Jon

Just to note that, after the recent whirlwind of (scheduled) travel, work sent me off to New Jersey and Manhattan the day after ironheadjane and I returned from seeing friends and family in the Bay Area. Sixty hours later, I was home.

I've finally posted a few photos of last year's trip to Hawaii and this spring's trip to Bermuda. I'm working on my photos from Sydney from February, but to a certain extent I'm not sure I've got the stomach to finish that work now.

You've probably noted a lot more of my Two Ideas blogging. In part, I've realized that I can do a pretty good job if I batch the work into one or two big weekly sessions, and pop in with brief additional ideas when they come to me. In part, I've been stalled on the fiction project I've been working on, and am trying to see my way clear to getting it going again. In the meantime, my mind wants me to keep writing, so I'm doing my best...

My sister and her husband are in town at the end of this week, as is another friend. I'm looking forward to that a lot, but I've got my first complete in-office workweek in almost a month ahead of me largely between here and there. We'll see how it goes.

Good day yesterday, with a whole lotta nothing, a little bit of food prep (marinated cauliflower salad and a black bean dip), and barbecue at Jer's. Too much food! And now, a little bit of writing then get ready for work. Not enough sleep - about seven hours.

Tomorrow and Thursday I'm on the road, at a customer in Mountain View. Unfortunately I doubt I'll have any time to see people: the kind of business travel I do tends to mean 16-hour workdays. Tomorrow I'll be up at, oh, quarter to four, so I'm unlikely to want to be up very late... by the time I get back to my hotel room and have dinner, it'll be eight or nine and I'll be done.

Went diving with my friend/co-worker Blake last weekend -- it was spectacularly good. We'd hoped to get out this weekend, but tides were unfavorable and Blake was on-call. Plus, I hear the viz was lousy. Still, the two dives we did at Redondo were among the easiest, and most pleasant, in recent memory.

Also, Laura's convinced me to give running a try. Ran three times last week, the third on my own. I'm truly lousy at pacing myself: I tend to slowly work myself faster until I'm going too fast, and it takes me a while to cool off when I slow down. But at least the heart-rate monitor tells me I'm doing it! Without it, I'd be pushing myself a lot harder than I should. Still, on that run I managed to do three and a half miles in about forty-five minutes, which is beyond what I would have guessed I could reasonably do. Maybe I'll get to run again this evening, though what with the trip and the packing my schedule is probably a bit tight...

Several weeks ago I'd planned to have a small movie night this past weekend, to celebrate my 33 1/3rd birthday. Given the craziness of the last couple weeks, not surprisingly, I failed to plan it or to invite anyone.

Fortunately, 2049live and ironlemur were visiting from Chicago, and we watched The Third Man, so I can at least claim to have fulfilled my plans. Though I didn't have a cake that looked like an LP. (No, I was never actually planning that -- it just occurred to me now.)

It's all right, though, as I spent a nontrivial portion of the weekend helping out with emergency work stuff. My role was limited, from a technical perspective, but time-consuming nonetheless.

Hopefully I'll plan a substitute movie night soon -- it would be good to make sure we still see people.

We have an answer on what happened to Ezra: a blood clot in the umbilical cord. While this doesn't make us any less sad, it's at least an answer. When Laura's off of blood thinners for the clot in her leg, we'll be doing the full panel of clotting disorder tests, and likely she'll be on blood thinners when we're ready to try again.

Not sure if we'll be joining much of the family at Disney in June -- it's expensive, and if Laura can't enjoy the rides due to the blood thinners maybe it makes more sense to pay down the credit cards, or at least not spend down the market-battered nest egg. On the other hand, even if Laura can't enjoy the rides we'd enjoy spending time with my siblings quite a bit. I still have to see if I can get the time off of work anyway, so I guess it's a bit premature to worry about that.

Speaking of worry, I'm dreading work this week. Not because I don't love my job (because I do!) but because of the volume of end-of-quarter work that needs doing. I'm involved in four separate situations involving last-minute problems and potential big money... it would be exhausting to think about, even if I wasn't already exhausted from day-to-day living right now.

I did have some interesting dreams last night -- in one, I was onstage. I'm not sure exactly what my act was, but I was fairly content and comfortable up there, whatever I was doing. There was a guy in the audience in a wheelchair, near the front, and I asked him his name, which was Joe. Someone in his group made a "Hey Joe" joke, and I replied that if I was closer to the drum kit I'd have given the rimshot myself. Everyone in the audience laughed, which surprised me and made me smile.

In another dream, I was trying to explain to someone why they were having more trouble writing their second novel than they did writing their first. I had two foam rings of exactly the same size, with the hole in the middle of each ring also the exact same size. I had a ball that exactly fit the hole, and I asked the novelist to pass the ball through the first ring. No problem.

I asked him to pass it through the second ring, but he couldn't fit it through. He measured and confirmed that the holes were exactly the same size, then tried again. Still no luck. I asked him what accompanied the ball on the second time through that ring that wasn't there the first time around. He didn't know. I answered: ego.

We finally got back from the hospital yesterday evening, and had dinner with some family before they left. (Laura's mother is still in town a few more days.)

When my stepmother died, Laura had a taste of what sitting shiva is like, and I think she found it comforting. We're adapting the tradition, in our own way. So we would very much appreciate folks local to Seattle stopping by in the afternoons and evenings this week, to keep us company. Some folks have offered to bring food, but feel free to bring nothing besides your company.

If you're planning to stop by, please feel free to check in via e-mail or calling us, so that we can make sure things aren't too crowded. (I don't imagine it would be a problem, but it's true also that we'll be going out at least some of the time and I'd hate for people to stop by when we're not here...)

We haven't yet had the opportunity or energy to respond individually to everyone who has offered their love and support, but please understand it's deeply appreciated at this time.

This is just a short note to let our friends know what's happening. I don't feel much like writing about it now but can't bring myself to tell everyone individually:

The baby is dead.

I've (obviously) cut my trip short, and managed to get home yesterday about 24 hours from when we first had the news.

I'm currently at the hospital with Laura, who is (thank goodness) physically fine so far. Labor has been induced and we're waiting. Laura has been properly medicated and is resting.

I'm upset beyond words. I'm crying terribly as I write this.

Thanks to everyone who has already come forth with support. The well of love shared with us by our family and friends has been deeper than I would have ever imagined. (More the fool me, I guess)

We will be receiving visitors on and off next week. Please call or e-mail before showing up, but we welcome everyone's continued support.

I believe a memorial service will be a week from Sunday. I don't know any details yet, but if you want them please mail me and I'll be sure to let you know when they're available.

People who are uncomfortable around death and grief should feel no pressure to attend, or to visit us this week. We understand that not everyone has the time or resources, physically financially or emotionally, and we really don't want anyone to be uncomfortable. We promise that we won't cross any names off our Christmas card list. (Metaphorically speaking, as we have never managed to mail Christmas cards, even if we talk about it every year.)

We thank everyone for their love and support in this awful, terrible time.

The bad news is that my team in the rescue diver class completely botched the rescue on Saturday. I'll be taking time off of work next week to try to do better. Sunday we didn't dive, as it was snowing and all three of us were in wetsuits. Hypothermia is not in my dive plan. (If I had infinite wealth I'd really, really want a drysuit, but even if I felt like I could reasonably spend $1400 on one right now I would rather use that money to pay down the last bit of debt we have or to save it for baby expenses.)

The good news is that issue 1 of The Ne'er-Do-Well arrived. Yes, my fiction is really and truly in print. I received two copies (plus one I need to autograph and send to my dad), and know where the copy I'm not keeping is going. Still, need to get going on that.

The other good news is that the pizza Laura and I made for dinner Saturday after my rescue diver class was probably the best we've ever made. Nothing fancy, just good mozzarella, tasty tomatoes, and fresh basil on top of a regular tomato sauce -- but exceptionally good nonetheless. Sunday we made a mushroom casserole out of The Enchanted Broccoli Forest (one of the Moosewood follow-ons), which was also completely delicious but a whole lot of work. (Washing and chopping two pounds of crimini mushroom caps is something that I'm not very fast at. The rest of the process put together took less work.)

As far as movie-watching goes, we've been on a Criterion Collection kick since they started releasing on Blu-Ray a few weeks ago. I think we plan to buy The Third Man at some point, and we also enjoyed Bottle Rocket and Chungking Express. I wouldn't say I enjoyed The Man Who Fell to Earth, but I was definitely fascinated by it.

This weekend we watched The Last Emperor, which was beautiful and entertaining but I'm not sure that it was especially deep. That said, even the first fifteen minutes of the commentary track were enlightening: the title sequence was created by Maurice Binder, who did the James Bond titles -- after which the sequence looked more like a James Bond opener than it did one for a fancy foreign film! The opening fifteen minutes of commentary on Chungking Express gave some details that explained the film to me in a way that it made sense: I now understand that Wong Kar Wai's relationship with the old, disappearing Hong Kong parallels the cops' relationships with women in the film. That's something I wouldn't have picked up on otherwise. (If I had the same infinite pile of money that let me feel like I could buy a drysuit, I'd probably 'subscribe' to Criterion's Blu-Ray releases.)

Last night we watched Roger Ebert's commentary track on Dark City. Turns out he recorded a new commentary track for the Director's Cut, which is on the same Blu-Ray disc but which I've never watched. I'll have to plan to watch the new version, then the other three commentary tracks at some point soonish.

As I noted in my other blog, I'm finally getting a short story published. That's five and a half years from first draft to print -- at that rate, I'll have a book of short stories maybe in time for my eighty-fifth birthday.

Also, in the "long time coming" category, I've finally made back every penny of my advance on Think Unix. That was published eight and a half years ago.

Sadly, I failed to accomplish my one new year's resolution for 2008, which was to find D.B. Cooper. Although early evidence this year suggested that someone else might get ahead of me on this, all those leads proved false, so while I failed to accomplish my objective here, nobody else really did any better.

My objectives for 2009 are pretty simple: stay employed, completely eliminate the last of our household debt including Laura's student loans, stay out of debt, and raise a happy, healthy baby. I don't expect to finish that last one this next year, or to do it without a whole lot of help, but it's what I'm most looking forward to doing.

... to say that I'm finally back in town -- I got told on Friday, October 24th that come Monday, October 27th I would be in Baltimore for two weeks, until yesterday, November 9th. But I'm back now.

And boxes are starting to unpack, and there's some room to walk in now, in some places.

And it's my birthday, and I made pasta sauce from scratch for dinner. Not the most elaborate thing I cook, but it's nice to have home cooking for a change, after spending something like three of the last four weeks on the road.

Tomorrow I go back to work -- a new bus line, to the same building, but a new cube. Kind of strange.

All this week, more unpacking, and stuff. Next weekend, cleaning the old place, unpacking the new place some more.

Glad to be home, and to have this opportunity to begin to settle in, but boy am I exhausted!

Baltimore peeps:

I'm going to be in Westminster, MD for about two weeks -- from this Monday, the 27th, through November 9th.

I'll actually be staying in Owings Mills... and I'd like to make it down to Baltimore to see folks, but I can't really be far from Westminster for too long too often.

Anyone from Baltimore wanna hang out? Comment here or e-mail me. Bonus points if you want to come up and hang out in the vast nothing that is Owings Mills.

Seattle peeps:

Getting down to the wire on the move thing, and still no offers of assistance with the last dregs of packing. It's 90% kitchen and clothing, which is easy but time-consuming, and a little bit of help would be very appreciated. Between being out of town for work this past week, and being out of town for work for the next two weeks, I've left Laura in the position of being entirely overwhelmed... and a little help on Saturday would go a long way toward making things work.

Any takers? Food and/or alcohol is available for folks who can help... really, there's not a lot to do, as these things go, and I'll spring for a nice dinner if a couple of people show up. (If a lot of people show up, it's beer and pizza, but that doesn't seem likely at this point...)

It's not that I haven't been posting because nothing's happening; I haven't been posting because too much has been happening.

At work, they haven't backfilled my old position yet, so I'm still doing a not-insubstantial portion of that job while also working on my new job. Which alone might be more than one person can reasonably handle, but it's hard to tell.

Last weekend ironheadjane and I went to New York for my sister's wedding, which was lovely. Next weekend, we move. To Ballard. Please comment or e-mail if you need our new address. This weekend we're packing, mostly.

Next week I spend three days in New York for work, for a three hour meeting. (It's too late in the day to fly back that night, and too early in the day to fly out that morning -- scheduled by a real expert!) The customer's probably going to yell a lot about an outage that occurred while I was out of town. It's kind of interesting when your boss's boss stops by your desk and says you're never allowed to take vacation again, and there's a kernel of truth in that.

Monday, Laura and I will go see The Polymath, which bears the long but helpful subtitle, "Or The Life And Opinions of Samuel R Delany, Gentleman" which still doesn't cover the fact that he's an incredible science fiction author and one of my personal heroes. Though I would be sort of disturbed if some documentary film mentioned that the subject was a personal hero of mine.

There's more to say -- but all in good time. If I get any time.

Yesterday I attended a comics workshop hosted by dlasky as a benefit for 826 Seattle, where I volunteer.

I managed to draw not only an identifiable self-portrait, but also the below "comic diary" documenting my Monday:


[2008-08-14: I've updated this with a version you can clearly see.]

Two more quart jars of brandied cherries are in the fridge. This time, it's Skeena cherries not Vans, and they're delicious, even if the kitchen makes me a bit sympathetic for Lady Macbeth. Sadly, I don't think I can justify more fridge room for spiced brandied cherries, and I suspect that Laura's patience with cherry season is wearing a bit thin.

I made a batch of tomato sauce, too, as Alvarez Farms had good-looking plum tomatoes. I'm usually too lazy to do it, but I decided not to worry about peeling or seeding the tomatoes. It manages to taste wonderful anyway, and I'm freezing half of it for later.

Dinner was salmon roasted in butter with basil, and sugar snap peas sauteed with butter and olive oil. Simple, but tasty.

For brunch today, Laura and I went to Smith. I didn't mind the decor (lots of animals on the wall, and lots of fairly terrible paintings) except that it was trying to be ironic, and I'm not much for aesthetic irony. Unfortunately, the food was very good so I'm likely to find myself back there occasionally.

On the subject of irony, it occurred to me that there was a difference between literary and aesthetic irony, and that I liked the former much more than the latter. This may be why I think Mad Men is overrated.

Hopefully this week at work will be less stressful than last week, during which one major customer had a series of blowups that should now be resolved. I had to stay late at work on Tuesday instead of leaving early to volunteer, as I usually do on Tuesdays, and had a number of twelve-hour days. Oof.

Cooking plans for the week include steak salad, something involving a whole chicken to be served alongside sauteed zucchini, pasta with the aforementioned tomato sauce, and pepperoni pizza. We've been making pizza pretty much every week since I discovered that even I could make decent pizza dough almost instantaneously in the food processor (thank you Mark Bittman!), and that one batch of dough is two pizzas, as is one batch of sauce.

I'm going to need to make some chicken stock this week, to get the chicken backs and necks out of the freezer. I'm concerned as to whether we have enough containers for freezing stock, but I'm sure I'll figure it out.

Finally, around two in the morning on Friday, I got home. Friday I slept in, and yesterday I even overslept in. Today I dialed it back and hopefully I'll be able to get up on time, or near on time, for work tomorrow.

It's good to be home.

It's also a good week to be shopping at the farmer's markets in Seattle, especially if you like cherries. At the U District Farmer's market yesterday, I saw sour cherries, and said aha! Now there's sour cherry soup cooling in the fridge, for dessert or maybe a light dinner. Yesterday, we also bought Rainier and Van cherries, about two pounds total, almost all of which I munched on while watching movies. There's about a half-pound of Rainiers left that I'm hoping to not eat until at least later tonight. Today, I bought more Van cherries, since they were so sweet, and made spiced brandied cherries, which are currently in the fridge. Sadly, I'll have to wait two days to eat them. I'm not quite sure how I'll manage.

Did lots of other prep cooking this weekend: cleared out scraps from the freezer and made several quarts of veggie stock; made mayonnaise; made zingy cucumber salad (with red onion, rice vinegar, bell pepper, and red pepper flakes). Basically got in a good position for eating well this week.

What else? Not much. Travel for work was tough, but I managed. (Nine days! Five states!) em_yrt was in town for a conference, so ironheadjane and I went out to dinner with her Friday. I'm not quite ready to go back to work, but I know there's more than enough to do... I'm dreading it more than a little, not because I don't want to be there, I just don't want to have to catch up.

So I'm hitting the road for work, starting tomorrow. Nine days, five cities.

I'm flying to Boston, where I'll be until Thursday night, at which point I take a train to Stamford, Connecticut.

I'll be in Connecticut until Sunday night, at which point I fly to Atlanta. Monday night I fly to Baltimore. Tuesday night I take the train to New York, and Thursday I fly home.

This means that I might have time to spare in Boston on Wednesday night this week (the 9th), and in Stamford on Friday (the 11th). I do have a fantasy of taking the train to New York on Friday night to see this, but I'm unlikely to do that in the absence of co-conspirators.

Saturday night is right out, though I should have some availability through mid-afternoon. I might have time early on Sunday, too, and maybe even in New York. Next week, I'll sadly not have time to see people in either Atlanta or Baltimore, but might have time to see folks on Wednesday the 16th.

All of this availability is subject to current expectations with regard to work commitment, etc., etc. But I would like to manage to see people, if possible. Please do comment here, or e-mail me, if you're interested and geographically appropriate.

I've decided, based on the recent politics and and business over here, to do more (most? all?) of my personal blogging over at Two Ideas. I just posted over there about buying scuba tanks and planning to dive tomorrow.

Yesterday morning, I was walking to Vivace for a coffee before getting on the bus. I do this every morning, at six twenty-five, plus or minus five minutes.

The sky was that deep blue it reaches just at dawn, bringing color to the morning. I heard some birds chirping, and a garbage truck groaning in the alley, several blocks away. Some cars passed by on a nearby road. But still, for the city, it was quiet. Peaceful. I was alone, content for a block and a half to be absorbed by my thoughts.

Which were, and I quote, "You know... I think this is my favorite time of the day."

Which brought me to a full stop, quite suddenly. After all, this is morning we're talking about. Early morning, before it's really light outside. Before the dry cleaners is open. When respectable people have been in bed for ninety minutes or so, and have five or six hours of sleep ahead of them.

Sometime, without noticing it, I passed the day when I became an old man. "I'm too young for this," I thought, but that didn't make it any less true.

I've made my peace with it: dawn may be my favorite time of the day, but I like twilight nearly as much. And it's totally okay to sleep 'til noon, too. Just because the dawn is my favorite doesn't mean I have to see it all the time. It's more like a favorite movie that I pull out and watch once in a while, right?

Right?

I wish I was feeling better. Dinner tonight was spectacularly good.

We had ham and bean soup, made with alder-smoked ham from Sea Breeze Farm, my favorite local purveyor of pork, duck eggs, chicken liver pate, and more, and with cranberry beans from Stoney Plains Organic Farm. I finished it up with water, carrots, onions, celery, salt, pepper, and lemon thyme, and it was spectacularly good.

Preparation was simple: cut the ham and veggies up, toss them and the beans in the crockpot with the salt, pepper, and thyme, and cover with water, then simmer all day long. Not bad for 15 minutes of prep work last night and fewer than five minutes this morning. Extremely filling, and I'd estimate the cost at about $2.50 or $2.75 a bowl, because it made about eleven servings. (The ham isn't cheap, nor the beans, but they're the best-tasting I can buy -- I can't say enough good things about Sea Breeze Farm's bacon or ham!) The only trick I missed was that I'd forgotten to put in a bay leaf or three, which I'd intended to do. Still, it was quite nearly perfect.

On the side, we had mustard greens I'd cooked on Sunday night for just this occasion. Two big bunches (about eight cups chopped, raw), one slice of the half-pound of ham for the soup, a couple of dried red peppers, half a head of garlic, salt, pepper, white vinegar, and some veggie stock I'd made from scraps. The stock isn't as useful as I'd like, because I was ignorant and had a bunch of carrot greens in there, which made it rather astringent (though not really bitter), but that perfectly complimented the greens, which were sharp and smokey and quite good.

Laura, a good Kentucky girl, gave the meal her seal of approval -- not bad for a northern boy improvising without a net.

Last night I'd cooked a leg of lamb, also from Sea Breeze farms. I'd de-fatted it the night before, and yesterday morning I rubbed it with salt and pepper, and tossed it into the crock pot with a head's worth of garlic cloves, a medium onion, sliced, and about a bottle of red wine. (I'd meant to put the thyme in that, but I forgot.) At the end of the day, I took it out, dried it off, and browned it nicely, then reduced the wine in that pan to make a gravy, adding two tablespoons of butter.

For veggies, we had carrots and parsnips braised in home-made chicken stock, cooked with salt and pepper, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Laura tossed in a tablespoon or two of apple juice, which made it lovely and pie-like, and at the end I tossed in another tablespoon of butter to turn the leftover stock and spices into a lovely glaze. Except for the apple juice, the carrots and parsnips are my mother's recipe.

Later that night, I snacked on some beets I pickled on Sunday according to Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything, which I do several times a winter. The beets (Chiogga Beets), as well as the carrots and Parsnips, were from Nash's Organic Produce.

The lamb was pricey, but excellent. And we're getting eight to twelve person-meals out of it, about six portions of lamb with veggies on the side, plus probably four portions of Lamb jhal fraizi I'll be making tomorrow with a portion of the lamb I set aside last night when alloquating the leftovers.

Way back on Sunday night, I made pasta puttanesca, which is always different, since I make it by ear and it depends on what I've got on hand. This time, we were a little light on the olives, and I wanted to tone the garlic down from the usual, so I used some extra anchovy paste. Laura approved of that as well.

Thursday, the plan is to make a hot soba soup, making the dashi myself (mmmm... bonito flakes!). I might toss a raw egg in my portion and let that cook, depending on how I feel about it. I'll have beets on the side, most definitely.

Friday's going to be leftovers. Saturday probably leftovers too, if I haven't eaten 'em all by then. (I also have two hamburgers in the fridge still, from Saturday, which I'll be focusing on at lunchtime tomorrow and the next day.) Sunday, maybe, I'll use the pork butt I got at the market to make lime and chili slow-cooked pork tacos, with red onion escabeche, via Kathy Casey's cookbook. But I don't know yet, since that's something I can do any day of the week (due to the slow cooker), and I'll probably be hitting the farmer's market on Saturday this week.

Mmmm... food!

Laura and I are heading to Portland for a weekend getaway next weekend, and we're looking for the following:

• A nice place for dinner on Saturday night. Something cozy and maybe a little romantic, but most importantly awesome food.
• A fun place for brunch on Sunday with a moderate-sized group
• People who want to have brunch with me and ironheadjane next Sunday, in Portland

(You can RSVP here or via e-mail.)

The deviled eggs (with homemade mayo) are ready. (Not as pretty as I'd like, but darned tasty. Pretty will come with repeated applications.)

The hummus is made. The carrots, and celery, and broccoli are chopped. The tzatziki is made. (Laura did that.) We've got simple syrup and mint for drinks, to say nothing of champagne, beer, and soda.

We've got two kinds of pate, three kinds of cheese, and three kinds of crackers.

The serving dishes are washed. The lights are set.

At about seven-fifteen I'll start plating the food. At about seven twenty-five I'll put on some music. Until then, I'm not sure that there's anything to do but wait.

Oscar Peterson's dead, bummer.

I'm sitting at home, eating leftover pasta puttanesca, waiting for UPS to come with my new toy.

Duck is defrosting in the sink, soon maybe I'll make the pickled cabbage salad, since that can be done in advance. Sometime after ironheadjane comes home, I'll pull the suitcase out of the closet and pack for tomorrow, and get to the post office, if it's still open, for some stamps. After that, I'll crisp-braise the duck, roast the potatoes, and make the port-wine pan sauce.

After that, dinner, and maybe a movie.

Tomorrow, Chinese food and A Christmas Story in hi-def at a friend's.