Mike

A good friend and a great evening

I had dinner with my friend Beverly tonight. I haven't seen her in over a year and a half, and until this past Valentine's Day we'd been out of email contact for a while. She's as beautiful and vivacious as ever. We met at High Cotton, on East Bay, at 7. Dinner was wonderful. We both started with the peach, goat cheese, and arugula salad garnished with prosciutto and walnuts. After that she had the shrimp-stuffed trout with sweet corn, aromatic creamed rice, toasted pecans, and ginger shrimp butter. I had the grilled Kobe flat iron steak with a stuffed potato, spinach, and a goat cheese-topped tomato. We shared a bottle of a really nice Pinot Noir. (You know me well enough by now to know that I have to talk about the food.) :-)

After dinner we walked around the Market briefly to let the meal settle, then went to Kaminsky's for dessert and coffee. (In Charleston, a late night stop at Kaminsky's is always a great way to end an evening.) Beverly had the Toll House Pie and I had the Double Chocolate Hazelnut Torte. (Between the coffee and the torte, I'll be up for a while tonight.) It was almost midnight when we finished.

Beverly is the one who sent me the South Beach diet book. She didn't see me before I started the diet but she says I've lost enough weight. Even though I'm still 4 lbs short of my goal, she's probably right. I'm looking damn good, and I feel great.

I'd love to show you photos but I didn't have my digital camera with me. She had her film camera but it will be a while before the film gets developed. I know she'll kill me but this is a photo from two summers ago when she, her son Brian, the girls, and I met up in New York and had an amazing Father's Day brunch in the revolving restaurant atop the Marriott Marquis Hotel in Times Square. That's her "Did you really have to take that photo?" look.

I hope we can get together more often than we have in the last few years. She lives in Columbia, which is about 100 miles from Charleston. I'll do the driving next time since the next meal is on her. :-)

*Chuckle*

(FromBlogsforBush.com)

A long day and an aching back

We moved Justine's furniture today. She's been in the guest room for the last few days, but prefers her furniture to mine, so we converted the office into her room. Since I went wireless, I don't really need a room to use as an office. My file cabinet would be just as happy in the garage. So I was up early moving the office furniture out. The desk is in my room for the time being. The day-bed is in the garage until I can take it to the landfill, where it should have gone a year ago. We went to pick up the rental truck at 9 and then went to her apartment to load up the things coming to the house. She and I had most everything loaded by the time her two guy friends showed up. We let them carry her TV - bulky and very heavy - down the stairs to the truck. After we brought everything to the house and got it upstairs I treated everyone to lunch. After that we went back to the apartment to load up everything headed to the storage unit. The guys were more useful that trip since they got to maneuver the sofa and loveseat downstairs to the truck, and out of the truck into storage. Justine and I loaded the lighter furniture. We've returned the rental truck and now Justine is at the apartment boxing up a bunch of small stuff that she hadn't moved here earlier. When she's done with that, she'll clean the place.

My house is a shambles at the moment, since most of Justine's boxes are sitting in my dining room waiting for her to unpack them. The rest of the boxes are in a similar state in the guestroom.

I need two Motrin and a place to put my feet up.

Update: Justine went back to the apartment today (Thursday) to box up more stuff and bring it to the house. The boxes have now spilled over from the dining room to the front entrance way and into the living room.

Her ears are burning

Scheherazade ponders the nature of blog crushes. I have a crush on her but I live too far away. I was about to add that I'm too old, but I'm never too old.

The Wild Kingdom

After hacking his way through impenetrable jungles, battling Buick-sized spiders, and portaging* between raging rivers, the photographer finally managed to catch the elusive Justine in her natural environment.

Unfortunately the flash spooked her, and she bolted back into the trees.

*Having lived in Canada, I've always wanted to use portage in a sentence.

"I yam what I yam and that's all what I yam."

I love reading British mystery books. I check out a couple of them every week from the Charleston Public Library. I just started to read one I got yesterday and the first line says:

"Nobody's perfect. Still, I've always thought of myself as a nice guy at heart."

I can relate.

You may find this hard to believe, but it's hard being a nice guy. I've lost count of how many times women have said, "You're a really nice guy, but..." Evidently not-so-nice guys get lucky more often than I do.

Sunday's Meme

When Hollywood finally gets around to filming the story of my life I want Charlie Kaufman, and his imaginary brother Donald, to write the script. Oliver Stone will lobby hard to be the director, but I'll pick Ridley Scott. There will be lots of steam, fog, and mist. Haley Joel Osment will play young-me. Matt Damon will play not-so-young me. Harrison Ford will play present-day me. (Yes, I know that doesn't make any sense but work with me here.)

When Hollywood films your life, who will write and direct it? Who will play you?

It's official. I have no life.

Are you Addicted to the Internet? 70% Hardcore Junkie (61% - 80%) While you do get a bit of sleep every night and sometimes leave the house, you spend as much time as you can online. You usually have a browser, chat clients, server consoles, and your email on auto check open at all times. Phone? What's that? You plan your social events by contacting your friends online. Just be careful you don't get a repetitive wrist injury... The Are you Addicted to the Internet? Quiz at Quiz Me!

I'd have thought that I'd score about the same as my brother, but I think my answer to question #5 tipped the scale.

Is there a Dog-Blogging Day?

I didn't know that Friday was cat-blogging day.

Here's my contribution, a day late:

1979 - Present

We decided that the 1979 exterior motif of our house (Cedar Plywood, stained and warped) was needing an update with big changes. So, we hired a crew that, in three 98 degree St. Louis days, gave us an incredible new look.

Before...

After...

I love it. I hope our friends can find it now. I wouldn't want them to miss it and drive around the cul-de-sac too many times before figuring it out.