SuperEggplant

Okay, so not exactly 20 years ago TODAY, but I CAN admit that my 20th high school reunion was last fall. Ugh. I didn’t go. But anyway, I have nothing interesting to report craftwise or foodwise, so I thought I’d bore some of you with the following tidbit. The eavesdropping site reminded me of a time in high school when a group of us went to our local hangout, Fryer’s Quality Pie. It was a 24-hour joint that served a huge variety of pie. It was a weird and unhip place, and we loved it. This one time we were seated at the big table directly underneath the bug zapper. There was a balding guy in a pink oxford cloth shirt sitting by himself in the corner. After we’d been there for a while, he got up and handed us a couple sheets of steno paper on which he had jotted snippets of our conversation. I still have those sheets, and this is what they say:
GROUP. I am not a punk rocker
Wait–let us order
How about buttermilk pancakes
They spelled biscuits right
Is it good?
I get scared really easily
Soft or hard ice cream
OK I’ll get it
With a glass of milk
I have to have mlk
I hate milk
a la mode
I could … every day
Oh shut up!
I don’t like any dairy product in my food.
She’s like half …
Half-what?
OK. What about her?
Do you like her?
She’s supposed to be really nice.
What happened, what happened?
So Lisa & Mary …
There was blood on it …
Murdered girls with a cleaver
You guys … I’m sorry
Manson was white.
This is a very simplistic explanation
It could have been better
Did you see …
Who? Who?
Vitamin deficiency
Do fish face
Do it! Do it!
Put your lips out
Do fish lips
Her eyes look better
Hmmm!
Are they punk rockers!
What kind is it.
Who’s that?
He was in European History
Tyler never came
…Levi’s for at least a year.
…turn in inside-out.
Hot. Water Water Hot
What. We’re considered a clique.
I’ve told this to Tina
Be quiet. Every single one of you said that to me
That’s so funny. That’s funny
It’s true. Who belongs to this clique.
David likes that. Maybe David needs that.
EVeryone’s like that. Frozen yogurt.
…is so disgusting
I remember we had a big laugh reading it and trying to figure out who said what. Idiocy can be fun, you know.

Just wanted you all to know that in between bites of brioche, bread, cookies, and chocolate, I AM still knitting. I just have nothing specific to report about it right now.
I like gadgets, but I don’t consider myself a cutting edge gadgety gal. I certainly don’t know anything about MP3s and all that, but how tempting are these:

They are MINIATURE. And I LOVE miniature things (except chocolates, of course). And it comes in PINK. And GREEN. Sigh.
Thanks to fellow native Portlander Amy and Annie for pointing me to a wonderful web site. This gal Eva lives in Berkeley and posts snippets of conversation she hears while out and about! So great! When I lived in Berkeley I used to carry around a notebook and jot down interesting conversations, too. People say interesting things in Berkeley (and elsewhere, too, I’m sure, but Berkeley is, well, you know, Berzerkley). Anyway, Eva seems to wander around North Berkeley quite a bit, which is where I lived at one point. Ahh, Peet’s Coffee and the Cheese Board!

Today the Hedster and I went on a little adventure. After a nice little run at Avila Beach, we headed south, an area rather unfamiliar to us. We went to the little town of Guadalupe. It has a predominantly Hispanic population now, but the buildings are quite old, and I believe parts of it ended up in the film Seabiscuit. Hedster had read about a Mexican restaurant there, so we went to check it out.

The interior of the place was like an old diner. It had a long counter with sunny yellow stools, and the booths had yellow formica. We both had the Sunday special of chicken mole.

Looks tasty, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, the mole sauce was not to our liking, but that didn’t stop us from scarfing it down. The beans were outstanding!
After lunch we headed to Santa Maria, a nasty and sprawling town (I believe Rachael can confirm this). We planned to hit Betty’s Fabrics for their 20 percent off everything sale. Little did we know that there is a Betty’s Yarns sharing the same space! And yes, it was 20 percent off everything in there, too. They had a bunch of Rowan yarn for 50 percent off, but I showed enormous restraint and left with just these items:

One last thing: Rob, you have created a monster:

This morning I discovered rust in my trusty Chantal tea kettle! It’s probably about 10 years old, but I was still very dismayed. I called Chantal, and they are sending me a replacement! I asked if I needed to send them the rusty one, and they said no. Can you believe it? I wasn’t expecting them to just send me a new one with no proof of purchase or rustiness (if I were really slimy and had more nerve, I would have asked for a different color. Hee hee). Anyway, now I am a loyal customer. Check out how cute the new teeny ball kettles are! They come in really tantalizing colors. Oooh, mandarin, seafoam green, and even pink (at Williams Sonoma).

Another New Year’s resolution: change my banner. I told my brother, “Hey, I don’t care if you have leukemia and you created the banner. It’s going down!!” Well, maybe I wasn’t quite so aggressive. There are so many good banners out there, but I have no clue how to make one. I don’t have any graphics software, either. But I’ll figure something out, even if it takes me until December 31, 2004!

Well, 2004 is already shaping up to be an interesting year. We just found out today that my insane brother does indeed have Chronic Myelogenous/Myeloid Leukemia. He went in for an introductory meeting with his new doctor last month, and they did a routine blood test. The results came back wonky, so they did another one, and the results were even stranger. Then came the bone marrow biopsy, and the news today that confirmed the disease. Luckily, it is in a very early stage, and there is a new drug, Gleevec, that is supposed to be very effective (but it makes you barfy and puffs up your body with edema. Oh, and it costs $2,000 per month). It’s not a very fun way to end a year or start a new one!
Hope everyone has a nice New Year! Remember to eat more chocolate and to stay hydrated!