“Resting Up”
When I left you, I was settling in to watch the Cowboys game. It was a good one, and they won the division. On to the playoffs! Thanks to Diana for signing me up for NFL Sunday Ticket so that I could watch the “out of market” game. I could even watch four games at once:
We did not make it to the Joe Krown show at the Maple Leaf. The girls were worn out from their afternoon in the French Quarter.
The middle part of the week was pretty quiet – recovering from all the New Year excitement and resting up for Mardi Gras.
We did make a trip to the nearest Home Depot to pick up pipe insulation and spigot covers for the upcoming below freezing temperatures. Diana remarked on the barbed wire around the top of the wall around Home Depot. I pointed out that it was actually razor wire – they really don’t want anyone climbing over that wall. Interestingly, there was a wall all the way around the parking lot and only one entry/exit point. We didn’t think we were in that bad of a neighborhood. Anne filled us in – that was put up right after Katrina when the store was constantly looted.
I decided to check a few things off my Diana To Do list. They were mostly outside of my skillset, or things I just didn’t fancy tackling. It seems like everything I take on with this house ends up being much more difficult than anticipated. I asked Tommy, our air conditioning guy, if he knew a handyman. “Sure, my brother will do it.” Billy showed up later in the day to check things out. And, yes, he’s as much of a character as Tommy. Just a great fellow. He just stopped by to drop off a bunch of fresh crabs and sauce for Diana – left over from his weekend feast.
Billy fixed a “broken” outlet, put a new outlet in the upstairs closet for the Dyson to charge, and ran power and mounted a new ceiling fan in the third floor area. Replacing the kitchen faucet and finishing the ceiling repairs are on deck for later this week. “Broken” is in quotes because there was really nothing wrong with the outlet – it had worked for a while and then stopped. Diana had mentioned to Billy that she’d like to figure out what the fourth switch on the kitchen wall went to. After checking all the fuse boxes and testing the outlet, Billy was at a loss. Then it occurred to him – the fourth switch. Ha!
I walked over to Aidan Gill’s for a haircut on Friday, and followed that by stopping in to try the Latin American restaurant across the street. Maya’s is a small place that I see each time I’m down on that part of Magazine, but had never tried. Their empanadas were good, and the large plates that other folks were having looked great.
Anne called on Friday afternoon and invited us to Happy Hour at Pizza Domenica. Another great place on Magazine street. Wine and pizza were half off between 3 and 5pm. What a deal! We had a pleasant visit and won’t see Anne again for a few weeks – she was off to visit her Mom in Florida, and then meeting up with Denny in Boulder.
I took Diana to a new place on Saturday afternoon – the Broad Theater is a very cool cinema in an interesting part of Mid City. It has so much more character than the massive AMC cineplexes. Diana was quite chuffed that a refill of wine and her large popcorn bucket was all of $5. We saw “American Fiction”, starring Jeffrey Wright.
The movie was very enjoyable – a humorous send up of “woke” culture and the clamoring around African American literature. McD enjoyed it as well – I wasn’t sure that she would.
I did battle with the Kamado Joe smoker on Sunday morning. My intent was to make a rack of baby back ribs to accompany the Cowboys playoff game. The plan was to cook at 220 degrees for 3 hours. The Kamado wanted to be hotter than that, and when I closed the vents sufficiently to get down to 220, it stayed for about an hour and then it seemed like the fire went out. The ribs were finished off on the regular grill and tasted good but not as great as they would have if cooked slower. My new bluetooth thermometer (Christmas from Diana) was very helpful in letting me know what was going on in the smoker.
And then there was the Cowboys playoff game against the Green Bay Packers. What a disaster from start to finish. A huge disappointment from the team that has the number one offense in football. I’m contemplating becoming a Saints fan next year. There have just been so many years like this – a great regular season and then a complete choke in the first playoff game.
While I was yelling at the TV – I gave up when it became apparent that the Cowboys had no chance, Diana was staying out of the way with her new birthday puzzle that Mum sent. She really enjoyed it – with the “whimsy” pieces:
And of course she wasn’t walking away from the table until it was completed:
I’m working my way through “The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store” by James McBride. It topped a number of “Best of 2023” lists. I’m not sure I like it that much yet, but I have quite a bit left to go, so I’ll let you know. Here’s an online synopsis.
“In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new development, the last thing they expected to find was a skeleton at the bottom of a well. Who the skeleton was and how it got there were two of the long-held secrets kept by the residents of Chicken Hill, the dilapidated neighborhood where immigrant Jews and African Americans lived side by side and shared ambitions and sorrows. Chicken Hill was where Moshe and Chona Ludlow lived when Moshe integrated his theater and where Chona ran the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. When the state came looking for a deaf boy to institutionalize him, it was Chona and Nate Timblin, the Black janitor at Moshe’s theater and the unofficial leader of the Black community on Chicken Hill, who worked together to keep the boy safe.
As these characters’ stories overlap and deepen, it becomes clear how much the people who live on the margins of white, Christian America struggle and what they must do to survive. When the truth is finally revealed about what happened on Chicken Hill and the part the town’s white establishment played in it, McBride shows us that even in dark times, it is love and community—heaven and earth—that sustain us.
Bringing his masterly storytelling skills and his deep faith in humanity to The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, James McBride has written a novel as compassionate as Deacon King Kong and as inventive as The Good Lord Bird.”
I may have shared this Duane Allman classic before. Either way, it’s worth repeating:
A very pleasant Jimmy Buffet cover:
And finally, a fun new sound that I came across:
Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all!