Sunday was my first full day in San Diego. It was mostly spent doing a phrase I have coined called “decompressing”. Many days at home I require just a few minutes (or a couple hours) mostly alone, but completely away from cell phones, computers and other devices so I can just let the daily rigors slip from me. If I don’t get some peace and quiet time I get very irritable and it’s best that people stay away from me.
This period of decompression helps me deal with the stresses of work and whatever is laying on my mind about regular life. Yesterday, with the added surprise of jet lag and how it impacts the body, I was more than happy to lounge around the entire morning, type a bit, read a bit and play with the dogs. Normally, I am eager to head out into the sea of people and see the sights, but that will come today. Yesterday, I didn’t shower until 3pm and it was a great day to just reflect, relax and let the mind wander.
I love to write but have found myself without motivation as of late. Many reasons are on the list why but I won’t cover those here. I mean, I know some of you guys, but some of this shit is complex and personal and while I might empty my brain on you over drinks in real life, I doubt I’ll go that far through a plastic keyboard and on your computer screen. You’ll just have to trust that I am like National Geographic and have tons of “issues” that press down upon me. I’m not special, we all have our burdens, but I am absolutely sure that the rest of you handle them much better than I do.
Trying to spark some sort of writing thoughts, I brought along a book that I bought for myself about a year ago. I started the book, read the first chapter but since then it has resided on my nightstand covered in dust.
I decided to bring two books with me (maybe, I’ll cover the other one in a future installment) and this one, “The Fourth Star, Dispatches from inside Daniel Boulud’s Celebrated New York Restaurant” simply must be one of the hardest books to explain to anyone.
Two people on the plane out here asked me what I was reading. It’s not a simple answer. It’s not a murder mystery, it’s not a biography and it’s not a how-to book. Put simply, it’s a diary of spending a year inside one of the best restaurants in New York City and documenting how food is purchased, cooked and how the staff divides up duties. Yeah, I know, it’s a tough sell. Who the hell wants to know such stuff.
Well, I fashion myself to have but a few real passions in life, but outside of the car and racing hobby, food, restaurants and high end Chefs hold a great deal of interest for me. Aside from motorsports websites, my bookmarks and browsing history is rich with restaurant industry sites, personal sites of Chefs and many blogs of similarly enthusiastic people. It’s a good hobby, I get to learn a lot and I get to aspire to maybe dine in one of these great restaurants someday.
This particular book about Daniel Boulud is special because it is likely the most indepth look at a 4 star restaurant that will ever be told. I can’t imagine that many Chefs the caliber of Boulud allowing someone to stand in their restaurant every day taking notes about everything (good, bad ugly, whatever).
This writer, Leslie Brenner, actually makes it very interesting. Sure, it’s a bit dry and she gets carried away in filling pages with minutiae but overall, it’s been a roaring page turning experience and I started on page 19 on the plane and am on 235 right now. The book ends at page 313 so I am just now getting to the conclusion where “Daniel” regains its coveted “Fourth Star” from a New York reviewer. If you are into food and the celebrity chef movement, it’s certainly a good cheap book that would keep you entertained. I think Amazon.com has it for $10 bucks now, but hey, if you ask nicely I might let you read my copy.
So yes, I spent a good part of yesterday morning on the couch in the front room reading this book and generally enjoying not being at home, not hearing a phone and not wondering when someone was going to knock on the door and disturb my peace.
I am an odd antisocial type of person and find that I don’t relax at home (and in my hometown) as much as I should. It’ certainly a mental disorder and I try to deal with it, but at times, I just can’t get over the hump and deal with life a bit better than I do.
From impromptu knocks at my door to simply running into people while out in public, I tend to not enjoy much of it. Yes, it’s most definitely a social disorder and generally I am proud to acknowledge my illness and I hope that someday there is either a celebrity endorsement or a telethon to help those of us that don’t like awkward social settings with people we don’t particularly want to talk to.
Walking through a grocery store here yesterday in San Diego was such a treat. I actually made eye contact with people and generally walked around with a mischievous smile on my face because I had almost no concern about running in to someone I know.
It’s not that I don’t want to see people; it’s just that I wasn’t born with the “small talk gene” and I have no idea what to say to you. Conversely, I don’t really know what to tell you about me in response to your questions, I don’t want to tell you how I am doing since my Mother died and I don’t want to have to go through the entire story explaining how my Sister and family were here in WV for a while but now they are back in California. I don’t want to explain that though I am dating more, I have not yet married and I don’t want to be forced to absorb your fake emotion and concern that I don’t have children yet.
The family, dating and children questions are something I always have to face. You see, I lost my father when I was 13 and my Mother became my entire family. We weathered tons of storms and remained very close until I lost her in 2002. Since then, anyone who knows me is aware that I am a very fragile person and many people have come to my aid and have shown genuine concern for my well-being. Ok, I appreciate that and have talked to many of those people and have expressed my appreciation, but for the rest of people I think it’s almost just a sick curiosity and they want gossip material for the next time they run into someone else and I become their subject of small talk.
Me, I would rather the entirety of society just believe I am an aloof and unreachable person so I can be left alone to my truly close friends and family. I don’t want or need society’s approval for how I live my life, how I deal with grief or how I am doing in the dating world.
Jeesh, pick a scab and some serious shit comes out like it was under pressure. Maybe it was. I realize I need to be more normal, but just walking around a store and not wondering if I am going to run into an old friend, an estranged family member, an ex-girlfriend or an ex employer all wondering how I am doing was a great experience.
At home I tend to shop at odd hours, go to stores miles from my neighborhood and generally survey and skulk around a store looking far ahead, avoiding blind corners and generally protecting myself like a Secret Service agent all in hopes of not having that awkward social moment when you see someone you know.
Being a mal-adjusted weirdo is hard work sometimes.
Whew, that felt good. I am really not THAT anti-social, but I am tired of telling the same stories. I have been inclined to type out the responses to the standard questions about my life and just hand them out to people I encounter. The true cure to this disorder is to actually be a bit happier and well adjusted in life and have something NEW to tell people. It’s the healthy way to face life and I am working on that.
Try telling a stranger that the most enjoyable part of your life is driving on race tracks and instructing people how to do it themselves. Explain that you strap yourself in someone else’s car and let them drive you at speeds up to 150mph around corners, up and down hills and through incredibly high speed corners with g-forces that would pull the urine from their bodies.
Nobody understands, nobody really cares and any follow-up questions they ask will invariably involve some form of NASCAR and I just don’t have the energy to go there anymore. Generally, I just tell strangers I am really into cars and leave it at that. Besides, when one adult tells another adult that they are into cars, the response is generally that fake smile which you know is really a smile of concern and disdain for this adult that still wants to play with cars. Frankly, I like and look for that disdain because if they are no longer impressed by me and my hobbies maybe next time when they see me in a store, it will be them who turns the other direction to avoid the encounter.
The store I was in yesterday was “Henry’s”. It’s a health food type of grocery store that only deals in the best quality products. Be it organic, whole grain, gluten free, chemical free or simply better stuff, Henry’s is the type of place that West Virginia sorely needs but would probably fail within weeks.
I invite you to look up “Henry’s” on the ‘net and learn about a great place to spend your money. A visit there is on an entirely different plane than simply getting one’s groceries from Wal-Mart.
While I was out, I stopped at a small greek café for lunch. It’s not as romantic as it sounds. The greek café is a franchise chain and while it is great, it’s not a local place teeming with flavor and ambiance. Daphne’s (and I just found their website http://www.daphnesgreekcafe.com) isn’t much more than a sit down fast food place, but the food is very good. I have stopped there on several of my trips and since I was craving a Gyro, it was the exact right place to go.
I showed up in the late afternoon and amazingly there was only one other couple in the entire restaurant. I ordered my food and sat down a good enough distance from those strangers, but given the quiet of the restaurant it wasn’t far enough.
Immediately I could hear the hippie woman’s overbearing voice as she explained the auto industry bailout to her dining partner. As I said, she looked hippie part with her stringy Little House on the Prairie hair, tie dyed shirt and Birkenstocks. He, was simply a fat, shapeless man wearing a shirt that had never been ironed and working with a comb over that a blind man would be ashamed of.
Ok, so I sat there and listened to this ill-informed dirty woman giving her opinion on why General Motors is failing. She was saying how GM doesn’t make a single car that anyone wants to buy and if they had any sense they would be making good small cars like Kia and Hyundai.
I wanted so bad to go over and set this woman straight. I watched as the guy with her was absorbing all the drivel spewing from her pie hole as if he was on a first date and desperate to get this mess in bed with him. I wouldn’t have slept with either of them on a bet and I sat there wondering how those two came to be in that restaurant at that time. I figured it was a blind date set up by some radio station show with a sense of humor. It simply must be something like that.
Anyway, I was treated to about 10 minutes of this left-winger’s diatribe about green technology and how city buses should be electric and how Americans should be restricted to driving their car only every other day. Jesus, and we wonder why this country is so “in the shit”. We have people passing themselves off as being informed who, in reality, have no more idea what they are talking about than the man on the moon.
Maybe she was using her talk on the auto industry and state of the earth as a birth control device. If she was utterly a bore and full of nothing interesting to that guy then they wouldn’t end up having sex and she wouldn’t get pregnant.
It sure worked for me. After seeing and listening to that stupid woman for a few minutes I was relieved of any desire to have sex. This lady could single handedly stop the spread of STDs.
The nightcap was a great dinner with the family and the several games of Pool with Keith and several of San Diego’s best microbrew, Karl Strauss beer. Last night I purchased the legendary “Red Trolley” and I also got another Karl Strauss selection called “Endless Summer”. The east coast would be well served by the availability of Karl Strauss beer, but I know that there are dozens of great micro brew beers that we don’t get in our backwards state. For now, I’ll just have to enjoy it when I am here.
I also bought a single (double size) bottle of “Fat Tire”. It’s from the New Belgium Brewing Company of Colorado. This beer is another of those made legendary by various websites who decry its lack of availability almost everywhere east of the Rockies. Me, well, I liked it a lot, but I have had many other beers just as good. It’s just another I’ll add to the list.
Ok, 9:30am here. I hear kids stirring, I have consumed my bagel and about 3 glasses of iced tea and I think it’s time for me to dress for good day (I showered at 3pm yesterday so I think with a quick brush of the teeth, a fix of the unruly hair and some other light maintenance, I might just be able to get away without a shower until later in the day)
Until next time.
***Everything typed and posted with little or no editing. I may come back later and clean up any spelling, syntax or flow errors, but mostly I just wanted to type in a stream of consciousness fashion and this is how it came out.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Sunday, December 21, 2008
And unto each a vacation should come (Day 1)
My Christmas tradition since 2002 has been to go to San Diego to see my Sister, her husband and their three daughters (my only nieces).
Apart from 2006 and 2007 when they were here in West Virginia, I have gone every year and it’s been special part of my life and I tremendously look forward to it.
The trip is normally for a few days prior to Christmas and I generally stay until a couple days before New Years. It’s a great way for me to reconnect with my only family left, to get away from the rigors of life and to have a vacation that doesn’t involve a race track and cars.
After a nice evening with friends and my other Christmas tradition (National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation) I flew out of Charleston at 6:15am, went through Houston and arrived in San Diego around Noon (local time).
In real time, it’s a nine hour trip, but the time change and excitement about the whole thing makes it seem so much shorter. As always, I was out of whack the remainder of the day, didn’t know when to eat and by 9pm west coast time I was a zombie and asleep on the couch in the front room. I missed the festivities with some visitors, missed the rousing games of pool and missed the additional consumption of “Red Trolley”, a San Diego only micro brew that I long ago took a supreme liking to.
We did go to a Saturday evening Christmas church service. It’s kind of hard to explain their Church, but the experience has always been something far different from anything I was used to. Their new church (upon the return to San Diego) is so large that they have to put on multiple services on both Saturday and Sunday in order to accommodate the thousands of attendees. It’s situated in a strip mall and is basically a huge auditorium, now beautifully decorated for Christmas.
We arrived and it looked like Hannah Montana was making an appearance. There were people and kids everywhere. Music, lights, live band, clapping, power point projections on plasma televisions, it was all beautiful and exciting but maybe a bit over powering for someone not accustomed to the experience. The sermon and Christmas message was excellent and that Pastor is one for the ages. If anyone was ever built to run a church and keep a crowd of thousands interested in the message, it was him. It’s www.cvcf.org if anyone want to check out their website, podcasts and what they call the e-church. I am not normally church visitor but seeing what was hundreds of people having such a great time on a Saturday evening in Southern California was enthralling. I might even check out the site and listen to some of the regular sermons.
The remainder of my day 1 (Saturday) involved me sneaking away for a visit to In-N-Out Burger http://www.in-n-out.com . It’s a SoCal must visit and a part of everyone’s life out here. It’s more than a standard burger place. I will go there several times before I leave. The internet is thick with websites proclaiming praise for everything In-N-Out. I discovered nothing new here and am only on the much used bandwagon, but damn, it’s good and I wish I had it at home.
Today, I am not sure what’s on the agenda, but I woke up at 8:00am local time (laptop says it’s 11:55am right now at home). I have walked around on the pool deck, I played with the dogs and I am getting ready to enjoy some kind of morning food treat.
As I finish this, my first entry, I must say something about the process of traveling. It’s such a change from everyone’s daily routine that it’s amazing any of us accomplish the process at all. The bad parts of a human’s personality is exposed when you put them outside of their daily routine and if you are a people watcher (like me) it’s quite an experience to see it all happen.
It started with me walking into the airport yesterday morning. There was a line of about 9 people at the Continental counter and I took my place at the end. The woman that took her place behind me, however thought she was special and asked me I she could move in front of me in line. I politely said no and explained how lines work (subtle note of sarcasm, but it was early and I didn’t want a battle with this woman).
After five or ten minutes the personal space barrier around me was being violated on a continual basis by this woman behind me. You see, I stayed a reasonable distance from the man ahead of me and I expected the same courtesy from this long coat wearing, shaggy haired woman with ugly glasses that was impatiently bumping into me.
I finally turned and asked if there was any reason that while we were standing still that she was bumping into me. Her only response was that she needed to get through this line and that I (and everyone else) was in her way. I told her that I would appreciate the courtesy of at least 12 inches of free air behind me and wondered aloud why she was so interested in spooning me in public.
I had to deal with this woman all through this line, the security line and even when we boarded the plane I found myself immediately beside her as we were squeezing ourselves into the seats. She was across the aisle but made her presence known throughout the entire flight. Special requests to the flight attendant, special requests to her poor seat mate (she needed armrest because of an elbow injury). Such an unpleasant lady that is consumed with the feeling that HER needs and HER desires are on some level HIGHER than that of the the rest of the people who were on the same adventure as her.
People eaten up with their own importance absolutely bleed the life from me. I make every effort to resist, annoy and generally get in the way of people exhibiting such behavior.
Once I affixed an ipod to my head and didn’t have to hear that lady any longer I was then able to focus my mal-adjusted people watching efforts on the lady one row ahead on the other side of the plane. She was wearing flip flops and had taken the liberty to remove one of them so she could cross her legs, one foot exposed to the aisle under her thigh. I was treated to the blackened, nasty sole of her foot hanging out like a treat for everyone behind her on the plane.
I sat there and increased my relationship with God by praying that above all else he planned to do that morning, that make the beverage cart come speeding down the aisle in an attempt to amputate or otherwise mangle that exposed nasty foot. Sadly, my prayers went unanswered and I entered Texas airspace staring at a nasty black foot. (how did she get such a dirty foot at 7am)
Why would anyone CHOOSE to begin a multi state, cross country journey wearing only flip flops? Who wants to see another person’s nasty feet? While on my layover in Houston, I contemplated just this and I counted no less than 25 people shuffling down the airport corridors while wearing only flip flops. Just think of the horrific toe injuries that could happen on those moving sidewalks, escalators and while walking on those jetways. For me, I would rather have some protection for my feet and I am courteous enough to not subject complete strangers to my feet.
There were only two highlights to the Houston/San Diego flight. One was a hugely overweight and tattooed woman who was flying with a young child. It was a boy, maybe 3 to 5 years old and while I assume he was her son, in this world, who knows.
I noticed her because they called her to the counter and as she stood I was presented with what I will call an entirely inappropriate amount of cleavage. Now, I must interject, as a card-carrying member of the heterosexual party, I rarely find that there is inappropriate amounts of cleavage. Even on women of larger carriage, the treat of cleavage is mostly appreciated and rarely a problem.
Sadly, this lady didn’t fit in that category and was showing an easy 9-12 inches of cleavage crack and the triangle shaped area of her actual torso that is the rarely seen real estate UNDER the cleavage. It looked like a small woman’s ass on her chest and as she was reaching down wrangling with the toddler boy it looked like one boob was in danger of escaping the confines of the v-neck black blouse and dropping down and hitting the poor child on the head. Trust me, in that eventuality, an injury would have ensued.
Naturally, once seated on my flight, this woman was 3-4 rows ahead and she chose to spend the waiting time (while everyone was boarding) on her knees on her seat, facing rearward and watching everyone. This put her cleavage on full display for all seated individuals. Once again, I wondered how she chose her clothing this morning. She would be tightly squeezed in a too-narrow airplane seat, she would be in close confines with hundreds of strangers and she chose to display and bring attention to her balloon shaped breasts, I guess believing that all of us wanted to see them. Me?, not so much.
I hope to check in every day (or more often). Let’s see how that works out.
***Everything typed and posted with little or no editing. I may come back later and clean up any spelling, syntax or flow errors, but mostly I just wanted to type in a stream of consciousness fashion and this is how it came out.
Apart from 2006 and 2007 when they were here in West Virginia, I have gone every year and it’s been special part of my life and I tremendously look forward to it.
The trip is normally for a few days prior to Christmas and I generally stay until a couple days before New Years. It’s a great way for me to reconnect with my only family left, to get away from the rigors of life and to have a vacation that doesn’t involve a race track and cars.
After a nice evening with friends and my other Christmas tradition (National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation) I flew out of Charleston at 6:15am, went through Houston and arrived in San Diego around Noon (local time).
In real time, it’s a nine hour trip, but the time change and excitement about the whole thing makes it seem so much shorter. As always, I was out of whack the remainder of the day, didn’t know when to eat and by 9pm west coast time I was a zombie and asleep on the couch in the front room. I missed the festivities with some visitors, missed the rousing games of pool and missed the additional consumption of “Red Trolley”, a San Diego only micro brew that I long ago took a supreme liking to.
We did go to a Saturday evening Christmas church service. It’s kind of hard to explain their Church, but the experience has always been something far different from anything I was used to. Their new church (upon the return to San Diego) is so large that they have to put on multiple services on both Saturday and Sunday in order to accommodate the thousands of attendees. It’s situated in a strip mall and is basically a huge auditorium, now beautifully decorated for Christmas.
We arrived and it looked like Hannah Montana was making an appearance. There were people and kids everywhere. Music, lights, live band, clapping, power point projections on plasma televisions, it was all beautiful and exciting but maybe a bit over powering for someone not accustomed to the experience. The sermon and Christmas message was excellent and that Pastor is one for the ages. If anyone was ever built to run a church and keep a crowd of thousands interested in the message, it was him. It’s www.cvcf.org if anyone want to check out their website, podcasts and what they call the e-church. I am not normally church visitor but seeing what was hundreds of people having such a great time on a Saturday evening in Southern California was enthralling. I might even check out the site and listen to some of the regular sermons.
The remainder of my day 1 (Saturday) involved me sneaking away for a visit to In-N-Out Burger http://www.in-n-out.com . It’s a SoCal must visit and a part of everyone’s life out here. It’s more than a standard burger place. I will go there several times before I leave. The internet is thick with websites proclaiming praise for everything In-N-Out. I discovered nothing new here and am only on the much used bandwagon, but damn, it’s good and I wish I had it at home.
Today, I am not sure what’s on the agenda, but I woke up at 8:00am local time (laptop says it’s 11:55am right now at home). I have walked around on the pool deck, I played with the dogs and I am getting ready to enjoy some kind of morning food treat.
As I finish this, my first entry, I must say something about the process of traveling. It’s such a change from everyone’s daily routine that it’s amazing any of us accomplish the process at all. The bad parts of a human’s personality is exposed when you put them outside of their daily routine and if you are a people watcher (like me) it’s quite an experience to see it all happen.
It started with me walking into the airport yesterday morning. There was a line of about 9 people at the Continental counter and I took my place at the end. The woman that took her place behind me, however thought she was special and asked me I she could move in front of me in line. I politely said no and explained how lines work (subtle note of sarcasm, but it was early and I didn’t want a battle with this woman).
After five or ten minutes the personal space barrier around me was being violated on a continual basis by this woman behind me. You see, I stayed a reasonable distance from the man ahead of me and I expected the same courtesy from this long coat wearing, shaggy haired woman with ugly glasses that was impatiently bumping into me.
I finally turned and asked if there was any reason that while we were standing still that she was bumping into me. Her only response was that she needed to get through this line and that I (and everyone else) was in her way. I told her that I would appreciate the courtesy of at least 12 inches of free air behind me and wondered aloud why she was so interested in spooning me in public.
I had to deal with this woman all through this line, the security line and even when we boarded the plane I found myself immediately beside her as we were squeezing ourselves into the seats. She was across the aisle but made her presence known throughout the entire flight. Special requests to the flight attendant, special requests to her poor seat mate (she needed armrest because of an elbow injury). Such an unpleasant lady that is consumed with the feeling that HER needs and HER desires are on some level HIGHER than that of the the rest of the people who were on the same adventure as her.
People eaten up with their own importance absolutely bleed the life from me. I make every effort to resist, annoy and generally get in the way of people exhibiting such behavior.
Once I affixed an ipod to my head and didn’t have to hear that lady any longer I was then able to focus my mal-adjusted people watching efforts on the lady one row ahead on the other side of the plane. She was wearing flip flops and had taken the liberty to remove one of them so she could cross her legs, one foot exposed to the aisle under her thigh. I was treated to the blackened, nasty sole of her foot hanging out like a treat for everyone behind her on the plane.
I sat there and increased my relationship with God by praying that above all else he planned to do that morning, that make the beverage cart come speeding down the aisle in an attempt to amputate or otherwise mangle that exposed nasty foot. Sadly, my prayers went unanswered and I entered Texas airspace staring at a nasty black foot. (how did she get such a dirty foot at 7am)
Why would anyone CHOOSE to begin a multi state, cross country journey wearing only flip flops? Who wants to see another person’s nasty feet? While on my layover in Houston, I contemplated just this and I counted no less than 25 people shuffling down the airport corridors while wearing only flip flops. Just think of the horrific toe injuries that could happen on those moving sidewalks, escalators and while walking on those jetways. For me, I would rather have some protection for my feet and I am courteous enough to not subject complete strangers to my feet.
There were only two highlights to the Houston/San Diego flight. One was a hugely overweight and tattooed woman who was flying with a young child. It was a boy, maybe 3 to 5 years old and while I assume he was her son, in this world, who knows.
I noticed her because they called her to the counter and as she stood I was presented with what I will call an entirely inappropriate amount of cleavage. Now, I must interject, as a card-carrying member of the heterosexual party, I rarely find that there is inappropriate amounts of cleavage. Even on women of larger carriage, the treat of cleavage is mostly appreciated and rarely a problem.
Sadly, this lady didn’t fit in that category and was showing an easy 9-12 inches of cleavage crack and the triangle shaped area of her actual torso that is the rarely seen real estate UNDER the cleavage. It looked like a small woman’s ass on her chest and as she was reaching down wrangling with the toddler boy it looked like one boob was in danger of escaping the confines of the v-neck black blouse and dropping down and hitting the poor child on the head. Trust me, in that eventuality, an injury would have ensued.
Naturally, once seated on my flight, this woman was 3-4 rows ahead and she chose to spend the waiting time (while everyone was boarding) on her knees on her seat, facing rearward and watching everyone. This put her cleavage on full display for all seated individuals. Once again, I wondered how she chose her clothing this morning. She would be tightly squeezed in a too-narrow airplane seat, she would be in close confines with hundreds of strangers and she chose to display and bring attention to her balloon shaped breasts, I guess believing that all of us wanted to see them. Me?, not so much.
I hope to check in every day (or more often). Let’s see how that works out.
***Everything typed and posted with little or no editing. I may come back later and clean up any spelling, syntax or flow errors, but mostly I just wanted to type in a stream of consciousness fashion and this is how it came out.
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