these days of leiderhosen

Oakland is officially the 21st most dangerous city to live in! Thanksgiving: what are you making? I am on tap for mashed potatoes and salad. Meanwhile, S & I have been snacking on a Whole Foods pumpkin pie all day. It makes an excellent breakfast.

This is my favorite web find ever. I am considering having it printed on my underpants. Amusements: The bikini wax video

I have been dealing with a filthy basement, filthy carpet, filthy entry, filthy front door. Who leaves eggs that kids threw at the front door for two years ?! I scrubbed that awful protein splatter for 15 minutes until I realized I was actually taking the finish off the door with it. Also gone is the enormus smear of bird shite on the front porch for all to see. Who lives like this? I am not overly tidy and wince at the idea of waterless personal sanitizer society, but this is not a bearable situation. There just isn't any reason for the doorknob's prior condition. Walking home from getting the mail, I met a stranger on the street who appologized profusely for smoking and held the Marboro far and away into the street, like I was going to jump for it. Not being an utter puritan, I let him know I was not about to mind unless he needed to be hit with a fire extinguisher. Perfectly charming man in a very nice hat, how could I mind? He was the most utterly pale shade of sienna with ...

..and don't even really want to discuss why. And no bloody file cabinet to kick until the stupid thing won't open no more, either. Ah, Feh . I ache, on the other hand, to distract us: Reading: Don't Get Too Comfortable by David Rakoff (known to This American Life Fans as Christmas Freud). Reading it aloud is a scream. Listening to: Prince's S.S.T (his hurricane relief effort which he put together in a day, playing all the instruments) The instrumental B-side is also exceptional. Craving: nothing. I had an It's It for dinner. Shopping: not another thing until I get a new gig Knitting: opera gloves , 55 rows into it. Not crazy about the yarn. It's rather bland & chalky black boring sock yarn. Next time, I say it's lace and koigu or fleece artist yarn! Favorite Christmas Story: again, Manhattan User's Guide - Tuba Christmas . Ever get those e-mails that just put everything right back where it ought to be? I have the best and loveliest almost-si...

A banner day, I tell you. I got up bright and early and dragged the Steven across the Bay Bridge. I wanted to be the very first person in the Kabuki Springs Communal Baths and -joy!- I was. It was a brief but entirely satisfying visit and do feel very, very scrubby clean and my hair is terribly curly due to all the steam and their fabulous conditioner. Not talking to anyone for an hour and a half can be mighty refreshing. We hit an early showing of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which translated very well at the Kabuki 8 Theater. (There were 40 minutes of commercials prior to the show. And theater owners complain that people aren't going to movies anymore. Huh. Imagine.) Had handmade Ramen and buckwheat soba noodles at a restaurant in Japantown which was very, very good with the exception that they had the employee sink (hygiene signs and everything) right there in the dining room facing me and I can't recall anyone using it. Can't remember the name of it for the life...

Hell: The candle aisle at Target. (I am never going to get that stink out of my nose.) Yank Sing on Spear Street in San Francisco is without a doubt some of the best dim sum I have ever eaten; it is reason alone to turn in your vegan card, brave the traffic, develop a fondness for crowds of enormous families and move here. It is also a grand reason to empty your husband's bank account because you must must must have another steamer basket of the soup dumplings. Yes, I said soup dumplings. Steamed luminous parcels of liquid goodness that have never seen the inside of a freezer, enrobed in a bit of vinegar and freshly julienned ginger and eaten in two bites out of large Chinese soup spoons. Oh and everything else was quite magnificent as well. The size and behavior of these dumpling resemble testicles, but otherwise they are heaven. I have picked up the makings for the Barbara Baughman Memorial Yams, the only family/holiday tradition to be practiced religiously since I moved my crap...

I corrected the chicken recipe. Have fun wadding the backless chicken into the brine. The bugs are definitely creepier in California: I had to mash something that looked like a 2.5 inch wingless wasp in the laundry sink the other day with a huge wad of paper towels and the gallon of white vinegar used to supplement the detergent, hollering all the time to avoid hearing the crunchy/squashy sounds. Gruesome, I tell you as I eye the nasty looking spider on the ceiling above the table. Hmmm. Looks like wool eating moths are native to this state as well. Joy. I am re-reading Madame de Sevigne's (French, 1626-1696) letters, the incorrigible gossip! Sevigne did not keep a journal and no other material by her exists other than her letters to her beloved daughter and friends. Her bed-hopping husband said he had never slept with a woman as utterly charming as his own wife. She was hotly pursued by many fabulously love-sick and well-padded men after her husband's mercifully early death, b...