then go about their business. An enjoyable evening all around.

Now, the club. There is no way in hell I'd ever be at this place without my escort. We're once again talking about a level of clientele that I'll never be on my own. I've never been to a gig where people were walking around offering hor d'oeuvres on trays and filling my drink whenever I choose. I felt like I was living in a Jane Austen novel and was sorely tempted to sit down at the baby grand and knock out some classic 19th century sing-a-longs. I looked all about for Elizabeth Bennet or Mr. Darcy. I must have waved away at least $400 in canapes, crudites, zakuski, amuse-buche, and meze; oh, for the want of a big, reusable bag. I probably would have stood out if I was wrapping each piece in foil and stashing it in my saddlebag.

We've done yeoman's work around the house this weekend. The boys have been hard working in moving everything into one room so that Laurel can move into the other when she arrives on Thursday. All the holiday gear is put away and our new (double) living room is back in order. I'm all about back in order so I'm quite happy. X is sitting over by the fire in in her slippers, allegedly reading some work; I think she's happy.

t

really? questions?

I ordered a refill, on-line, for my dayplanner the other day and just a minute or so ago I got this update, via e-mail, from the company. I need you to really focus on the power of this correspondence and remember that this is the entire update:

Your order has been updated to the following status.

New status: Packing

Please reply to this email if you have any questions.

Do I really need this? Can you let me know when Pete the Packer is taking lunch? I really want to know how 'packed' it is. Will Pete be able to finish it by this afternon? Is he a good wrapper?

Wow.

t

bags of money

I was ready to off and run on using cash versus card fees this morning when I stumbled upon this in the NYTimes. Usually, I feel like they steal ideas from me but I didn’t get on the ball fast enough to claim any sort of misdemeanor on their part. This all blends into a local-area thing I’ve been on over the last months: cash money. When you read the piece you’re clued in on what goes on beyond just the fees and percentages and stumble into things like interchange costs. I’d read about the process awhile back and when you realize that the “percent” paid isn’t actually the “percent” paid then you get frustrated. It seems like we’re talking about nickels and dimes but it isn’t; they estimate it costs the average family $427 per year and brings in $45 billion to the issuers and banks - not just nickels and dimes anymore. My initial change from card to cash was based on local businesses more than chain stores and national retailers. If I can save myself and my computer repair shop, auto mechanic, co-op, local bookstore, local CD shop, or small restaurant a few bucks here and there, I’ll do it. I’m not naïve enough to believe that there isn’t a need for plastic – whether debit or credit – but we can limit what it costs us and our merchants. Clearly there’s a need when shopping online for big ticket items like plane tickets and hotels but I know I’ve been able to limit my use of my even my debit card when buying around here. It certainly takes some planning on my part: stopping at the bank and withdrawing cash to pay bills (I even avoid the ATMs as much as possible) in advance can be a bit of a hassle, but not anything I’m not willing to do.

In the words of William M. Sheedy, VISA’s president for the America (nice title, BTW), “At times we have a perspective problem.” I don’t think it’s perspective, Mr. Man.

Speaking of hassles. D.C. implemented a $.05 charge on plastic bags starting on January 1, 2010 and apparently the apocalypse is upon us. Once again, a pretty simple life lesson (even beyond the enviro-screaming): if you’ve never been one to use reusable bags then I will guarantee if you give them a go you’ll never go back. If you need to load up three bags of chow and haul them to the car, the hemp or reusable bags with actual handles are so much better. You keep them in your car, you carry them into the store, just like you do with your wallet, your keys, your head, and your feet, and you shop. This is not some cultural overhaul; think of it as a functional change to your life. If, after you’ve done that, you want to further consider the benefits of not having a bunch of plastic bags flying around the planet, feel free. If you want to keep using plastic bags, feel free, I’ll merely add you name to the column under ‘simpleton’.

I have a Capitals game tonight so I’ll be in my seat and drinking a beer.

apparently this is what you need to groom a cat

I decided to take a picture of this box that was sitting on the living room table as a sort of mystery. This might be the strangest list of tools you'd come across in day-to-day life. Consider it a mystery - maybe you'll know.

This is what's become of my cat after her visit from the grandparents who spoiled her rotten. By the way, that's our bed she's hijacked.

tools/trade

I have my orientation for school on Thursday morning. That’s a picture of my knife rack, up above; I’m purchasing a kit for school that includes knives, unis, a bunch of other kitchen gear, and whatnot (although I’m adding my own Scando-peeler to the total). The knives aren’t as good as mine but I’ll make due – if there’s a problem then I’ll just slap my Globals in there and lay down some gold. One of those knives was the first quality piece I ever bought (at a kitchen shop in Dinkytown years ago) along with my big, thick, quality board; I remember lugging them home on the flight back to England. That was the period when I began to cook real stuff in earnest, and now I’m moving along. I love my knives.

I got a call at home early on New Year’s Eve from the Canadian Border Patrol, or whatever they’re called. Melissa and L. were heading into and they decided to give me a jingle. We’ve managed to keep up with the parental affirmation letters when one parent and child are traveling out of the country (L. to Canada a few summers back and again with me last summer). This was the first time they’ve ever asked for the letter and they called first my work (not there), then my cell (I didn’t recognize the 604 area code and had gnocchi- covered hands), and finally the home phone about two minutes later. Fortunately, X answered and passed Dudley along to me. A very nice gent just confirmed the dates I’d included in the letter and following up with a question about where she’d be going after this trip (answer: here). He was no doubt confirming the story on that end and I was happy to see it. Anyway, they are out in the great NW and L. will fly into D.C. on the 14th.

If I haven't wished you a Happy New Year, then I do now: Happy New Year.