My willingness to help friends celebrate their birthdays knows no limits.
This one was a two night affair that began Friday night with dinner at L'Opossum and ended early Sunday morning on a screened porch with the Ohio Players blasting.
The birthday celebrant was Beau, dressed fetchingly in a subtly toned Hawaiian shirt and still on a high because of his recent new job, making for a double celebration. The four of us arrived to the flattering semi-darkness of L'Opossum's interior and took over the corner banquette (only because of a reservation made months ago, natch) with a toast to Beau thanks to a bottle of pink bubbly.
The sheer amount of food that we ordered might shame a lesser bunch, but not us.
Escargots cloaked in ham biscuits, a couple of Lettuce Toss Your Salad (impressed, as we were, with its inclusion of "a tight little green goddess downtown"), "Faberge" eggs with caviar and salmon, clams with bacon and herbs and, given the old hippies at the table, the vegan orgy on Texas Beach (five vegetable spreads and papadom).
Next came halibut, beef Swellington, butter-poached lobster mac and the portabello stack with beets, butternut squash and shallot fondue. I'm not ashamed to admit I didn't do justice to my entree after so many starters, but there were no food police at our table.
Not that we hadn't reached an elegant sufficiency, but the birthday bylaws stipulate desserts after a birthday dinner and who were we to mess with rules? There was my flaming chocolate, an apple tarte tatin, lavender limoncello creme brulee and hot black bottom a la mode.
The funniest moment arrived as we sat there in a food coma contemplating our next move. Rubbing his hands together, Beau cracked, "Are we going dancing now?" That's a reference to the time we were out for my birthday and as they dropped me off at home, I turned and asked that question, only to return to the car so we could all go dancing. Not this night.
Saturday night, we reconvened on the screened porch at Pru's manse with additional guests for more celebrating, this time with bubbles, Rose, absinthe and chocolate turtle birthday cake from Northside bakery Morsels. And because Pru was hostessing, also enough cheese and charcuterie to stock a small cheese shop.
Holmes and Beloved were just that day back from a week's vacation on the Outer Banks and when I inquired how things had gone with the other couple, Holmes quipped, "I only got kicked off the island once!"
Apparently he'd had some harsh words for the owners of the Salt Air Motel across the street when they'd left their trashcans in the bike lane and his housemates saw his reaction as un-vacation like. I try not to judge.
Why, just Friday when I was coming back from my rain-soaked walk on the beach, a car driving by had splattered me as it drove through a massive puddle. Did I shake my fist and hurl unkind epithets at the offender? I did not, but probably because I was already soaked to the bone.
Never mind.
Pru's porch is an ideal space for a party of seven bent on non-stop banter and constantly chilling wines. When two of the male members of the party were directed to the same settee, I asked rhetorically what the two non-alpha males had in common.
Beau summed it up first, "We don't like pants!" but his comrade-in-clotheslessness nodded happily in agreement.
When we got low on chilling agents, Beau volunteered to make a 7-11 run, returning with bag in hand across the back yard. "The iceman cometh!" Beloved joked when we spotted him.
"That's the second time this week someone has said that about him when he's come back with ice," Pru noted. Because of course she would have multiple literary friends capable of referencing Eugene O'Neill.
Midway through the evening, the absinthe fountain was filled with ice water and it was drips for all, except the hippie chick who eschews drinking. As the Green Fairy settled over the porch, seconds were ordered and conversation revolved around the unique effect of an absinthe buzz.
That was when Pru decided to replace the Artie Shaw we'd been listening to all evening with something a whole lot more funky and danceable: the Ohio Players.
Because loud music and loopy friends on a screened porch make every birthday better. Pants optional.
Showing posts with label l'opossum. Show all posts
Showing posts with label l'opossum. Show all posts
Sunday, August 6, 2017
Sunday, June 4, 2017
Sweet Smoke of Rhetoric
All the couples wanted my company today.
The newlyweds invited me to join them for the RVA Clay Studio Tour, a drive-yourself opportunity to visit over 20 studios and houses to ogle more than 100 artists' handiwork.
The Beauty, herself a beginning clay artist, promised that we would not be out all day because her husband Beckham had already set parameters: "There are only so many clay pots you can look at in one day."
He can say that to her.
When I got in their car, she admitted that she was still amazed that Beckham had been willing to come along. "I only came because Karen was coming," he joked, but we both benefited from having company every time she got into discussions of glazes and kilns with another potter.
Our first stop was in Bon Air, in a house the owner said was one of many in the neighborhood designed by a Frank Lloyd Wright apprentice. "They were kit houses brought in on the railroad," he shared.
At a Forest Hill studio housed in a backyard outbuilding, I inquired about a row of wood circles, only to find they were her husband's collection of tree knots, culled from his work in the tree biz.
"You'd be amazed what people think they are," she whispered, raising her eyebrows. Her pots were eye-catching because of the unusual substances - Miracle Grow to make blue and baking soda to create a cloudy white effect - she'd incorporated into her glazes.
We made two more stops somewhere in the Westover/Stratford Hills area, providing glimpses into neighborhoods I didn't really know between admiring pottery and bantering about the shrubs he'd been making lately.
That is, when he's not making orange-iced rosemary cake or goat cheese cheesecake. Beauty found one of the truly great ones when she met Beckham (and vice versa).
The next stop was to be the Depot, but we slid into Assado (Beckham hadn't been there since it was the dark and claustrophobic Empire and he was amazed at what letting in all that light did to the place - he didn't recognize it until I told him what it had been) first for tacos - barbacoa, patas bravas, spicy ginger grilled shrimp, fried green tomato and bacon and finally, fish tacos - and non-clay conversation before they moved on to see more pots and I walked home.
Much as I enjoyed seeing the handiwork of so many talented artists, I also love being with this couple because they're young and in love and it's soul-nourishing to be around.
When I offered him a bite of my shrimp or fish tacos, he demurred, saying, "No, I want to to be able to kiss her later," a reference to her dislike of anything seafood related. Just as I was marveling at how considerate he was being, he relented and had a bite.
Maybe he planned to brush before going in for a kiss. When we parted company, they had more pottery to see and I had walking to do.
The couple who picked me up tonight, Pru and Beau, are at a slightly different relationship stage than the newlyweds, so they don't gush or look at each other with cow eyes. Plus Pru's Mom was along for the ride and who wants to make sex jokes in front of their parent?
Fortunately, we were going to see a play about love, but our first stop was L'Opossum for a dinner that outdid itself.
To get us started were ham and escargot biscuits, chilled vichysoisse with crabmeat and corn, the vegan orgy on Texas Beach (aka papadoms with five vegetable spreads) and French onion dip gratine taken over the top with currant rye bread.
With Shakespeare looming large ahead of us, dinner discussion revolved around language, at one point about how to pronounce "niche." Beau, ever the technology geek, couldn't stop himself from researching it mid-meal, only to learn that both pronunciations - neesh and nich - are acceptable.
Don't get me started on multiple pronunciations based on popular usage. Really, if enough people mispronounce a word, we're going to say the incorrect pronunciation is also valid? Please.
Most interesting thing learned? That niche can also be a verb, a fact that led to extended niche wordplay which Beau tried to shut down (unsuccessfully) multiple times.
More exceptional eats arrived in the form of melt-in-your-mouth grouper over wild rice and greens, crabcakes with so little filler they fell apart into lumps of crab meat, obscene seared Hudson Valley foie gras and - ta da - lobster mac and cheese described on the menu as in a "ridiculously rich white truffle mornay cream sauce."
Ridiculously may be a fine adverb but it does not begin to cover butter-poached lobster. We did a number on it anyway.
Needless to say, dessert was out of the question, but my sweet tooth was unexpectedly satisfied by a final course of salad with pickled leeks and two dressings, a Green Goddess under the mesclun and a tequila sorbet dressing on top. Perfection.
Tonight's entertainment was Quill Theater's "Love's Labour's Lost" (considered the most Shakespearean of Shakespeare's plays) at Agecroft and, for a change, the weather was so perfect, so breezy and un-humid, that we didn't need the fans we'd brought.
Hell, I'd brought my entire fan collection, all six of them, and never required a one.
The mind shall banquet, though the body pine.
The program had informed us that the play was a master class in the use and abuse of language, and if anyone enjoys language abuse and use, it's this crowd. Because it's less often produced, I hadn't seen it since 2002 at Dogwood Dell.
Love is familiar. Love is a devil. There is no evil angel but love.
When the play began at 7:30, the half moon perched off to the side lingered over the trees in a soft blue sky and at dusk, frogs began to make their presence known. By the second act, that moon was hanging high over the James, with fireflies and moths looping around the courtyard.
Is she wedded, or no?
To her will, sir.
Just the other day I'd told a girlfriend I was coming to Agecroft for this tonight and proceeded to wax poetic of the sensory pleasures of seeing the actors use the 500-year old building as a set and a prop. "No one's ever explained it to me that ways," she'd marveled. "Now it sounds like something I'd love to do."
Young blood does not obey an old decree.
In one scene tonight, Berowne appears head and shoulders over the top of the stone wall that separates two English cottage gardens (a wall, by the way, that was directly behind our seats) and then slides out of sight. That's the magic of using Agecroft as a prop.
Oh, they have lived long on the alms basket of words.
At one point, the ubiquitous Richmond train whistle moving through the night from somewhere along the river competed with the actors' voices for our attention.
Nip not the gaudy blossoms of your love.
Dan Cimo killed it as Boyet, the companion to the Princess and her ladies, scheming and plotting to ensure that the womenfolk outwit the men, while Alex Johnson played Berowne as ably in diction as in humor. Not for even a nanosecond out of character as Don Armado, Luke Schares used a hilarious accent, killer timing and an affecting performance to make him my focus anytime he was on stage.
Maggie Bavolack's portrayal of the country wench Jaquenettta, all tight skirt and decolletage, was hilarious, one step removed from that girl in "West Side Story" who proclaims, "I and Velma ain't dumb."
Our wooing does not end like an old play.
I certainly wasn't being wooed tonight, but absent that, watching an old play in a courtyard under the stars after a spectacular meal was pretty wonderful.
And for the record, I remain wedded to my will but willing to bend it for the good of the cause. My goal: for the mind and body to banquet.
Goodness knows the stomach already did.
The newlyweds invited me to join them for the RVA Clay Studio Tour, a drive-yourself opportunity to visit over 20 studios and houses to ogle more than 100 artists' handiwork.
The Beauty, herself a beginning clay artist, promised that we would not be out all day because her husband Beckham had already set parameters: "There are only so many clay pots you can look at in one day."
He can say that to her.
When I got in their car, she admitted that she was still amazed that Beckham had been willing to come along. "I only came because Karen was coming," he joked, but we both benefited from having company every time she got into discussions of glazes and kilns with another potter.
Our first stop was in Bon Air, in a house the owner said was one of many in the neighborhood designed by a Frank Lloyd Wright apprentice. "They were kit houses brought in on the railroad," he shared.
At a Forest Hill studio housed in a backyard outbuilding, I inquired about a row of wood circles, only to find they were her husband's collection of tree knots, culled from his work in the tree biz.
"You'd be amazed what people think they are," she whispered, raising her eyebrows. Her pots were eye-catching because of the unusual substances - Miracle Grow to make blue and baking soda to create a cloudy white effect - she'd incorporated into her glazes.
We made two more stops somewhere in the Westover/Stratford Hills area, providing glimpses into neighborhoods I didn't really know between admiring pottery and bantering about the shrubs he'd been making lately.
That is, when he's not making orange-iced rosemary cake or goat cheese cheesecake. Beauty found one of the truly great ones when she met Beckham (and vice versa).
The next stop was to be the Depot, but we slid into Assado (Beckham hadn't been there since it was the dark and claustrophobic Empire and he was amazed at what letting in all that light did to the place - he didn't recognize it until I told him what it had been) first for tacos - barbacoa, patas bravas, spicy ginger grilled shrimp, fried green tomato and bacon and finally, fish tacos - and non-clay conversation before they moved on to see more pots and I walked home.
Much as I enjoyed seeing the handiwork of so many talented artists, I also love being with this couple because they're young and in love and it's soul-nourishing to be around.
When I offered him a bite of my shrimp or fish tacos, he demurred, saying, "No, I want to to be able to kiss her later," a reference to her dislike of anything seafood related. Just as I was marveling at how considerate he was being, he relented and had a bite.
Maybe he planned to brush before going in for a kiss. When we parted company, they had more pottery to see and I had walking to do.
The couple who picked me up tonight, Pru and Beau, are at a slightly different relationship stage than the newlyweds, so they don't gush or look at each other with cow eyes. Plus Pru's Mom was along for the ride and who wants to make sex jokes in front of their parent?
Fortunately, we were going to see a play about love, but our first stop was L'Opossum for a dinner that outdid itself.
To get us started were ham and escargot biscuits, chilled vichysoisse with crabmeat and corn, the vegan orgy on Texas Beach (aka papadoms with five vegetable spreads) and French onion dip gratine taken over the top with currant rye bread.
With Shakespeare looming large ahead of us, dinner discussion revolved around language, at one point about how to pronounce "niche." Beau, ever the technology geek, couldn't stop himself from researching it mid-meal, only to learn that both pronunciations - neesh and nich - are acceptable.
Don't get me started on multiple pronunciations based on popular usage. Really, if enough people mispronounce a word, we're going to say the incorrect pronunciation is also valid? Please.
Most interesting thing learned? That niche can also be a verb, a fact that led to extended niche wordplay which Beau tried to shut down (unsuccessfully) multiple times.
More exceptional eats arrived in the form of melt-in-your-mouth grouper over wild rice and greens, crabcakes with so little filler they fell apart into lumps of crab meat, obscene seared Hudson Valley foie gras and - ta da - lobster mac and cheese described on the menu as in a "ridiculously rich white truffle mornay cream sauce."
Ridiculously may be a fine adverb but it does not begin to cover butter-poached lobster. We did a number on it anyway.
Needless to say, dessert was out of the question, but my sweet tooth was unexpectedly satisfied by a final course of salad with pickled leeks and two dressings, a Green Goddess under the mesclun and a tequila sorbet dressing on top. Perfection.
Tonight's entertainment was Quill Theater's "Love's Labour's Lost" (considered the most Shakespearean of Shakespeare's plays) at Agecroft and, for a change, the weather was so perfect, so breezy and un-humid, that we didn't need the fans we'd brought.
Hell, I'd brought my entire fan collection, all six of them, and never required a one.
The mind shall banquet, though the body pine.
The program had informed us that the play was a master class in the use and abuse of language, and if anyone enjoys language abuse and use, it's this crowd. Because it's less often produced, I hadn't seen it since 2002 at Dogwood Dell.
Love is familiar. Love is a devil. There is no evil angel but love.
When the play began at 7:30, the half moon perched off to the side lingered over the trees in a soft blue sky and at dusk, frogs began to make their presence known. By the second act, that moon was hanging high over the James, with fireflies and moths looping around the courtyard.
Is she wedded, or no?
To her will, sir.
Just the other day I'd told a girlfriend I was coming to Agecroft for this tonight and proceeded to wax poetic of the sensory pleasures of seeing the actors use the 500-year old building as a set and a prop. "No one's ever explained it to me that ways," she'd marveled. "Now it sounds like something I'd love to do."
Young blood does not obey an old decree.
In one scene tonight, Berowne appears head and shoulders over the top of the stone wall that separates two English cottage gardens (a wall, by the way, that was directly behind our seats) and then slides out of sight. That's the magic of using Agecroft as a prop.
Oh, they have lived long on the alms basket of words.
At one point, the ubiquitous Richmond train whistle moving through the night from somewhere along the river competed with the actors' voices for our attention.
Nip not the gaudy blossoms of your love.
Dan Cimo killed it as Boyet, the companion to the Princess and her ladies, scheming and plotting to ensure that the womenfolk outwit the men, while Alex Johnson played Berowne as ably in diction as in humor. Not for even a nanosecond out of character as Don Armado, Luke Schares used a hilarious accent, killer timing and an affecting performance to make him my focus anytime he was on stage.
Maggie Bavolack's portrayal of the country wench Jaquenettta, all tight skirt and decolletage, was hilarious, one step removed from that girl in "West Side Story" who proclaims, "I and Velma ain't dumb."
Our wooing does not end like an old play.
I certainly wasn't being wooed tonight, but absent that, watching an old play in a courtyard under the stars after a spectacular meal was pretty wonderful.
And for the record, I remain wedded to my will but willing to bend it for the good of the cause. My goal: for the mind and body to banquet.
Goodness knows the stomach already did.
Sunday, May 21, 2017
It Shoulda Been You
It's a Saturday night tradition to progressively celebrate my birthday.
The past three years, I've been accompanied by two favorite couples, but this year, I wanted a third dynamic duo added to the mix. The funny part was her comment, "Wow, we finally made the cut! I guess we were just being auditioned up 'till now."
Not true, but their presence was a lovely addition to the party.
Things kicked off at Metzger because Mr. Fine Wine's music never gets old and just after opening is the very best time to enjoy Metzger before it's noisy and overcrowded. I arrived at the bar to find four of my six friends awaiting my arrival with bubbles in front of them in my honor.
I'm not entirely convinced that they wouldn't have been drinking bubbles anyway, but still, it was a lovely greeting. The late arrivals merited ordering another bottle.
With the early evening sun beating down on Metzger's shaded windows, my friends ate through multiple cheese and charcuterie plates, a couple of specials of pork meatballs, Morattico oysters (home to my parents), a salad of English breakfast and watermelon radishes and, most impressively, roasted asparagus over the pinkest of shrimp mousse.
It was here that we learned about the seafood/kiss rule already well-established by the newlyweds. You see, she doesn't care for seafood, so he refrains from eating it until after she's had enough wine not to mind. Such was his rationale for turning down Morattico oysters before he scored an early kiss.
I'd be the first to admit I love to kiss, but I can't see turning down a perfectly delicious oyster, either.
Mowing through food like we didn't still have two more stops to make, I gently reminded my posse not to overly front-load. Not everyone took the gentle reminder well, but part of that is due to the siren song of Metzger.
Our next stop was Nota Bene, where we went from a bright, sunlit space to the dimness of multiple candles and a wood-burning oven. Holmes regaled us with tales from the accounting world, there was talk of men in yoga pants, and, in an extraordinary moment, the entire table voted for Germany over Provence when it came to drinking Rose.
In fact, the Villa Wolf Rose carried us though multiple plates of sugar toads, braised fennel with tomato sauce and breadcrumbs, the grilled cauliflower with fresno peppers that made Holmes a believer, squid ink pasta with scallops and pizzas of at least three varieties.
Anyone watching our feeding frenzy might have been inclined to judge...and justifiably so.
Once we had hit every possible savory note, we moved on to L'Opossum for dessert at the sole dining room that's actually dimmer than Nota Bene. The next step would've been complete darkness.
Instead we indulged in apperitifs and cocktails - the Laura Palmer, the Violet Femme - and every chocolate dessert on the menu, plus apple tartine and creme brulee. When I blew out my candle, it was with a very specific wish.
Gifts beyond the company of good friends were opened and I was the happy recipient of a very groovy beach towel, loads of vinyl and a bottle of South African Pinotage brought from the source that I hope to enjoy with abandon once I find another Pinotage lover beyond the gift-giver.
He's gotta be out there somewhere. That's what birthday wishes are for, right?
The past three years, I've been accompanied by two favorite couples, but this year, I wanted a third dynamic duo added to the mix. The funny part was her comment, "Wow, we finally made the cut! I guess we were just being auditioned up 'till now."
Not true, but their presence was a lovely addition to the party.
Things kicked off at Metzger because Mr. Fine Wine's music never gets old and just after opening is the very best time to enjoy Metzger before it's noisy and overcrowded. I arrived at the bar to find four of my six friends awaiting my arrival with bubbles in front of them in my honor.
I'm not entirely convinced that they wouldn't have been drinking bubbles anyway, but still, it was a lovely greeting. The late arrivals merited ordering another bottle.
With the early evening sun beating down on Metzger's shaded windows, my friends ate through multiple cheese and charcuterie plates, a couple of specials of pork meatballs, Morattico oysters (home to my parents), a salad of English breakfast and watermelon radishes and, most impressively, roasted asparagus over the pinkest of shrimp mousse.
It was here that we learned about the seafood/kiss rule already well-established by the newlyweds. You see, she doesn't care for seafood, so he refrains from eating it until after she's had enough wine not to mind. Such was his rationale for turning down Morattico oysters before he scored an early kiss.
I'd be the first to admit I love to kiss, but I can't see turning down a perfectly delicious oyster, either.
Mowing through food like we didn't still have two more stops to make, I gently reminded my posse not to overly front-load. Not everyone took the gentle reminder well, but part of that is due to the siren song of Metzger.
Our next stop was Nota Bene, where we went from a bright, sunlit space to the dimness of multiple candles and a wood-burning oven. Holmes regaled us with tales from the accounting world, there was talk of men in yoga pants, and, in an extraordinary moment, the entire table voted for Germany over Provence when it came to drinking Rose.
In fact, the Villa Wolf Rose carried us though multiple plates of sugar toads, braised fennel with tomato sauce and breadcrumbs, the grilled cauliflower with fresno peppers that made Holmes a believer, squid ink pasta with scallops and pizzas of at least three varieties.
Anyone watching our feeding frenzy might have been inclined to judge...and justifiably so.
Once we had hit every possible savory note, we moved on to L'Opossum for dessert at the sole dining room that's actually dimmer than Nota Bene. The next step would've been complete darkness.
Instead we indulged in apperitifs and cocktails - the Laura Palmer, the Violet Femme - and every chocolate dessert on the menu, plus apple tartine and creme brulee. When I blew out my candle, it was with a very specific wish.
Gifts beyond the company of good friends were opened and I was the happy recipient of a very groovy beach towel, loads of vinyl and a bottle of South African Pinotage brought from the source that I hope to enjoy with abandon once I find another Pinotage lover beyond the gift-giver.
He's gotta be out there somewhere. That's what birthday wishes are for, right?
Thursday, November 10, 2016
Broken in a Complex Kind of a Way
The election of Donald Trump can be traced directly back to one thing: bad parenting.
If this election proves nothing else, it's that fully half the country lost sight of the absolute necessity for role-modeling for current and successive generations, or how else could they have willingly gotten behind a candidate who bullies and demeans women, gropes them and mocks the disabled, seeks out revenge and belittles those who disagree with him?
After much consideration, I have to assume that they must have been raised by wolves rather than by mindful parents aware of how their actions - public, private and political - would be read by young minds as an endorsement of an abominable man.
In these times of diminishing attention spans, fear of missing out and complete self-absorption, our new reality is that few have the desire or energy to worry about how their actions as a parent will resonate in the decades to come with the children who witnessed them.
Let's face it, the major challenge of being a parent is that it's a 24/7 role for a minimum of 18 years. Apparently we're no longer a culture that makes that kind of commitment to anything, even future generations.
Because it's 18 years of always crossing the street at the corner with the traffic light so that kids learn that it's not acceptable to break the rules simply because no one's looking. It's 18 years of not using foul language in front of children lest they think it's an acceptable form of expression. Eighteen years of always considering how what you do and say will mark the people you're raising.
Bottom line? Parenting is inconvenient and requires an inordinate amount of selflessness and who's got that to spare anymore?
That this has become the norm is the true crime here.
I can not believe that any parent who voted for Trump took into consideration the damaging message they were sending to their children by choosing this man, by treating him as worthy to run, much less lead or represent this country to the rest of the world.
We've shown future generations that a sociopath with no more credentials than a string of failed businesses, half a dozen bankruptcies and a reality show is good enough.
The bar has been lowered so far that it becomes inevitable that future candidates will also climb out of some primordial ooze with an entitled attitude and misogynist bent while no one bats an eye.
I thought yesterday was difficult because of the tension and worry of election day, but in retrospect, yesterday was a walk in Byrd Park compared to the reality of today's headlines. No one I know seems to have a handle on how to process it.
From my best friend in Texas who I'm trying to lure to Richmond...
WTF!!! How did this happen??? The morons who elected this egomaniacal ass wipe just did a grave disservice to our country and the world. It may be Canada instead of VA.
From my Mom, who's voted Democratic in every election since Adlai Stevenson...
I am past worried. I am stunned, appalled and every negative thing you can think of. Can you imagine him at state dinner or a meeting of world leaders where he can't just lay down the law as he did as a CEO? And what is going to happen to his supporters when he can't deliver the pie in the sky things he promised? Utter chaos.
From a smart musician friend looking for answers...
What a morning. Oh, I should probably check out your blog for enlightenment. Oh, nothing new yet. Understandable.
From Coalition Comedy Thetaer...
Free shows all this weekend. It's the very, very least we could do. We woke up to a bizarre reality this morning. We're offering the people of RVA a consolation; a much-needed distraction from the weird times we're trudging through. Let's take a break this weekend and just laugh, OK?
Given the state of the day, I felt grateful to already have plans to laugh with like-minded friends - three good people bound to be as dazed about this outcome as I felt - first for a killer dinner at L'Opossum (the foie gras! the oysters in absinthe fog! the hot black bottom!) and then with an inscrutable film noir, "The Big Sleep," ("She's a real sad tomato") at the Byrd.
In fact, all day long, I kept reassuring myself that friends and community will help us all get through whatever lies ahead. Part of the favorite couple who'd picked me up said he'd experienced much the same feeling of reassurance earlier.
There are denial, grieving and acceptance phases to navigate still, sure, but like sailors tossed overboard, all we can do is cling to something, even if it's just others who also grasp how deep the water is.
After being joined by our easy-going fourth, the mood lightened once we'd finished the post-mortem on the election results and the dinner plates were cleared. Or perhaps that was just the delirium of four desserts, more wine and a need to laugh so we didn't cry.
The Bogart and Bacall film also provided chuckles with the kind of witty, rapid-fire dialog that smart characters in '40-era films had while wearing pin-striped suits and satin dressing gowns.
Vivian: You go too far, Marlowe.
Marlowe: Those are harsh words to throw at a man, especially when he's walking out of your bedroom.
Two of us had never seen the movie before and the other two knew it well. The classic film managed to provide a fine distraction and even a dash of relevance.
Vivian: I don't like your manners
Marlowe: And I'm not crazy about yours. I didn't ask to see you. I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They are pretty bad. I grieve over them on long winter evenings.
In a related note, I don't like what happened on election day. I didn't ask for this. I don't mind if you don't like my reaction. I don't know how to feel any other way. Things may get pretty bad.
And I know with complete certainty that we will grieve over this bizarre reality for many a long winter evening to come.
I am eternally grateful for fellow sad tomato friends who help me forget that for a while.
If this election proves nothing else, it's that fully half the country lost sight of the absolute necessity for role-modeling for current and successive generations, or how else could they have willingly gotten behind a candidate who bullies and demeans women, gropes them and mocks the disabled, seeks out revenge and belittles those who disagree with him?
After much consideration, I have to assume that they must have been raised by wolves rather than by mindful parents aware of how their actions - public, private and political - would be read by young minds as an endorsement of an abominable man.
In these times of diminishing attention spans, fear of missing out and complete self-absorption, our new reality is that few have the desire or energy to worry about how their actions as a parent will resonate in the decades to come with the children who witnessed them.
Let's face it, the major challenge of being a parent is that it's a 24/7 role for a minimum of 18 years. Apparently we're no longer a culture that makes that kind of commitment to anything, even future generations.
Because it's 18 years of always crossing the street at the corner with the traffic light so that kids learn that it's not acceptable to break the rules simply because no one's looking. It's 18 years of not using foul language in front of children lest they think it's an acceptable form of expression. Eighteen years of always considering how what you do and say will mark the people you're raising.
Bottom line? Parenting is inconvenient and requires an inordinate amount of selflessness and who's got that to spare anymore?
That this has become the norm is the true crime here.
I can not believe that any parent who voted for Trump took into consideration the damaging message they were sending to their children by choosing this man, by treating him as worthy to run, much less lead or represent this country to the rest of the world.
We've shown future generations that a sociopath with no more credentials than a string of failed businesses, half a dozen bankruptcies and a reality show is good enough.
The bar has been lowered so far that it becomes inevitable that future candidates will also climb out of some primordial ooze with an entitled attitude and misogynist bent while no one bats an eye.
I thought yesterday was difficult because of the tension and worry of election day, but in retrospect, yesterday was a walk in Byrd Park compared to the reality of today's headlines. No one I know seems to have a handle on how to process it.
From my best friend in Texas who I'm trying to lure to Richmond...
WTF!!! How did this happen??? The morons who elected this egomaniacal ass wipe just did a grave disservice to our country and the world. It may be Canada instead of VA.
From my Mom, who's voted Democratic in every election since Adlai Stevenson...
I am past worried. I am stunned, appalled and every negative thing you can think of. Can you imagine him at state dinner or a meeting of world leaders where he can't just lay down the law as he did as a CEO? And what is going to happen to his supporters when he can't deliver the pie in the sky things he promised? Utter chaos.
From a smart musician friend looking for answers...
What a morning. Oh, I should probably check out your blog for enlightenment. Oh, nothing new yet. Understandable.
From Coalition Comedy Thetaer...
Free shows all this weekend. It's the very, very least we could do. We woke up to a bizarre reality this morning. We're offering the people of RVA a consolation; a much-needed distraction from the weird times we're trudging through. Let's take a break this weekend and just laugh, OK?
Given the state of the day, I felt grateful to already have plans to laugh with like-minded friends - three good people bound to be as dazed about this outcome as I felt - first for a killer dinner at L'Opossum (the foie gras! the oysters in absinthe fog! the hot black bottom!) and then with an inscrutable film noir, "The Big Sleep," ("She's a real sad tomato") at the Byrd.
In fact, all day long, I kept reassuring myself that friends and community will help us all get through whatever lies ahead. Part of the favorite couple who'd picked me up said he'd experienced much the same feeling of reassurance earlier.
There are denial, grieving and acceptance phases to navigate still, sure, but like sailors tossed overboard, all we can do is cling to something, even if it's just others who also grasp how deep the water is.
After being joined by our easy-going fourth, the mood lightened once we'd finished the post-mortem on the election results and the dinner plates were cleared. Or perhaps that was just the delirium of four desserts, more wine and a need to laugh so we didn't cry.
The Bogart and Bacall film also provided chuckles with the kind of witty, rapid-fire dialog that smart characters in '40-era films had while wearing pin-striped suits and satin dressing gowns.
Vivian: You go too far, Marlowe.
Marlowe: Those are harsh words to throw at a man, especially when he's walking out of your bedroom.
Two of us had never seen the movie before and the other two knew it well. The classic film managed to provide a fine distraction and even a dash of relevance.
Vivian: I don't like your manners
Marlowe: And I'm not crazy about yours. I didn't ask to see you. I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They are pretty bad. I grieve over them on long winter evenings.
In a related note, I don't like what happened on election day. I didn't ask for this. I don't mind if you don't like my reaction. I don't know how to feel any other way. Things may get pretty bad.
And I know with complete certainty that we will grieve over this bizarre reality for many a long winter evening to come.
I am eternally grateful for fellow sad tomato friends who help me forget that for a while.
Monday, May 23, 2016
A Voice of Reason
We've been through a lot together, and most of it was your fault
~wording on birthday gift (box of out-sized matches)
I hear this a lot, but that stuff wasn't my fault, just a byproduct of, you know, having fun.
Besides, birthdays aren't a sprint, they're a marathon.
They're an opportunity to discuss the Oxford comma, which happened at Metzger while drinking Anton Bauer Zweigelt Rose, eating a cheese plate and a charcuterie plate and listening to vintage soul thanks to a Taurus also obsessed with my favorite New Jersey DJ.
For the birthday girl who grew up in Maryland, the fried softshell crab was a decided highlight.
Sitting five abreast, from the farthest bar stool I overhear, "He's talking about putting tse-tse fly sauce on his sub," and wonder how my friend can be so far along when it's only our first stop.
Oh please, do go on! I could listen to you talk about your blog all night!
~ front of birthday card showing couple deep in discussion
Prom kids commandeered a long table behind us at Nota Bene, where we wound our five-top around the corner of the bar - and I learned that the bartender's prom date 20 years ago had been named Nikki LaRoqua and that she measured up to her name - for ease in hearing each other blather.
Words fell short when a steady stream of food began showing up, a lot of it off the specials board: two bowls of braised fennel with capers and tomato, two more of sugartoads with bagna caude and lots of bread to soak up its buttery, garlicy goodness, pizza of Tellegio and onions, the same roasted cauliflower with lemon, olive oil, capers and fresno chilies I'd fallen hard for just over a week ago and a big bowl of clams and fennel.
People think I'm bossy, too."
~ caption on birthday card image of Ghengis Khan talking to dark-haired woman with glass of pink bubbles in front of her
There was spirited discussion of the difference between a harlot and a strumpet, with the consolation "harlot" t-shirt going to Pru.
Lights were dim but the restaurant was still packed when we arrived at L'Opossum for our final course. Inquiring about the nature of the black bottom, our server summed it up by saying, "It's a circle of life in a chocolate cupcake."
Perhaps not everyone could glean her meaning from that, but I could.
With disco alternating with k.d. lange crooning cover songs, we had three of them, mine with a lit candle, plus creme brulee, fiery chocolate and foie gras bread pudding. I sipped glasses of Cocchi Barolo Chinato while others savored plastic-wrapped Laura Palmers.
Holmes ordered a Glen Moray and our server asked if he wanted it over a Death Star. He did, allowing us all to marvel over the globe-shaped ice.
It takes a long time to become young.
~ Picasso, but handwritten inside one of my birthday cards
For the second year in a row, we closed down L'Opossum in service of celebrating my birthday.
Today began with a birthday gift being delivered (on Sunday, no less) before motoring through the mist to Upper Shirley Vineyards for lunch. I hadn't expected the place to be so large, but both the packed parking lot and capacity dining room prove that the word was out.
I'll tell you this much: it appears to be the place for ladies who lunch (eat? trash talk?) in the East End. Lots of bling, lots of all-female tables, lots of shrill conversation bouncing off hard walls.
Addressing the Southern half of my heritage with practically perfect ham biscuits sweet with pepper jelly eaten on the couch for lack of a free space, followed by a move to a table of our own, shrimp and avocado salad and then fried chicken and waffles, we saved the wine tasting for afterward in lieu of dessert.
I am too lucky to have you as a girlfriend, companion, confidante, soul sister, advisory. partner-in-crime and voice of reason when I need one.~ sentiment written inside a birthday card
How hilarious is it to hear me referred to as a voice of reason? I'll take it with a grain of salt.
The Tannat was the most arresting of the bunch but it was glasses of Rose we took first to the big porch to get a view of the river, where it was too chilly and damp for the birthday girl before moving back to the couch and eventually to the city for a double hot fudge sundae at Bev's and at Secco, a bottle of Can Xa Brut Rose because birthdays.
A quick stop at En Su Boca made birthday nachos my reality and I finally got to see "Barbershop: The Next Cut," a film I'd gone to see weeks ago only to find it sold out.
Funny and not funny, relevant without being strident, with talking points that come across like an overdue rap session, it's the kind of film that makes you realize that white people don't see nearly enough black movies.
Shakedown 1981 during the scene when the entire barbershop breaks into dance at the first notes ("Can't fool myself...") of Luther Vandross' "Never Too Much" and I immediately flash back to a Christmas party that year when the exact same thing happened, albeit not as rhythmically since we were white.
And can we just have a moment for how good looking - body and face - Common is? It's too bad about that time I didn't get in to see him at the Pit. Needless to say, I also have new respect for Nicki Minaj's bountiful booty. Truly, a masterpiece of human engineering.
And wear some jeans for chrissakes.
~ sentiment written inside a birthday card
I might if I had that kind of booty.
~wording on birthday gift (box of out-sized matches)
I hear this a lot, but that stuff wasn't my fault, just a byproduct of, you know, having fun.
Besides, birthdays aren't a sprint, they're a marathon.
They're an opportunity to discuss the Oxford comma, which happened at Metzger while drinking Anton Bauer Zweigelt Rose, eating a cheese plate and a charcuterie plate and listening to vintage soul thanks to a Taurus also obsessed with my favorite New Jersey DJ.
For the birthday girl who grew up in Maryland, the fried softshell crab was a decided highlight.
Sitting five abreast, from the farthest bar stool I overhear, "He's talking about putting tse-tse fly sauce on his sub," and wonder how my friend can be so far along when it's only our first stop.
Oh please, do go on! I could listen to you talk about your blog all night!
~ front of birthday card showing couple deep in discussion
Prom kids commandeered a long table behind us at Nota Bene, where we wound our five-top around the corner of the bar - and I learned that the bartender's prom date 20 years ago had been named Nikki LaRoqua and that she measured up to her name - for ease in hearing each other blather.
Words fell short when a steady stream of food began showing up, a lot of it off the specials board: two bowls of braised fennel with capers and tomato, two more of sugartoads with bagna caude and lots of bread to soak up its buttery, garlicy goodness, pizza of Tellegio and onions, the same roasted cauliflower with lemon, olive oil, capers and fresno chilies I'd fallen hard for just over a week ago and a big bowl of clams and fennel.
People think I'm bossy, too."
~ caption on birthday card image of Ghengis Khan talking to dark-haired woman with glass of pink bubbles in front of her
There was spirited discussion of the difference between a harlot and a strumpet, with the consolation "harlot" t-shirt going to Pru.
Lights were dim but the restaurant was still packed when we arrived at L'Opossum for our final course. Inquiring about the nature of the black bottom, our server summed it up by saying, "It's a circle of life in a chocolate cupcake."
Perhaps not everyone could glean her meaning from that, but I could.
With disco alternating with k.d. lange crooning cover songs, we had three of them, mine with a lit candle, plus creme brulee, fiery chocolate and foie gras bread pudding. I sipped glasses of Cocchi Barolo Chinato while others savored plastic-wrapped Laura Palmers.
Holmes ordered a Glen Moray and our server asked if he wanted it over a Death Star. He did, allowing us all to marvel over the globe-shaped ice.
It takes a long time to become young.
~ Picasso, but handwritten inside one of my birthday cards
For the second year in a row, we closed down L'Opossum in service of celebrating my birthday.
Today began with a birthday gift being delivered (on Sunday, no less) before motoring through the mist to Upper Shirley Vineyards for lunch. I hadn't expected the place to be so large, but both the packed parking lot and capacity dining room prove that the word was out.
I'll tell you this much: it appears to be the place for ladies who lunch (eat? trash talk?) in the East End. Lots of bling, lots of all-female tables, lots of shrill conversation bouncing off hard walls.
Addressing the Southern half of my heritage with practically perfect ham biscuits sweet with pepper jelly eaten on the couch for lack of a free space, followed by a move to a table of our own, shrimp and avocado salad and then fried chicken and waffles, we saved the wine tasting for afterward in lieu of dessert.
I am too lucky to have you as a girlfriend, companion, confidante, soul sister, advisory. partner-in-crime and voice of reason when I need one.~ sentiment written inside a birthday card
How hilarious is it to hear me referred to as a voice of reason? I'll take it with a grain of salt.
The Tannat was the most arresting of the bunch but it was glasses of Rose we took first to the big porch to get a view of the river, where it was too chilly and damp for the birthday girl before moving back to the couch and eventually to the city for a double hot fudge sundae at Bev's and at Secco, a bottle of Can Xa Brut Rose because birthdays.
A quick stop at En Su Boca made birthday nachos my reality and I finally got to see "Barbershop: The Next Cut," a film I'd gone to see weeks ago only to find it sold out.
Funny and not funny, relevant without being strident, with talking points that come across like an overdue rap session, it's the kind of film that makes you realize that white people don't see nearly enough black movies.
Shakedown 1981 during the scene when the entire barbershop breaks into dance at the first notes ("Can't fool myself...") of Luther Vandross' "Never Too Much" and I immediately flash back to a Christmas party that year when the exact same thing happened, albeit not as rhythmically since we were white.
And can we just have a moment for how good looking - body and face - Common is? It's too bad about that time I didn't get in to see him at the Pit. Needless to say, I also have new respect for Nicki Minaj's bountiful booty. Truly, a masterpiece of human engineering.
And wear some jeans for chrissakes.
~ sentiment written inside a birthday card
I might if I had that kind of booty.
Friday, February 26, 2016
Keep Your Eyes on the Legs
Gemini: Allow a little more levity into your daily life. Sometimes you could feel overwhelmed by all the requests being made of you. Schedule time for a loved one, whether it's a lengthy lunch or a special happening at the end of the day.
Believe me, I'm trying to look for levity in all the right places.
After two solid months of planning, two Geminis took on today's fierce wind by walking to Citizen for lunch (see above) and two hours of conversation.
What do you call something if you're trying to name it after me? The Bon Vivant, I'm told.
My day was made.
The new location boasts everything the old one didn't: soaring ceiling height, a rack of vintage comic books, colorful artwork, lots of light and a bar (not to mention dinner hours).
Lunch was two pupusas filled with black beans and cheese, topped with radishes, cilantro and pulled pork with a sassy tomatillo salsa for dipping. The accompanying curtido was less slaw-like and more pickled sliced vegetables, but the fruit salad - pineapple, apples, grapefruit, orange, kiwi - was appealingly fresh and juicy.
The entire afternoon was spent south of the river at the studio of a painter whose Dad once told me I was hot. Did I mention his Dad is my eye doctor? When I shared this information, he chuckled, insisting his father had every right since it was an "appropriate compliment."
With a clever wit and decided talent for mimicry, he entertained me to the point of laughter (see above) while surrounded by his paintings on the wall. Even when we got on to heavier subjects, an innate positivity suffused his take on life, something a fellow optimist appreciates.
Then there was the geek appeal. There is nothing quite as satisfying as spending hours with another art history nerd.
To illustrate what he was talking about, he'd pull out an art book or six and show me color plates of the paintings in question. Eventually, he brought out his laptop and we went down countless rabbit holes when we were reminded of this artist or that.
We went so far as to look at his high school yearbook so I could see him as a fresh-faced over-achiever participating in almost every activity.
It's no wonder when we looked up hours had passed and the sun was looking faint.
Scheduling time for me, I stopped at home long enough to find out how many people were making requests of me (see above) in the time I'd been gone (eight), changed clothes and went to dinner.
L'Opossum's bar had my favorite stool free and a man just finishing up his dinner - well, actually scraping every last bit of creme brulee out of the dish noisily with his spoon - so I slid in and was immediately greeted by the bartender who said he remembered serving me at Balliceaux.
Honestly, I marvel at how servers manage to remember a face out of so many.
As always, the lighting was gloriously dim (read: flattering) and the chef's play list was terrific. I'm talking French pop songs, Liberace, Burl Ives' "Keep Your Eyes on the Hands," a cover of Coldplay's "Viva la Vida" and my favorite Petula Clark song, "Don't Sleep in the Subway."
Noting my interest in the eclectic soundtrack, a photographer friend walked over, pointed at the speaker and said, "And that's Charro. I love this play list he made." Coochie, coochie (Google it, kids).
New to me on the menu was French onion dip gratinee with brandied figs served with Grandma Dave's toasted pecan-currant bread, which read like a list of things Karen loves. Accompanied by a glass of Jean-Luc Columbo Rose, I swooned over the sweet/salty combination and the flavorful vehicle to get it to my mouth.
Just as I finished eating, a guy asked if the seat next to me was taken (nope), ordered a martini (gin, so it counts as a martini) and provided me with a conversational partner.
I couldn't get too excited about his taste in music - jam bands, as in he's seen Phish scores of times - but his job fascinated me. First of all, he lives nowhere, as in no apartment, no house.
Because he works for the largest mobile power company in the world, he moves around and makes his home in different places depending on the job. Right now, that's in Richmond, but often his job involves happenings such as movie shoots and major sporting events. As in, he'll be in Rio this summer for the Olympics.
No home base, how interesting is that?
It suits his foodie nature fine because he gets to discover fabulous food cities through constantly moving around. Right now, he's in love with Richmond, especially how affordable it is to eat here, although he admitted a tendency to find something he likes and get in a rut with it.
He's been to Pizza Tonight four of the past seven days and had the same dish - pappardelle with duck ragout - every time.
Running into me seemed pre-ordained since he immediately asked for a list of places to eat so he can branch out, noting them in his phone and checking the spellings with me.
While I enjoyed venison carpaccio, he dug into Moroccan chicken, moaning over its complexity (and price) and feeling virtuous for a) having gone to the gym and b) breaking his pasta streak.
Despite our near stranger status, I neatly took care of that by sharing with him my lobster mac and cheese adrift in truffle mornay sauce and effectively sucking him right back down the pasta rabbit hole. Don't let him tell you he wasn't willing to be seduced.
Sated, our conversation drifted back to music. After procuring paper from the bartender and checking his phone, he wrote something down and slid it over to me like a secret password. The New Mastersounds, April 26, Broadberry.
"I expect you to be there," he said, certain that the British jazz fusion/funk band would appeal to me. "I hope you show up on a bar stool next to me at one of these other restaurants."
Are you trying to overwhelm me by making a request of me?
The final stop of the evening was at Stir Crazy Cafe to see Eastern European and Balkan folk band My Son, the Doctor play.
Not that I haven't seen them before, but now my friend is their bass player, a fact I only learned last weekend when I randomly ran into him for the first time in three years. So long that both our relationship statuses had changed since I'd last seen him.
Holy cow, he'd gotten married. I had nothing to compare to that.
With dueling clarinets, guitar, bass, drums and percussion, the band wove a spell over the coffee shop that eventually caused two obviously talented women to get up and begin belly dancing in the center of the room (see above), despite not a single song being sung in English.
Sometimes special happenings at the end of the day don't require words you can understand. Most times they do.
Believe me, I'm trying to look for levity in all the right places.
After two solid months of planning, two Geminis took on today's fierce wind by walking to Citizen for lunch (see above) and two hours of conversation.
What do you call something if you're trying to name it after me? The Bon Vivant, I'm told.
My day was made.
The new location boasts everything the old one didn't: soaring ceiling height, a rack of vintage comic books, colorful artwork, lots of light and a bar (not to mention dinner hours).
Lunch was two pupusas filled with black beans and cheese, topped with radishes, cilantro and pulled pork with a sassy tomatillo salsa for dipping. The accompanying curtido was less slaw-like and more pickled sliced vegetables, but the fruit salad - pineapple, apples, grapefruit, orange, kiwi - was appealingly fresh and juicy.
The entire afternoon was spent south of the river at the studio of a painter whose Dad once told me I was hot. Did I mention his Dad is my eye doctor? When I shared this information, he chuckled, insisting his father had every right since it was an "appropriate compliment."
With a clever wit and decided talent for mimicry, he entertained me to the point of laughter (see above) while surrounded by his paintings on the wall. Even when we got on to heavier subjects, an innate positivity suffused his take on life, something a fellow optimist appreciates.
Then there was the geek appeal. There is nothing quite as satisfying as spending hours with another art history nerd.
To illustrate what he was talking about, he'd pull out an art book or six and show me color plates of the paintings in question. Eventually, he brought out his laptop and we went down countless rabbit holes when we were reminded of this artist or that.
We went so far as to look at his high school yearbook so I could see him as a fresh-faced over-achiever participating in almost every activity.
It's no wonder when we looked up hours had passed and the sun was looking faint.
Scheduling time for me, I stopped at home long enough to find out how many people were making requests of me (see above) in the time I'd been gone (eight), changed clothes and went to dinner.
L'Opossum's bar had my favorite stool free and a man just finishing up his dinner - well, actually scraping every last bit of creme brulee out of the dish noisily with his spoon - so I slid in and was immediately greeted by the bartender who said he remembered serving me at Balliceaux.
Honestly, I marvel at how servers manage to remember a face out of so many.
As always, the lighting was gloriously dim (read: flattering) and the chef's play list was terrific. I'm talking French pop songs, Liberace, Burl Ives' "Keep Your Eyes on the Hands," a cover of Coldplay's "Viva la Vida" and my favorite Petula Clark song, "Don't Sleep in the Subway."
Noting my interest in the eclectic soundtrack, a photographer friend walked over, pointed at the speaker and said, "And that's Charro. I love this play list he made." Coochie, coochie (Google it, kids).
New to me on the menu was French onion dip gratinee with brandied figs served with Grandma Dave's toasted pecan-currant bread, which read like a list of things Karen loves. Accompanied by a glass of Jean-Luc Columbo Rose, I swooned over the sweet/salty combination and the flavorful vehicle to get it to my mouth.
Just as I finished eating, a guy asked if the seat next to me was taken (nope), ordered a martini (gin, so it counts as a martini) and provided me with a conversational partner.
I couldn't get too excited about his taste in music - jam bands, as in he's seen Phish scores of times - but his job fascinated me. First of all, he lives nowhere, as in no apartment, no house.
Because he works for the largest mobile power company in the world, he moves around and makes his home in different places depending on the job. Right now, that's in Richmond, but often his job involves happenings such as movie shoots and major sporting events. As in, he'll be in Rio this summer for the Olympics.
No home base, how interesting is that?
It suits his foodie nature fine because he gets to discover fabulous food cities through constantly moving around. Right now, he's in love with Richmond, especially how affordable it is to eat here, although he admitted a tendency to find something he likes and get in a rut with it.
He's been to Pizza Tonight four of the past seven days and had the same dish - pappardelle with duck ragout - every time.
Running into me seemed pre-ordained since he immediately asked for a list of places to eat so he can branch out, noting them in his phone and checking the spellings with me.
While I enjoyed venison carpaccio, he dug into Moroccan chicken, moaning over its complexity (and price) and feeling virtuous for a) having gone to the gym and b) breaking his pasta streak.
Despite our near stranger status, I neatly took care of that by sharing with him my lobster mac and cheese adrift in truffle mornay sauce and effectively sucking him right back down the pasta rabbit hole. Don't let him tell you he wasn't willing to be seduced.
Sated, our conversation drifted back to music. After procuring paper from the bartender and checking his phone, he wrote something down and slid it over to me like a secret password. The New Mastersounds, April 26, Broadberry.
"I expect you to be there," he said, certain that the British jazz fusion/funk band would appeal to me. "I hope you show up on a bar stool next to me at one of these other restaurants."
Are you trying to overwhelm me by making a request of me?
The final stop of the evening was at Stir Crazy Cafe to see Eastern European and Balkan folk band My Son, the Doctor play.
Not that I haven't seen them before, but now my friend is their bass player, a fact I only learned last weekend when I randomly ran into him for the first time in three years. So long that both our relationship statuses had changed since I'd last seen him.
Holy cow, he'd gotten married. I had nothing to compare to that.
With dueling clarinets, guitar, bass, drums and percussion, the band wove a spell over the coffee shop that eventually caused two obviously talented women to get up and begin belly dancing in the center of the room (see above), despite not a single song being sung in English.
Sometimes special happenings at the end of the day don't require words you can understand. Most times they do.
Thursday, August 6, 2015
Goodbye, Horses
Nothing like happening unexpectedly into a celebration.
Since it had been too long since I'd been to L'Opossum, I figured I'd start there. Imagine my surprise to walk in and discover that today was their one year anniversary.
They grow up so fast, don't they?
That's one year of the best-written menu in town ("Sweet and innocent North Atlantic salmon beguiled by comrade Dave's enigmatic embrace of..." you get the idea), easily the finest soundtrack ("Love is a Many Splendored Thing" to "Goodbye Horses," the '80s gem used in "Silence of the Lambs") and the wildly eclectic crowd.
I walked in behind a solo guy arriving early for his dinner meeting with friends. Waiting for them, he shared that he was from New Jersey (by way of India) but had spent ten years visiting Richmond. His first time at L'Opossum, he watched eager to pick up tips as I ordered.
There wasn't much to it.
I listened as the unfamiliar bartender detailed two specials and wanted both of them. Plum tomato gazpacho with black bean salsa, tequila- marinated shrimp and sliced avocado was the ideal marriage of flavors while foie gras with summer succotash of corn and lima beans in ringlets of charred red onion got a kick from smoked peach sauce, blackberry balsamic and Sauterne-soaked blackberries.
Fat + the flavors of summer made for an exquisite combination.
As I was swooning over my dinner accompanied by a glass of Domaine Bellevue Rose, this guy's posse showed up and instinctively reverted to shop talk.
They've reassigned him to special projects.
What does that even mean?
It means he has one foot out the door.
Apparently, this is how business people talk even when they're out on a social occasion.
Okay, now let's get to gossip.
You mean internal matters?
Yes!
Even once they moved to a booth, every time I looked over, they were loudly talking corporate politics and technology.
Yawn.
Once they vacated the bar, I spotted a cute couple, coincidentally the same one who'd sat next to me at the Club Saison wine dinner 48 hours ago. Richmond is a small, small town sometimes.
Filling in the stools between them and me arrived a trio of parents and grown son, with the matriarch looking around. "It's (long pause) cute?" she announced uncertainly.
Meanwhile out of the back comes owner David Shannon, making a bee line for the lights and adjusting them lower to better suit the waning outdoor light. "I do this five times a night," he says, stating what has become obvious over my many visits.
Brilliant. I'm the first one to admit that I appreciate a restaurant that progressively lowers its lights so that the patrons look progressively better as the night goes on.
Everyone is prettier in David Shannon's lighting.
But the fact is, the man also is known to come out and quietly tweak the music, much like the DJ at a party always looking to give the crowd what it wants before it knows it needs it.
Things getting too settled? Let's make your backsides wanna move.
The woman who'd been unsure about the place is soon won over when she spots the shiny, orange globe light fixture over a nearby booth. "I had that orange ball light over my dining room table in the '70s!" she squeals with delight.
Overhead, Lefty Frizzel's song "If You've Got the Money, Honey, I've Got the Time" comes on and her husband gets excited. "This was my favorite song!" Now we know he dates to the early '50s.
Half of the couple at the end of the bar comes over to chat about David's passion for details and how it's the reason for their frequent visits. "And the people-watching is amazing!" he says.
Well, it's certainly all over the map. There are sedate-looking couples and parties of four (known each other for years, probably), a dumpy guy in backwards sunglasses and flip-flops with two young women (daughters? for hires?), a large non-communicative couple who look like they wish they were at Olive Garden and plenty of regular-looking people.
The norm is anything goes.
Cute couple comes over to say farewell, hoping that we will run into each other again in another 48 hours. Given both our devotion to meals out, it's certainly a possibility.
It's while I'm getting rhapsodic about my black bottom pie that I spy a familiar restaurant couple through the masses. Once they spot me, as if on cue, the four people next to me at the bar decide to move to a table. I now have company.
When they ask what I've eaten (during a Dolly Parton song I didn't recognize but did enjoy), I rave about the gazpacho and foie gras, resulting in them ordering both. What surprises me is that he, a long-time restaurant employee, has never had foie gras. Turns out he didn't eat meat for 20 years (for which I offer my condolences) so he's still playing catch-up.
I'd play it a little faster if I were you, friend.
In that vein, he orders the ultra-luscious duet of veal sweetbreads and butter-poached lobster with a backbeat (I told you David was a wordsmith) of lavender grits and English peas climaxing into a blissful crescendo of sherried sauce Americaine.
Miraculously, it is the first time this 46-year old has had sweetbreads or lobster and I am a witness.
It's a wondrous thing to watch the first time someone's eyes roll back in their head because something so sensual has gone in their mouth.
We get to talking about career servers (this needs to be appreciated in this country), meddling spouses (not everyone is cut out for the restaurant business) and flirtatious customers while they ply me with more Bellevue Rose and pointed conversation about the local scene.
We marvel how it's like a train wreck when people get called out publicly on Facebook. No one can look away.
When the chef comes out in street clothes, I raise my glass momentarily to his monumentally successful first year. Everyone I've talked to tonight had mentioned how removed from Richmond you feel when you're inside this funky interior eating fabulous food.
You want to talk best new restaurants? Try climaxing into a blissful crescendo. I got your best new restaurant right here, buddy.
Since it had been too long since I'd been to L'Opossum, I figured I'd start there. Imagine my surprise to walk in and discover that today was their one year anniversary.
They grow up so fast, don't they?
That's one year of the best-written menu in town ("Sweet and innocent North Atlantic salmon beguiled by comrade Dave's enigmatic embrace of..." you get the idea), easily the finest soundtrack ("Love is a Many Splendored Thing" to "Goodbye Horses," the '80s gem used in "Silence of the Lambs") and the wildly eclectic crowd.
I walked in behind a solo guy arriving early for his dinner meeting with friends. Waiting for them, he shared that he was from New Jersey (by way of India) but had spent ten years visiting Richmond. His first time at L'Opossum, he watched eager to pick up tips as I ordered.
There wasn't much to it.
I listened as the unfamiliar bartender detailed two specials and wanted both of them. Plum tomato gazpacho with black bean salsa, tequila- marinated shrimp and sliced avocado was the ideal marriage of flavors while foie gras with summer succotash of corn and lima beans in ringlets of charred red onion got a kick from smoked peach sauce, blackberry balsamic and Sauterne-soaked blackberries.
Fat + the flavors of summer made for an exquisite combination.
As I was swooning over my dinner accompanied by a glass of Domaine Bellevue Rose, this guy's posse showed up and instinctively reverted to shop talk.
They've reassigned him to special projects.
What does that even mean?
It means he has one foot out the door.
Apparently, this is how business people talk even when they're out on a social occasion.
Okay, now let's get to gossip.
You mean internal matters?
Yes!
Even once they moved to a booth, every time I looked over, they were loudly talking corporate politics and technology.
Yawn.
Once they vacated the bar, I spotted a cute couple, coincidentally the same one who'd sat next to me at the Club Saison wine dinner 48 hours ago. Richmond is a small, small town sometimes.
Filling in the stools between them and me arrived a trio of parents and grown son, with the matriarch looking around. "It's (long pause) cute?" she announced uncertainly.
Meanwhile out of the back comes owner David Shannon, making a bee line for the lights and adjusting them lower to better suit the waning outdoor light. "I do this five times a night," he says, stating what has become obvious over my many visits.
Brilliant. I'm the first one to admit that I appreciate a restaurant that progressively lowers its lights so that the patrons look progressively better as the night goes on.
Everyone is prettier in David Shannon's lighting.
But the fact is, the man also is known to come out and quietly tweak the music, much like the DJ at a party always looking to give the crowd what it wants before it knows it needs it.
Things getting too settled? Let's make your backsides wanna move.
The woman who'd been unsure about the place is soon won over when she spots the shiny, orange globe light fixture over a nearby booth. "I had that orange ball light over my dining room table in the '70s!" she squeals with delight.
Overhead, Lefty Frizzel's song "If You've Got the Money, Honey, I've Got the Time" comes on and her husband gets excited. "This was my favorite song!" Now we know he dates to the early '50s.
Half of the couple at the end of the bar comes over to chat about David's passion for details and how it's the reason for their frequent visits. "And the people-watching is amazing!" he says.
Well, it's certainly all over the map. There are sedate-looking couples and parties of four (known each other for years, probably), a dumpy guy in backwards sunglasses and flip-flops with two young women (daughters? for hires?), a large non-communicative couple who look like they wish they were at Olive Garden and plenty of regular-looking people.
The norm is anything goes.
Cute couple comes over to say farewell, hoping that we will run into each other again in another 48 hours. Given both our devotion to meals out, it's certainly a possibility.
It's while I'm getting rhapsodic about my black bottom pie that I spy a familiar restaurant couple through the masses. Once they spot me, as if on cue, the four people next to me at the bar decide to move to a table. I now have company.
When they ask what I've eaten (during a Dolly Parton song I didn't recognize but did enjoy), I rave about the gazpacho and foie gras, resulting in them ordering both. What surprises me is that he, a long-time restaurant employee, has never had foie gras. Turns out he didn't eat meat for 20 years (for which I offer my condolences) so he's still playing catch-up.
I'd play it a little faster if I were you, friend.
In that vein, he orders the ultra-luscious duet of veal sweetbreads and butter-poached lobster with a backbeat (I told you David was a wordsmith) of lavender grits and English peas climaxing into a blissful crescendo of sherried sauce Americaine.
Miraculously, it is the first time this 46-year old has had sweetbreads or lobster and I am a witness.
It's a wondrous thing to watch the first time someone's eyes roll back in their head because something so sensual has gone in their mouth.
We get to talking about career servers (this needs to be appreciated in this country), meddling spouses (not everyone is cut out for the restaurant business) and flirtatious customers while they ply me with more Bellevue Rose and pointed conversation about the local scene.
We marvel how it's like a train wreck when people get called out publicly on Facebook. No one can look away.
When the chef comes out in street clothes, I raise my glass momentarily to his monumentally successful first year. Everyone I've talked to tonight had mentioned how removed from Richmond you feel when you're inside this funky interior eating fabulous food.
You want to talk best new restaurants? Try climaxing into a blissful crescendo. I got your best new restaurant right here, buddy.
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Playing Festively
If someone asked me to plan my kind of date, it might go something like this.
Begin by choosing a restaurant where the ambiance is as seductive as the food (L'Opossum) and then suggest that you meet there (always have your own car, just in case) shortly after they open and before the masses arrive.
If you're smart, you'll choose a place at the bar because you know the bartender is a great conversationalist (Anton LaVey, materialism, societal accountability) and always willing to talk music with you.
Once your date arrives (a couple tonight), choose a bottle of the beautiful Domaine Bellevue 2013 Touraine Rose to toast each other. Theirs is a unique relationship ("We started drinking together 15 years ago, but we've only been together for five") and there's a lot of laughter between us.
Good dates should abound with laughter.
Like me, they are enchanted with the eclectic soundtrack on this date - Glen Campbell's "Gentle On My Mind," Helen Reddy's "No Way to Treat a Lady" and Liberace's version of "Theme from a Summer Place," during which a discussion of Liberace ensues and the bartender sagely observes, "I never knew much about him but now that I've done some listening, I think he plays so festively."
My favorite dates are feasts of food, so tonight I start with something new on the menu: juniper-encrusted venison carpaccio with lingonberries, pickled walnut seeds over rocket. It's Scandanavia on a plate.
From there, my dates and I share oysters in an absinthe mist (be still my heart, absinthe twice in three days), the decadence of buerre blanc-drenched escargots in and around a ham biscuit and Faberge eggs with caviar and Champagne Rose jigglers (I don't hesitate to devour these with my fingers), finishing our first round with the lobster taco with seared foie gras, an obscenely seductive note on which to end.
Since part of the appeal of a date is sharing stories, we do. The bartender joins us to discuss the Phil Ochs songbook one of us discovered today at an estate sale and music conversation develops (folky Ochs versus orchestral Ochs? early Leonard Cohen versus late? is there such a thing as too much Bowie?).
Possibly my favorite song heard all evening is Mercury Rev's "Laurel Canyon" but talk is most spirited about Suzy Creamcheese.
We are regaled with tales of dating a VCU art history professor who used to take photographs of dog poop everywhere he traveled and then insert them into his lectures between slides of Notre Dame and Chartres.
Appropriately, a second bottle of Rose accompanies our next course of Caesar salad, rack of lamb and black grouper while "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden" plays. It's been so long since any of us heard it that we debate whether or not it's the original (it is, as it turns out).
A smart date defers the choice of dessert (and another bottle of Rose) to me and I graciously accept, opting for the sexual innuendo of hot black bottom a la mode topped by a dominant rich ganache and whipped cream and just to prove I can, le petite mort au chocolate (because who doesn't want an orgasm on a date?) set aflame with 151 rum.
By now, we are four plus hours into this date, a very good sign that food, drink and conversation are all hitting on the most pleasurable levels. No one wants to stop, so we order after dinner drinks and when one of us gets the Blackout 77, we begin by inhaling its impressive aromas.
One verdict is that it smells like Cary Grant in New York City back during the TWA era. The bartender admits to choosing the NYC power outage of 1977, an event he remembers from childhood, as a point of reference for the potent libation.
There will be two of these beauties before the night is over.
The Laura Palmer is served wrapped in plastic around the glass, its gin and muddled cherries a blood red reminder of poor Laura's fate. Balvenie tastes of, well, Balvenie, because sometimes for some dates, only brown liquor will do. I find myself drawn to Zaya 12-year old rum, a far cry from the Meyer's Rum of my youth.
By the time the date winds down, only a couple of tables are left, but they hadn't arrived when it was still daylight as we had done. Favorite parting compliment: "You are the coolest chick in Richmond."
Note to those seeking to plan the best kind of date: compliments should be part of the game plan.
But dates shouldn't end with a fabulous meal, at least not one on a Saturday night. Better to find yourself at a place like Balliceaux for Body Talk, with DJs playing records of boogie/funk/modern soul for a dance party that's in full swing as I shed my coat and join the throngs on the floor.
The dance floor itself extends to the walls of the room because the place is so packed, but it also means that even if you arrive technically date-less, you will have plenty of people to dance with. And what better use for all those calories and drinks consumed over the past six hours than a few more of non-stop motion?
I guarantee that by the time you get home, nearly nine hours after your date began, you'll fall into bed full, happily and almost talked out.
It will be because that kind of date is the most fun you could have without being kissed.
Begin by choosing a restaurant where the ambiance is as seductive as the food (L'Opossum) and then suggest that you meet there (always have your own car, just in case) shortly after they open and before the masses arrive.
If you're smart, you'll choose a place at the bar because you know the bartender is a great conversationalist (Anton LaVey, materialism, societal accountability) and always willing to talk music with you.
Once your date arrives (a couple tonight), choose a bottle of the beautiful Domaine Bellevue 2013 Touraine Rose to toast each other. Theirs is a unique relationship ("We started drinking together 15 years ago, but we've only been together for five") and there's a lot of laughter between us.
Good dates should abound with laughter.
Like me, they are enchanted with the eclectic soundtrack on this date - Glen Campbell's "Gentle On My Mind," Helen Reddy's "No Way to Treat a Lady" and Liberace's version of "Theme from a Summer Place," during which a discussion of Liberace ensues and the bartender sagely observes, "I never knew much about him but now that I've done some listening, I think he plays so festively."
My favorite dates are feasts of food, so tonight I start with something new on the menu: juniper-encrusted venison carpaccio with lingonberries, pickled walnut seeds over rocket. It's Scandanavia on a plate.
From there, my dates and I share oysters in an absinthe mist (be still my heart, absinthe twice in three days), the decadence of buerre blanc-drenched escargots in and around a ham biscuit and Faberge eggs with caviar and Champagne Rose jigglers (I don't hesitate to devour these with my fingers), finishing our first round with the lobster taco with seared foie gras, an obscenely seductive note on which to end.
Since part of the appeal of a date is sharing stories, we do. The bartender joins us to discuss the Phil Ochs songbook one of us discovered today at an estate sale and music conversation develops (folky Ochs versus orchestral Ochs? early Leonard Cohen versus late? is there such a thing as too much Bowie?).
Possibly my favorite song heard all evening is Mercury Rev's "Laurel Canyon" but talk is most spirited about Suzy Creamcheese.
We are regaled with tales of dating a VCU art history professor who used to take photographs of dog poop everywhere he traveled and then insert them into his lectures between slides of Notre Dame and Chartres.
Appropriately, a second bottle of Rose accompanies our next course of Caesar salad, rack of lamb and black grouper while "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden" plays. It's been so long since any of us heard it that we debate whether or not it's the original (it is, as it turns out).
A smart date defers the choice of dessert (and another bottle of Rose) to me and I graciously accept, opting for the sexual innuendo of hot black bottom a la mode topped by a dominant rich ganache and whipped cream and just to prove I can, le petite mort au chocolate (because who doesn't want an orgasm on a date?) set aflame with 151 rum.
By now, we are four plus hours into this date, a very good sign that food, drink and conversation are all hitting on the most pleasurable levels. No one wants to stop, so we order after dinner drinks and when one of us gets the Blackout 77, we begin by inhaling its impressive aromas.
One verdict is that it smells like Cary Grant in New York City back during the TWA era. The bartender admits to choosing the NYC power outage of 1977, an event he remembers from childhood, as a point of reference for the potent libation.
There will be two of these beauties before the night is over.
The Laura Palmer is served wrapped in plastic around the glass, its gin and muddled cherries a blood red reminder of poor Laura's fate. Balvenie tastes of, well, Balvenie, because sometimes for some dates, only brown liquor will do. I find myself drawn to Zaya 12-year old rum, a far cry from the Meyer's Rum of my youth.
By the time the date winds down, only a couple of tables are left, but they hadn't arrived when it was still daylight as we had done. Favorite parting compliment: "You are the coolest chick in Richmond."
Note to those seeking to plan the best kind of date: compliments should be part of the game plan.
But dates shouldn't end with a fabulous meal, at least not one on a Saturday night. Better to find yourself at a place like Balliceaux for Body Talk, with DJs playing records of boogie/funk/modern soul for a dance party that's in full swing as I shed my coat and join the throngs on the floor.
The dance floor itself extends to the walls of the room because the place is so packed, but it also means that even if you arrive technically date-less, you will have plenty of people to dance with. And what better use for all those calories and drinks consumed over the past six hours than a few more of non-stop motion?
I guarantee that by the time you get home, nearly nine hours after your date began, you'll fall into bed full, happily and almost talked out.
It will be because that kind of date is the most fun you could have without being kissed.
Friday, January 9, 2015
Foie Gras and Philosophy
Oh, yes, I have been ridiculed for my eclectic taste.
A friend used to joke about it, saying things like "Who are you off to see tonight? Portuguese hula hoop chanters? Norwegian midget clown poetry? Senegalese haiku dancing girls?" As if.
One friend who does not mock me for my varied interests was more than happy to make plans to meet at L'opossum tonight, although she had one concern. "Supposed to be oh-so very cold on Thursday. Not sure your legs will make it out of your apartment!"
Assuring her that my legs always make it out of the apartment, we were welcomed warmly as the bar's first occupants. You have to appreciate a bartender who remembers an infrequent customer.
Since it was our first 2015 get-together, we decided to begin with glasses of the oh-so dry Treveri Brut de Blanc to toast our nearly 20-year friendship and the new year. And, let's be honest, because we just plain like sparkling.
Because it was my friend's first visit, we took some time for her to get the lay of the land, surveying the visual splendor that is L'opossum. As an artist, she couldn't help but be taken with the colorful light fixtures, the Andy Warhol wallpaper-covered bar, even the beautiful votive candle holders along the bar. No detail escapes the owner's discerning eye, making it a pleasure to behold, no matter where your eye lands.
After admiring the most unique menu design in town (she and I originally met when she was making her living as a graphic designer), we got down to ordering so we could move on to social intercourse.
Like me on my first visit, she was understandably immediately drawn to the el Dorado low rider, a lobster taco with truffled guacamole, although, unlike me, she decided we needed to splurge and have the chef's surprise (silky foie gras) added on.
Since that combination was guaranteed to close our arteries mid-conversation, we balanced it with the polyamorous hippie three-way because the two of us are, after all, products of the '70s (which should not necessarily be construed to mean that we were polyamorous...or that we weren't).
Eating the plate of toasted papadoms with quinoa tabouleh, hummus and baba ganouche first, the bright, fresh flavors made it difficult to keep in mind that this was our healthy choice.
And while I knew how flavorful and well balanced the lobster and tomatillo taco was, the addition of the foie gras pushed it into all new territory, something at once obscene and glorious. And with the Treveri, an absolute indulgence.
Several times while we ate, my friend paused and cocked her ear toward the speaker, taken by the noticeably well-chosen music playing. I assured her it's always that good. It's no exaggeration to say that there's no more unique or compelling restaurant soundtrack in this town.
Midway through eating, a friend came up to say hello and I almost didn't recognize her. She was dressed to the nines and looked absolutely fabulous, but I'd never seen her in anything but jeans or a bathing suit. You just never know how beautifully some people clean up, I teased her. For that matter, her happy husband looked tres dapper in a suit, something else I'd never seen and I've known him far longer.
Not long after, the couple who'd taken up residence next to us at the bar, turned to my friend and greeted her by name. He was someone who used to date a co-worker of hers and his companion was the set designer for a local theater company's upcoming production.
Always in Richmond you may be guaranteed that even in a tiny restaurant on a freezing Thursday night, people will know you and say hello.
Rather than leave our palates hanging on a savory note, we closed out with la petite mort au chococlat en flambe (because what woman doesn't want to die by chocolate?), admiring the finesse of our server as he poured 151 rum over the chocolate brick and ignited it for a bit of dessert pyrotechnics.
That left us no choice but to inhale the cayenne-infused delicacy and moan a little.
By the time we reached for our coats, the dining room was full and we were up to date on each other's lives. My dressed-up friends were still waiting on the couch up front for a table, so we paused to chat, meeting their charming friend who's about to embark on a two-year motorcycle trip through South America. Last year, it was the Yukon.
My only question was, "You don't have a girlfriend, do you?" He grinned and said no. With his accent and winning smile, I doubt he'll lack for company south of the border.
As she is wont to do, heading out my friend inquired what my next stop would be.
Duh. What else but Balinese Wayang shadow puppetry with Master Gusti Sudarta and musical accompaniment by members of the Gamelan Raga Kusuma?
Laugh all you want, but the back room at Balliceaux was crowded with spectators when I arrived. It was a diverse group - I spotted three berets in the room - from a child to a very old-looking man. The shadow screen was set up in the center of the room, with people sitting on both sides of it for very different views.
Those in front saw a traditional Balinese shadow play. Those behind could see the master as he chose colorful cardboard figures to manipulate behind the screen, as well as the three musicians playing behind him. Those on the sides could see bits of it all.
I began on the side next to the sax player I know, listening to the Gamelan leader explain what would happen and that it was okay to move around during the performance for varying views. He said we could expect everything from fart jokes to philosophical observations, meaning the narrative was going to be as wide-ranging as the audience.
During the "overture," I chose to move to the bar and take a yellow stool so I could watch from the traditional view, while still having a clear shot of two of the musicians playing. It was ideal for me, but plenty of people moved around throughout.
Parts of the story were in Balinese with others in heavily-accented English, such as when one character called out, "Happy New Year, everyone!" to the audience. There were traditional Balinese songs followed by cracks about Mick Jagger and Michael Jackson. During a fight scene, there was a crack about Bruce Lee.
It was after our hero, the prince, had gone to the woods for enlightenment that we got to see the creatures of the woods: giraffes, kangaroos, frogs (with background mouth harp accompaniment), big cats and rabbits. At one point, a character pulled out a cell phone puppet, to the crowd's delight. My favorite element was the hair ponytail on certain "devil" puppets because it flew around wildly when they were fighting.
At the end, the moral seemed to be that life was happy in the forest because there was no stress.
While some people in the audience looked at their phones throughout, most people seemed pretty into the performance and there was lots of applause when it finished. The master came out to take a bow, wearing only one sock, the other foot barefoot.
Maybe this is an ancient Balinese custom.
Holy cow, maybe I'd just seen semi-barefoot Balinese Wayang shadow puppetry, an even more culturally rarefied way to spend an evening.
I don't care how frigid it is, I'd have to have the stupidest legs in Richmond not to leave my apartment for that.
A friend used to joke about it, saying things like "Who are you off to see tonight? Portuguese hula hoop chanters? Norwegian midget clown poetry? Senegalese haiku dancing girls?" As if.
One friend who does not mock me for my varied interests was more than happy to make plans to meet at L'opossum tonight, although she had one concern. "Supposed to be oh-so very cold on Thursday. Not sure your legs will make it out of your apartment!"
Assuring her that my legs always make it out of the apartment, we were welcomed warmly as the bar's first occupants. You have to appreciate a bartender who remembers an infrequent customer.
Since it was our first 2015 get-together, we decided to begin with glasses of the oh-so dry Treveri Brut de Blanc to toast our nearly 20-year friendship and the new year. And, let's be honest, because we just plain like sparkling.
Because it was my friend's first visit, we took some time for her to get the lay of the land, surveying the visual splendor that is L'opossum. As an artist, she couldn't help but be taken with the colorful light fixtures, the Andy Warhol wallpaper-covered bar, even the beautiful votive candle holders along the bar. No detail escapes the owner's discerning eye, making it a pleasure to behold, no matter where your eye lands.
After admiring the most unique menu design in town (she and I originally met when she was making her living as a graphic designer), we got down to ordering so we could move on to social intercourse.
Like me on my first visit, she was understandably immediately drawn to the el Dorado low rider, a lobster taco with truffled guacamole, although, unlike me, she decided we needed to splurge and have the chef's surprise (silky foie gras) added on.
Since that combination was guaranteed to close our arteries mid-conversation, we balanced it with the polyamorous hippie three-way because the two of us are, after all, products of the '70s (which should not necessarily be construed to mean that we were polyamorous...or that we weren't).
Eating the plate of toasted papadoms with quinoa tabouleh, hummus and baba ganouche first, the bright, fresh flavors made it difficult to keep in mind that this was our healthy choice.
And while I knew how flavorful and well balanced the lobster and tomatillo taco was, the addition of the foie gras pushed it into all new territory, something at once obscene and glorious. And with the Treveri, an absolute indulgence.
Several times while we ate, my friend paused and cocked her ear toward the speaker, taken by the noticeably well-chosen music playing. I assured her it's always that good. It's no exaggeration to say that there's no more unique or compelling restaurant soundtrack in this town.
Midway through eating, a friend came up to say hello and I almost didn't recognize her. She was dressed to the nines and looked absolutely fabulous, but I'd never seen her in anything but jeans or a bathing suit. You just never know how beautifully some people clean up, I teased her. For that matter, her happy husband looked tres dapper in a suit, something else I'd never seen and I've known him far longer.
Not long after, the couple who'd taken up residence next to us at the bar, turned to my friend and greeted her by name. He was someone who used to date a co-worker of hers and his companion was the set designer for a local theater company's upcoming production.
Always in Richmond you may be guaranteed that even in a tiny restaurant on a freezing Thursday night, people will know you and say hello.
Rather than leave our palates hanging on a savory note, we closed out with la petite mort au chococlat en flambe (because what woman doesn't want to die by chocolate?), admiring the finesse of our server as he poured 151 rum over the chocolate brick and ignited it for a bit of dessert pyrotechnics.
That left us no choice but to inhale the cayenne-infused delicacy and moan a little.
By the time we reached for our coats, the dining room was full and we were up to date on each other's lives. My dressed-up friends were still waiting on the couch up front for a table, so we paused to chat, meeting their charming friend who's about to embark on a two-year motorcycle trip through South America. Last year, it was the Yukon.
My only question was, "You don't have a girlfriend, do you?" He grinned and said no. With his accent and winning smile, I doubt he'll lack for company south of the border.
As she is wont to do, heading out my friend inquired what my next stop would be.
Duh. What else but Balinese Wayang shadow puppetry with Master Gusti Sudarta and musical accompaniment by members of the Gamelan Raga Kusuma?
Laugh all you want, but the back room at Balliceaux was crowded with spectators when I arrived. It was a diverse group - I spotted three berets in the room - from a child to a very old-looking man. The shadow screen was set up in the center of the room, with people sitting on both sides of it for very different views.
Those in front saw a traditional Balinese shadow play. Those behind could see the master as he chose colorful cardboard figures to manipulate behind the screen, as well as the three musicians playing behind him. Those on the sides could see bits of it all.
I began on the side next to the sax player I know, listening to the Gamelan leader explain what would happen and that it was okay to move around during the performance for varying views. He said we could expect everything from fart jokes to philosophical observations, meaning the narrative was going to be as wide-ranging as the audience.
During the "overture," I chose to move to the bar and take a yellow stool so I could watch from the traditional view, while still having a clear shot of two of the musicians playing. It was ideal for me, but plenty of people moved around throughout.
Parts of the story were in Balinese with others in heavily-accented English, such as when one character called out, "Happy New Year, everyone!" to the audience. There were traditional Balinese songs followed by cracks about Mick Jagger and Michael Jackson. During a fight scene, there was a crack about Bruce Lee.
It was after our hero, the prince, had gone to the woods for enlightenment that we got to see the creatures of the woods: giraffes, kangaroos, frogs (with background mouth harp accompaniment), big cats and rabbits. At one point, a character pulled out a cell phone puppet, to the crowd's delight. My favorite element was the hair ponytail on certain "devil" puppets because it flew around wildly when they were fighting.
At the end, the moral seemed to be that life was happy in the forest because there was no stress.
While some people in the audience looked at their phones throughout, most people seemed pretty into the performance and there was lots of applause when it finished. The master came out to take a bow, wearing only one sock, the other foot barefoot.
Maybe this is an ancient Balinese custom.
Holy cow, maybe I'd just seen semi-barefoot Balinese Wayang shadow puppetry, an even more culturally rarefied way to spend an evening.
I don't care how frigid it is, I'd have to have the stupidest legs in Richmond not to leave my apartment for that.
Friday, August 29, 2014
Take Five
Some nights are all about the simple pleasures.
I set out to check out L'Oppossum, eager to see how the former Pescado's China Street had been transformed.
When I expressed my preference for the bar over a table, the two gentlemen at the host stand assured me that the bartender would be friendly.
That was an understatement. He not only recognized me from eons ago, but even inquired about a mutual friend of ours.
There's really no escaping your past in this town.
Settling into the end stool, the first thing I noticed was all the interesting art on the wall interspersed with "Star Wars" plates. Behind the bar, I spotted a stuffed possum and a painting of Nick Cave.
It was a pleasure to see a restaurant that bore no resemblance to the current restaurant decor trend.
The second was the music, everything from Helen Reddy to the Delfonics "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time) with nary a cliched indie tune to be heard. Absolutely delightful.
The trio nearest me at the bar were soon replaced with the casually dressed director of the VMFA and his wife about the time my pale pink glass of fresh and fruity La Galope Rose Comte arrived.
I was told they'd sold out of nine bottles the first night they were open. Could it be that we are finally becoming a Rose town? Be still, my heart.
Apparently the director and his wife had been there before because I heard her tell the bartender that they were positively smitten with the place, rating it their new favorite.
Since it was my first visit, the menu was a blank slate to me so I began with the obvious: the el dorado low rider, a lobster taco with tomatillo sauce and decadent guacamole.
While there was the option to add the chef's surprise, I opted out of adding tonight's surprise of foie gras, not really needing my arteries to close down before Labor day.
Once I opened the conversational door by inquiring about the about music, the bartender boldly walked through, providing endless opinions and observations about music past and present.
I admire a man who appreciates a good pop song, no matter the genre.
We covered his first show (the Kinks), his thoughts on Television's first album, his recommendation of Comasat Angels and memories of early Cure.
At one point, a man came to the bar, credit card in hand, to order a beer. Seems he'd ordered a beer from his server at the table, but hadn't the patience to wait for it to arrive.
"I need a beer now," he clarified. "I'll still drink the one the server brings me." Off he went, beer in hand.
Man, that's some serious jonesing for a beer, friend.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, I was being asked what I wanted next. His suggestion was to get something I wouldn't want to share in case my next visit involved a companion.
Good thinking. I ordered escargots a la ham biscuit, which was exactly what it sounds like: a plate of escargot (and greens) with a ham biscuit adorned with, that's right, an escargot.
Proving I am my Richmond grandmother's granddaughter, I pulled off a piece of biscuit, slathered it with butter and devoured it to assess the biscuit worthiness.
Before long, it was just me at the bar, leaving the bartender to make drinks for tables and in between, chat with me.
About how Wilco started out aping Gram Parsons. How 20-somethings don't even know who Gram Parsons or the Flying Burrito Brothers are. About what pop gems the Strokes wrote.
I considered death by chocolate, but instead had another glass of Rose to accompany the music talk.
After anticipating a quick, solo meal, I'd been having such a terrific time talking with my fellow music lover, I'd completely lost track of time. Hours had passed and I now had somewhere to be.
Of all the unlikely places, it was with the Baptists. Just don't tell them I'd been imbibing.
I arrived at the courtyard at First Baptist on Monument, already knowing the drill for how this works.
Although tonight was the first of this year's courtyard classics I'd attended (and none last year because they were all cartoon movies), I've seen plenty of movies in the shadow of this church during other hot August nights.
Out host made sure everyone who wanted popcorn had gotten some because, he said, movies are more palatable when you're eating popcorn.
After a prayer of thanks for the nice breeze (I abstained), we were on to a 1954 MGM cartoon called "Dixieland Droopy" about a dog (a beagle, perhaps?) named John Irving Pettybone who loves Dixieland music.
Only problem is no one else does so he keeps getting kicked out of places like the "Good Rumor Ice Cream" truck for playing his Dixieland record.
After the record is broken, he lucks out by having a flea band take up residence in his tail and play non-stop Dixieland.
It was hysterical when the dog tells the flea band to "take five" and they hop off his back and approach some smoldering butts on the street, puffing away during their break and then going back to play.
Thus warmed up, we moved on to the main feature, a Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz classic called "The Long, Long Trailer."
Taking place in the pre-interstate era (1954), the story follows the newlyweds as they buy a trailer and car in which to honeymoon and then live happily ever after.
In a nod to the crowd, it had subtitles so you didn't have to listen too hard to understand the dialog.
Since I spent a good part of my childhood watching reruns of "I Love Lucy," I expected this to be similar so I was pleasantly surprised when it wasn't.
That said, their character names were Tacy and Nicky, but we'll let that slide.
But here Nicky was an engineer (not a bandleader) and Tacy wasn't quite as zany, unless you count hoarding rocks for the future garden she planned to plant once they arrived in Colorado, their goal.
It was very '50s, of course, with Tacy (frequently in hat and gloves) lobbying hard for the trailer purchase (by the way $5,345) so that, "No matter where were are, I could make home for you."
Aww, how sweetly Eisenhower years is that?
And speaking of that, all the roads were two lanes, policemen directed traffic at intersections and parking lots cost fifty cents.
While it wasn't "I Love Lucy," there was still plenty of physical humor such as Nicky hilariously fighting with the trailer shower head and Tacy trying to make a fancy dinner while the trailer is being pulled.
When she tells Nicky she's making beef ragout and a Cesar salad, he says he'll get out the Roquefort.
"Only boors use Roquefort," she corrects him. "Everyone knows it's Parmesan." Did everyone know that in 1954?
There's even a too cutesy scene of the two of them motoring along, Tacy stretched out on the giant bench seat of their Lincoln convertible, singing a song called "Breezin' Along."
That's how you know they're in love.
Well, that and Nicky says, "You could make me happy living in a cave." Doubtful, but we got his point.
The climax comes when they have to go over an 8,000 foot mountain and Nicky tells Tacy to jettison all the stuff she's been collecting, which of course she doesn't do.
During scenes of the trailer being pulled along high, narrow roads on the edge of a cliff, the crowd around me got vocal.
"Oh, my word!"
"Uh oh!"
"No, no, she's in trouble now!"
When the clouds are the ceiling in your outdoor movie theater, I guess it's just fine to talk to the characters in a fifty year old movie.
I didn't, but I'd also unexpectedly spent a whole lot of conversation at dinner, maybe all I had for the evening.
Doubtful, but you get my point.
I set out to check out L'Oppossum, eager to see how the former Pescado's China Street had been transformed.
When I expressed my preference for the bar over a table, the two gentlemen at the host stand assured me that the bartender would be friendly.
That was an understatement. He not only recognized me from eons ago, but even inquired about a mutual friend of ours.
There's really no escaping your past in this town.
Settling into the end stool, the first thing I noticed was all the interesting art on the wall interspersed with "Star Wars" plates. Behind the bar, I spotted a stuffed possum and a painting of Nick Cave.
It was a pleasure to see a restaurant that bore no resemblance to the current restaurant decor trend.
The second was the music, everything from Helen Reddy to the Delfonics "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time) with nary a cliched indie tune to be heard. Absolutely delightful.
The trio nearest me at the bar were soon replaced with the casually dressed director of the VMFA and his wife about the time my pale pink glass of fresh and fruity La Galope Rose Comte arrived.
I was told they'd sold out of nine bottles the first night they were open. Could it be that we are finally becoming a Rose town? Be still, my heart.
Apparently the director and his wife had been there before because I heard her tell the bartender that they were positively smitten with the place, rating it their new favorite.
Since it was my first visit, the menu was a blank slate to me so I began with the obvious: the el dorado low rider, a lobster taco with tomatillo sauce and decadent guacamole.
While there was the option to add the chef's surprise, I opted out of adding tonight's surprise of foie gras, not really needing my arteries to close down before Labor day.
Once I opened the conversational door by inquiring about the about music, the bartender boldly walked through, providing endless opinions and observations about music past and present.
I admire a man who appreciates a good pop song, no matter the genre.
We covered his first show (the Kinks), his thoughts on Television's first album, his recommendation of Comasat Angels and memories of early Cure.
At one point, a man came to the bar, credit card in hand, to order a beer. Seems he'd ordered a beer from his server at the table, but hadn't the patience to wait for it to arrive.
"I need a beer now," he clarified. "I'll still drink the one the server brings me." Off he went, beer in hand.
Man, that's some serious jonesing for a beer, friend.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, I was being asked what I wanted next. His suggestion was to get something I wouldn't want to share in case my next visit involved a companion.
Good thinking. I ordered escargots a la ham biscuit, which was exactly what it sounds like: a plate of escargot (and greens) with a ham biscuit adorned with, that's right, an escargot.
Proving I am my Richmond grandmother's granddaughter, I pulled off a piece of biscuit, slathered it with butter and devoured it to assess the biscuit worthiness.
Before long, it was just me at the bar, leaving the bartender to make drinks for tables and in between, chat with me.
About how Wilco started out aping Gram Parsons. How 20-somethings don't even know who Gram Parsons or the Flying Burrito Brothers are. About what pop gems the Strokes wrote.
I considered death by chocolate, but instead had another glass of Rose to accompany the music talk.
After anticipating a quick, solo meal, I'd been having such a terrific time talking with my fellow music lover, I'd completely lost track of time. Hours had passed and I now had somewhere to be.
Of all the unlikely places, it was with the Baptists. Just don't tell them I'd been imbibing.
I arrived at the courtyard at First Baptist on Monument, already knowing the drill for how this works.
Although tonight was the first of this year's courtyard classics I'd attended (and none last year because they were all cartoon movies), I've seen plenty of movies in the shadow of this church during other hot August nights.
Out host made sure everyone who wanted popcorn had gotten some because, he said, movies are more palatable when you're eating popcorn.
After a prayer of thanks for the nice breeze (I abstained), we were on to a 1954 MGM cartoon called "Dixieland Droopy" about a dog (a beagle, perhaps?) named John Irving Pettybone who loves Dixieland music.
Only problem is no one else does so he keeps getting kicked out of places like the "Good Rumor Ice Cream" truck for playing his Dixieland record.
After the record is broken, he lucks out by having a flea band take up residence in his tail and play non-stop Dixieland.
It was hysterical when the dog tells the flea band to "take five" and they hop off his back and approach some smoldering butts on the street, puffing away during their break and then going back to play.
Thus warmed up, we moved on to the main feature, a Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz classic called "The Long, Long Trailer."
Taking place in the pre-interstate era (1954), the story follows the newlyweds as they buy a trailer and car in which to honeymoon and then live happily ever after.
In a nod to the crowd, it had subtitles so you didn't have to listen too hard to understand the dialog.
Since I spent a good part of my childhood watching reruns of "I Love Lucy," I expected this to be similar so I was pleasantly surprised when it wasn't.
That said, their character names were Tacy and Nicky, but we'll let that slide.
But here Nicky was an engineer (not a bandleader) and Tacy wasn't quite as zany, unless you count hoarding rocks for the future garden she planned to plant once they arrived in Colorado, their goal.
It was very '50s, of course, with Tacy (frequently in hat and gloves) lobbying hard for the trailer purchase (by the way $5,345) so that, "No matter where were are, I could make home for you."
Aww, how sweetly Eisenhower years is that?
And speaking of that, all the roads were two lanes, policemen directed traffic at intersections and parking lots cost fifty cents.
While it wasn't "I Love Lucy," there was still plenty of physical humor such as Nicky hilariously fighting with the trailer shower head and Tacy trying to make a fancy dinner while the trailer is being pulled.
When she tells Nicky she's making beef ragout and a Cesar salad, he says he'll get out the Roquefort.
"Only boors use Roquefort," she corrects him. "Everyone knows it's Parmesan." Did everyone know that in 1954?
There's even a too cutesy scene of the two of them motoring along, Tacy stretched out on the giant bench seat of their Lincoln convertible, singing a song called "Breezin' Along."
That's how you know they're in love.
Well, that and Nicky says, "You could make me happy living in a cave." Doubtful, but we got his point.
During scenes of the trailer being pulled along high, narrow roads on the edge of a cliff, the crowd around me got vocal.
"Oh, my word!"
"Uh oh!"
"No, no, she's in trouble now!"
When the clouds are the ceiling in your outdoor movie theater, I guess it's just fine to talk to the characters in a fifty year old movie.
I didn't, but I'd also unexpectedly spent a whole lot of conversation at dinner, maybe all I had for the evening.
Doubtful, but you get my point.
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