“Getaway to Bay St. Louis”

You should see this one handed catch if you missed the Miami vs Notre Dame college game last Saturday:

I’m sure Timmy didn’t love the C.J. Daniels acrobatics.

I listened to this Fresh Air podcast during a walk in the park on Monday.  It featured late 80s interviews with Charles Brown and Ray Charles.  Highly recommended.  Charles Brown playing live in the studio is easily worth the listen.

We made the short (one hour) drive to Bay St. Louis on Tuesday afternoon.  I rented an Airbnb for a few days and we invited Kenny and Kara to join us.  We arrived before check in time and so had a relaxing drink at Barracuda tacos – this is the sister of the place that we have on Magazine St in New Orleans, but I think they make better drinks.

You can see how close Barracuda is to the Airbnb – it’s right next to PJs Coffee:

We were very pleased with the house on check in.  The pool and outside seating areas were great.

It came with a golf cart and bikes that we didn’t use – everything was within close walking distance.

There were some interesting features – a parking meter mailbox and “Seize the Bay” neon sign (once I figured out that there was a fancy remote to turn it on):

Diana and I walked to the Thorny Oyster for dinner on Tuesday evening.  We passed a few interesting buildings on our walk (church and courthouse).

This ended up being one of the best meals that we’ve had in a long time – in a large part due to the recommendations from our waiter Zak.  We shared three small plates – whipped ricotta with “reds” (apparently Argentinian red shrimp), crab claws with a wonderfully good sauce (Zak joked about bringing a straw to enjoy all of it, and apparently I was the only person in months to take advantage of it), and a tuna tostada with massive cubes of very fresh tuna.

I like the oyster wallpaper in the restaurant.  Seems appropriate for Diana’s office given her penchant for those creatures:

Kenny and Kara arrived later on Tuesday evening and we enjoyed relaxing by the pool for a while.

The girls went for a run along the beach on Wednesday morning while Kenny and I enjoyed a breakfast snack at Barracuda.

That was followed by pool time and then lunch at the Blind Tiger.  Here’s some history on the name:

This was an easy, casual beach front place with good food and service.

Randy and Amy (friends who live in Bay St. Louis) came over in the afternoon.  Amy showed up fully loaded – pool floaties and pump, Old Fashioned cocktails with large ice cubes and cherries, and cookies.  The perfect guest.  We had a very enjoyable afternoon and early evening visiting by the pool.  Amy suggested Trapani’s for dinner and I think everyone enjoyed their meal.  I had a fresh and well cooked trout and I know Kenny really enjoyed his steak.

Later that night, as we were watching some of the tennis, Kara entertained us with a comedy bit on all the ways the professionals played a similar game to her – “They hit it into the net, I hit it into the net.”  You had to be there.

Thursday began with pickleball.  They had some city courts that were no cost – just rock up and play.  Good fun.

We followed that with a well earned breakfast at the Mockingbird Cafe – just across the street from Barracuda and very close to the house.  Kara and I enjoyed frittatas, avocado toast for Diana, and a yummy looking breakfast burrito for Kenny.

Kara and Kenny left in the early afternoon so that Kenny could be back in time to teach his tennis clinic.  I do love that when he commits to something, you can 100% count on him to execute.

We had a pleasant evening walk over to the Depot district – this is where the railway station is located and it has grown into a small retail area.  There is a duck pond and you can buy feed at the depot.

A rail service from New Orleans to Mobile with stops in Bay St. Louis started a few weeks ago.  They call it the “Mardi Gras Express.”  I might consider it for our next trip – $15 and about an hour.

We walked from the Depot down to the beach and along to the Thorny Oyster.  I didn’t enjoy this meal as much as the last one – no Zak for starters.  The Italiano salad that we split was large and very good.  The calamari was good but not the best that we’ve had.

We were home in time for some pool time before the Cowboys and Eagles game.  The Cowboys played better than expected but came up just short 20-24 after an hour long lightning delay.  This meme about Jerry Jones trading Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers made me chuckle.

I’m not laughing as much after just watching Parsons make an amazing sack for the Green Bay Packers – the closing speed!

Friday had a leisurely start.  Sleep late and then pack up and make sure we take care of everything on the checkout list.  Then back to the Mockingbird Cafe.  This time I got the biscuits with sausage gravy and a fried egg – delicious.  Diana reprised her avocado toast and added some excellent bacon (a meal in itself.)

We had an easy drive back and even stopped at Trader Joe’s to pick up some supplies once we reached New Orleans.  We’re hosting a “Spinal Tap” watch party on Monday, ahead of the release of “Spinal Tap II” next Friday.  We picked up some fish and chips type snacks for that.

Back at the house we watched the Djokovic vs Alcaraz tennis semi-final – very good tennis.

This article showed up in the Saturday newspaper.  So funny how this happens sometimes – all about the recovery of Bay St. Louis since Hurricane Katrina 20 years ago:

“Katrina battered Bay St. Louis — destroying half the city’s homes, blowing out the bridge that connects it to Pass Christian and decimating the population. The downtown area, once busy, was essentially flattened to a blank slate.

Recovery was a yearslong effort sustained by an outpouring of assistance from the government, volunteers and locals who stayed. Public buildings, roadways and vital bridges were eventually repaired and replaced by federal money. By 2013, new developers were flocking to downtown as longtime business owners rebuilt.

Today, the ghost of Katrina’s devastation is hard to find in most parts of Bay St. Louis. In Pearlington, though, it lingers just about everywhere.

A town reborn

On Friday, the anniversary of Katrina, Nikki Moon sits in her Bay St. Louis home and remembers that day 20 years ago. When the storm hit, she clung to a bald oak with her Scottish terrier and three guests from her bed-and-breakfast, Bay Town Inn.

Today, that tree still stands by the inn. Carved into its branches are two angels, one facing the water and another looking toward Beach Boulevard, lined with busy seafood restaurants and palm trees rustling in the breeze.

Even on its slower days, the town’s rebirth is unmistakable.

On the corner of Main Street and Beach Boulevard, a couple walks into Pearl Hotel with rolling luggage. A few blocks away, in Mockingbird Cafe, a group of locals sit at a table and talk about how Bay St. Louis has transformed in the last decade.

“It is a community that came back very strongly,” Moon says, “And its people are really something special.”

Several businesses, including Bay Town Inn, began reopening on Beach Boulevard in 2013. Moon had applied for a $150,000 grant from the Hancock County Chamber of Commerce, which she said gave her “the seed money” to rebuild her bed-and-breakfast. The county’s tourism office also provided funds for advertising.

“We had no roads. We had no water. We had no power,” Moon says. “Our infrastructure was starting from scratch. The city and the county had to raise the money.”

Bay St. Louis slowly came back to life, regaining its pre-Katrina identity as a quaint art colony and weekend retreat for New Orleanians.

Moon sold the inn in 2022 to Jim MacPhaille, a New Orleans developer who owns a restaurant and several other businesses in Bay St. Louis. A decade earlier, he had already seen the town’s potential.

In 2013, MacPhaille purchased two buildings on Main Street. Despite its damaged infrastructure and lack of tourism, he recognized how Bay St. Louis was “eager to get things done” as storm recovery in New Orleans lagged.

But still, “business was tough,” MacPhaille said. “Back then, they were barely making it. We had like three or four tenants roll in and out.”

In 2018, he opened two New Orleans staples — PJ’s Coffee and Creole Creamery — in his two buildings on Main Street. Today, that once-empty corridor is filled with new boutiques and restaurants. There’s little trace of the blight Katrina left behind.

Signs of hope

Even in Bay St. Louis, the story of recovery extends beyond downtown.

A few blocks away in the Depot District, new restaurants, boutiques and other businesses have opened across from the Amtrak train station, where Bay St. Louis is a stop along the Mardi Gras Service from New Orleans to Mobile. In other parts of the city, new subdivisions are emerging with houses and condos.”

We enjoyed a walk/run in the park on Saturday morning.  Diana had planned on playing pickleball on Saturday evening but didn’t know about the need to register ahead of time and just missed a slot.  Lesson learned.  We watched some TV instead – a Catherine Zeta Jones movie called “The Rebound.”  Not too bad.

Sunday was about sports – U.S. Open men’s final (relatively easy Alcaraz win) and Saints loss.  I’m hoping the Lions come back against the Packers soon.

My first book this week was “I Regret Almost Everything” by Keith McNally.  I enjoyed this a lot and read it in a couple of days.  I used to love eating at Odeon when I was working on Wall Street for AIG – it was an easy walk and I loved the feel of the place and the quality of the food.  Reading this book I learned a lot about the history that I didn’t know at all.  Here’s the online summary:

“The entertaining, irreverent, and surprisingly moving memoir by the visionary restaurateur behind such iconic New York institutions as Balthazar and Pastis.

A memoir by the legendary proprietor of Balthazar, Pastis, Minetta Tavern, and Morandi, taking us from his gritty London childhood in the fifties to his serendipitous arrival in New York, where he founded the era-defining establishments the Odeon, Cafe Luxembourg, and Nell’s. Eloquent and opinionated, Keith McNally writes about the angst of being a child actor, his lack of insights from traveling overland to Kathmandu at nineteen, the instability of his two marriages and family relationships, his devastating stroke, and his Instagram notoriety.”

The book starts right out with McNally’s stroke and then rewinds through all of his previous accomplishments:

“After the doctor left, I tried wriggling my arms and legs to check that I wasn’t paralyzed. I wasn’t, thank God. To test my memory, I wrote the alphabet on the back of the nurse’s chart. I then tried saying the letters aloud, but here there was a problem. The words wouldn’t conform to my efforts. They exited my mouth in such a slurred and disorderly way that I sounded like a stage drunk. But this was a small price to pay for my stroke. My first stroke, that is. Because the next day the artillery arrived and gave me such a hammering that in one fell swoop I lost the use of my right hand, right arm and right leg. And my slurred speech, perhaps in fright, went AWOL. Overnight I was confined to a wheelchair and deprived of language. So much for The Restaurateur Who Invented Downtown.”

McNally describes the days following his stroke in a shared ward:

“I shared a ward with five other men whose ages ranged from forty to eighty. At night, with words inaccessible to me, I’d listen in awe to them talking. Speech suddenly seemed like a divine accomplishment. Even everyday words had an element of poetry to them. I dreaded the moment when the men would stop talking and I’d be left with my own thoughts. Sleepless, half-paralyzed and unable to speak, I felt buried alive. More than anything, I wished the stroke had killed me.”

Talking about the desire to keep on building and creating rather than running:

“Although my restaurants were taking in $ 80 million a year before my stroke, my reason for building them was never the pursuit of money. It was partly to gain the admiration of those I respected, and partly the satisfaction I received from seeing an idea realized. But whatever satisfaction the restaurants gave me was fleeting—which is probably why I can’t stop building.”

Diana and I have spent a few fun evenings at Pravda (subterranean vodka bar) with Teddy – it was fun to hear about this encounter:

“I caught the misty reflection of an Asian-looking woman with a sultry gaze. She was accompanying her friend to a job interview. Although we scarcely talked to each other, Alina cast such a powerful mix of tenderness and sensuality that I couldn’t look at her. During the thirty minutes she was there, we barely exchanged two words. The next time we met was two weeks later at Pravda, a subterranean vodka bar I owned. It was raining heavily that night and the place was packed and steamy. I was helping the maître d’ seat customers when Alina walked in with some girlfriends. I took a break and sat down with them. After twenty minutes we were sitting alone together.”

Who leaves school with one O level and waits on Marlon Brando two days later?:

“I left school at sixteen with just one O level—the barest minimum of qualifications—and took a job as a bellhop at London’s Hilton Hotel on Park Lane. On my second day, I was asked to escort Marlon Brando to his room. Like most movie stars, Brando was shorter in person than on the screen. He had a boxer’s broad shoulders and a surprisingly high, nasal voice. In the elevator, he asked me what I intended to do with my life. I had no idea and said as much. (I still have no idea.)”

I love this Woody Allen joke:

“the old Woody Allen joke: “You know, this guy goes into a psychiatrist’s office and says, ‘Doc, my brother’s crazy! He thinks he’s a chicken.’ And the doctor says, ‘Why don’t you turn him in?’ And the guy says, ‘I would, but I need the eggs.’”

I remembered this passage when wondering why the Napkin dispenser at Barracuda in Bay St. Louis had an exclamation point:

“Standing ovations began to increase in the 1970s, which, by coincidence, was the same decade in which the use of the exclamation point increased. It wasn’t until the 1970s that the key for the exclamation point—which in some ways is the standing ovation of correspondence—was added to a typewriter’s keyboard. The exclamation point has no grammatical purpose except to turn up the volume to eleven.”

A great description of Heathrow:

“At Heathrow I was jolted into the real world. After six weeks in the hospital and rehab, the frenzied terminal was an assault on my nerves. It was a snake pit of manic confusion. Faces strained and contorted. Couples arguing. Kids being screamed at. Is any vacation worth the anxiety that precedes it? When did travel become such a torment?”

The genesis of the title of the book:

“Po Ming was an exceptional man with a kind face and rare integrity. I once read that great people never regret anything. I regret almost everything. But most of all I regret not saying goodbye to Po Ming.”

An excellent point about all the wonderful 70s movies prior to Star Wars and the onset of the blockbuster movie phenomenon:

“the seventies: Taxi Driver, Chinatown, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Klute, Network, Marathon Man, The French Connection, Don’t Look Now, Mean Streets, Young Frankenstein, Deliverance, Annie Hall, Barry Lyndon, Three Days of the Condor, Shampoo, The Conversation, Five Easy Pieces, The Godfather parts 1 and 2, Paper Moon and my favorite film of the period, Dog Day Afternoon. By coincidence or not, each of these films came out before the blockbuster Star Wars had its theatrical release in the summer of ’77.”

The reason for calling his first restaurant “Odeon.”  I enjoyed this place so much.

“Within the month, we’d signed a fifteen-year lease and roped my brother Brian into being our third partner. It was Brian who came up with the idea of calling it the Odeon—growing up, our local cinema was the Mile End Odeon.”

Some local New Orleans colour – I remember that clock very well:

“Between signing the lease for the restaurant and fixing it up, Lynn and I spent a week in New Orleans. While walking around a shady area outside the French Quarter we saw a large thirties-style neon clock in the window of a junk shop that looked perfect for our unbuilt restaurant. The only problem was there was a NOT FOR SALE sign in front of it. The eternally shy Lynn persuaded me to go in alone and make an offer. “Offer a hundred dollars but no more,” she advised.”

“That twenty-five-dollar neon clock was our first purchase for the Odeon and has been hanging in the same position on the wall next to the bar since October 1980.”

One of the things that I liked about Odeon was the different cast of characters – folks in suits and folks in jeans and tees:

“The Odeon’s success was mostly due to happenstance: being in the right place at the right time. It was a sort of success that defies logic and defines its time. Through no intention of our own, the Odeon quickly became the epicenter of the downtown art scene with Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Julian Schnabel mixing with the likes of Anna Wintour, Lorne Michaels and the cast of Saturday Night Live. Harold Pinter, as well as the writers Joseph Heller and Edward Albee, ate at the Odeon that first year.

During the Odeon’s early days, the actor John Belushi was our most regular customer. An original cast member of Saturday Night Live, he’d recently starred in the blockbuster film Animal House. Looking like someone who’d perpetually slept through his alarm, Belushi would swagger in just before closing and sit down with the staff as they gossiped about the night’s customers. One time, he came in after the cooks had left and volunteered to make the few remaining staff hamburgers. I somehow felt he was eager to show them that he could do something other than make people laugh. Watching him alone in the kitchen, cooking, was the only time I felt that Belushi was truly himself. The rest of the time I felt he was acting. But he had such a boyish charm that one couldn’t help but like him. The staff adored him.”

Talking about visiting Belushi and Aykroyd’s secret bar.  I would have stayed and enjoyed the performance:

“Cheeseburgers on our laps, we sat in the limousine as it delivered us to an anonymous bar in the middle of nowhere. Anonymous, that is, until we opened the door: two hundred of Belushi’s friends and hangers-on were crowded into the tiny bar. After wolfing down the burgers, Belushi and Aykroyd jumped onto a makeshift stage and began belting out a well-known Motown song. Predictably, the crowd went berserk, and the place became too frenzied for me. Aside from a chronic inability to enjoy rock concerts—even small ones like this—I had my own bar to run. Unnoticed by Belushi and Aykroyd, Lynn and I meekly left midway through James Brown’s “I Feel Good” and returned to work.”

I loved the book “Bright Lights, Big City” years ago – not sure it would have an impact on me these days:

“In 1984, an unknown author called Jay McInerney showed up at the Odeon and asked if he could use an image of the place for the cover of his first book, Bright Lights, Big City.”

I was invited to Balthazar a few times and never made it.  My loss:

“The idea for Balthazar came about while I was living in Paris seven years before I built the place. Although it’s hard for me to come up with good ideas, the few decent ones I’ve ever had have come about by pure accident. I was searching for vintage curtains at a Paris flea market in 1990 when I suddenly spotted an old sepia photo of a turn-of-the-century bar. Behind the bar’s zinc counter were hundreds of liquor bottles stacked twenty feet high, flanked by two towering statues of semi-naked women carved in the classical Greek style. I was so mesmerized by this image that I forgot about the curtains and bought the photo instead. For years I carried it in my back pocket, thinking that if I ever found a space with a sky-high ceiling, I’d build a bar just like the magnificent one in the photo. Stepping into Adar Tannery in the summer of 1995, I’d found that space. Five months later construction began.”

I love this adoration of the solitary diner and reader.  I enjoy a restaurant with a book – maybe not quite as high end as these places:

“The literary critic Harold Bloom once wrote that “there is nothing more profoundly healing than the act of solitary reading.” I never really thought about this until my stay at McLean. The first books I reread were Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises and Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. Reading The Sun Also Rises at twenty-two, I was bowled over by how good it was. I found Pride and Prejudice, which I read at twenty-three, artificial and silly. Rereading the Hemingway book, I winced at the dialogue and found parts of it embarrassing. With Austen it was the opposite. Second time around I thought Pride and Prejudice was a masterpiece and couldn’t believe I’d ever thought otherwise.”

I agree – the pace of change of places seems to increase as you age:

“After spending a month on Martha’s Vineyard and nine weeks at McLean, I’d been away from New York for over three months. I returned to the city in the fall of 2018 only to discover that my local barbershop had turned into a Baskin-Robbins. Why do changes in the landscape accelerate as one ages? You take a quick shower and another Duane Reade opens. You wake from an afternoon nap and there’s a new president. The second you hit sixty, life becomes the unstoppable bus in the film Speed.”

I highly recommend this autobiography.  I’m not sure those who haven’t spent much time in New York restaurants will enjoy it as much as I did.

My next book was “Broken Country” by Clare Leslie Hall.  This was more of a romance than I had expected, but the plot turns and construction of the story were very impressive.  Will be a good one for Diana.  Online summary:

““The farmer is dead. He is dead, and all anyone wants to know is who killed him.”

Beth and her gentle, kind husband Frank are happily married, but their relationship relies on the past staying buried. But when Beth’s brother-in-law shoots a dog going after their sheep, Beth doesn’t realize that the gunshot will alter the course of their lives. For the dog belonged to none other than Gabriel Wolfe, the man Beth loved as a teenager—the man who broke her heart years ago. Gabriel has returned to the village with his young son Leo, a boy who reminds Beth very much of her own son, who died in a tragic accident.

As Beth is pulled back into Gabriel’s life, tensions around the village rise and dangerous secrets and jealousies from the past resurface, this time with deadly consequences. Beth is forced to make a choice between the woman she once was, and the woman she has become.

A sweeping love story with the pace and twists of a thriller, Broken Country is a novel of simmering passion, impossible choices, and explosive consequences that toggles between the past and present to explore the far-reaching legacy of first love.”

Gabriel’s goal for his writing:

The New York Times(NYT) puzzle this week had a clue “Many TV Panelists” with the answer “Talking Heads.”  Rex Parker, NYT puzzle blogger, shared this video about that:

What an excellent performance.

I had always thought this was a Paul Young song (growing up in the UK).  Turns out it’s a Hall and Oates classic:

Did you know Stevie Nicks had a song about New Orleans?  I didn’t.  Found out in the “Inside Out” section of the newspaper – a couple was talking about flying back from New Orleans to Chicago, landing at O’Hare and this song was playing.  They took it as a message to pack up and move;

I love this Isbell cover of R.E.M. and also highly recommend his interview with Terry Gross on Fresh Air (argumentative in a kind way):

Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all!

“Visit to the Florida panhandle”

Our travel back from San Francisco on Monday was smooth.  We had an exit row and nobody in the middle seat – so plenty of room to spread out.  On entry to our home, I heard a smoke detector beeping to let us know the battery inside was low.  Just what I wanted after a 4 hour flight, but I got up on the six step and disconnected it.

We drove from New Orleans to Navarre Beach on Wednesday, covering 4 states enroute – Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.  It was about a 3.5 hour drive and Kenny, Kara, and Nina rode with us.  We were on our way to a funeral service for Anne’s mum, Carolyn, and a celebration of life for Carolyn and her husband, Jack.  We broke up the journey with a lunch stop at the Original Oyster House.  I remembered it from our last trip to Navarre with Denny and Anne, and it was still very good.

We arrived at Saint Peter church in Mary Ester (just beyond Navarre) in time to have a coffee before the service began.  The service seemed to follow a  traditional Catholic approach, although apparently the response words have changed since Diana last attended one.  We laughed that they do that every decade or so to see when folks were last in church.

Here’s a link to Carolyn’s obituary, she was my blues music buddy:

https://www.daviswatkins.com/obituary/Carolyn-Bauer

After the services we checked into the condo that we had rented.  The door code was 10 digits long, and I couldn’t get it to be accepted.  At least 5 attempts before I gained access.  The girls were happy to point out that they always got it on the first try.

I’m sure Anne was touched that everyone from her friend group made the trip:  Alex and Laura, Thom and Libby, Kelly and Fred, Greg and Colleen, Julia, and Jancy, and then all of her local Florida girlfriends, Courtney, Bob,  Tammy, and Sue.  I enjoyed “facilitating” a conversation between Courtney and Fred.

There was a reception at Juana’s – the divey bar complex next to Carolyn and Jack’s condo.  Carolyn had apparently picked out the menu of snacks to be served.  Once the reception time ended, the pool tables were placed back in position and everyone enjoyed them.  It might not seem appropriate for a celebration of life, but Carolyn would have wanted it that way.

I treated the group to my mini quiches on Thursday morning.  They really are a bit of work to complete, but I enjoyed it.

Double red flags were flying at the beach on Thursday, signifying nobody allowed in the water for any reason due to currents and rip tides.  It was also pretty windy at the beach.  We opted to set up on the “Sound” side behind the condo.  It has a beach, you can swim, and it’s nicely sheltered.  Jack set up the blue awning and we were all able to avoid too much sun.

After a day in the sun and water, pizza and salad sounded like the perfect dinner.  We all ate together at Carolyn and Jack’s condo.

Friday was very much a repeat of Thursday.  The girls did spend some time on the beautiful beach – still no swimming.  About time to leave to pack up and drive home, Diana suggested staying another night.  I called the rental company and we were booked for an extra night.  What a weak moment I had.  We joined the group at Dewey Destin’s for dinner.  We all enjoyed very fresh seafood – excellent shrimp and scallops, and another good Denny recommendation.

We got a decently early start on Saturday for our drive back to New Orleans, deciding to stop for breakfast after clearing the thrombosis that is the Mobile, Alabama tunnel.  Diana’s research showed the Breakfast Spot as a good option.  We parked, after passing a street pole vaulting competition, but the place was too busy and we didn’t want to wait very long.  We had passed Bob’s on the way and remarked on the brass band playing outside – let’s walk over there.  We sat outside and enjoyed a yummy breakfast and some great traditional New Orleans music.  The band had an eclectic makeup – all ages and ethnicities represented, including an older lady on the tuba (don’t see that often).

The drive was uneventful – the usual slow downs as trucks pass each other, or sit beside each other occupying both lanes and going at almost the same speed, and some very heavy rain for a few minutes on the approach to New Orleans.

We enjoyed a walk/run in Audubon park to stretch out our legs before it got too hot on Sunday.

Our friend Dr. Thom, professor of infectious diseases at Tulane, had this article published this week.  It tells a bit of a heartbreaking story about all the years he has spent eradicating malaria around the world, and how funding cuts are impacting that.

https://tulane.edu/research/malaria-control?utm_source=tt&utm_medium=content

I watched an interesting movie this week – “The Way We Speak”.

The movie tells the story of a writer who refuses to cancel a debate with his friend who has died of a heart attack.  Instead, he insists on going ahead with a replacement opponent.  And then everything starts to come apart…

My read this week was “River is Waiting” by Wally Lamb.  Kelly recommended it with this text, “Just finished this book.  Absolutely gutted.  Dark content but really good book.”  She summarized things well.  The last paragraph of the first chapter was almost too much for me.  And the writing and characters are very good.  Not sure I recommend this unless you are ready for some very dark material.

Wally was listening to Irma Thomas when writing and realized that her song, “River is Waiting”, from the wonderful “Simply Grand” album had just inspired his title.

I read about a third of “Letters to John” by Joan Didion as what I hoped would be a bit of a palette cleanser.  These are letters to her husband relaying what happened in her weekly therapy sessions.  I have a hard time relating to someone who puts this much thought into their thoughts and then rehashes them in written form for her husband.  And I have been a huge Didion fan for many years.  “The Year of Magical Thinking” is in my top 10.

The annual literature edition of the New Yorker magazine is always a treat.  I particularly enjoyed an article on the impact of AI on learning.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/07/07/the-end-of-the-english-paper

A couple of paragraphs that caught my attention:

“One study, published last year, found that fifty-eight percent of students at two Midwestern universities had so much trouble interpreting the opening paragraphs of “Bleak House” by Charles Dickens that “they would not be able to read the novel on their own.”  And these were English majors.”

“The London cabdrivers rigorously trained in “the knowledge” famously developed abnormally large posterior hippocampi, the part of the brain crucial for long term memory and spatial awareness.  And yet, in the end, most people would probably rather have swifter travel than sharper memories.”

Interestingly, the next story in the magazine had this:

“The taxi-drivers of London, my parents told me, knew every street and lane, every address by heart.”

It’s so strange how things that you haven’t thought about in years come up repeatedly within minutes of each other.

Here’s that Irma song that gave Wally Lamb his title:

This album is wonderful from start to finish.  Each track has a different pianist – Norah Jones, Dr. John etc..  It’s fun to try and pick out who is on each track.  Who do you think this is?

Such an excellent Randy Newman song.

Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all.

“Annual Check Ups”

We took off for Dallas on Sunday to attend our all day physicals at the Cooper Clinic.  A few minutes into the flight, the pilot let us know about a big storm in Dallas and Air Traffic Control telling him to fly up through Oklahoma and then loop back down.   Only problem – they told him after he took off and so we didn’t have enough fuel.  No big issue – we’ll land in Corpus Christi and get some more fuel.  That was a very efficient process with us on the ground in Corpus for less than 15 minutes.  I think we were around a couple of hours late getting to Dallas.

We were looking for a quick and healthy place to have dinner before checking into the Cooper Clinic.  I found something called “Flower Child” in Inwood Village.  This was perfect – quick, healthy, and tasty.  It seems to be an expanding chain and I recommend it if you come across one.

Flower Child made me think of my sister in law, Amy.  She was out protesting that we don’t need a king to rule the US:

I had originally considered Casa Rosa for dinner – when I waited tables there in the 80s, it was located right next to Flower Child.  They had a recent reprise closer to Love field airport and are now permanently closed again.

Also right next door is the Inwood movie theater.  Best known as the place where Denny and Anne had their first date.  The movie  – “Reservoir Dogs.”  The offerings were much tamer on Sunday:

After dinner, we checked into our massive suite at the Cooper hotel and relaxed before all the prodding to come on Monday.

I caught up on texts and found some funny things.  Will sent this picture of us a few years ago:

He also sent this caricature of the four of us:

And this silly one of himself – not sure how Christine feels about it:

Will is going to a wedding in Ibiza sometime soon and visiting Paris on his way.  He remembers eating moules frites with curry sauce the last time he was in France – more than 25 years ago.  Diana helped me pull up pictures to show him the best place in Paris – in Montmartre – big portions, well cooked, at a good price and with good service.

Alicia sent a funny Father’s Day meme – we’re not sure why the penguin has a purple eye and I couldn’t capture it at the point where the other penguins join in.

Our Cooper day started at 7:00am with blood draws.  Diana was ahead of me and so I asked the lady how she had done getting blood from her.  “Oh boy, that was hard, took four of us.”  Diana told me they ultimately called in “Queen” from a different department to get her blood.  The lady from the last two years who got her on the first poke wasn’t there anymore.  I feel badly for Diana that there aren’t more superbly qualified phlebotomists out there.

Our days of tests were busy with nothing major found on either of us.  Various vitamins that we need to take, and I had a couple of things frozen off in dermatology – finally getting rid of that thing under my glasses pad on my nose.  This is the last time this very expensive day of tests will be covered by my work – we’ll see what we do going forward.

We left the clinic around 3pm and headed for McKinney to meet up with Finn and Holly.  We checked into the very cool and historic Grand Hotel – above Rick’s Chop House (home of still the best shrimp and grits that I’ve ever had.)

We met Finn and Holly at the Urban grill in downtown McKinney.  Diana and I had eaten a snack at the bar there and remembered it being good.  Everything we had was delicious, with great service.  I dropped a fork at one point and had a new one in my hand a few seconds later.

Our appetizers included calamari (Holly’s favourite), fish and chips (Finn), and ahi tuna tartare (yep – D.)

For dinner Finn went all out for his birthday with the ribeye steak.  Diana and Holly both had the lamb chop lollipops, and I enjoyed a delicious heirloom beet salad.

The kids gave me a belated Father’s Day card and goodie bag.  The card is excellent:

Very clever.  The only one we had to explain was the “Sage” advice.  Is that a generational thing?  I don’t think so.

I received a very thoughtful goodie bag of treats.

Finn had gone to the cigar shop close to our old house and asked the guy for his best cigar recommendation.  The penguin came from “Fair and Square” in downtown Mckinney (where McD got a cutting board gift for them) right before dinner.  Finn remembered that Diana liked Mounds and not Almond Joy – huge brownie points scored.  And then the Chanel goat juice (Elroy Kee term) – we think it smells really good.  What a thoughtful little goodie bag.

We walked the kids back to their car and saw this sign outside Emporium Pies – I’m looking forward to trying the rhubarb pie at La Petite Grocery soon – been way too long.

You may know that June 17th is also our wedding anniversary.  I love the cards that Diana and Mum got me – Diana’s with British pennies on it (do they still have those?) and Mum’s with a pair of dragonflies.

We looked at some pictures and videos from that lovely day in Cozumel.  Finn thinks he would  like to take Holly there for a honeymoon.  That could happen.

We slept late on Tuesday and then made a trip to our old regular – “Filtered”, where we would have our coffee and a quiche.  The place has been remodeled a bit, and for the better, looks great now.  We passed on the quiche with the expectation of lunch at the Blue Goose.  I can’t remember how we did on the puzzles, or if we even did them.  We were sitting at a table of nerds working away on their laptops.  When did going for coffee mean being surrounded by 90% nerds on laptops?  When do you get a break?

We drove over to the local Blue Goose and had a lovely lunch experience – such amazing and positive service.  I loved my sour cream enchilada and got the recipe for the sauce.  Diana had the “off menu” pulled chicken taco salad and was quite happy.

The car returned, we were back inside Love field airport.  We laughed at a guy from Lubbock sitting next to us at the bar who was exclaiming how humid it was.  Diana and I had remarked in the morning that it was so dry and comfortable to move around.  It’s all about what you’re used to – as they say.  This guy was still sweating after having been in the very cool airport for 20 minutes.

The jet bridge wouldn’t align with the plane for our flight home, and so they ultimately moved the plane to a new gate.  We arrived home a bit late, but probably got home around the same time as we missed rush hour traffic.

On Thursday evening we met Jeff and Merry Lee for dinner at Compere Lapin.  This is a restaurant by Nina Compton from the Caribbean – and the dishes are a mix of New Orleans and her homeland.  The place has won many awards.  Diana and I went close to the opening (10 years ago) and I can still remember how amazing the goat curry tasted.  I also remember being amazed by how adventurous Jack and Mason were with the menu, and Denny saying, “they eat what we eat.”

Jeff and I both had the goat curry (ridiculously good with all the flavour and the little gnocchi’s) , and the ladies both had the sea bass.  I think we were all quite happy.  We had some appetizers of fish collars, smoky fish dip, and ahi tuna.  Deserts were I think mango creme brulee and something else that I can’t remember.  I had a port and desserts aren’t really my thing.

Trey had asked us to consider attending his friend, and dog sitter, Nina’s show at the Maple Leaf on Friday night.  Given that his dog, Bear, saved his life before his house burned to the ground recently, we thought we could do him a favour.

On Saturday I again got disappointed in our nation.  First I read this New Yorker article – geez!:

Australia writer deportation – New Yorker

I stupidly followed that with “The Mauritian” movie.  Jodie Foster is an excellent defense attorney and the movie is very well done, albeit a bit plodding.  The message is that the main character spent 14 years in Guantanamo Bay prison, tortured as we have heard about, and never charged with a crime.  I believe there were 778 prisoners there, only 8 were ever charged, and 5 of those were overruled on appeal.  So 770 folks held for many years with no charges?

“Adventures in Cooking”

Kenny was in the neighborhood on Monday morning and stopped in for a coffee and a chat.  Always a good way to kick of the week.

We visited the New Orleans Athletic Club (NOAC) for a workout later in the morning and then worked on a summer salad with watermelon for dinner.  We’ve decided to try and cook at home much more and to focus initially on recipes from the Mediterranean diet – I started researching some ideas for the rest of the week.

A walk down the streetcar tracks to Jefferson avenue kicked off our Tuesday.  It was starting to get pretty hot as we walked home and were facing directly East and into the sun.  Nonetheless we covered close to 4 miles.

Tuesday dinner was our first dive into the Mediterranean stuff and consisted of jambalaya stuffed peppers and bang bang cauliflower.  I chose the jambalaya version as we had some leftovers in the freezer that eliminated most of the preparation steps.  The bang bang sauce for the cauliflower was made with sriracha, sweet chile sauce, mayonnaise and lime juice.  Both dishes were very tasty and we enjoyed making them.

After dinner, I headed over to Dat Dog for trivia with the guys.  It was the usual krewe plus a kid whose name started with an “M” – I can’t remember what it was – geez.  Mitchell, Maxwell, Matthew?  None of those seem right.  Anyway, Mr. M had studied AP English at Jesuit High and came in handy on a couple of questions – one about “Beowulf” and then on a Jane Austen related question about the English ten pound note.  We were in 3rd place going into the final round and then wagered too much on a question we did not know the answer too (always a bad strategy), and dropped to 4th.  Ugh!  Here was the final question:

Put the following in order from largest to smallest:

1  Number of mirrors in the Versailles hall of mirrors (I thought they were very large mirrors and this would be a small number – completely wrong)

2.  Number of steps in the Statue of Liberty

3.  Number of members of the House of Representatives (I did know that one)

4.  Number of doors in the White House – ridiculous, even if you knew the prior 3, nobody knows this

I would challenge you to take a shot at the answer, but just like with Mr. M, I can’t remember the correct order.  I do know that all the answers were between 300 and 400 – one of the more difficult final questions that we’ve experienced.

A NOAC workout kicked off our Wednesday.  On starting the car to drive home, I noticed the low tire pressure warning light – the rear left tire had an issue.  On arrival home, Diana checked the pressure – around 20 lbs versus the 36 recommended.  I finally got the tire repaired on Thursday afternoon.  A real local character who runs the Park Place repair shop on Tchoupitoulas found a piece of sheetrock on the internal wall.  He had it repaired and sent me on my way in a few minutes.

This was the sad day when we learned that Brian Wilson of Beach Boys fame had died – more in the music section below.  The Beach Boys always make me think back to a Neil Young Bridge School Benefit concert at Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, California.  There was a lady police officer in front of us that was growling at anyone trying to go up the wrong set of stairs in a very officious and negative manner.  As soon as the Beach Boys started their set, she turned into a completely different person – dancing with folks walking past – the power of good music!

Dinner on Wednesday was planned to be mango shrimp.  I visited Breaux Mart for mangoes.  Unfortunately I’ve never bought them before and wasn’t exactly sure what to look for – something yellow with an oval shape?  No.  I finally asked and found them.  I was glad that the recipe gave helpful instructions on how to peel and dice a mango – it would have been quite an ordeal otherwise.  This was another tasty and healthy meal.

After dinner we watched an episode of “Swing” with Owen Wilson.  We find this golf related comedy entertaining so far.

And after that, we finished “The Brutalist”.  The last 3o minutes of this movie are very “artsy.”  I’ll leave it at that.  I think I would have been pretty peeved if I’d been at the cinema house and sat through 3 and a half hours to get to those last 30 minutes.

Dinner on Thursday was taco stuffed avocados.  The taco stuffing consisting of ground turkey, black beans and onions.  Poor Diana ultimately visited three grocery stores to get the necessary ingredients.  Whole Foods and Breaux Mart after her physical therapy session.  She did get some delicious avocados at Whole Foods, but reported that the shelves were mostly bare – must be restocking day.  Then she visited Rouses (the big grocery store) in the afternoon to get the last ingredients.  I really enjoyed this meal and will make it again soon, perhaps with a different stuffing.

I read this article by Malcolm Gladwell in the New Yorker on Thursday evening.  A very interesting analysis of what causes violent crime reduction and I’m not sure you would guess correctly:

Malcolm Gladwell New Yorker article on violent crime reduction

It had been a long time since we’d been to the movies and so, with it being so hot outside, we decided to go and see “The Materialists” at the Broad Theater on Friday afternoon.   This was opening day for the film so we didn’t really have much to go on .

Dakota Johnson plays a New York based matchmaker who is caught between a previous relationship with an actor who is broke, and a very successful financier.  It gave us a good bit to talk about after we left.

Here’s what the New Yorker had to say about things:

New Yorker review of the Materialists

We stopped by to visit with Kenny and Nina, and ultimately Kara when she got off work, on the way home from the movie.  They were planning to go to the free Friday concert at Tipitinas and we had talked about going to see the Joe Krown trio at Dos Jefes.

On the way to Dos Jefes, we stopped into Rouses to pick up supplies for our Saturday brunch recipe.  Kenny, his youngest brother Tommy, Kara, and after a while Pepperoni (Michael Azzano), joined us at Dos Jefes for some of Joe Krown and then headed back to Tips for Eric Johanssen.  Krown played as amazingly as ever – hands just dancing across the keys.  We need to make the effort to visit this bar more often.

I watched “Hitchcock” on Netflix to wind down from all of the excitement of the day.  I thought this was really well done with a great performance from Anthony Hopkins as Hitch.  Helen Mirren and Scarlet Johanss0n  also turned in strong performances.  The focus was on the movie “Psycho” and the struggles of making it something that an audience would want to go and see.

Diana joined Julia for a walk in Audubon park to start her Saturday, while I read the newspaper and worked on the blog.  We made tomato and parmesan mini quiches for brunch, using a new muffin tray that we bought at Rouses on Friday night.  Diana had decided not to move hers to New Orleans, having not made muffins in many years.

The petite quiches turned out very well and I’m looking forward to making them with all kinds of fillings.  Using slices of ham as a “crust” was a great idea.

I spent the afternoon reading with various sports on TV in the background – US Open golf and LSU baseball.

I’m about half way through “Everybody’s Fool” by Richard Russo, the second in the North Bath trilogy.    Russo is best known for  the Pulitzer prize winning “Empire Falls”, made into a movie that I enjoyed.

I like what Entertainment Weekly had to say: “A crowning achievement—“like hopping on the last empty barstool surrounded by old friends” —from one of the greatest storytellers of our time.”

Some passages that I enjoyed from my reading so far:

“His heart went out to the kid.  Imagine having her for a mother, your whole life a giant margin for her to ask her impossible questions.”

“A giant margin” – what a great simile.

“Maybe it was time, not love, they’d run out of.  It was pretty to think so.”

Do you think this is a nod to the last sentence of Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises”, when Jack says to Brett “Isn’t it pretty to think so?”

“”You gonna get in?” “I’m still thinking.”  “There’s your problem right there,” Jerome said.  Like his sister, he spent far too much time diagnosing Raymer’s problems.  “Best nip that in the bud, bud.  Man starts thinking this late in life, no previous experience or proper guidance, there’s no telling where it could lead.””

A great example of the typical dialogue between Russo’s characters.

I’m pleased that I have half of this book and another two books in the trilogy to look forward to.

Earlier this week I was playing an Earth Wind and Fire album.  On returning it to the alphabetically filed album collection, I noticed a very old Duke Ellington Album that I hadn’t heard – must have come from McD.

“Mood Indigo” is on this album – such a wonderful piece.

I came across a number of entertaining covers:

We lost two massively influential musicians this week – Sly Stone and Brian Wilson.  Here’s my favourite from Sly and the family Stone:

Depending on when you ask about my all time favourite songs, the answer could well be “God Only Knows” by the Beach Boys – a Brian Wilson masterpiece of composition, arrangement and production:

I was reading a newspaper article about the local band, Better Than Ezra, and The Kingsway studio was mentioned.  This was Daniel Lanois’ studio at the corner of Charters and Esplanade – 544 Esplanade to be exact.  Nicholas Cage bought the house after Lanois and it is now owned by the Cumming guy who has the boutique hotels.

The albums that Lanois produced in that building are legendary:  “Oh Mercy” by Bob Dylan, “Automatic for the People” by R.E.M., “Achtung Baby” by U2, “Us” by Peter Gabriel, and “Yellow Moon” by the Neville Brothers, to name just a few.  Unbelievably productive and wonderful sounding place.

We’re flying to Dallas tomorrow afternoon and so I’m going to go ahead and publish this post a day early – much better than a month late like the last few.

Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all!