Food Frustration

I looked down at my feet on the bank while using a popper for some fat bluegills. A moth fluttered in the grass a few inches from the water. A perch came out of the water six inches, in a sort of evolutionary quarterback-sack dry Australian crawl, ate the moth, backed into the water and swam away. If somebody told me that, I wouldn't believe them either.
-- Howard Waldrop, "Come For the Fish, Stay For the Fish"

Tuesday, September 21, 1999
One year ago: Lee Press-On
Two years ago: Work Ethic

The lindy exchange dance weekend was great! But I'm still rather tired from it, so I'll go back and write my report tomorrow night.

I went to work Monday morning with two guests still in my apartment! Amy and Michelle from Chicago were going to be doing some things in Seattle during the day, so I left them sleeping in my living room.

Food at work was frustrating yesterday! When I arrived, they only had small cartons of skim milk, which isn't so good for oatmeal. I succumbed, and bought myself a sausage and muffin breakfast sandwich -- not the healthy food I'd intended! (I realized later that I could have asked them to pour me a cup of milk for the same price as one of the cartons, and they'd probably have done it.)

Then, at lunch, I walked again into the small deli on the first floor of our building. "A Reuben, please." oops! The two weeks when Reubens are the daily grill special are over; now it's grilled turkey and havarti, which wasn't what I was hankering for at all. "Ok, give me tortellini from the pasta bar, with pesto sauce, please." Sorry, no pesto, only garlic alfredo sauce, which didn't appeal to me.

So I walked to the deli in the next building. "A Reuben, please." "Would you like mustard, mayonnaise, or thousand island on that?" This sounded very ominous. I made it clear that the presence of mustard or mayonnaise wouldn't be appropriate for a Reuben, and that thousand island dressing is a necessary ingredient. I should have chosen the light rye; the dark rye bread was equivalent to pumpernickel. The sandwich was edible, at least.

But the treat we had midafternoon made up for all the food annoyances earlier. Coworker Kat was having a birthday, so Chip, our boss, decided to take us to Spazzo's for the dessert platter, which we'd enjoyed so much a few weeks ago. Sorbet, mocha mousse in a spun-sugar-lace cup, chocolate decadence cake, fruit, and a few pistachio cookies. It hit the spot again, and we enjoyed the view of downtown Bellevue. Kat didn't come up with any stories when I asked her about her best or worst birthday.

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I've been playing with a new toy today! Rather than get myself some new CDs, I decided to check out this shoutcast thing that Bill Humphries has been doing.

But first I had to install WinAmp, and I think I was about the last person to get around to trying it. I haven't been inclined to fool with it as long as you had to download MP3s, but now that they can be streamed it seemed like a better deal. Download and setup were quick and easy. Live365.com makes it possible to netcast streaming audio up from your own PC and out to whomever,

I didn't really get into Bill's choices: "Ozone Broadcasting plays an eclectic mix of Surf, Nerd Rock, Hip Hop and World Fusion." But I did enjoy the classical stations, "Fine Chamber Music by the VibeMaster" and "Classical Harmonies." I've no idea who the VibeMaster, but zie has a great name! "Who is the keymaster?" I kept the station on all day.

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I'd missed this on More Like This the other day -- Howard Waldrop has a fishing article on GORP (Great Outdoor Recreation Pages). Howard moved to Washington state several years ago, just for the fishing! I really like his stuff, and it's still great even if you can't imagine him reading it in his Texas accent. I looked for other pieces by him on this site, but couldn't find any.

A lot of Howard's books are out of print, but you can search for them at American Book Exchange. It's worth it!