hrj

I made a big dent in dealing with the archaeological strata on the dining room table. Most of it was various pieces of paperwork that needed to be sorting through for either filing or disposal. The major incentive was the need to clear the table for dining with goldenstag, aastg, and the youngest brother coming over.

aastg and I had the planned objective of looking at sealing methods for early medieval Welsh charters in order to finalize the plans for sealing my laurel scroll, for which purpose the collection of charter photos at the National Library of Wales' Digital Mirror site was invaluable. (ermine_rat finished the scroll a couple years ago, but first there as the fruitless attempt to hunt down the original issuing royalty for signatures and then it's been kicking around for special seal handling for the last year or so. And given that the award was given nearly 30 years ago, it's not like there's a sense of urgency.)

The youngest brother was there for the purpose of utilizing HRJ's airport satellite parking lot and shuttle service.

We started out with sourdough baguette with two kinds of bruschetta (tomato and artichoke) and some Cowgirl Creamery "Mt. Tam" cheese. A salad followed, with sliced heirloom tomatoes and snake cucumber (from the CSA box) plus fresh mozzarella, all sprinkled with truffle salt. (Yes, I have a serious thing about tomatoes and truffle salt. I'm sure I'll get tired of it after a few years.) At this point I discovered that the big propane canister on the grill had run out -- with the lemon-basil chicken nicely browned but not yet cooked through -- so I tossed it in the oven and rearranged the dishes. We went straight to the cold tomatillo soup (which counts as a "mystery produce" item because I've never cooked it before -- another CSA box item), followed by corn-on-the-cob, with the roast chicken bringing up the rear. (Recipe: in a food processor, combine 3 cloves garlic, a handful fresh basil, zest and juice of 3 lemons, and one stick butter. Work this in under the skin of the chicken. Fill the cavity with the spent lemon rinds and truss on the rotisserie. Or if the propane runs out ... roast at 350. Cook until the proper internal temperature.) Finished up with mango sorbet. It wasn't exactly a menu designed for the brother's more narrow tastes, but I don't think he'll starve.

Then it was off to SFO the long way around through San Mateo (since the Bay Bridge looked like a parking lot) and twice around the domestic terminals before we hauled out the iPhone to go online and discover that Jet Blue operates out of the international terminal.

This morning I took in a silly movie (G-Force in 3D -- I'm just a sucker for those 3D animated flicks), put in a 15 mile bike ride along the bay (to make up for skipping the gym Friday), dropped by my haircut place to make an appointment before the trip east (they squeezed me in Thursday after work -- just barely in time), then continued dealing with paper strata (which had ended up being moved in stacks to a shelf to clear the table last night).

To-do this week: drop by the credit union for deposits and to pick up the new checks (which they don't seem to have notified me had come in -- I noticed the debit came through on last months statement, so I assume they have them); look into the previously mentioned credit card mystery; buy cat food; process most of the produce box into non-perishable form (since I'll be off in New York for half the week); pack; get my hair cut; briefly contemplate going shopping for something new to wear on the trip (the event is my uncle and aunt's 50th wedding anniversary) and decide I don't have time and have perfectly reasonable things to wear already; verify cat-sitting coverage; verify transit schedules to the airport. Oh, and work on a massively important investigation report at work. (After gloating that at least someone else was the principal investigator for this one ... they transferred it to me after all. I am, of course, flattered and comforted.)

Saturday went out with duchessletitia, scotica, and klwilliams for dinner and Wicked in San Francisco. Loved Wicked, but to tell the many ways in which I loved it would be to give spoilers for some details that were most enjoyable for having been surprises. After that I crashed at duchessletitia's place so we could get on the road early to drive up to Quincy for part of Cynagua Coronet. It was very laid back on my end: since I was doing my lady-in-waiting thing, I didn't plan on any other activities or distractions. And since we were being fed and hosted, I decided to bring the sleeping platform for the Element and not bother with tentage or anything. So, all in all, a very low maintenance event and a lovely drive up Hwy 70 and back. I had a bit of fun participating in a low-key bardic Sunday evening ... although I failed to remember all the words to any of the songs I tried to sing. Did some experimentation and did a slight elaboration on a story from Giraldus Cambrensis and, after reciting the first few lines of Pwyll Pendefig Dyfed as a party trick (that is, the party trick is reciting them in the original medieval Welsh), I was encouraged into a highly interpretive retelling of the entire first episode of the story which I think managed to avoid the usual deathly flaws of impromptu storytelling. I really should work on memorizing more of the opening, though.

First it was dancing at Kalamazoo. Today it was going out with the co-workers for bowling and beer (well, ok, cider in my case). I've dared them to make the next excursion involve karaoke. You'd think I was a normal human being or something.

I haven't gotten any responses to my "blind date" ad for Shadows of Pompeii (the musical) in SF Thursday evening, so I'm throwing this open as an "un-date". Anybody interested? (I've bought the tickets already, so I'm committed to going.) The theater is in the Embarcadero district and I'll be BARTing over. Show starts at 8pm but I'm also up for dinner in advance.

I've been letting the Blind Date Project languish for the past half year or so, but I spotted an item in the paper that induced me to start it up again: a musical being workshopped in SF set in ancient Pompeii. (Female main character, but -- alas -- solidly het romantic content.) So before I could hem and haw myself into letting it slip past (since the thing is only running through next weekend, and of course the weekend itself is Collegium) I went online and bought tickets for Thursday's show then posted the pitch on Craig's List.

Now I really and truly am all done with xmas shopping, even for the workplace Secret Santa and for 12th Night items. I've printed out the xmas card mailing spreadsheet so I can start addressing envelopes at lunch tomorrow. And I've realized that in addition to packing for the trip east, I should pre-pack for 12th night, since even with the best of scheduling, I'll be leaving for the event the same day I get back in town. (In worst case, I may barely get home long enough to switch suitcases.)

Concert Review: Chris Williamson & Friends at the Freight and Salvage ( Read more... )

Unrelated Rumination: On Flirting with Straight Women ( Read more... )

Wow. I must say I have never been to an all-out corporate party like this one. It was like those parties that Genentech or Google throw that get mentioned in the society columns (except we didn't have celebrity entertainment). To be fair, the excuse for such a big bash was the 20th anniversary of the first use of our product in patients. They assure us that we won't get this elaborate a do on a regular basis.

I took scotica as my date -- and it was definitely more fun taking a date because then you have an instant script for interacting with people as you make your way around the event. We took BART over from my place and found the event shuttle from the Civic Center station by means of spotting the large crowd of elegantly dressed folks standing around on the sidewalk on Market Street. (They'd been standing there a while, it turned out, because the shuttle company had changed the pick-up point to around the corner without telling anyone, but that got sorted out.) We get dropped off at the event site and there are colored spotlights projecting the company name and logo on the sidewalk and a unicycle rider juggling lighted clubs welcoming us. (The main entertainment was a cirque-style acrobatics group.) From guest-list checkoff and coat check you move on the the first of multiple bar stations where you can redeem your drink tickets and move on to the first of four buffet stations creating fresh appetizer-sized food items as you browse (Mexican with made-fresh tortillas and various fillings, "American" with mini-burgers and salad cups, Asian with an assortment of steamed dumplings and sushi, and the dessert buffet). In addition to half a dozen bar stations, there were several espresso stations making hot drinks to order. The ultimate bar station was the one up on the mezzanine where the bar itself was one big ice sculpture with the Big B logo on it.

There were a couple different bands playing: one in the main stage/dance area at the far end of the venue, and another just inside the front door. For the first part of the evening, the main stage area was where the aerialists and rhythmic gymnastics performers were doing their thing to live music. The bands were, of course, much too loud, especially when the speeches had been taken care of and they switched over to dance music. In addition, the entertainment featured a history display and audio-visual tour of the manufacturing process, pool tables, a wii-games area, masseuses, caricature-sketch artists, henna tattooists, fortune tellers (I think the last group were part of the "circus" theme), and -- of course -- the fun of seeing one's co-workers all dolled up in fancy clothes.

We bumped into thread_walker w/husband pretty much right after walking in the door (and she was looking stunning in a beaded bodice and foofy black skirt). Then it was simply a matter of slowly working one's way through all the offered delights, stopping to exchange formulaic introductions when bumping into someone I knew well enough to introduce, and trying to figure out which instance of all the multiple food stations had the shortest lines. (We're all so inured to line-standing for food at corporate events that the wait staff had to keep pointing out to us that each station had 4 or 5 identical sections and that there was really no need for everyone to line up at the first one!)

It took most of the evening simply to work our way all around the perimeter and check everything out. When we ended up next to a short-line massage station up on the mezzanine we both took advantage of it and then decided to call it an evening. On the way to the door, I met up with another co-worker who had just arrived -- too late to get properly checked in and given free drink tickets, so I handed off the 3 (out of 4) that we had left. Oddly, I only bumped into two other people from my department at the party, although we also ended up chatting with my boss on the shuttle back to BART and hanging around at the station. But then, it was a big party. [*]

Wow. I feel like I've arrived somehow.

[*] I feel that it's only just to note that the financial arrangements for the party had been finalized before all the recent global financial hoo-ha, so despite superficial appearances, this isn't a case of fiddling while the economy burns. It would have cost almost as much to cancel the party as to go ahead and hold it. Besides, we're stimulating the local economy, right?

Started off the day taking BART downtown to the anti-8 rally. Definitely more a "rally" than a "protest". It being downtown Oakland, pretty much nobody was around on a weekend morning other than the rally attendees and a handful of bored police standing around in clumps. There was a somewhat random progression of speakers and it went on far beyond a critical mass of enthusiasm, with people drifting off while there was still no end in sight. For me the highlight was our newly-elected (lesbian) city councilwoman Rebecca Kaplan putting in an appearance, but she was the only official presence while I was there. (And since she isn't actually in office yet, I'm not sure she counts as "official".) The plaza out in front of Oakland city hall is a sunken semi-circular amphitheater around a raised "speakers platform". Great for photo-ops and press conference backdrops, but I kept feeling that having Greek-theater seating for a protest rally tended to suck a lot of the energy out of the crowd. It had more of a concert in the park feel -- abetted by the 80-degree weather. Lots of couples with young children, which sort of puts the lie to the whole "it's all about protecting the children" thing. I snapped some phone-pictures but don't think I got any good shots except for some generic crowd scenes.

I left with things still going on sometime after 1pm and took BART over to SF, ending up at Borderlands Books for anghara's reading, where I also got to meet brooksmoses and suzimoses in person for the first time. *waves*

I'd been planning to camp for Mists Coronet this weekend, but I've rethought the matter. When I started plotting out planning a menu, shopping, packing, and whatnot, I got to feeling overwhelmed (and even had a brief moment of irrational depression). And then I got to thinking that I still have to prepare my classes for Collegium the weekend after. So I'm currently thinking about possibly day-tripping, but all in all I'd rather save my energy for Collegium. And I still want to do another car-camping trip before the holiday season sets in -- Halloween weekend looks like a possibility, but I have to come up with a destination.

The official invitation arrived for the Big B's semi-formal dinner Thing in mid-November. I've set myself a goal of finding a date for it, but the prospect is a bit daunting. I mean: are free food, drinks, and dancing sufficiently enticing to balance having to socialize with a large mass of unknown co-workers? For an adventurous spirit, perhaps, but it seems a lot to ask. I sometimes think that while the whole Blind Date Project has been ok in terms of proving I can work outside my comfort zone, it hasn't really changed the overall paradigm. I still have no idea where one manages to find Eligible Parties. And I still haven't worked out the social economics of how one discovers a Romantic Attraction without having spent a year or so getting to know each other in depth.

I'm settling in more to the shifted workout schedule but one, perhaps predictable, change has popped up: I'm ravenously hungry for breakfast. Rather than juice and coffee sufficing to hold me over until lunch, I've been craving something more substantial. This will be a challenge to manage without involving baked goods. I actually went so far as to get oatmeal at the cafeteria one morning. If I'm going to do that, I need to work out something I can take from home (but that doesn't involve any prep time in the morning).

On my lunchtime bike ride today the wind seemed to have shifted back to cold-and-damp, so maybe our October fire season is on its way out. That would be nice. Now, onward to filling out my mail-in ballot so I can ignore politics. (Well, except for stressing out about the chances of Proposition 8 passing.)

My call for an impromptu dinner party to partake of another rotisserie experiment rousted out one vegetarian (xrian) so I trolled the neighborhood to round it out with a few carnivores and got bites from both the tenants. ( Here's the menu. )

The results: Either I did something wrong with brining the chicken (despite having followed the magazine recipe) or it simply isn't my thing. The chicken was delicious -- absolutely delicious -- but I'd rather let my diners control their own sodium intake a bit more. But I'm starting to get more confident about the whole rotisserie thing. The bird was done to a turn, as they say, and meltingly tender. The tomato dish was heavenly (if simple). The carrot appetizers will be added to the repertoire. The other sides worked, although not particularly special. The pudding was divine and has inspired me to do a whole red-and-green menu (to go with my previous orange-and-purple menu). (The idea will be to use the colors in non-obvious ways, e.g., not just "red meat and green vegetables".)

I've realized that I need to get past three mental roadblocks for dinner parties. The whole last-minute spontaneous open-ended thing is fun on occasion, but I suspect it's also a crutch. 1) Yes, fixing a date in advance creates a Commitment which will then make me feel unwarrantedly burdened. Deal with it. 2) Yes, sending out invitations in advance to specific people means that I have to identify specific people I want to have dinner with and negotiate schedules with them. Deal with it. 3) Putting out general invitations to the general ether is not an appropriate way to deal with fear of rejection. Deal with it.