“Much Colder in New Orleans”

I know that I’m having some trouble with videos.  The YouTube plugin for my blogging software is causing a problem with mobile rendering and I haven’t found the best workaround yet.  I spent hours on it yesterday just to determine which plugin was causing the problem.

We flew back home on Tuesday – thanks to Caroline for the airport ride – advance party and departure assistance.  All our Thanksgiving travels were completely smooth – not what it was looking like a week or two before with all the government shutdown and other nonsense.

While we were flying, the Bayou Boyz trivia teams in New Orleans and Boulder were plugging away.  The New Orleans version struggled with the final question – particularly how many territories there are in Risk – I would not have been any help as it’s 40 years since I played (at a minimum.)

The guys ended in third place – very respectable.  Meanwhile, in Boulder, CO, the other team came in a lower place – but against many more teams.

It was too cold for yoga and other stuff outside the house on Wednesday morning.  Diana ventured out to get stuff for butternut squash soup in the afternoon – it was a recipe I’d seen in the paper and asked her to consider making – she made the curry version and it is delicious (we have lots of leftovers.)  Those squash were hard to cut through – I had to take on a knife sharpening task after that.  And what do you know – Amazon popped up with an email recommending a Japanese knife sharpener to me – of course they’re not listening to us.

A beautiful calendar from Mum was delivered.  I always love the nature photographs and the clever titles.

I did some chopping for Diana with the newly sharpened knives on Thursday night.  She made a recipe that I had found and that we had shopped for earlier in the day – a Mediterranean style stir-fry featuring mushrooms.  Here’s the recipe – we substituted barley for the rice:

Mediterranean mushroom stir-fry

The Cowboys win streak ended – too good to be true.  The Detroit Lions were way too much for them.  This means they are for all intents and purposes eliminated from the playoffs – nothing to get too excited about for the rest of the year.

I invited Diana to lunch at N7 on Friday to celebrate our stock crossing the $20/share mark.  Not bad from $11 at the beginning of the year – amazing actually.  We sat in the inside dining room for the first time and had a lovely experience.  Great ambience, service, food and company.

We split the charred romaine salad with clever presentation plate.  Then followed that with the N7 burger – check out the squid ink infused bun.

To cap of the celebration we finished with a pavlova.  The meringue and cream were perfect – so unusual to get that chewy center in the U.S..

On the drive to N7 Diana was explaining the World Cup draw process to me – perfectly.  She had all the aspects covered, including the 6 remaining open spots and how that works.  Where is all this sports knowledge coming from?

Scotland has a touch group with Brazil:

When I think about Scotland and the World Cup, I always map to 1978 against Holland and the Kenny Dalglish goal.  I couldn’t tell you the score in the last Cowboys game, but I know Scotland won that match 3-2.

Kenny and Kara invited us to join them to watch a film by a friend that was playing at the Black Film Festival.  The event was headquartered at Cafe Istanbul which is in the community center on St Claude Avenue.

This is a very cool venue that supports a lot of local community events.  It turns out we got the wrong time for the film that we wanted to see.  No worries – we listened to the panel for the prior film and then transitioned over to the St Roch market.

I really like this venue.  It has space for 10 or 12 pop-up style restaurants and a great bar.  I was wandering around looking for some snacks for us while the other 3 settled in at the bar.  When I got there, Diana was in a conversation with the bartender.  He hails from the English Midlands and has an extremely strong accent.  I was amazed at Diana’s ability to carry on a conversation – she’s come a long way since Ian Fanning from Linlithgow.  The bartender was a very nice gentleman, recently a U.S. citizen, and interested to talk to me about what I missed from Scotland as compared to New Orleans and about the process to obtain citizenship.  He shared a single malt Welsh whisky with me – and it was very smooth.

We stopped into the Avenue Pub (one of my favourites) on the way back home.  This was Diana’s first visit and I talked her into trying some of their excellent food – this time the loaded tater tots with pork – they were very good.

I forgot to mention that before all those festivities took place, I was enlisted to help install the latest blow up holiday nonsense – a polar bear with penguins – hanging off the front porch.  Sitting on top of that hedge doesn’t look comfortable to me.

Our neighbour, Thomas, came walking by right as we started – “That’s perfect.”  Of course it is.  Should I expect an Easter bunny next?

Sunday brought the holiday parade, delayed by the weather from Saturday.

This was a fun parade – Diana found Debra in the hundreds of Dolly Partons and we enjoyed the penguin balloon and Santa:

I had asked Diana (new sports commentator) her opinion about whether Alabama would make it to the college playoffs.  She made some notes:

I finished “Flesh” by David Szalay this week.  I can appreciate the sparse writing style that led to this winning the Booker prize.  At the same time, that’s really not my preference.  I felt as if we jumped through things way too quickly without smooth transitions.  Here’s some online review thoughts:

“From Booker Prize-winning author David Szalay, comes a propulsive, hypnotic novel about a man who is unravelled by a series of events beyond his grasp.

Fifteen-year-old István lives with his mother in a quiet apartment complex in Hungary. New to the town and shy, he is unfamiliar with the social rituals at school and soon becomes isolated, with his neighbour—a married woman close to his mother’s age—as his only companion. These encounters shift into a clandestine relationship that István himself can barely understand, and his life soon spirals out of control.

As the years pass, he is carried gradually upwards on the currents of the twenty-first century’s tides of money and power, moving from the army to the company of London’s super-rich, with his own competing impulses for love, intimacy, status and wealth winning him unimaginable riches, until they threaten to undo him completely.

Spare and penetrating, Flesh is the finest novel yet by a master of realism, asking profound questions about what drives a life: what makes it worth living, and what breaks it.”

Spotify sends out an annual “wrapped” thing.  It tells you what you listened to most, and this year provided a “listening age” based on the release years of the songs you play most.  I listened to a lot of new stuff, and apparently a lot from 1970 and 1971 – giving me a listening age of 69.  Younger than Diana’s 89 – she played a lot of Sinatra for her Mom.  Here were my top albums:

Kenny had an age of 34 and Kara was in her forties.  Hopefully they’re keeping us young at heart.

Steve Cropper died this week.  He was a guitar giant, playing with Booker T and the MGs, on most of the famous Stax records, including Otis Redding’s “Dock of the Bay.”  He was also the guitar player on the Blues Brothers albums and in the movies.  Here are some of the more famous songs:

Steve Cropper songs

As we were driving home from N7, the local radio DJ played some Steve Cropper and gave a recap of his career.  Diana laughed as he said almost all the same things I had told her in the same order.  I told her she had to leave when she didn’t now who Cropper was – kidding as I didn’t expect her to.

“Happy Thanksgiving – Cowboys win 3 in a row”

We had a smooth flight to San Francisco on Tuesday afternoon with a helpful MUber (Marco’s Uber) pickup.  Caroline had kindly cleaned the house, made up the bed, and shopped for some staples.  What Marco calls our “advance party.”

Wednesday was pretty much an all day preparation day for Diana and Alicia.  The scalloped potatoes are usually Alicia’s dish and this year I gave her a “loaded” version of the recipe – adds in bacon and other cheeses.  Diana worked on her regular and vegan stuffings.  I think I provided adequate supervision as all dishes turned out well.  Ouch – that punch hurt.

One thing you can count on in most Pacifica visits – amazing sunsets.  No disappointment on this trip:

Thanksgiving started out well with ANOTHER Cowboys win – this time over the Kansas City Chiefs – the other Superbowl team from last year.  This is what makes it so difficult to be a Cowboys fan – they beat the elite teams and lose to all kinds of others.

We had a delicious meal and enjoyed the company and particularly the usual excellent hospitality from Amy and Adamo.

Friday was a take a breath day, with Diana enjoying some well deserved veggie time.

Joey (Diana’s stepson) and his lovely family came up to visit on Saturday.  The little monsters were selling cards and gift tags outside of Grace’s shop, Sirens, and so they all went down to support them.  Some amount of the money they raised is going to support a local “resource center.”

Joey’s wife, Bonna, made a wonderful tart with fig jam, goat cheese, and onions.  I’m hoping Diana was paying attention (think she was) as it seemed like a great party guest recipe.

Marco and Julie joined later on Saturday afternoon and we had a fun visit with everyone.

Caroline and Carolyn (Clorinda’s caregivers) came over on Sunday afternoon.  It was so nice to hang out with them in a non-stressful situation.  Carolyn brought over a deep frier and all the stuff to make her famous wontons – yummy!  And she cranks them out so effortlessly.  Caroline told me a funny story that I’m going to call “Tsunami’s Over!”  You can ask me to hear it – think I’ll get in too much trouble if I publish it here.

Later on Sunday the Gypsy Hill krewe – Adamo’s group plus Andy and Jude, Diana, Carolyn, and Caroline – decorated the tree by the entrance to the hill.  Apparently this has become an annual thing with hot chocolate, champagne and carols.   I like it!

I continued with the two books I started last week.  The first was “Licks of Love” by John Updike.  Not at the level of his prime “Rabbit” and other work, but still a great read.

Updike has a way of capturing things that just makes me smile.  For example:

“She was a solid, smooth-faced woman, so nearsighted that she moved with a splay-footed pugnacity, as if something she didn’t quite see might knock her over.”

Not necessarily a kind description, but paints a picture so elegantly.

One more example:

Just wonderful – “an increase of pedantry in her fluting voice.”

Here’s an online summary of the collection:

“In this brilliant late-career collection, John Updike revisits many of the locales of his early fiction: the small-town Pennsylvania of Olinger Stories, the sandstone farmhouse of Of the Farm, the exurban New England of Couples and Marry Me, and Henry Bech’s Manhattan of artistic ambition and taunting glamour. To a dozen short stories spanning the American Century, the author has added a novella-length coda to his quartet of novels about Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom. Several strands of the Rabbit saga come together here as, during the fall and winter holidays of 1999, Harry’s survivors fitfully entertain his memory while pursuing their own happiness up to the edge of a new millennium. Love makes Updike’s fictional world go round—married love, filial love, feathery licks of erotic love, and love for the domestic particulars of Middle American life.”

The other book I dabbled in this week was “Flesh” by David Szalay.  I’ll say more about it next week.  It did win the Booker prize and is written in a quite different style – like a terse Hemingway.

I came across this on Youtube – just ridiculously talented:

Tom Stoppard died a few days ago.  You may not have heard of him – a famous British playwright who was knighted.  I studied “The Real Inspector Hound” in high school and may even have attended a performance at a theater in Glasgow.  I can still remember one line “vilified and pilloried in the stocks of common gossip.”  Crazy that just jumped into my head, given all that I can’t remember to save my life.

What’s this doing in the music section?  Fair question.  Be patient.

I read a post from our wonderful New Orleanian, originally from England, Jon Cleary.  He describes an evening from Jazzfest last year or the one before when he had Tom Stoppard at a backyard party.  Stoppard comes to see him at the tiny Chickie Wah Wah music club the following evening, and finds himself seated at the bar next to another Sir Tom – Jones.

Here’s a video of Sir Tom Jones joining in with Jon Cleary:

Here’s some of what Cleary reported:

“One Sir Tom, Tom Stoppard, the English one, was a knighted playwright, an icon of sixties and seventies London. The other Sir Tom, Tom Jones, the Welsh one, is a knighted singer of equal stature and also in the arts. They chatted amiably, amused to be seated next to one another by chance, caught up in the bonhomie, enjoying the ambience of a neighbourhood saloon bar in New Orleans at night. My job was to play the piano and and Sir Tom, the Welsh one, needed no arm-twisting to bounce over with jaunty enthusiasm to join me on the small stage to belt out an old Joe Turner tune to the delight and surprise of all the ladies in the audience (and the fellas too).”

I like that Jon uses the “proper” spelling on neighbourhood – generating a red spelling underline warning.  Don’t change it Jon.

I cite this as another example of things that only happen in New Orleans.

“Paradise Point”

Diana went for a run with Laurie on Monday morning.  I finished my reading and decided to get breakfast across the street at Chicory House.  They have a new menu and it sounded very good.  I gave it my best shot, but after waiting in line for five minutes with those entitled McGehee girls running back and forth, I couldn’t take it any more.  It’s like Diana says – “You have to time around the drop-off Moms and the annoying kids.”  Giving up, I had a snack at Ruby Slipper – the waitress forgot my drink and ketchup (two separate requests at two separate times) and so I gave her a good tip – something has to right this day.

Next stop was French Truck coffee – they have never been a problem, and true to form, they had my delicious macchiato out promptly in a “for here” cup.  Things are turning around.

I rambled my way down Magazine Street to Breaux Mart (local grocery store), where I picked up a new puzzle for McD and some other supplies.  The walk back with my purchases was a workout, but good for me.

Diana enjoyed her new “Blind Date with a Puzzle.”  I repurposed the wrapping from the last one and updated the clues:

Diana did not guess the subject of the puzzle yet.  Can you?

Here it is:

Yes – the streetcar that runs a few hundred feet from our house and can be heard from our bedroom in the middle of the night.

Around 3pm, we walked down to Bistro Aquila and split a burger and tater tots.  We had the choice of salad or fries, and one of us decided we needed tater tots.  “But their tots are so good.”

Monday was John Boutte’s birthday (of performance the night before at NOMA) and WWOZ was playing a montage of his songs (with him texting in suggestions – that’s when you know you live in a small town with a close knit musical community.)  I loved this collaboration with Jon Scofield:

Here’s another one from that wonderful album:

I know, sometimes the music and book parts spill over into the weekly update part.  Such is this blog.

On Tuesday we picked up Anne for a drive down to her condo in Navarre (Florida panhandle close to Fort Walton.)  We had dinner at the restaurant on the pier.  My drink was served in a fancy glass, while the girls got their wine in plastic cups.  On inquiry, I learned that “we have 4 of those fancy glasses for Old Fashioneds and the like”, not for wine.  Anne was considering donating some condo glasses.

The girls were very productive on Wednesday morning – boxing up an entire service of china to be passed down.  They earned some beach time in the afternoon.  The place was deserted – great weather, no wind and chilly water.  Perfect!

And later it got very calm and pretty:

Anne and McD made their way to Fort Walton Beach to meet up with Anne’s long time friends Tammy, Susie, and Beth for a pizza dinner:

I decided to enjoy a quiet night alone.

Thursday was similar, Diana and I went for a longish walk and then Diana helped Anne to pack up some glasses and such.  Then we relaxed out back on “Paradise Point”:

Anne’s Mum and Dad have plaques on a bench by the point:

We made our way home on Friday afternoon, stopping in Mobile, Alabama for lunch.  The girls chose “Noble South” as our stop.  It had just earned  a “Bib Gourmand” rating from the first ever Michelin review of the South and did very well from the “K Review.”

The food and service were very good.  Diana’s grain bowl was a stand out.

Diana was a trooper on Friday night, going out with the enlarged Krewe to see Hayes Carll at Tipitinas – I knew I would be too tired and stayed in.

This was the opener “A Drunken Poet’s Dream:”

And here’s the great pianist:

Diana bumbled home shortly after midnight to tell me about 45 Chop, a bar down from Tipitinas that I’ve been to a few times, but not in years.  Funnily, Debra and the 300 Dolly Parton marching ladies showed up on Saturday and reported that their afternoon started at 45 Chop – a place Diana hadn’t hear of before last night.

Saturday was free outside music day.  Laurel Street porch concert followed by the Kingpin.  Pedro, Martin and Oscar were together again at Laurel Street.  We had previously seen them at the NOMA last Sunday.  Here they shared all that positive and youthful energy again:

World class jazz musicians performing on a porch for free.  Only in New Orleans, in my opinion.  We saw the three of them perform some of the same music a week ago.  It was just as good the second time.

After that, we dropped by Martin (local wine store) to pick up supplies to make Spaghetts  for the boys at Denny’s later (MIller High Life, Aperol and lemon juice.)  And then on to the Iguanas at the Kingpin with all the Dolly Partons and Debra.  I finally met Diana’s running friend Laurie at the Kingpin.  Her husband, Michael, filled in for me at trivia on Tuesday and the team won first place – so you can imagine the chatter about that.

Denny and Anne invited a bunch of us over to watch the Alabama and LSU college football game on Saturday evening.  This was a very fun night with good friends.  Greg brought an amazing pork loin, stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped in bacon – that and a smoky spaghetti squash side.

My book this week was “The Librarians” by Sherry Thomas.

“”This delicious murder mystery is a must-read for any library lover!”—New York Times bestselling author Shelby Van Pelt

Murder disrupts four quirky librarians’ lives when they try to hide among books to keep their secrets.

A LIBRARY READS PICK!

Sometimes a workplace isn’t just a workplace but a place of safety, understanding, and acceptance. And sometimes murder threatens the sanctity of that beloved refuge….

In the leafy suburbs of Austin, Texas, a small branch library welcomes the public every day of the week. But the patrons who love the helpful, unobtrusive staff and leave rave reviews on Yelp don’t always realize that their librarians are human, too.

Hazel flees halfway across the world for what she hopes will be a new beginning. Jonathan, a six-foot-four former college football player, has never fit in anywhere else. Astrid tries to forget her heartbreak by immersing herself in work, but the man who ghosted her six months ago is back, promising trouble. And Sophie, who has the most to lose, maintains a careful and respectful distance from her coworkers, but soon that won’t be enough anymore.

When two patrons turn up dead after the library’s inaugural murder mystery–themed game night, the librarians’ quiet routines come crashing down. Something sinister has stirred, something that threatens every single one of them. And the only way the librarians can save the library—and themselves—is to let go of their secrets, trust one another, and band together….

All in a day’s work.”

I’m about half way through and am enjoying this book quite a bit.  I put it on Diana’s list – she loves to try and solve the mystery.

I am a huge Rick Wakeman  fan – all the over the top stagings and bankrupting performances notwithstanding.   Here’s a recent performance of the magnificent “The Six Wives of  Henry VIII:”

I lost the recent performance clip and so gave you the old vinyl version.

Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all.

“True Companion”

Monday started with a walk in the park.  We both talked to our financial advisor during our walk – Diana being sure to let him know she was ahead of me.  He was calling to commiserate on our legal bill for estate planning and the like – the price remains the same.

I got a few interesting pictures on Tuesday.  Will and Christine’s professional pictures from the Eiffel tower:

And these three rock stars that are making my retirement savings blossom:

$4/share when I joined to $19 shortly after I left – I’m sure that’s all my hard work…

Those guys are in Roatan, Honduras at the annual recognition event that Diana and I loved the last two years – some things you miss out on in retirement – particularly spending time with those three daily.

While we’re on non-weekly activity based content, I learned that a “Nickelodeon” was originally a jukebox that took a nickel to play a song – that’s where the TV channel came from.  I did not know that.

Continuing in that vein -a funny that Diana got from Ken – “if a con is the opposite of a pro, does that mean that congress is the opposite of progress” – most definitely!

We, and particularly I, had a pretty poor showing at trivia on Tuesday.  Even worse given that it was Thom’s birthday.  The only highlight was the cannoli’s that Thom brought form Brocato’s – perfect little nibbles.  We had a table based trivia question – what movie has the line, “Leave the gun, take the cannoli”?  I guessed Pulp Fiction, everyone else got it right – Godfather part I.

“Leave the gun, take the cannoli” is a famous line from the movie The Godfather.  It was delivered by the character Peter Clemenza after his associate Rocco kills a traitor and it was an improvised line by actor Richard Castellano, who added it after his wife suggested it to him.”

Here was the final question.  We bet the maximum and got it wrong by a long shot.  I think we bet 49 as the answer, you get 5 points either way from the correct answer of 25 and we somehow arrived at 49.

The “Number of seasons in the original Star Trek” did get a funny story out of McD.  After she guessed the answer correctly, she told me her favourite episode was “Trouble with Tribbles.”  And went on to describe how cute the “tribbles” really were:

We flew to Kansas City on Wednesday, ahead of the Marc Cohn and Shawn Colvin concert on Thursday night.  Marc has Parkinson’s disease and we wanted to see him one final time.

Wednesday night diner was at the Antler Room.  My search for “best restaurants in downtown Kansas City” had this one on it – and I almost skipped by, envisioning a trophy animal head type of establishment.  Thankfully I gave it a second look.  The shared plate menu was amazing, located in a house in a historical neighborhood.

Diana looked at the small menu and said, “I’ll eat anything on this list.”  That lets me know it’s an amazing selection.  And it was.  We started with cauliflower, then carrots, then radiatori pasta with crab, and finally amazing mushroom things.  Everything was so good.  When I got to the concert on Thursday night, the guy next to me, the lead architect on the renovation of the Folly theater, said it was his favourite KC restaurant.  The cauliflower  (reminds me of the amazing place in Bend, Oregon when Finn was there):

Carrots can be so wonderful:

And finally the crab pasta (I didn’t capture the wonderful mushroom pockets):

If you find yourself in KC, skip the steak houses and BBQ joints and go here.

After all that, we had made a reservation at 1587 Prime for 10pm.  This is Patrick Mahomes (KC Chiefs quarterback #15) and Travis Kelce (KC Chiefs tight end and Taylor Swift fiancée #87) new place.  It opened a few months ago and folks in town told us it takes months to get reservations.

There was a party going on in this place.  I couldn’t believe it was full at 10pm – and it was.  They were playing great music at a good volume, but it was still easy to have a conversation at the table – some amazing acoustic planning.  We were going to have a drink and the steak tartare.  Our server talked us into the carpaccio instead – good call – the steak, truffles and mushrooms were amazing.  The tuna tartare, served with some fancy foam, was also delicious.

1587 was way over the top, and the service was perfect – casual, relaxed, kind and knowledgeable – very hard to teach.  I was impressed by the environment and the wait staff.

I started Thursday with a swim in the 22nd floor lap pool (nice feature that clearly pre-dated the Marriott acquisition – they wouldn’t spend the money for a lap pool.)  After that we walked to Homegrown for brunch.  It’s weird how quiet downtown KC is during the day – no cars on the streets, parking lots empty, restaurants quiet – where is everybody?  Brunch was good but nothing exceptional.

The concert arrived on Thursday night – a solid hundred yards from our hotel.

The Folly theater was gorgeous.  I was asking the usher about the new seats.  He told me they widened them, taking out one per row, about 20 years ago.  The guy sitting next to me turned out to be the lead architect for the renovation – he had to negotiate the acoustic damping discs versus the group who wanted to retain the details of the ceiling.  I don’t know how it sounded before, but after it’s excellent.  The discs are similar, but much smaller than those in the Royal Albert Hall.

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And then there was the concert.  I think I said before that Marc Cohn has Parkinson’s disease and this may be his last tour.  We knew this, but were not prepared for the vision of him walking out so frailly and relying on Shawn Colvin for his balance.  The first song just floored us:

He may be “tougher than the rest” indeed.  That’s a setlist from a couple of days before and pretty close to what we heard.

Marc started his solo set with 29 Ways, a Willie Dixon cover, and a great example of his wonderful backup pianist:

Shawn Colvin took over for a bit to give Marc a break:

Marc came back for his two famous songs, first “True Companion”, our wedding song (I smile every time I hear “my arms are open wide” and remember our choreography):

And then, “Walking in Memphis” – “Ma’am I am Tonight”:

The concert finished with a cover of Van’s “Into the Mystic”, morphing into all his other well known songs.  What a poignant event – a great musician sidelined by a horrible disease – particularly for someone who relies on the steadiness of his fingers for his livelihood..

How about this song leading up to the encore.  Geez:

We walked to the “River District” on Friday morning for brunch at the Farmhouse.  This was a yummy farm to table spot that had some interesting mushrooms for their omelets.  Diana chose to explore the river area while I walked back to the hotel.  She accidentally found a large homeless encampment and then explored the rest of the river area.  We had commented earlier in the week that there were so few people living on the streets, and Diana found out where they congregated.

Here’s some quick research on the history of Kansas City, which appears to be modern and booming city:

History of Kansas City

Other than some traffic leaving the airport for our drive home, this was a smooth trip for a last concert from Cohn.

We watched the “Diplomat’ TV series on Friday night – so well written and acted.

We enjoyed the show with a “Smoky Blue Rogue Creamery” cheese – wonderful!  The best cheese that I’ve tasted in a long time.

I watched LSU lose on Saturday morning in college football – such an underperforming team.  Alabama did win for the Ogan contingent visiting for homecoming weekend.  UT did eke out a win over Kentucky – a late birthday present for Thom, albeit barely a win.

My main book this week was “Blood, Bones and Butter” by Gabrielle Hamilton.  Anthony Bourdain advertised this as his favourite chef book – I loved it all around.

Remembering D’Angelo

From a bus in Florianopolis to an audience with the King from Indianola

It’s 1995 and I’m riding 12 hours on a bus in Brazil, an uncomfortable, bouncy, long, overnight journey on bad roads from Sao Paolo to a coastal town called Florianópolis, many miles distant. Buried somewhere in my bag is a tape that had arrived the week before in my New Orleans mailbox. It was from a friend in the UK. ‘Listen to this’ said the handwritten scrawl on the cover. So, as the long night stretched ahead and the ceaseless panorama of dreary Brazilian jungle paraded past the bus window, I dug out the cassette, glanced at the picture on the cover of someone I’d never heard of, put the headphones on and pressed play.

I knew nothing about D’Angelo, had never heard of him. I was prepared to be underwhelmed; the name seemed pretentious – something a major label exec. would have come up with. Over the next ten or eleven hours, I listened and nodded off and woke, the music still playing, and listened and glanced at the blackness through the window and listened some more and flipped the tape over again and fell back asleep. My curiosity grew as my discomfort and fatigue deepened. And while I dozed, woke and slept, the music filled my head and my imagination, and I think it’s true to say that the contents of my skull have not been quite the same since.

It was a game changer and an epiphany. The more I heard, the more it seemed to me that the music I was hearing on this cassette tape was the missing link: the connection between music of the future, as yet unborn, and the rhythm and blues and soul of two decades past, the world of Curtis Mayfield, Johnny ‘Guitar’ Watson and Donny Hathaway; that linear evolution that had been side-lined into oblivion by ‘crossover’, major label distribution and the ‘four on the floor’ Disco of the mid ‘70s.

In the mid nineties there was no internet yet, no googling, well at least there wasn’t for me, not in my neck of New Orleans in South Louisiana. No information, no way of finding out who was actually hands on, playing the musical instruments on this record. What was D’Angelo? Who was D’Angelo? I didn’t know but it seemed obvious that that voice was connected to those fingers on the keys, one mind at work, one brain and that there was genius there.

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It’s 1996 and I’ve just arrived at John Porter’s house in Los Angeles from the airport. John, stirring a freshly brewed cup of tea, says excitedly, “I’ve been asked to produce a B.B. King record for MCA, an album of duets. Help me make up a list, the record company’s sent me the names of who they want and it’s the same people they always suggest: Willie Nelson, Carlos Santana, Van Morrison, Eric Clapton…”

So we put their list on one side and came up with another hipper list on the other and I asked him, ’Have you heard of this guy D’Angelo? No-one really knows him, but he’s amazing. We should definitely get this guy, he’d be perfect’. He hadn’t, and really at that point, neither had anyone else. ’No’, he said, “sadly, the problem is the label won’t go for it’. It’s typical, they only want big famous names that’ll guarantee record sales”.

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It’s 1997 and I’m in New York, at the recording studio for the first day of tracking. I’d arrived with John before everyone else showed up and I was at the piano, checking it out, getting the morning’s cobwebs pout of my fingers. John Porter came from the control room, stuck his head round the door with a slightly mischievous smile on his face and said,”Oh, By the way, I forgot to tell you, guess who’s coming in today? D’Angelo”. I couldn’t believe it. I’d been listening to nothing but Johnny Watson and D’Angelo for the last six months.

Minutes later D’Angelo walked in to the room, empty but for me and the mics and the instruments. He walked over to the piano, I stood and we shook hands, he said hello, smiled a shy smile, seemingly a little embarrassed to have interrupted my piano noodling. He sat behind the B3 organ and we played, grooving for about ten minutes, just the two of us in the room. Hearing those first few notes, I knew that I’d been right, that it was indeed him playing keys on the Brown Sugar record, it was one person’s brain behind all that music, music that had been spinning around and bouncing off the walls of my brain since that long bus ride in Brazil – confirmation that he was everything I suspected and more – and we hit it off.

We fooled around on the instruments and chatted and he asked me if I dug Thelonious Monk, I said I did, I really did. He said he’d only recently got hip to him and then proceeded to casually trot out some ridiculously cool Monk licks that blew my mind. That’s when I knew that not only could this guy really, really play, but that that he had something different. He was possessed of genius, the real thing. In a world where that word has been bandied about and whose currency has been so devalued, he was a genius, the real deal. And I knew even then that this was one of the few times in my life I was likely to be in the same room as that much talent.

The session got underway. The musicians filed in introducing themselves, taking their places, twiddling controls and getting sounds, drinking coffee, telling jokes. John Porter and Joe the engineer came in to make some mic adjustments. ‘What are we doing?’ I asked. John said, “Dunno yet. The song B.B. wants to to cut is ‘Ain’t Nobody Home’ by Jerry Ragavoy. But first we should just play something for everyone to warm up and get some sounds. D. just said he wants to play some Johnny ‘Guitar’ Watson”.

B.B. was a delight to play music with, an absolute monster gentleman. And the rhythm section was killing too: Hugh McCracken, Steve Jordan, Leon Pendarvis and bassist Pino Palladino who had flown in from London, an old acquaintance of mine through a mutual friend, alto player, Mike Paice.

D’Angelo started singing ’Superman Lover’. The musicians fell in, one by one, and the combined instruments locked into a natural groove, everyone gracefully re-calibrating to D.’s unique sense of time as the unit, playing together for the first time, morphed into a well-oiled machine. His unique vocal phrasing, his timing and the way he approached the keyboard smothered extra layers of grease on the gears. For about twenty minutes we jammed, the band fine-tuned now like a cross between a Rolls-Royce and a ‘73 Cadillac Eldorado while the engineers made all the adjustments. We got to the end and I said fuck, that was incredible, let’s cut it. ‘Oh no,’ D. said, ‘I didn’t want to record it, I just felt like playing it!’

We got back to work, and If I remember correctly we cut ‘Ain’t Nobody Home’ in one take. We filed into the control room to listen back and everyone was pleased with what we’d got, ready to move on to the next guest artist and the next tune. I think it’s fair to say that at that time I was perhaps the only one in the room that had really familiar with D’Angelo’s music and knew that one of the things that made him so special was the way he sang his own background vocals. I suggested to D. who was sitting next to me, talking on the phone, that before he left he should stack up some falsetto harmonies on the chorus hook. He seemed pleased that someone had suggested it, almost too shy to have suggested it himself. I had a quick word in John’s ear and D. went back to the vocal mic and laid one part on top of another, quickly, effortlessly, flawlessly and brilliantly. And the song was complete. All that was left to do was to record Wardell Quezergue’s horn arrangement, a separate session that happened a few months later in New Orleans when John was in town working making a record with me at the Boiler Room studio.

D’Angelo was happy and had obviously enjoyed the morning’s work. I don’t think he’d ever done a session quite like this before, a little overawed to be in a New York studio recording with this calibre of session players, and for a legend like B.B. King, no less. He took a few selfies with B.B, introduced me to his friend, Amir, who had a great afro and his girlfriend, Angie, who was holding their new baby.

He was unhappy though with the phone conversation. It had been from his bass player, who had called to cancel – stranding D. at short notice without a bass player for an important gig. An idea had occurred to him though – a long shot. He’d been impressed by Pino’s masterful bass playing and before leaving asked him if there was any chance he might be able to change his plans and fill in.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Here’s the song:

I know – not that exciting after all of that.

Here are some more exciting things, the songs that Mark Cohn and Shawn Colvin covered:

Coexist peacefully, with patience and kindness for all.

“Gretna Fest, 2025”

When I left you last week, I was watching the Saints and Bills football game.  The Saints hung in well and ended up losing – a much more promising game than last week.

After that game, we walked over to NOLA Brewing to listen to The Walrus, a very good local Beatles cover band.  Denny joined us for a while.

Next we made the short walk to Peet’s out in the cold so that Diana (and Denny) could get a frozen Pimm’s cup.  Denny was then going to drop us home.  We let him drive a little while before asking where he was going (seemed to be heading home and not to our home.)  He was confused and we ended up driving further down Magazine to check out a brand new place called Studio.  This seems to be a high end steak and other exotic meats place and they say they will open a butcher shop soon.

Then it was time for the Cowboys and Packers game.  Very evenly matched, ultimately going into overtime and ending in the first Cowboys tied game since 1969.

Here’s a more detailed recap:

Cowboys Packers Game Recap

Diana had finished her new puzzle before lunch on Monday.  I’m going to get more than 1,000 pieces going forward.

Diana had to get a sore tooth looked at on Monday afternoon – likely a root canal candidate.   While she did that, I hosted Tommy at the house to investigate a leak from the A/C duct in our living room.  I was also able to track down a guy in Gulfport, Mississippi who may be able to fix our electric grand piano.  The annual termite inspection was also scheduled for this week.  Look at me cranking out administrative tasks at the start of the week.

“Roadtrip to Gulfport, Mississippi” was the Tuesday theme.  We left around 10:30am and arrived before noon.  As mentioned in the previous paragraph, the intent was to rendezvous with a guy who might be able to fix our Yamaha electric grand piano.  I met Eric and handed over the patient – I had disassembled the keyboard and I thought identified the issue – a capacitor on the amplifier/sound board.  We went to find some lunch while Eric worked on things.

I had assigned Diana the task of finding a nice place for lunch during our drive.  She chose “The Chimneys”, a somewhat upscale place on the beach road.

We were both pleased with our seafood lunches.  Diana had a crab and shrimp salad and I had grouper with scallops.  The setting was lovely – mature oak trees and a view of the beach and ocean.

Eric called, as we were enjoying an after lunch coffee at Boozers, to let us know that all was fixed.

I enjoyed the piano pickup – made the pleasant mistake of asking if he worked on Hammond organs.  Eric took me to the other room, full of Hammonds and regaled me with stories of the various churches that he had retrieved them from and how he maintained all the local church’s Hammond organs.  Good stuff.

The capacitor was indeed the issue – an $0.18 part – good grief!

All fixed:

Here’s a bunch more info on Gulfport and the history:

Gulfport Mississippi Information

We listened to a podcast of Terry Gros from Fresh Air, in conversation with Mark Ronson about his new book, “Night People – How to be a DJ in New York in the 90s.”  This was a very good listen.  Ronson has won 9 Grammy awards as a producer and collaborator and has an amazing musical ear and creativity.  His step father is Mick Jones of Foreigner and I enjoyed his stories about helping Mick decide which mix of famous Foreigner songs was best.

Here’s a quote from the podcast:

“You just get this crazy blowback, this charge from the crowd all going like, ‘Oh!’ at the same time. You can call it the scream, the chant, whatever it is,” Ronson says. “It’s like clay or Play-Doh, like the whole crowd is this thing that you’re able to mold together. It’s incredible. It’s kind of why I can’t stop DJing. It’s still a feeling that I only get from this one thing, no matter what else I do in my work as a producer.”

I enjoyed talking to our friend Nick about this book.  He was a DJ in New York around the same time and says Ronson was his idol.

Open in Spotify

I was sorry to read this article about the wonderful Austin, TX guitar player and singer, Ian Moore, and his voice loss:

Ian Moore Can’t Speak

The Tuesday newspaper included an article about the “skeleton house” on State Street – it’s up and running and one of the new pieces for this year is hilarious:

This just made it on the Sunday morning national news show with Willie Geist.

I did not make it to trivia on Tuesday night and the krewe came in third.  This was the final question, which they answered correctly:

My guess is iPod, Office, Farmville, Netflix.  After research the correct list is:

Farmville 2009

Netflix 2007

Office 2005

iPod 2001

I’ve never heard of Farmville, so no wonder I got that in the wrong spot.

If it’s Wednesday, then it’s likely that Diana, Kara, and Laurie are running in Audubon park and doing yoga.  Yes – this is a typical Wednesday.

Then we went to see the movie “Eleanor the Great” starring June Squibb, 95 years old and amazing, playing a 94 year old lady who has moved back to New York.

Eleanor the Great details

The movie is directed by Scarlett Johansson and I teased Diana that we were just going to see it to support the director.  We both loved this movie and highly recommend it.  There are not many movies made like this these days – a great story, small cast, wonderful acting, and lots of quiet scenes with no dialog.

After the movie, I surprised Diana with a wander through the French Quarter to Patula, a hidden restaurant near the Toulouse and Royal intersection.  This was our first visit and an excellent experience.  A beautiful hidden courtyard, a wine that Diana loved, delicious Turkish style meatballs with yogurt and dill sauce, and wonderful service.  Highly recommended and going on the regular rotation.

Here’s a more detailed write up on Patula:

Patula – Gambit article

Diana just told me there’s a new article about Patula in the paper – from a selfish perspective, that’s not helpful.

We had a walk and run in the park to start out Thursday.  I even ran a bit as the weather starts to cool marginally.  The termite inspection guy decided to try and come a couple of hours early as I was in the park – and wanted to argue with me that he had no control over his schedule and it wasn’t his fault I was told the wrong time – “I really don’t mind and am happy for you to reschedule.”  Surprisingly (not) he was able to fit us in during the afternoon – and we are termite free.

We watched “All the King’s Men” on Thursday evening.  This is about Huey P. Long and stars Sean Penn in that role.  Jude Law, Kate Winslet, Patricia Clarkson, Anthony Hopkins and James Gandolfini all have parts.  The movie occurred to me as I read in the Kermit at Vaughan’s book that they remodeled the bar with the money they received from the movie.  I’ll have to watch again as I didn’t see anything that looked like Vaughan’s.

Diana had a run with Laurie on Friday morning, and I walked the 2.5 miles to meet her for breakfast at a new place afterwards.  Cafe Malou opened on Monday and is connected to the wonderful Octavia Books via louvered book shelves, giving a speakeasy feel.

I listened to a podcast interview with the bluegrass phenom, Bill Strings, during my walk.  This guy has had a very difficult life.  My goodness.  Thankfully music seems to have saved him so far.

Open in Spotify

The restaurant is small and loud when filled with the uptown ladies meeting up after dropping their kids at school.  We will time our arrival differently next time.  The food, however, was very good.  I had grits carbonara – baked eggs with creamy grits and bacon – yummy.  Diana had smoked salmon toast and a side of bacon – also yummy.  I was notified that we’ll need to return soon to try the chocolate pot de creme:

Friday afternoon brought one of my weekly highlights – making groceries (that’s what they say here) with my wife.  Always a treat.  We bought supplies to make a lemon chicken and orzo dish and to reprise the breakfast casserole that I enjoyed recently.

Here was my mis en place preparation for the lemon chicken.  Just like a cooking demonstration on TV.

I listened to WWOZ (local radio station) reprising their “Festing in Place” series:

“Festing in Place” was such a treat during COVID.  Reliving Jazzfest experiences – and Diana decorated our patio with all the wonderful photographic memories over the years.

After dinner we watched Jon Batiste performing the opening show of the new Austin City Limits series (maybe the last given funding situations these days.)  Excellent as always and highly recommended – such a variety of music and musicians.

Here’s a short biography of the wonderful Batiste:

Jon Batiste – a brief biography

And after that we watched about half of “The Lost Bus”- about a bus of school children trying to make it out of the Paradise, California wild fires.  Matthew McConaughey is the bus driver.

Diana met Julia for a walk in the park on Saturday morning.  I made my breakfast casserole and added Italian seasoned chicken this time.  Here’s the recipe if you would like to play along:

breakfast casserole

And here’s a recommended cooking playlist that I used with the casserole:

Diana showed me this post from our neighbours and the three pups:

It rained off and on all afternoon, and I decided to break open my model car that Mum gave me for my birthday.  It’s a large, complicated undertaking and comes with a 500 page assembly manual.  After over an hour, I had just this start to the chassis done.  It took a while to figure out the difference between many pieces that look alike.  I think things will go much faster now that I’m over some of the basics.

Denny and Anne picked us up to go and see the Honey Island Swamp Band at NOLA Brewing on Saturday evening.  Greg, Colleen, Fred and Kelly also attended.

The opening band went on forever and then the Honey Island tuned up forever.  A show that was advertised to start at 7pm (albeit with an opening band) didn’t start until 9pm.  They lost at least half of their audience.  Once the band started, I enjoyed them:

I made the mistake of suggesting frozen Pimms cups on the way home – Anne and Diana were all in.  It took a while for Anne to convince Denny to take a picture with this “Shout out to my arms for always being by my side” sign:

I enjoyed an article in the Sunday paper about the ability to get a haircut and a shot for $20 at the R bar in the Marigny.  Diana was there recently with Kenny and Kara and took a picture of Kenny relaxing in the barber chair.  This happens on Monday nights from 7pm until midnight.  One puts one’s name on the list with the bartender and waits one’s turn.

https://app.nola.com/article/a-cut-of-the-action/content.html

We braved the rain on Sunday for Gretna Fest (one of my favourite annual festivals.)  My weather app showed no rain from noon until 5pm – that would allow us to see the three bands I like before heading home.

The rain was light when we arrived and soon let up – I thought we were in the clear.

This scary looking wolf thing was guarding the Italian village food area.  Sent it to Adamo as his Lupo constrcution is named after this species.

You can tell from the pictures that this festival was very lightly attended when we arrived just after noon.  Even fewer people in the margarita area – usually very busy:

We set up near the front of the main stage and awaited the first band, Uncle Lucius.

We like this band a lot and have seen them several times.  Kevin Galloway has a great voice.  I thought this was the best that I had heard them – I think a new guitar player was helping lift their game but haven’t researched that yet.  You might see someone you recognize up on the big screen in this video:

Next up was St. Paul and the Broken Bones.  I have seen them on TV quite a few times, but never live.  The band was very good and the singer very passionate, but they didn’t grab and keep my attention as much as other live bands.  I know they’ve sold out Tipitinas a few times and think that might be a better venue for them.

Some heavy rain arrived during the St. Paul set.  Thankfully Diana and I were prepared with ponchos and her wellies, Denny – not so much:

Look at these four drowned folks:

Denny, in an attempt to needle me, mentioned a young up and coming Country artist playing on the other big stage on the Riverfront.  I offered to accompany Diana over there and miss the second half of St. Paul.

The offer was well received and she enjoyed John Foster quite a bit.  He was quite impressive for 19 years old.  Here’s the band doing the Charlie Daniels classic, “The Devil Went Down to Georgia:”

We returned to the Main Stage for JJ Grey and the rain rejoined us – quite heavy now.  I’m amazed that these shows continue with as much water on the stage.  JJ Grey was a real highlight for us – even better than I’ve heard him before, with two backup singers this time.  Diana looked to see where he’s playing in the future that we might want to visit – that’s how much she enjoyed the show:

And finally, here’s what that sounded like a year ago at the same location:

This was a wonderful day of music and fun, despite the persistent rain.  We did leave before Trombone Shorty – enough rain and stuff for the day already.

Here’s a wonderful personal history story from Ann Patchett, published in the New Yorker:

Glowworms by Anne Patchett

Clorinda loved Ann Patchett, particularly “The Dutch House”.  I’ve enjoyed everything of hers that I’ve read, the only disappointment being “Bel Canto”, which others really enjoy but I just couldn’t relate to at all.

I read less than normal this week, making meager progress on “Real Tigers” by Mick Herron.   I’ve always enjoyed the “Slow Horses” TV series and have been happy to find this series of very well written books.  Here’s a summary of the story:

“London: Slough House is the MI5 branch where disgraced operatives are reassigned after they’ve messed up too badly to be trusted with real intelligence work. The “Slow Horses,” as the failed spies of Slough House are called, are doomed to spend the rest of their careers pushing paper, but they all want back in on the action.

When one of their own is kidnapped and held for ransom, the agents of Slough House must defeat the odds, overturning all expectations of their competence, to breach the top-notch security of MI5’s intelligence headquarters, Regent’s Park, and steal valuable intel in exchange for their comrade’s safety. The kidnapping is only the tip of the iceberg, however–the agents uncover a larger web of intrigue that involves not only a group of private mercenaries but the highest authorities in the Secret Service. After years spent as the lowest on the totem pole, the Slow Horses suddenly find themselves caught in the midst of a conspiracy that threatens not only the future of Slough House, but of MI5 itself.”

I really like the opening paragraph of this book:

“Like most forms of corruption, it began with men in suits.
    A weekday morning on the edge of the City; damp, dark, foggy, not yet five. In the nearby towers, some of which reached upwards of twenty storeys, random windows were lit, making haphazard patterns in the glass-and-steel grids, and some of those lights meant early-bird bankers were at their desks, getting a jump on the markets, but most were a sign that the other City workers were on the job, the ones who wore overalls, and whose pre-dawn tasks involved vacuuming, polishing, emptying bins. Paul Lowell’s sympathies were with the latter. You either cleaned up other people’s messes or you didn’t–and that was the class system for you, right there.”

This Bowie cover was playing on the Patula patio and caught my ear:

This was on a radio show this week, I just can’t remember which one:

One of my cooking soundtrack songs:

Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all!

“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?