kerewin's whine cellar

Fat Tuesday

We just spent a restful weekend in Oregon with the in-laws. That is, if it is restful to drive at least 200 miles each day, Friday through Monday, including working full days both Friday and Monday. It was wonderful though, mostly because we got to spend time with the inlaws. They are such nice people and I love hanging out with them. They are Catholic with a capital "C" and not in any sort of judgmental way. They do good, act well, and don't give anyone flack for not going to church.

It is near a major Catholic holiday and so it was a definite topic of conversation during the weekend. What are you giving up for Lent? Now, I am not Catholic, big or little c, nor particularly religious but I am very attracted to the idea of control and self-sacrifice. Once, I didn't eat red meat for eight years and I spent more than a year being fully vegetarian. So what would be difficult to give up for six weeks?

Starting tomorrow morning, I am done with caffeine for at least the next six weeks. I considered just giving up coffee but that would mean I could drink my caffeine equivalent in tea each day in its place. I could drink decaf, but there is always a bit of caffeine, even in that. Six weeks. Not even green tea. Perhaps I should take up wasabi?

For The Record

Just for the record, in my last post when I said, "So that's the ironic part of my life. I decided to 'out' this weblog to family and friends (which I was doing anonymously), and not a single one of them read it." I actually meant not a single one of my family read it. They stopped by once, and found it dull, or something, and never came by again. It is like the complete opposite story you hear about people with weblogs. Usually they get caught out when they think they are hidden. However, I would like to say that MANY friends have been supportive and positive. Moña, ned, Suz, LB, and elp just to name a few. I never meant to imply that.

I suppose in some ways my disappointment comes not just because I can't even seem to get my own family to read, but I find myself reading a lot of stuff that is far more interesting, and topical, and (ouch) better written than anything I have done. That is when I ask myself, "What is the point?"

How to keep myself interested AND other people? Perhaps I need a little personal focus. So what do I have to offer? Restaurant stories, wine experience, travel, writing (fictional?), bitchiness, love of sleep, the occasional political rant, and some good links.

One of my personal favorite stories comes from when I waited tables. It was an upscale Italian restaurant in an upscale mall. One lunch around Christmas we were particularly busy. I had this wonderful table of three ladies in their late 40s. They were funny and having a great day out with friends. I told them about our special crab cake entrée and in addition to their starter, they all ordered that as their main course.

The restaurant computer system was set up to turn in an entire order to the kitchen, in courses. The kitchen printer would spit out a chit with a carbon and the first course on the top of the ticket, then a divider line and the second course below. The Lead Line (guy in charge) would pull the ticket and call the first course, and if something on the second course had a long cook time, he would call prep on that. After that, he (or she, let's be fair although kitchens tend to be male dominated) would take the top copy and put it in line for cooking and setting up in the pass-through window, and take the carbon and place it in line for prep. The server would then be responsible for knowing how busy the kitchen was, how fast the people were eating, and they would put into the computer a "fire" on the second course. The Lead Line received the "fire" and moved the second course into the lineup for completion.

My ladies just got their salads and since we were busy I put in the call to fire their second course (table 31). I then went about my work on my other tables, getting drinks, greeting people, making up checks, etc. I cleared 31 and started looking for my entrées up in the window. After just a bit more than the usual wait, I went and asked the Lead how much longer for the 3 orders of crab cakes.

"Five minutes," he barked at me.

I went back to the table, refreshed beverages, and alerted the ladies to the extra wait on the food, explaining the extra business. They were very sweet and had no problem waiting. So five minutes later I go look in the window (this is an open kitchen by the way, not a lot of hiding going on). Still nothing there, so I ask again.

"Two minutes," was the curt response. Any server will tell you this is the kiss of death. Two minutes is a very standard response and just like football it can mean anywhere from 10 minutes to 30. However, fighting with the kitchen during a rush is a fool's game and I was not about to participate. I made myself busy with other things for those minutes and notice that table 31 is starting to get a little anxious. Finally I go up to the line and ask in harsh tones about my three crab cake entrées on table 31. I see the Lead Line look through the tickets. He looks farther and farther left through the line up. He then looks up at me, then looks over to the tickets in the prep line. Halfway through he spots table 31, picks it up, moves it to the front of the fire line and looks up at me.

"Two minutes."

I was dead meat. Until that point I thought my food was seconds from coming up. I even saw the prep guys plate up the sides on what I thought were my entrées (when the plates are getting prepped you know your food is almost there). So every assurance I gave those ladies had the complete ring of truth. Now we were getting into dicey area. I had to act fast.

I went to the table and handed them dessert menus. Those lovely ladies looked a tad perplexed. "You might as well decide on what you are having for dessert now, ladies, since we will be buying it for you." More consternation. Then I took the dice and threw.

"That noise you heard in the kitchen?" at this point I was just praying for a miracle.

One of them looked at me, "Yes, we wondered what that crashing noise was!"

"That was your lunch, and we were all pretty sure you didn't want it after it hit the floor. So right now the kitchen is remaking your dishes and they should be out soon. Still, I want you to look at the dessert menu, we have a lovely bread pudding and you certainly can't beat our créme brulée."

There was no dropping of the meals, there weren't any big noises at all. Still, somehow there was something they heard and commented upon and it saved me. It also saved their good time. They left with intact memories and a good story. We bought them $15 in custard and maintained a good following. The moral of this story is not that it is apparently acceptable to lie when someone screws up, but rather that everyone has a different method to maintain satisfaction.

So I could make a cute analogy here about me being the Lead Line with the unfired ticket, scrambling. Or I could be the server just trying to keep a brave face on it and keep the customers happy. In the end, we are all just trying to make sure the customers leave happy. One of those customers is me, however. What will it take here to make me feel as if I am really doing some writing? How do I make my muse happy? Hell, how do I make this a place that my punkass nephew might hang around and read through and comment? I guess I am not sure, yet. But I am trying.

Just read through the dessert menu, something there will catch your eye. Keep in mind, it will be on the house.

There's So Much Here, Yet So Little

The other day about 8 topics ran through my head that I wanted to chat about. Somehow many things have prevented me from putting them to paper. In some small part because I gave my weblog address to my 16 year-old nephew last week after he sent me an email praising/criticising some of my fictional writing. So apparently what I should be writing here should be not only perfectly grammatical but also inspirational. Oh yeah, it shouldn't teach a teenager lewd conduct or language. And good luck with that.

So speaking of my writing, the other day my beloved Aunt asked me, "Do you miss your degree?"

So how does one answer that? Smartass, apparently.

"How can I miss it? It isn't like I don't have the degree anymore." (B.A. in Communications from the U of WA just in case anyone was curious.)

"Don't you miss writing?" she asked.

So that's the ironic part of my life. I decided to "out" this weblog to family and friends (which I was doing anonymously), and not a single one of them read it. So, if a tree falls in the woods and no reads about it, does it count as writing? Somehow the answer doesn't matter, because I need this here thing. Sometimes for fluff (maybe more than others), sometimes for outrage, and maybe a new concept; a day here and there for some fiction.

Saturday is fiction day at Whine central. Except this Saturday which will be spent in Oregon with the inlaws for the Hub's birthday. I might tag it as "For Taylor" my nephew who wants to be a writer, too*. I would ask for good short story topics from the comments but I think that anyone who has less than 10 regular readers (wait until this catches on with my family, there are at least five more of them!) shouldn't be asking for something they won't get (Bitter, party of one?).

*A few years ago my brother and his sons drove to the West Coast for a vacation. Kevo and I drove down to the Oregon coast to hang out with them. It was a lovely day and at one point we had the nephews in our car, on the way to the ocean. Taylor (who was maybe 12-13 at the time) told me that he wrote a short story and wanted to read it to us. So he started and talked about these people living in this futile society. On our drive home I asked the hub if he had noticed how intellectual Taylor was, thinking of our society as futile. I was so impressed. It wasn't until several weeks later that it hit me that Taylor had said, "feudal society" and was likely swayed by all of the LotR stuff out at the time. Major smack on the head time.

Unfortunately for me, sometimes I wonder if this little venture might not be a tad futile. Hell, I can't even get my own husband to read it on a regular basis. Let alone a single person from my immediate family. That's what I miss. I miss being interesting.

A Napa Vacation

Did I forget to tell you that we are on vacation?

I like bubbles so this is where we went today. Of course, yesterday we visited Francis, he's doing well. There's more, but I am trying not to overwhelm my non-wine-drinking spouse.

We are eating well, working out, and sleeping a lot. Did I mention that the weather is sunny and 70? So much nicer than the continuous downpour in Seattle. Which is good, because I thought I was going to kill myself if it rained one more day. I thought I was going to post more, however the hotel we are in only has free dial-up. The computer we brought doesn't even HAVE a dial-up modem and there's no way I am paying $10/day just to check e-mail.

Mind Bending

The real mind bender? These are real photos. Want to get this effect with your own camera and don't want to pay $1,000 for the lens? Try this. However, I don't know of any hack that will substitute for the vantage point of the helicopter. It might be cheaper to just make the teeny tiny models.

I have to find a way to get to the Yancey Richardson Gallery in NYC sometime between March 31, 2006 and May 13, 2006.

Link via sitboaf, supposedly found on Wil Wheaton's second blog site. I looked on the front page and never saw it, and not wanting to be accused of being a Star Trek geek, I refused to click into any history.

Just Like A Flacid Penis

WASHINGTON - One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.

In what exact effing way did he mean it, then? I bet after he said it the White House telephone lines lit up like a tree on Christmas day with all of Bush's old Texas oil cronies.

Fuckers.

link via Dadahead