Day 2 Day radishes

Breathless in Seattle

Guest blogger here.  The Radish is currently taking up residence in a local hospital having contracted a virus from her visiting granddaughter.  We expect her to exit the hospital in a day or two, her lungs in working order.  Thoughts and prayers by her loyal readers are appreciated.  Pray it doesn't spread any further, either, while you're at it. 

June 22/Welcome to the United States

 

Yesterday was the solstice, and in fact it is the first day of summer. We, I, got Calligan and Gabe off to school. I left the dog poop at the top of the stairs for Gabe to clean up after school. Then my husband (who, by the way had preened for the occasion and looked pretty spiffy, while I looked haggarded and thrown together) got into two vans and went to the aeroporto. The plane was on time, and we got a sky cap to haul the luggage in a cart. There were eleven bags. A few were small, but some are like body bags.

It is so great to see the ex-Brasileros. Somehow when they leave for China, they will still be the Brasileros to me. They seem to belong in that setting. Their ex maid Nilda came. No Name was very proud of her because at customs Nilda held her own. When asked how she could afford to come, she said the visit was a gift. I guess that customs could not understand how anyone would give the gift of a ticket, especially coming business class. That is how much Noname appreciated her help and her loyalty.

This picture was taken at Red Robin. I love the photo. The older girl was valedictorian at her eighth grade graduation a few days ago. She will be a guest blogger. More later.

June 19/purses

Today I went out to shop with my youngest daughter. The goal was for her to be able to shop with the money her father and I gave to her for her birthday. My goal was that I was to hold the baby, and she was to shop. But tragically in the last week the baby has become a Mother’s boy. So she held the baby, and I shopped. We are in transition in wardrobe fashion currently. Thank God the belly hanging out is over and out. This year is a return to dresses and floaty fabric. There are ruffles and shears, and the skirts are above he knee, sometimes, way above the knee, but nearly everything is more demure than in recent years. I guess most of the dresses are worn braless, as I can not imagine additional bra straps to complete the picture. Probably I may be so old fashioned that pasties are the covering.

I got hung up on purses, partly because my $15.00 tote has lost one handle, and partly because of a Sunday front page Associated Press article about Super Buying and specifically purses. Purse manufacturers that five years ago sold purse for in the two hundreds now sell in the five hundreds. Purses that sold for $1,000. a couple of years a go, sell for $5,000. People, especially young people are spending more on consumer goods such as purses, shoes, clothes, bikes than on their mortgage. These same people complain that they should be paying off their credit cards, but
when designers keep coming up with this over the top hot stuff, you just “have to buy it“. Today a neighbor told me who had read the article that teenagers want to have the purses that Paris Hilton has. Can you imagine buying one for your child, let alone more than one

I

had to look at purses. Few were traditional, and as it is summer that is fine. Most of them are clunky and look heavy. But after some perusing, I got out of the department for $64.00 with a cotton striped bag, and I hope that takes me through the season. . Recently I saw photo purse by Gina Alexander. It was made exceedingly very attractive, a lot because the little boys images were so charming. The purse looked well made. When I get $164.00 I am going to get one.

June 17/ Grandma's Eve

Today is Grandma’s day Eve, because Tuesday starts my 2007 Grandmother’s summer life. I go to stay with grandkids, while their parents go to New York. We have had a little snafu here in that the date that the children from Brazil are coming was incorrectly calendared by Popster and myself. I am needed to go to the airport to get the Brazileros, who are six in number with much baggage, and take them home. This is a two car operation as there are also the drivers. But I am also needed miles to the east.

The Brazilero father is in logistics. I loved the days when he would say, “You tell me what you want done , and I will get sign ups to get the job done, and supervise. But now my sons -in-law are hot shots, for which I am grateful, but they have lost their ability to think on the grunge level. I have always needed my own logistic guru. I like logistics. Unlike my husband, who is a point A to point B, straight line kind of guy, I am more a circuitous thinker. In my head there are the kids over at the airport needing to go north, and their cousins are over east needing to be picked up from school. This is stuff to make a grandmother weep.

June 16/ high school students and religion

Apparenly in Minneapolis high schools, muslim students are given 20 minutes from class each day  to pray unattended in a closed room. Chrisian students are allowed to pray only at the flag pole at 6:00am, or so I heard.   

June 16Strawberries

If you live in Washington, please go out and buy strawberries.  The growers have had a tough time this season because of the rain, so the berries are rotting.  What you can do with strawberries:

Make ice cream, make sorbet (even easier), make short cake, dah, wash them and freeze them individually on a cookie sheet and then bag them.  You can make strawberry fool, which I think is just whipped cream and crushed berries.  There is strawberry pie.  Work. But I will try for fathers day.  I hope that I can find my recipe which has berries cooked a little with sugar and cornstarch and then raw ones added.  And there is a triffle which is basically cake layered in a bowl with sugared, sliced or mashed strawberries, with whipped cream and if you can do it, creme anglaise.

June 16/boat saga

Indeed at high tide, people did come to work on getting the boat off the beach. But alas they came too late. The workers needed to be there earlier doing the work of getting the boat slightly pried up, and to work while the water was coming in. Too bad the rich people just have to continue to look at it. But there is a high, but lesser tide tonight. . . . .

June 15/ waiters

Once Michael and I were on a road trip for two months. When driving takes up a good deal of the day, you need to sometimes think up some entertainment. And as we always ate out, and that could get tedious, we played the game: Ask The Waiter. It was an attempt to see how bright they were and if they knew their surroundings. For example in Santa Fe we asked how to get the Folk Art Museum, a publicized destination. Waiters/Waitress did not know the museum, and they certainly did not know how to get there. But then we would ask them where was the closest car wash, and they could give every turn, if not the street names. Maybe it was two blocks, or maybe it was three blocks, but they knew where it was. On our last road trip, again we studied waiters/waitresses. Mostly they were bad. Sometimes not bad because they were bad, but bad because they had no guidance, no leadership. Of course, at the fancy shmancy place, we had a good waitress. One afternoon we arrived in Ellensburg, and it was 5:30 pm, and we went into a wine bar/bistro and had beer/wine. Our waiter was very pleasant, as we were one of his only two tables. He answered many questions about the local scene in Ellensburg. Were there feed lots? Was there fishing? How much did it snow in the winter. Unfortunately, we did not stay at that small chic, chic restaurant, but chose to move on to a steak house near the motel. There was one waiter, and he was frazzled and he motioned us to sit down anywhere. It was obvious that money was his only reward. He was like a bull in a china shop. He started out with his white shirt tucked into his black pants, his hair sort of combed. More people came in and he got even busier running around. His hair became disheveled, his shirt came out of his pants. There was no chit-chat. What do you want? How do you want it? And how much wine is enough? In a way he was a disaster. But he won our highest award for waitperson for the trip. Everything arrived on time, as requested. At the right time he brought more wine. When we need more napkins they came. And at the end, we found him to be bright, and in addition he told Michael where to fish. He got a gooood tip. He handled the tough questions.

June 14/ food porn

This is food porn or garlic unzipped. 

June 14/ tides

Today is the full moon. With this comes high and low tides. I am fascinated with what will be the tide. What is the highest and what is the lowest. Tomorrow has the lowest tide of the year, if not close and it also has a very high tide. This boat has been moored for a long time, but in the last winds, it broke it’s mooring. The whole neighborhood is watching this boat. And those of us who live in the low rent district up on the hill, are delighted that the rich guys on the beach with multimillion homes are having to contend with this. They have tried many things to move it, but no go. My best guess is , aside from burning it,is that the beach owners are waiting for tonights tide to float it off the beach.  Maybe then they could sink it.