Determine to Live Through the Day

Stay with me here, I'm going to try to take you from shoegaze to Nippy, aka the past 48 hours.

Conveniently after a weekend away, Amtrak deposited me back in Richmond half an hour before a show I wanted to see was set to start. I have to admit, Bandito's isn't my favorite venue, but it had been too long since I'd seen Glass Twin and I liked what I'd heard online of Mon Chere.

Besides, I was overdue.

If we don't count musical theater, it's been ages since I've seen music and while I'd thoroughly enjoyed Cold Cave at the Broadberry, that was over three weeks ago and, frankly, I'm not okay with that. To address that, I put up with the excessive air conditioning (C'mon, Sunday's weather was exquisite), questionable smells (I don't even want to know) and overly talkative show attendees (why talk while standing 8' from where the band's playing when you could simply move to the large, uncrowded bar on the other side of the glass door?) like a trooper.

No surprise, the only people I knew were two of the guys in Glass Twin, talented musicians I'd been fans of since their 2008 days in their last band, Marionette and their smiling projectionist. Like that band, Glass Twin does old film projections on the wall behind them as they play for additional stimulation.

Familiar as a few of those clips are, I marvel at how easy it is to lose yourself in them while the band plays.

The band has evolved since I saw them last, with two new guitarists (one of whom is sharing vocal duties with Kevin the drummer), including one who announced that the next song was going to change our outlook on life. The sound guy apparently took that to mean it was their last song and when it finished, he immediately cued up music.

Only problem was, the band had two more songs. Awkward. One guy tried to help the sound guy's cause by yelling to the band, "How're you gonna top that anyway?" which was at least a left-handed compliment.

Actually, Susanna, Mon Chere's singer said it best when they finally took the stage a few minutes past midnight. "How is Glass Twin so amazing every time?"

What I'd heard of her band online had piqued my interest because of how many of my hot buttons their sound included: a fabulous, big female voice, electronic and shoegaze. Count me in.

Despite the annoying drunk quartet shouting at each other while Mon Chere played, I enjoyed their sound live every bit as much as I'd thought I would. Their online trail only dates the band back to 2016, so chances are they're very much in the "playing out often" stage and I can check them out again.

When I finally deposited my bags at home at 1:15, it felt like a very long time since I'd gotten on the train at 6:45.

The dearth of eateries open on Monday only made Metzger's Monday Funday - a NOLA-themed night of fundraising for No Kid Hungry and Chefs Cycle - all the more appealing. Funny part was, it wasn't chef Brittany who'll be cycling come September. Seems she volunteered her husband to do that.

What she was willing to do was make a big pot of gumbo (for the first time ever, she said), offer raw or grilled Tangier oysters (any questions which I had?) and donate the proceeds. Meanwhile, the bar staff had come up with some appropriate Big Easy type cocktails.

While they didn't have an absinthe drip, I must have shown enthusiasm while ordering an absinthe frappe because my partner followed suit. It may have been my first, but it's a drink I should know because not only is it a superb summertime refresher (simple syrup, soda water, mint), but there's a 1904 song about it.

At the first cold sip
On your fevered lip
You determine to live through the day
Life's again worthwhile
As with a dawning smile
You imbibe your absinthe frappe

Some might see it as mere early evening drinking, but I see it more as cultural education. If not for that drink being on the menu, I might never have upped my theater literacy by learning about the turn-of-the-century Broadway play, "It Happened in Nordland" and its most enduring song.

Well-chosen New Orleans music from various eras played on the sound system and a lot of the people who came in lived in the neighborhood. Since they're not usually open on Mondays and it's the first of these monthly events, things were as uncrowded as I've seen Metzger in eons.

We'd come early just in case and the bartender said they were ready to be slammed, but when we headed out nearly 3 hours later, it was still very civilized. I don't know whether to to feel glad for us or sorry that more fundraising wasn't accomplished.

I've had a lot of suggestions lately to be more selfish, so I may just go that route.

This morning while out walking, I had one of my finest moments when I came to where Clay Street is closed at Harrison. When I walked that block last week, I dutifully walked blocks out of my way because of the signs saying the street was closed because of all the heavy machinery and the dug-up street.

Today, I just wasn't feeling it and joked to one of the construction guys that he was impeding my progress. He grinned and pointed, "Come right on through!" so I didn't hesitate. As I passed, he said, "You look great!" which was nice and all, but nearly as good as being allowed through.

Meanwhile, the guys at the other end of the block gave me the look that said, how the hell did you breeze right past our boss? In my defense, all I did was state the obvious and he offered a solution. Not a big deal.

I didn't have time for a detour because I'd stacked my day full: an interview done at the Kroger Training Center, of all unlikely places, being interviewed myself (a highly unusual role for me) and a meal in service of my hired mouth took me right up to movie time and an opportunity to satisfy my inner documentary dork.

There were two main reasons I wanted to see the new Kevin MacDonald film "Whitney." Critics have been raving about it and Whitney Houston was the very first concert I saw when I moved to Richmond in 1986. I hadn't chosen it (my husband had) but in hindsight, I can say that if I was going to hear that one-in-a-million voice, the time to do it was the '80s before drugs ravaged it and her.

Like a good documentary that teaches me things, I learned that Whitney's interpretation of the national anthem had been inspired by Marvin Gay's version, done before an NBA championship game. Even more impressively, there was no rehearsal. Her music director wrote out the music and played it for her once and she said, "I got it," then went on to sing it in a way no one could ever forget.

And while I'd seen "The Bodyguard" when it came out, I had no recollection of what a big deal it was to show an interracial relationship. When asked, Whitney said she was just glad that her character was a strong, black woman. I'm guessing that didn't occur to most of us in 1992, either. She was also the first major musician to play post-apartheid South Africa, not to mention looking fabulous in a bejeweled  yellow turban and gown doing it.

The audience at Criterion was mostly women and a lot of them didn't hesitate to answer back, advise and admonish people on screen. You could hear how appalled some of them were when Whitney's Daddy sued her for $100 million. Whose father does that?

Of course, one of the earmarks of a good documentary is holding your interest even when you know what's going to happen and I'm here to say that MacDonald had talked to all the important characters except Whitney's lesbian lover (although she was shown and mentioned extensively) and they were remarkably candid about some very difficult subjects.

Oh, yes, and her nickname from childhood was Nippy. In one weird scene, she tries to address Nippy as Whitney, but can't. Then she has Nippy call up Whitney and that works. Some deep stuff there. Or at least I think there is.

What really matters is that I've now caught up the blog, so life is worthwhile again.

Just One Look

Conclusion: Uber drivers are the new Everyman.

Its easy to say this after a weekend in Eastport and multiple Uber ride conversations with voluble drivers. And why not? Each ride brings new conversational partners.

Driving us to Cantlers' Riverside Inn to eat extra-large crabs at 10 p.m., 80-year old Norman regaled us with his life story.

Interesting as it was that he began working at NASA in the '60s before becoming an engineer for the Department of Transportation, I was most fascinated to hear that he married for the first time at 44. That would be after he retired.

When I asked how his bride was doing, he gushed, "She's 18 years younger than me and she's doin' just great!"

By 1974, Norman had taken a job at the Department of Energy as part of the new solar energy program. When I asked if Jimmy Carter hadn't put solar panels on the White House, he was tickled to death. "Our program did that!" he told us proudly. I didn't bother mentioning how Reagan had ripped them out, though I'm sure he had an opinion on that, too.

Norman's funniest story was about his fellow engineer who'd driven his Jaguar XKE through Huntsville, Alabama in the '70s and gotten a ticket for changing lanes 57 times. Ah, the '70s.

Personally, I'm in awe of the cop who had patience enough to wait through that many lane changes before pulling the guy over.

Saib, the Pakistani who drove us from Cantlers to the Middleton Tavern was a poster child for immigration. A US citizen for 10 years now, he enthused about his wife and 3 kids, the wonderful life they've carved out in this country and his hopes for his children's futures.

When he heard I was from Richmond, he wanted to tell me about his very favorite kebab restaurant, which just happens to be in Richmond and how he'll finish his shift and hit 95 to get there because their kebabs are that good. When 2 1/2 hours is just too much, he'll grab his second favorite kebabs. They're conveniently located in Crystal City, which still seems like a fer piece to drive from Annapolis for a kebab.

Then again, who am I to tell a Pakistani where the best Virginia kebabs are? And why is Maryland so lacking?

When I left my friends at Middleton's listening to a blues band, it was for an Uber ride with a young man who, it turns out, not only grew up in nearby Midlothian but is doing his pre-med at VCU. Currently, he's working at G.W. University (coincidentally where I was born) on a research project. We talked about Richmond the entire four minute drive home and as I exited his car, he thanked me for the dose of home.

Now I ask you, what are the chances I'd climb in the car of a local guy while at the Annapolis waterfront? Apparently pretty good.

Besides absorbing the sagacity of assorted Uber drivers, I had the distinct pleasure of meeting my friend's new main squeeze, a decidedly funny man ("I'm just a pork-eating Jew boy," he cracked after admitting his new-found fondness for pancetta thanks to her) with a passion for music (our pancake breakfast began with Linda Ronstadt, moved through kd lang and settled on Gary Clark) and with the added benefit of being a wine rep.

Translation: he brought scores of Roses (heavy on the Loire Valley and Spain) for us to sip through.

But when it came time to get out the needle to taste Callejon de Crimen Gran Reserva, a pricey and stellar Mendoza Petit Verdot, it was just the two of us since my girlfriend insists on sticking solely to whites and Roses. Her loss, at least when it comes to wine. When it comes to him, I think she's got a keeper.

The funny part is, the last time I was up there was April  when she was still smarting from the breakup of a long-time relationship, convinced she'd never find the right partner for the rest of her life.

Ah, my little petunia, you just never know what the Adjustment Bureau will lay lay at your doorstep.

It's like what Norman the Uber driver told us in parting: "Every new journey happens for a reason."

Allow me to be the first to say amen to that.

Catch the Moon, One Handed Catch

Apparently I need to leave town to have time to blog.

Now that I'm ensconced on Amtrak's quiet car and headed north, I finally have time to look back at this ridiculously hot and continuously busy week trying to play catch-up after the beach. A week that meant pitching new stories to my editors, planning upcoming getaways (you know, like next weekend and, oh, June 2019) and trying to get back into some sort of cultural life after a week doing little more than worshiping at the altar of the crashing waves.

Independence Day meant a walk and an interview about death followed by a seventh floor terrace view of the fireworks at Rockett's Landing. The challenge was getting into Rockett's before practically every adjacent street around it was closed. Trying to pull into the parking lot, an official-looking security guard stopped my car and asked if I had a permit.

Pshaw, I don't need no stinkin' parking permit. Instead, I pulled out my Rockett's pool pass where my smiling face matched the smiling photo and he stepped back, smiling and saying, "You're good! Come right on in."

A shame I hadn't brought my bathing suit.

Up on the terrace, we bypassed a small group already staking out the chairs and loveseats to take up residency on the southwest corner with a view of over a dozen boats anchored in the river. Before long, the terrace crowd grew behind us while we sipped Italian Rose, nibbled on chocolate and watched the endless line of cars trying to navigate all the roadblocks.

When the fireworks display finally kicked off, we had a primo view, not to mention slightly more distant views of two firework displays on southside, the displays at the Carillon and at the Diamond, plus a couple more somewhere north of us (Dorey Park?).

It was nothing short of a fireworks wonderland from that rooftop.

Thursday evening was given over to taking my favorite fan of show tunes to Virginia Repertory's stellar production of "West Side Story," but only after settling for dinner at Tarrant's (my grumbling about the venue was met with a reminder from my partner, who reassured me, saying, "We have 30-some years to eat at good restaurants") after my first choice, Chez Fosuhee, turned out to be closed for the 4th and 5th. Ever adaptable, we made do with the back-most booth (he loves his prospect and refuge) where we were surrounded by fellow theater-goers.

The blue hairs at the booth in front of us probably got an earful, never more so than when I made a crack about a love hangover and one woman's head nosily whipped around like it was on a swivel. Hilarious.

After having seen "Romeo and Juliet" together a few weeks ago, "West Side Story" was not only added theatrical romance, but visually stunning, beautifully choreographed and proof that some plays are truly timeless. Issues of immigration (the Puerto Ricans reminding the Polacks that they used to be the newcomers), assimilation and overstepping policemen felt as relevant now as they surely did 60 years ago when the play debuted.

The late, great Jerome Robbins' groundbreaking choreography for "WSS" was on full display with a cast that often moved as one unit and in the air. Richmond Ballet dancer Paul Dandridge played A-Rab and his full-out extensions, his graceful hands and his skill at getting air and lifting his partner were nothing short of breathtaking to a lifelong fan of dance.

But equal love has to go to the 11 members of the band - reeds, trumpets, trombone, violin, synthesizer, bass, percussion and drums - who made Leonard Bernstein's music soar to the rafters inside the November Theatre. And don't even get me started on the unabashed brilliance of Stephen Sondheim's lyrics and internal rhymes.

I feel charming, oh so charming
It's alarming how charming I feel
And so pretty
That I hardly can believe I'm real

I feel stunning and entrancing
Feel like running and dancing for joy
For I'm loved 
By a pretty wonderful boy

Honestly, I could happily go back and see it again if I had a free night in the foreseeable future. As if. From the expectant wonder of Tony's  "Something's Coming" - a feeling I experienced for the first time back in February - to the unbridled optimism of "Tonight," seeing "West Side Story" with the right person was a revelation, both theatrically and emotionally.

If, as my friend of 40 years Leo has always told me, I am a hopeless romantic, this was the production to indulge that part of me.

Last evening was also spent in the Ward, making the rounds for First Friday, albeit with umbrella in hand given the scattered thunderstorms hovering above and promising relief from the punishing heat.

I never miss Candela Gallery's annual "Unbound" group exhibit, which I love for its variety as well as for the gallery's commitment to purchasing some of the pieces with the intent to donate them to a worthy institution someday (I'm hoping for the VMFA, natch).

This year's "Unbound 7" didn't disappoint, although my favorite photographs were straight out of my era: the '70s. Micheal Abramson's three vintage gelatin silver prints spoke to me with portraits of men with Afros and women styling in polyester dresses and big hoop earrings. The images had an authenticity to them that would be impossible to recreate today.

Making our way to Gallery 5, I ran into the silent movie king and, a bit further on, my favorite harmonium player before checking out the downstairs market and the friends behind the tables. Upstairs, I found myself scanning Courtney LeBow's portraits for people I knew and there were plenty including both the friends I'd just seen on the way over as well as musicians, muralists, puppet-makers, burlesque ringmasters, the mayor, the bartender and, of course, artists I know.

Sort of a who's who of local subculture and a solid reminder of how many talented people I"m lucky enough to know in this town.

We finished off the evening with a major dose of estrogen humor at Comedy Coalition's "Till Death Do Us Part: Decorum Manor," an ongoing live comedy series about a group of women trying to learn how to be ladies, which meant changing best friends, shunning the stuck-up rich girl and meeting the birth mother who donated her eggs 25 years ago.

Meanwhile, some of the funniest bits concerned the differences in the cultural literacy of varying age groups. Let's face it, millennials have no clue who Sarah McLachlan is or why Lillith Fair was such a big deal, much to the consternation of those who lived through the '90s.

Best of all, when we walked out, the rain had dropped the temperature enough to offer what felt like a new lease on summer. I just can't promise how reliable I'll be at documenting mine.

Just know that it's going splendidly and I do feel pretty. Oh, so pretty, but I can definitely believe that I'm real.

And the Beat Goes On

The consensus was that it was too hot for whipped cream on body parts.

We didn't reach that conclusion immediately - I mean, who does? - but rather after kicking off our Fourth of July eve with a food orgy followed by a record party, where the subject inevitably came up.

Holmes, Beloved and I met at his house for celebratory glasses of Graham Beck Brut Rose before heading to Dinamo for dinner. Luckily, we had an 8:00 reservation because the place was full up and people never stopped coming in the door. Finding an open restaurant tonight was no easy task given how many have posted "gone vacationing" signs on their social media pages.

Sitting at one of the Rob Womack-designed tables, I had a new appreciation for the tables and artwork after seeing Womack's work as part of the "Coloratura at 35: A Retrospective" show at the Branch a couple weeks ago and shared the back story with Beloved, my fellow art geek.

But not for long because a bottle of Miano Brut Catarrato arrived, our cue to start ordering enough food for a proper pre-Independence Day feast. I'm talking fish soup, egg in creamy tuna sauce, crostini with cured salmon, capers and cream cheese, arugula salad with olive-oil poached tuna and shaved Parmesan, mussels in white sauce and white pizza with mushrooms.

If it sounds like a lot for three people, it was, but how better to celebrate our break with the mother country than with gluttony? I will point out that we eschewed dessert for the simple reason that even gluttons have their limits.

Back at Holmes' man cave, we listened to some recent record finds from an estate sale, beginning with one I wished I owned: "Smash Sounds," a compilation of 1967 hits that launched our record party like a bottle rocket into the July night sky.

Not gonna lie, I didn't even know all the songs and artists, but that didn't stop me from enjoying every single one, including Otis Redding doing "Respect," a song I hadn't known he'd written.

The first side ended with Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth," a complete shift in musical mood from what had preceded it, which caused a group singalong while Beloved rifled through record stacks, Holmes poured himself some whiskey and I danced in my bar stool.

Everyone was in their happy place, in other words.

Reluctant to listen to side two because of the unfamiliar songs, I insisted and we were rewarded with what sounded like the hip, '60s soundtrack to a swingin' cocktail party we all wished we were at. Side two had plenty of slow songs for close dancing, but when I commented that it was good grinding music, Holmes looked confused. Beloved not so much.

Apparently women who lived through the '70s are far more familiar with the term than men.

I got to make the next pick and chose the seminal 1976 album "Silk Degrees" by Boz Scaggs, causing Holmes to complain that he couldn't get behind Boz because he abandoned Steve Miller's band to strike out on his own. Beloved and I, no fans of the Steve Miller band, had no such issue.

I can't say what decade I last heard "Silk Degrees" but I'm here to tell you that the moment the white boy soul of "What Can I Say?" began, Beloved and I were immediately transported back to 1976 and all that meant to us (youth and lots of dancing in clubs).

But to make Holmes feel better, I shared that three members of Boz' band went on to form Toto, so he too must have felt the pain of abandonment. Holmes, no Toto fan either, decided to learn more. "Let's do some research the way old people do," he said, grinning, and fetching a musical compendium where we looked up Toto and wound up taking all kinds of tangents while "Lowdown" and "Lido Shuffle" blared at top volume.

Over the next three plus hours, Holmes told us about the room where he listened to a lot of Led Zeppelin and how while tripping ended up passed out in the woods. "Who found you?" Beloved wondered. "No one, I decided to get up," Holmes answered as if she were an idiot. Meanwhile, my musical IQ benefited from Holmes' detailed explanation of what a Moog synthesizer was and could do.

Next up was the Troggs' "Love Is All Around You," also from 1967, and as groovy a song as we could have hoped for at that point in the evening, despite its poor recording quality ("That's part of its charm!" Beloved insisted and I agreed). Holmes reminisced about taking a girl and a blanket to a grassy knoll and playing the song for her on his 12-string guitar.

Now that's some major '60s style romance right there.

"Krupa versus Rich," Traffic's "Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys" and Joni Mitchell's "Court and Spark" (lots of sparking tonight) took us into Independence Day before my hosts walked me outside to say goodbye. There we were greeted by a yellow half moon that resembled nothing so much as a thin wedge of lemon, causing the three of us to stand in the middle of Grove Avenue at 1:30 a.m. admiring it.

What can I say? At some point, you just have to decide to get up and go home.

Heat of the Moment

Let's talk hot, shall we?

Mac and I dutifully trudged to the river to walk even though we knew we couldn't cool off in the water because neither of us knew if e. coli was still an issue after all the media attention the high levels got a few weeks back.

Ordinarily, we'd get as far as the pipeline and either climb rocks to find a spot to put our legs in the water or dismount the walkway at one of the little beaches and wade out to cool off. Today we had to make do with the new Native American monument in Capital Square which conveniently has a water feature burbling out of its center. I couldn't resist sitting down on the water-covered surface while the more circumspect Mac just leaned in to wet her hands, meaning I had to finish the last mile with my shorts soaked in the back.

If I looked like I'd wet my pants I was okay with that because wet shorts are cooler than dry shorts. No shame here.

Driving down Broad Street this afternoon to run errands, I saw one digital clock that read 102 degrees and another that read 108. Even splitting the difference, that's still 105 degrees. Meanwhile, back in my apartment, the temperature has been stuck at 94 for the past ten hours, although that doesn't take into account the humidity which makes it feel far hotter than a mere 94.

Even so, I'm not complaining about the heat. Granted, it's the hottest day of the year so far but I'm the one who chooses to live without air conditioning (proudly, in fact) and let's not forget that summer is supposed to be hot, humid and sweaty weather. Sorry, kids, but it's just not natural to be comfortably cool in July in Richmond.

Hello, that's why seersucker, sundresses and the south were invented.

But I'm also not too proud to admit that I didn't hesitate to spend two hours at the movies to escape the heat this evening, just like people have been doing since the 1920s when theaters began advertising their air conditioned interiors.

Tonight was the kickoff of the Byrd Theatre's month-long tribute to Wes Anderson with his debut feature, "Bottle Rocket." Given how well attended it was, I have to assume there are a lot of Anderson fans stuck in town for the July fourth holiday since I'm quite sure I was the lone attendee to have central a/c at home and choose not to use it.

For anyone who cares about the full story, I turned my back on air conditioning in 1993 for myriad reasons - the environment, the cost, the unnaturalness of it - and never looked back. That decision dictates that I sleep under a ceiling fan with two other fans pointed directly at me and occasionally forces me into a heat nap, but that's a small price to pay.

Part heist movie, part buddy film and visually a precursor to the celebrated Wes Anderson "look" he developed with his films, "Bottle Rocket" not only provided a respite from the heat but a slew of laugh out loud dialog ("Wow, you're really complicated." "I try not to be.") and - wait for it - multiple scenes shot inside and outside Frank Lloyd Wright's John Gillin residence in Dallas, the last Usonian house built before he died and the largest.

So, you see, I wasn't just catching a break from the heat, I was upping my architectural literacy. Like I do.

And now I'm back in J-Ward, all the street lights are out for some reason and it's still 94 degrees in my apartment. I call that another glorious summer night in the city.

Dance Card Filled

Beach vacation over, I have sacrificed two prized possessions to the gods of the ocean.

A towering wave claimed my prescription sunglasses with a smack to the back of my head while my favorite sunhat, that relic of 1998, finally succumbed to years of sun, salt and washings, arriving home a tattered shell of the SPF 100 head covering that has saved my face for two decades. That would be the same chapeau that causes strangers to regularly tell me that they like my hat as I traipse around the streets of Richmond.

A moment of silence, please, for a hat life well lived and traveled. That hat shaded me in places ranging from South Africa to the Loire Valley with a whole lot of seaside locales - Barbados, Bermuda, Pismo Beach - in between. With any luck, a replacement will be ordered post haste to carry me through the next 20 years.

My sunglasses, which had been chosen not because I thought I could pull off aviator frames (I had serious doubts but eventually decided that anyone who lived through the '70s could) but because they were on sale will also need replacing and now I've just got to decide whether the universe was trying to tell me to step away from the aviator frames or just to wear a leash to keep them attached to my big old head.

Those two incidents aside, my beach week finished out in a blur of sunshine, waves and the best possible company once the girlfriends had returned to RVA. In addition to the flowers that had preceded his arrival, my final guest arrived with yet another gift, this one a contribution to my beach reading: "Women Writers of the Beat Era."

I'd like to say I got around to reading it at the beach, but pretty much non-stop conversation and activity ensured that didn't happen. Fortunately, it'll read just as well now that I'm back to real life and fewer distractions.

Water temperatures hovered between 75 and 79 and most afternoons, the surf was so clear we could easily see our shadows on the ocean floor, right through the water, at least when we weren't being knocked down by waves.

Given my lifelong lack of hand/eye coordination, it should also be noted that when I was put to the "catch a football while in the ocean" test, I made a left-handed catch on the first throw. As the Bo Deans would say, ain't that what dreams are made of? At least to this thrower anyway.

Thursday night we devoted to the full moon, sipping Patron and settling in on the porch swing in time to catch the moonrise. In between dancing on the porch to a mash-up of '70s slow jams and pounding surf, we followed the moon's progress from low, small and red to huge, white and overhead, which is where we left it when we finally abandoned our watch.

At dinner Friday (a gorgeous and refreshing gazpacho with lump crab, a Mediterranean platter of bread and 3 kinds of baby carrots with olive tapendade, tzatziki and curry hummus, a crab-stuffed avocado and a Thai chopped salad with peanut dressing followed by German chocolate cake) on the screened porch of the Salt Box Cafe, we were seated across from N.C. restaurateur/chef/author Vivian Howard and four local women who were discussing work/life balance and other hot button estrogen topics before having Vivian sign copies of her first cookbook "Deep Run Roots."

And while I haven't been to her restaurant The Chef and the Farmer in Kinston, Mac has and we've talked about a pilgrimage back at some point. You just don't expect that kind of literary star power at a little soundside restaurant in Colington, N.C.

Saturday was devoted to last day beach pleasures (loss of glasses aside) and the night to a full fireworks display coming from the Avalon Pier area, a bonus considering it was still June, but a fitting sendoff after four practically perfect beach days with himself.

And that's with only having finished one book, an all-time beach low. Everything else about the trip, though? Glasses and hat be damned, easily an all-time beach high.

I'm also thinking of having that football bronzed as a souvenir. Who am I kidding? Like I'm ever going to forget any of this...

Surf's Up

One thing we're not doing is working on our tans.

Oh, sure, Mac and I got out after breakfast and walked a few miles up the beach along Southern Shores, but it was under cloudy skies and with a stiff breeze that made keeping my hat on my head challenging.  Yet despite the absence of sun, the ocean was obscenely warm - 72 degrees when we walked and up to 76 by mid-afternoon - albeit much rougher than the past few days.

Pru had spent our walking time cooking up butter beans from Morris' Farm Market using butter and a spice blend from Penzey's that had us praising the beans to high heaven. After a couple of taste tests of my own, I insisted Pru provide Mac with a sample and don't you know she finished her first sample and went back for a second? These were not your average butter beans.

Meanwhile, our beach prospects were dimming with every additional cloud that appeared. We decided that the only logical thing to do was amuse ourselves on the screened-in porch for the day, a pastime that involved eating crustaceans, listening to music, drinking wine, Wild Weed ale (Pru was attracted to its juniper berry and cucumber infusions) and root beer and playing board games.

Mac saved the day by venturing down to Whalebone Seafood (where her brother works) to score us a box of crabs and a couple pounds of local shrimp (uncooked so that it wouldn't overcook on the drive back up the beach road) for our mid-afternoon feast of crabs, shrimp, pineapple, cantaloupe and, thank you jeezus, those butter beans.

No surprise, Pru doesn't pick crabs or even particularly like crabmeat, but Mac had long ago proved her worthiness as a crab-eating partner so we tore into the warm, meaty crabs while Pru was steaming her shrimp with Old Bay, celery and onions. She eventually joined us at the long table on the porch - scoring points by bringing a bottle of Prieur et Fils Sancerre Rose and three glasses - to peel shrimp while we picked crabs. Our final guest was Mac's Mom, who came by to join the crab feast and conversation, but also got lucky enough to sample the butter beans.

Let's just say that as the crab and shrimp shells piled up, there was a lot of estrogen and deep Outer Banks roots represented on those picnic benches.

After eating ourselves silly to the sound of the surf, Mac's Mom left and two of us retreated for naps while Pru decided to be the first in the outdoor shower. And although the shower is just outside my open bedroom door, I never so much as heard the shower door open or close while I was out cold a few feet away.

Our consensus had been that eating, drinking and talking at the beach can be exhausting, so there should be no shame in napping, even after a night of 9+ hours sleeping. In fact, that's part of the beauty of beach vacations, which, unlike true vacations, require no sightseeing, day trips or effort of any kind.

Too full to contemplate another meal even post-nap, we did what any self-respecting beach-goers do when the sky is spitting rain and no one is motivated to leave the cottage. We played board games. I hadn't brought any, so we made do with what was in the cottage cupboard: Yahtzee (a personal favorite from childhood) and Sagarian, a MENSA game choice for 1997 which was delightfully dated.

The Concorde? Personal ads? The Netherlands has the highest crime rate? No millennial would recognize half the outdated references contained in the game's questions and answers, but we definitely got some good laughs out of it. As part of the game's directives, Pru sang "On the Good Ship Lollipop" (and rather well, I might add), Mac named all 7 dwarfs and I had to state the colors of the Cat in the Hat's hat.

It's amazing the information you can pull out of the dusty file drawers of your mind after doing nothing much more than listening to and watching waves crash for two days. Multi-tasking has been reduced to eating cheese and crackers while listening to game instructions read aloud. And we still played fast and loose with the rules.

The same goes for the rules of engagement at the beach. No umbrella was raised today, no SPF applied, no bodies bronzed by the sun. Hell, I've only finished one book. At this rate, no one's going to believe I was even at the beach.

As for those lovely pink calla lilies that were delivered to the cottage mid-morning, what beach girl doesn't appreciate flowers when she can't work on her tan lines?

Don't look at me. I'm all in.

But the Air Outside So Soft

The city has been abandoned for the beach.

Driving down yesterday involved listening to quintessential road trip music like the Bo Deans and a stop at Adams' Country Store for an RC Cola and a bag of local peanuts. The couple who entered the store just ahead of me wanted nothing but a dandoodle - Adams' signature bag of pig parts - and walked out with it looking like they'd scored big.

My favorite beach cottage had weathered another year to greet me, the only change being two new raised Adirondack stools on the deck that I could live without. After all these years, the house is still in the flight line of a flock of pelicans who pass over the porch regularly.

Yesterday's ocean temperature was a delightful 69 degrees, while it was 68 today, maybe due to last night's brief but violent thunderstorm, which also knocked my favorite radio station off the air for much of today. The same radio station that had greeted me yesterday with Toad the West Sprocket's "All I Want," as perfect a pop song as ever written and a solid reflection of my current mood.

Or maybe all I want is to feel this way I do when I settle down for a week in my favorite beach house with nothing more expected of me than eating and sleeping. And while I was uncharacteristically up and out of bed by 8 a.m. (don't ask) and walking by 10:00, I'm not ashamed to say that by noon I had closed my book and retreated to my bedroom for the first official nap of vacation.

Mac hung on for a couple hours and then did the same. She'd barely sailed off to slumberland when Pru arrived and Whispering Angel Rose was put to chilling. I'm guessing our boisterous conversation awakened Mac, who soon joined us on the porch to display what Pru affectionately dubbed "the thigh incident," which involved some tender looking sore spots caused by rubbing from a hole in a pair of leggings.

Pros that we are, Mac and I would be the first to attest that walking is not without its own risks.

Late afternoon slid into early evening and eventually night as we drank more wine, periodically found snacks, made food, lighted candles and continued a conversation that included heavier things (a debate about whether or not I'm the emotional type) as well as lighter (memories of Jeanette's Pier back when it had rotting boards) and a whole lot in between.

Only Lady G was missing, but she's off to make nice at a family reunion in New England, god help her, so we're just three for now.

Pru likes to say that we've been through a lot and most of it was my fault and while I might argue the point, I think it's safe to say that there'll be a lot to blame on me over the next few days with these two as my cohorts.

Though the air speaks of all we'll never be
It won't trouble me

Not much does these days. Add in salt air and it only makes this happy woman happier.

A Wise Man Knows

I feel incapable of slowing June down, much as I'd love to.

So often lately, I find myself coming up for air and being startled that it's been four days and countless adventures since I last had time to catch my breath, much less blog. It's already a summer on steroids.

Thursday, the official first day of the best season, Mac and I walked over to East Leigh Street for House Story's peek into a "before" property, arriving just as the owner thanked the crowd for listening. We lucked out, though, because the contractor took his place on the rotting second story landing, explaining the many hoops they'd be jumping through to ensure their historic tax credits.

A more punctual guest informed us that the new owner planned to live on one floor, while his son's family would live on another and they'd rent out the first floor. Ditto the building in the backyard, where Mac and I were admonished not to climb the open staircase because, as the owner claimed, "I'm in good shape and it's tough for me."

Naturally, as soon as he walked away, both Mac and I climbed the ladder to test his pronouncement. All I can say is, these two women who frequently climb the vertical ladder at the east end of the pipeline found no challenge whatsoever.

And what's with telling us he's in "good shape?" I mean, wouldn't we be able to tell that if it were true?

The opening of "Coloratura at 35: A Retrospective" Thursday at the Branch was technically my second viewing of the exhibition in four days and I was already primed to go back.

Husband/wife artistic duo Catherine Roseberry and Rob Womack create the most exquisite works of painterly art using old furniture as their canvas. I'd seen a chest she'd done at the former Ghostprint Gallery, but this Branch show is 50 pieces of their work spanning 35 years of art-making and marriage.

Catherine's themes revolve around motherhood and womanhood while Rob creates imaginary, fantastical landscapes on pieces of furniture that somehow seem to suggest they'd be right at home in that landscape. Both showed extraordinary referencing to art history, a real talent with realism (and tromp l'oeil) as well as incorporating the lines and details of the furniture piece, almost as if they were elements the painter had envisioned.

To sweeten the pot even further, there was the bonus of seeing pages of preparatory drawings and sketches hung over finished pieces to allow a window into the artist's process. Compositions were rearranged, figures deleted and details added in the final piece.

Editing, I get it.

While it would be impossible to choose favorite pieces, there's no question that "The Boy who Loved Ketchup," a reverse-painted glass table designed for Dinamo gets the award for cleverest and most heartfelt. The story had originally been told to Rob as a child repeatedly by his grandfather. Rob signed and dated the table on the anniversary of his grandfather's 100th birthday.

Sniff. Anybody got a tissue?

The best statement award had to go to Catherine's 1999 cube, where each side depicted a woman (black, brown, yellow, white) visibly constrained by society's limitations on her and represented by the edges of the cube. It was based on a cube she'd done back in the '80s, which is to say she could probably paint about women's role in our culture every decade because so little has improved.

But enough of that rant.

My articulate architect made a comment about how satisfying it was to actually be surprised by art - can't say either of us have seen a lot of furniture painted with references to everything from the Renaissance to Edward Hopper - while also acknowledging he was left feeling inspired. Me, I was just leaving in my usual art junkie mode, feeling a little buzz after ingesting so much beautiful art.

Friday found me at the Criterion to see "Won't You Be My Neighbor?" the new documentary about Fred Rogers, a 6:00 show so sold out that a couple sat in metal folding chairs in the back to see it. After near universally good reviews, my inner documentary dork kicked in and here I was learning about this rich, formerly fat and sickly kid who grew up to be a Presbyterian minister and essentially ministered by doing a revolutionary (read: low production values and technology) public children's TV show in the '60s.

Absolutely fascinating. The scene where he's testifying in front of Congress about cutting the PBS budget by $20 million, it's unreal to watch this heartless Congressman about-face and restore funding based on Mr. Rogers' simple and straight from the heart explanation about why children matter.

His wife came across like a delightful women who'd fallen for a sweet man who eventually became bigger than life, albeit for a good cause and in pursuit of his ministering. Her love for him was there in everything she said about him and even how she looked when talking or chuckling about him.

Here was a man who had a black cast member who played the neighborhood cop and invited him to take off his shoes and soak his feet with Mr. Rogers in his kiddie pool. The kicker is that Fred wrote that scene to address a recent disturbance at a segregated pool when blacks had had the audacity to get in the pool.

That Mr. Rogers was ballsy. He used his dime store puppets to teach kids not just about tolerance, but about assassinations (MLK, RFK), divorce and why it's okay to feel sad sometimes. Deep stuff.

But what tickled me more than anything was Fred's devotion to swimming, part of his determination to never waver from 143 pounds. Scenes of him swimming in a pool show a man who is neither going for speed or technical prowess, but something more like underwater zen. You can tell he's in his element.

Turns out 143 was a significant number to him because the word "I" has one letter, the word "love" four and the word "you" three, making 143 shorthand for I love you. You have to admire a man who creates a world where his weight becomes a weighty statement.

I got home from Mr. Rogers' neighborhood to find an invitation to Pru's porch, but not until "Westworld" ended at 10. Mac had just been telling me about the show's new season on our breakfast/walk the day before, assuring me that it was far too bloody and violent for me.

No, give me something chatty and occasionally hilarious on a screened porch while it rains cats and dogs all around us if you want to hold my interest.

I'd come to hear the scuttlebutt from Pru's annual foray with her three UR buds to the Northern Neck, from which she'd returned a couple days earlier. There were tales of drunkenness, although not hers since she was a bit compromised with a nasty case of galloping consumption that still had her coughing, lots of seafood meals in and out and a general acknowledgement that women of every age find Sam Elliott swoon-worthy.

As she, Beau and I can do, we went down a word nerd rabbit hole while discussing the metal sign he'd had made of her "house rules." One involves never boring the host.

The use of host over hostess spawned a conversation about why Beau had opted for host. He said he'd considered it, but felt like host was the more appropriate word choice, a sentiment both Pru and I agreed with. Likewise, I can't think of any women who prefer to be labeled an actress over an actor.

I know I don't want to be called a blogess, for crying out loud.  Of course, if my life doesn't slow down a bit, it'll be a moot point. Try as I may, daily posting seems to be a relic of another lifetime. And it can't hold a candle to this new one.

Take my word for it. I'm in good shape and it's the least tough thing I've ever done. But it sure is making June fly by.

Conversation Peace

Not to be too specific, but my interest in origami can be traced back to the evening of April 15, 2001.

That evening, my then-boyfriend and I had plans to meet his arty VCU friends for drinks at Baja Bean, but he bowed out at the last minute because he hadn't finished his taxes (don't get me started). Mine, on the other hand, had long since been mailed off (it was the olden days, kids), so I figured I'd go solo.

It wasn't like I didn't know all of that arty crowd anyway.

The new face in the group belonged to a Peruvian sculptor who was doing a short residency at VCU and after being introduced, we settled down to happily converse for a couple of hours. He was a fascinating person with intriguing stories and since it was unlikely we'd ever see each other again, there was no reason not to talk about everything.

When I said goodbye, it was after a thoroughly satisfying evening talking to this man. End of story.

So you can imagine my surprise the following week when the VCU dean who'd brought the Peruvian into the bar that night shared that he had a gift for me from the artist who'd since returned home: a bronze-colored origami crab he'd crafted that night after meeting me.

It's an utterly amazing thing, this elaborate crab - complete with claws - folded from a single piece of paper. A gift from a man I'd never see again created for no other reason than to demonstrate his pleasure in the short time we'd spent talking.

These days, it occupies a place of honor atop my stereo receiver and invites conversation about origami. All of that's a roundabout way of saying of course I'm going to be interested in Lewis Ginter's outdoor exhibit of bronze, steel and aluminum origami, an invitation extended to me back in April, not to mention all the way from Japan.

Naturally, I'd said yes then and now we were finally making good on plans made while we were on different continents.

Given the heat and sun, I had no shame in bringing along my pink Victoria's Secret umbrella to act as a parasol as we made our way through the gardens. I wasn't the only one happy to carry her sun protection, either, which gives me hope that parasol pride is still growing.

Having the origami pieces scattered around the gardens all but ensured a haphazard path through them as we'd spot one in the distance and then have to try to figure out the best way to get there without missing anything along the way.

Given the heat, we also weren't shy about pausing at any shady bench we came to and letting the waves of sweaty humanity pass us by.

Artist Kevin Box and his collaborators - his wife, Jennifer, plus four origami masters - had managed to create metal sculptures that not only had the delicate detailing of folded paper, but also appeared to be as light as paper. Looking at a sculpture like "Flying Peace" (the most complicated origami crane ever folded) with its pleated wings, tail and head and legs stretched out behind it is to marvel at the minds and hands of artists inspired and brilliant enough to conjure up such a thing.

One of the simplest forms resembled nothing so much as a simple white folded paper boat set adrift in the middle of a pond. I felt cooler just looking at it.

We almost missed "Who Saw Who?" because it was tucked away in the children's garden, dangerously near the splish splash area rife with shrieking children. It was a tableau of an owl and a tiny mouse on a rock, each eyeing the other warily.

Yet again, we had to remind ourselves that the sculpture in front of us had begun life as a piece of folded paper. Truly amazing.

Looking at "Folding Planes," I was immediately reminded of the Air Force Memorial just outside of Washington, with its gracefully arcing folds reaching skyward. "White Bison" was exactly that, but my takeaway was learning that bison stand and face an oncoming storm, a fact I find unfathomable.

And if we were looking for a personal metaphor, there was a lot to be said for the wisdom of "Nesting Pair" and not just because of the beauty of two cast stainless steel cranes hovering above a cast bronze nest made from olive branches.

Because, you see, it gets even better: Most artwork is a self-portrait of some kind. This composition naturally emerged at a time in our lives when we were building a home together and discovering the value of compromise. ~ Kevin Box

Shoot, substitute "relationship" for "home" and "pleasure" for "value" and we're there.

As for my bronze crab, it's a daily reminder that you never know what might result from a great conversation. As for my origami-loving partner, ditto.

And as I was reminded afterward eating and drinking at Peter Chang's, if he can make me laugh, too, it's all over. P.S. It's all over.

I Defy You, Stars

Summer may not have officially begun, but its ways and means are well underway.

The bedspread is packed away (the cotton blanket soon to follow), heat naps have become the norm on unbearably sticky afternoons and the 20th annual Richmond Shakespeare Festival is in full swing at Agecroft Hall.

Now, I know that sitting outside in the courtyard of a 500-year old house on a summer night isn't everyone's cup of tea (Pru's complaints run from the humidity to the uncomfortable chairs to the bugs), but for decades, it's been mine.

Don't waste your love on somebody who doesn't value it.

Although my date wasn't technically an Agecroft virgin, it had been enough years since that one long-ago visit (for a party, not a play) to dim its full memory. Right there you know I just have to give him the full experience. Add in the production - "Romeo and Juliet" - and I'm in my element making sure we cover all the bases.

Intermission on the stone terrace, for example. A picnic dinner. The usual.

Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs.

We were the first to spread a blanket on the lawn behind the gardens for a picnic with a diminishing view of the James and the bridge. Despite being non-natives, we both extolled the good old days of less verdant trees allowing for wider vistas from the lawn, ending up sounding like old-school Richmonders always assuming the past was better than the present.

Maybe it's something in the humidity.

Did my heart love 'til now?

The costumed young players moved from blanket to blanket, offering up scenes to accompany the al fresco dining going on, and though we never got asked, we had great seats for two scenes from "Taming of the Shrew," a play I inevitably enjoy.

I know, I know, plenty of people take issue with its chauvinistic overtones, but I can overlook that because of Petruchio and Katerina's brilliant dialogue (just as good but without the machismo: Beatrice and Benedick's parrying in "Much Ado About Nothing"). Those two sure can talk.

Under love's heavy burden do I sink.

When it came time to go to the courtyard to find seats, the location was left up to me, presumably the pro. Usually I'm a front row kind of a gal, but at Agecroft, that sometimes makes you part of the show.

I got pulled onstage once and told to scream on cue. I did it several times, but I'm no actress. Better we sit in the second row where we lucked out when no one sat in front of our view. More good first-timer vibes.

'Tis an ill cook that can not lick his own fingers.

I have no idea how many times I've seen "Romeo and Juliet," but a stellar production can still wow me every time. Quill's James Ricks had fashioned a teen-aged love story with equal parts sass and heart. And may I just say how utterly refreshing it is to see a Romeo still within reach of his teen-aged years? Tyler Stevens had the face and voice - not to mention all the young man bravado necessary to woo a major crush - to nail Romeo's youthful/testosterone-fueled exuberance.

Educated men are so impressive!

And don't get me started on Todd Patterson's scene-stealing depiction of the swaggering Mercutio. It was as if David Bowie and Mick Jagger had a love child and he channeled his parents to do Shakespeare (and then maybe bed a wench). Loyal, lascivious and oh-so fluid in his movements. a pity since he dies in the first act.

Seek happy nights to happy days.

Eventually the sun went down, the fireflies came out and both the lovers were dead. Everyone left was devastated. I don't know when I've had such a romantic evening.

Oh, wait, yes I do. Never mind me, that's just a fume of sighs...

Sunday Light, Summer Night

Electronica was the cherry on top of my Father's Day sundae.

Don't get me wrong, I got up early, grabbed lunch for all at Nate's Bagels and was in the Northern Neck to see Dad an hour before noon. It was a hot river day with only the occasional breeze and a fine haze still burning off the Rappahannock when I joined Sister #2 on the screened porch. Sister #3 arrived not long after and the time was passed with nothing more strenuous than conversation.

Even better, I came back with leftover crabs, meaning my first priority once back in Richmond was covering the outdoor table in newspapers and going to town on crustaceans in my shaded but still sticky-hot backyard.

Don't let the weather whining fool you, I was in heaven because they were outstanding - large and meaty - and I was happily reveling in a day that included two of my very favorite food groups: Nate's bagels and crabs.

But also music. And not just any music, but electronica, a genre I love but see live far too infrequently.

After a post-crabs heat nap, I woke up half an hour before showtime and made it to the Broadberry not long after Salt Lake City's Choirboy had started their dark pop set. Everything about their sound spoke to me, from singer Adam's incredible vocal range (a blend of Tears for Fears' Roland Orzabal and ABC's Martin Fry) to bass lines that owed their existence to the Cure to synth stylings reminiscent of Depeche Mode. Sigh.

I was immediately sorry I'd missed any of their set, given blond Adam's charismatic delivery and killer voice.

During the break, I scanned the crowd for familiar faces, even knowing that plenty of music friends wouldn't bother with a Sunday night show, and saw not a single one. What I did see plenty of was what I have decided is the electronica male stereotype: tall, skinny and with long hair and by long, I mean past their shoulders. That's not some random generalization, either, that's pure observation.

To give you some idea, there were dozens of guys in front of the stage who fit that description and there were only 300-some people at the entire show. Electronica = lotta long, tall drinks of water with serious hair.

Scanning the crowd, it occurred to me that standing at the Broadberry for three hours watching three bands was as good as it gets tonight and just exactly what I needed after three hours sitting in a hot car today.

Next up was L.A. band Black Marble (guitar and bass over drum tracks) and their post-punk sound reminded me why I'd fallen hard for Interpol 15 years ago and why I'll never tire of hearing young bands find their own interpretation of post-punk. Singer Chris Stewart's voice seduced my ears while the relentless beats and bass lines spoke to other body parts.

Both opening bands had delivered such strong sets that I could have gone home happy and felt I'd gotten my money's worth and the headliner hadn't even appeared yet.

When I saw Cold Cave last it was January 2017 and that show had been sold out, and while the weather outside had been frightfully cold, as usual it had been miserably hot inside Strange Matter. The Broadberry followed suit tonight, the temperature rising to an uncomfortable, stifling level and then the a/c kicking on just long enough to make you feel like you weren't going to pass out after all.

I'm not complaining, I'm just acknowledging that music and sweat go hand in hand.

It was the kind of heat that made you want to move as little as possible, while the bands tonight were relentlessly ensuring that you couldn't possibly stay still. We electronic fans are a bunch of dancing fools, temperatures be damned, and it wasn't long before I could feel my hair getting damp at the roots as my body looked to cool off any way possible.

Cold Cave never disappoints visually and tonight's set featured an elaborate light show (black an white pinwheels, fields of black and white sunflowers), strobe lights, songs sung in darkness while the lights were focused on the crowd and as much fog as you'd expect from a project so devoted to the darkwave synth-pop tradition.

That era was also mirrored in all the high-waisted jeans and shorts I saw on so many young women tonight, a style some of us were rocking in the '80s, first time around. Just like the music I'd come for.

And don't even get me started on how many Father's Days Dad and I have celebrated together at this point. It's like the number of crabs I've eaten since the Reagan years (you know, back when he was trying to make ketchup a vegetable in school lunches).

More than I care to count, but each a pleasure. Like dancing and sweating to electronica.

Everything is Beautiful

A dancer.

That had been the answer given years ago when a former boyfriend had been asked the question, "If Karen wasn't an editor, what would she have been instead?" I remember being surprised at the response while also knowing there was a kind of truth to it.

Granted, my dance training had amounted to three years at Miss Rita's School of Dance, but assuming that this was a bigger picture question, his answer wasn't far off. If I could have been exposed to real dance training, I think I'd have loved being a dancer, even given the relatively short span of a dance career.

So what better play to see to remind me of what never was than Richmond Triangle Players' production of "A Chorus Line" with my posse? The hardest part of seeing it was acknowledging that I remember when it debuted back in the dark ages of 1975.

After a stellar meal at Belmont Food Shop - the crab-topped Spring pea sformato over pea shoots was positively swoon-worthy - that began with amuse bouches of housemade pate, as well as gougeres, plus a hug from a long-time favorite chef now part of the kitchen there, we joined the throngs of theater-goers eager for one singular sensation.

I have little doubt that I saw "A Chorus Line" at the Kennedy Center back in the '70s, but the intervening four decades all but ensured that I had limited memories of it. Besides, if you lived through the '70s, you're not supposed to remember them, right?

Needless to say, I was surprised at how many of the Marvin Hamlish-penned songs besides "One" and "What I Did for Love" I knew (I Hope I Get It, I Can Do That, At the Ballet), a fact no doubt reinforced by all those Ghostlight After parties I attended at RTP where local actors got up and sang show tunes. Of course, to them "A Chorus Line" had been an "old" Broadway show, whereas to some of us, it represented the new breed of musicals that began taking over in the '70s.

But last night, it felt as rooted in the here and now as in that long-ago decade. In a nod to the 21st century, rather than cookie-cutter bodies, these dancers looked like real people of various shapes and sizes, similar only in that they could all dance and sing so well.

And while the entire cast was strong, I found my eye kept returning to Alexa Cepeda as Diana because her energy was so strong and her smile so beautiful, never more evident than when she brought down the house singing "What I Did for Love." Of course Alexander Sapp nailed the role of the imperious director, although it was hard not to miss watching him act since most of his lines were delivered from the back row.

The buzz among local theater geeks had been about how RTP was going to manage to stage this 17 actor-play on its petite stage, but I'm here to tell you they not only did, they made the audience forget its size when that chorus line was stretched out across the stage. It can't just be us wanna-be dancers who marvel at a well-executed kickline.

I may have missed out by choosing writing over dancing, but one thing I won't miss out on is seeing "A Chorus Line" a second time.

A girl can still dream of what could have been...

Obligated to Be Among the First

If a tone was being set tonight, it was an admirable one.

The Institute for Contemporary Art was hosting its inaugural Cinema Series and first up was Afrikana International Film Festival with a program simply entitled, "Richmond Speaks: A Short Film Showcase."

Mac was at my house by 5:30 and we strolled over to the ICA, dodging the speeding and ineptly-driven cars carrying crazed relatives of soon-to-be high school graduates. These days, both the Seigel Center and the Altria Theater are churning out multiple graduating classes a day, meaning it's a congested mess to go anywhere from Jackson Ward. That includes going to Lowe's - I know because I tried it this afternoon - barely 3/4 of a mile away.

First up was walking the entire perimeter of the block that houses the ICA so we could see it from every angle, including looking east from Grace Street against the traffic. Once we got inside for the films, it was only to be stopped cold and red-faced because we were those idiots who hadn't reserved tickets and now they were all gone.

I don't know who was more surprised at the oversight, Mac or me. Generally, we're pros at these kind of events.

Since it was sold out, there was nothing to do but put our name on a waiting list and browse the galleries until they determined who didn't show up. Failing that, the plan was to stream it live in the lobby and we'd try to snag a seat on one of the couches. Either way, we'd get to see the films and the post-film discussion, so we were happy.

Things worked out well for us because of the people who'd gotten tickets and then been no-shows, so we nabbed seats in the second row just before Afrikana founder  Enjoli Moon greeted the audience with some heartfelt gratitude and a bit of a preview of what was to come. One point she repeatedly stressed was that as tonight's first audience for the series, we were witnessing the start of something important, something with the potential to encourage Richmond's much-needed race conversation.

Then to bring it to a close with full southern charm, she announced, "Without any further ado, I will hush my mouth," and the Richmond-made films began.

"May It Be So" showcased the grassroots effort of one woman to ensure that the city memorializes its black ancestors and their burial grounds, insisting that, "We have the right to take care of our own ancestors." Her one-woman campaign to keep pushing for a truthful acknowledgment of Richmond's past, including the uncomfortable parts, proves the power of every voice.

Part of a larger social justice series, "Adrian's Story" focused on a man who'd been in trouble with the law since he was 15 and served time and probation repeatedly. Finally, he became a barber's apprentice and began to see another way of life. Seeing him cut the hair of street people who can't afford haircuts almost has Mac and I in tears

I'd already seen the third film,  "Don't Touch My Hair RVA," a fascinating look at what Richmond women consider "going natural," interspersed with shots of every type of black hair imaginable: braids, Afro, straightened, corn rows, even a black albino woman with natural platinum blond hair. That it had been made by a VCU ph.D student who'd never made a film (or even held a camera) before only made it more compelling and fun.

During a panel discussion with the filmmakers, the young couple who'd made "Adrian" were asked about their choice of subject matter. "If we can use our white privilege to undermine white privilege, we believe we're obligated to do so," as clear a point as could be made if any racial progress is to be made.

The last talking point of the evening revolved around what the ICA's role in the community needs to be now that it's open, state-supported and smack dab in the middle of the city. Enjoli probably said it best, hoping that the ICA embraces its role as needing to be responsive to the entire community, not just the traditional audience (not to be confused with the inaugural audience) with wide-ranging programming.

As an inaugural audience member, I'm not sure the ICA could have had a stronger kickoff to their new film series, even if more than one wine glass was heard shattering when everyone stood up after the final applause. We put our money on glass being banned in the auditorium from here on out, but maybe it's just a learning curve.

Mac and I did our own post-film discussion at the counter of 821 Cafe over a massive platter of black bean nachos we couldn't finish, while the restaurant filled up behind us. Next to us, a couple of guys discussed alcoholism in the workplace and asked about the taco special, which had already sold out.

You snooze, you lose. Just like those idiots who'd gotten tickets for tonight's screening and then not come, who'll never be able to say they were there when the ICA was brand new and you could still score a last-minute seat in the auditorium to hear Richmond speak.

How fitting that the ICA gives us a place to hush our mouths and listen.

Giddy and All In

It's been a while since anyone complimented me on my firm handshake.

But that's exactly how the Dutchman in the blue/green house greeted me after I said hello and extended my hand. And that's before I'd even handed off a bottle of J. Mourat Rose to him as a contribution to the evening's festivities.

My partner-in-crime/favorite traveling companion and I were there, in fact, for sipping and nibbly bits (as Pru likes to call them) accompanied by travel conversation - past and future - with he and his artist wife. But that came after admiring the art-filled house they'd completely renovated four years ago - including removing the balustrade from the staircase, turning mere steps into an eye-catching architectural focal point - and her compact backyard studio.

Part of the conversation was about change. Because he was Dutch and part of her youth had been spent in Europe, both carried memories of a time when far fewer tourists crowded desirable destinations. After dealing with massive crowds in Madrid and Amsterdam a while back, she'd had enough (her term was "a meltdown") and was ready to go home if they couldn't find a place less clogged with tourists and selfie sticks.

As someone who refused to even go in the Louvre gallery where the Mona Lisa hung for exactly that reason, I felt her pain. What was astounding was her adoring husband's reaction: he immediately returned all the tickets that had been procured for the remainder of their itinerary and instead found a small village in southernmost Italy for them to spend the rest of their vacation time.

Like any sane people, they were soon seduced by the region, resulting in them now owning a house there. Even better, a house they let out to close friends. And while I didn't yet qualify, my handsome partner apparently does, so for such a devoted planner, this was the kickoff for him to start another planning binge.

When we weren't talking travel, the womenfolk were comparing notes about how we got to Richmond in the first place. I thought I'd had it bad arriving here from D.C. in 1986 and first living in Chesterfield County before high-tailing it to the city, but she took the prize when she shared that she'd arrived in Colonial Heights in 1983. Ye gads.

After checking out the area, she'd promptly driven home to Boston, a reaction I find completely understandable. No intelligent, much less creative, woman should have had to live in Richmond back then and yet here we were: two survivors and glad we'd stayed.

As we got up to go, I was asked about my favorite restaurant (no one such thing, but I do have multiple top choices) but I turned the question on my hosts, who copped to liking Fat Dragon, Bacchus and Galley.

So after we'd said our good-byes, I thought our next stop should be Galley Market so I could deflower a Giustino's pizza virgin while furthering the travel talk. For the first time, I sat at a table among the shelves of groceries, rather than the counter. A Greek salad was followed by a Bianca (yes, I know I'm a creature of habit, but I wanted to make sure his first pie experience was one I could vouch for) and a whole lot of talking about everything. Like we do.

I was especially taken by his assessment of our long weekend in Irvington about how we have more conversation than any other two people would even think possible, much less intensely pleasurable. And he's right.

Walking to the river with Mac yesterday, she commented how my blog posts continue to sound giddy, even as I really do try to rein in my euphoria when blogging. "I love that you're so happy," she told me, cracking wise about my rose-colored glasses.

And it only took 32 years from my arrival in Richmond to get to that beatific point. And if I thought that time flew by, it's nothing compared to the warp speed that's become my new normal. It's like what the late, great Anthony Bourdain said. "Your body is not a temple, it's an amusement park. Enjoy the ride."

Enjoying. Every. Second.

To Fall Down at Your Door

Language is power, life and the instrument of culture, the instrument of domination and liberation. ~Angela Carter

Let's call tonight an evening of deja-vu in the Ward.

When I saw there was a touring pop-up photo exhibit at Black Iris Gallery, I considered starting my evening there. When I saw that it was an exhibit of large-format black and white photographs by Bill Daniel, the deal was sealed. That's because back in the dark ages of 2010, I'd gone to Gallery 5 to watch Daniel show a trove of lost and found music acts filmed between 1965 and 1987 and it had been fascinating.

As much as I'd enjoyed that, why wouldn't I want to see his photographs of skateboarders, punk bands, graffiti and the like from the past 35 years?

That's a rhetorical question, by the way.

The photographs were such snapshots in time, from the airborne skater with a Circle Jerks sticker on the bottom of his board to the punk singer - Fender guitar slung to the side and guitar pick between his bad teeth - playing the cowbell. Or put another way: it was an era when so many punk musicians were wearing Black Flag t-shirts to prove their cred.

Daniel captured the punk ethos in photo after photo, never more so than in a shot of a dingy music club door with a handwritten "NO MOHAWKS!" sign on it, in front of which was a mohawked guy in mid-jump in front of it. Another showed an old VW van modified with three sails atop it, presumably to increase the van's infamously slow pace.

Gawking at a photo of two '80s show-goers (her shoulder pads and bangles, his eyeliner and piercings), I heard my name and turned to see my favorite artist/DJ couple. After chatting about the exhibit and her new baby chicks (one of which she said likes to ride on the back of a full-grown chicken like it's a pony or something), we reverted to our favorite topic: what we're reading.

After mentioning Roberto Bolano, she asked if I'd ever read the English novelist Angela Carter, a new favorite of hers. Negative, I said and we launched into one of our standard procedure book talks (like we do) that involved her recommending Carter highly for her feminist, magical realistic style of writing. Sounds right up my alley.

But it was when she asked what was new with me that I had that moment. Where do I start when I run into friends I haven't seen for a while? In this case, I may have mentioned the update to my relationship status and having just returned from a long weekend at the river.

"Ooh, I like a man with a house on the river," she enthused with a knowing smile, since they live in his house on the Chickahominy River, a charming place, complete with chickens, that I'd visited last year. So she knows.

When I departed Black Iris, it was for some theater at the Basement, where I immediately ran into Foto Boy and his betrothed, an actress/director who was looking fabulous and theatrical in a way I could never pull off. Our first stop was at the bar in search of  alcohol for her, caffeine for him and sugar for me. Hey, whatever gets you through the play, right?

We were all there for the preview of TheatreLab's production of "Gruesome Playground Injuries," a play with which I had some familiarity, having seen a staged reading of it back in 2011. I said it was a night of deja-vu, after all.

Despite the intervening years. its poignant yet disturbing story had stayed with me. Imagine two kids who meet in the school infirmary at the tender age of eight; she's throwing up non-stop and he's ridden his bike off of the school's roof. Because boys are dumb.

The hook is that they immediately bond over shared maladies, touching each other's wounds and scars, while over the next thirty years, they continue to see each other periodically, always due to one or the other's sickness or injury. And to be clear, it's a story with many, many funny moments despite the gruesome injuries.

A dungeon is a place where people can go to languish.

They're both damaged souls and whether it's a fireworks accident that causes Doug to lose an eye or Kayleen's self-medicating and cutting, the two continue to share an increasing bond of personal pain throughout their friendship/love.

I don't want my first kiss to be with you. AND I just threw up.

When I'd first seen it, I kept hoping that they would acknowledge their feelings for each other, but there were always hospital beds and comas and psychiatric institutions keeping them distracted from their true feelings.

The top ten things anyone has ever done for me were all done by you.

As with any two-actor production, it's all about the chops and chemistry of the actors and Jeffrey Cole and Rachel Rose Gilmour nailed their characters in all their dysfunction and tragedy. Cole singing in a thick Scottish brogue while trying to dance with Gilmour to the Proclaimers' "500 Miles" was nothing short of masterful. And hilarious.

One particularly clever device was that the scenes didn't play out in chronological order, so we saw them first as children, then young adults, then back to teens, then slightly older adults and so on, while music marked scene transitions and the passage of time. From Aimee Mann's "Save Me" through David Gray's "Please Forgive Me" to a cover of REM's "Everybody Hurts," the music helped with the ten- and fifteen-year jumps the script made while providing time for the actors to change clothes onstage.

TheatreLab, you never cease to impress me.

As an added accompaniment to the theatrics we'd come to watch, throughout the production we also got a symphony of jackhammers blasting Broad Street just outside the Basement's door. It was the sound of the city desperately trying to finish up the Pulse construction for the touted completion date and while the cacophony was superfluous to the story, it did add a certain city grittiness.

Punk photographs, an emotional tour de force of a play and an unexpected chance to catch up with two favorite couples along the way. Exactly what a city woman needs after languishing at the rivah for a few days.

And by languishing, I mean having the time of her life.

As Dreams Make Way for Plans.

I can see the t-shirt now: I spent three days in Irvington and all I got was a lousy coffee mug

Except that's nowhere close to all I got during the time that Irvington - and my host with the most - were spinning their three-day charm offensive on me.

And I can say that even after slogging through a grueling Friday afternoon traffic jam on I-64 (the sign warned of a vehicle on fire at mile post 209, a vehicle long gone by the time I made my way past the mile marker) that turned an hour and 20 minute drive into a solid two hours, one hour of which was spent creeping along at 5 to 15 miles an hour happily listening to Paul Westerburg's "14 Songs."

On your mark
Here I am
I'm your spark
Runaway wind

I didn't mind a bit (windows down, sunny skies, weekend plans to look forward to) considering what (and who) was at the end of the journey. And while my new mug may be the only tangible souvenir (besides photos), I returned to the city with some pretty wonderful memories.

Like a trip to the River Market for picnic supplies where the affable and aproned owner Jimmy was kind enough to come from behind the counter to meet me and then extol the virtues of his hand-prepared food (the Thai noodles were stellar). He was invaluable in helping us choose our picnic fixin's for an evening at Good Luck Cellars sipping their Vidal Blanc and Petit Verdot while listening to a rather talented musician cover the discography of my youth.

Or like a mid-morning canoe ride on Carter's Creek accompanied by a who's who history of the houses, docks and boats we were gliding by. Electric boats? Who knew? And while I did do some rowing, there's also photographic evidence of me taken from the back of the boat that shows the paddle across my lap and arms leaning back on the sides of the canoe, that prove how easy I had it.

There was the second picnic of the weekend, that one at Belle Isle State Park on the Rappahannock, where a foreboding gray sky couldn't diminish the serious blues chops of the surprisingly young Tom Euler and his trio. Think John Mayer without the bad decision-making.

And speaking of decisions, I knew the performance was doomed when a park ranger stood nearby scoping out the thunder and lightening providing the light show. Only an hour into it, she told Tom that for safety's sake, they needed to stop the show. The trio obliged by playing the whimsical "Mary Had a Little Lamb" as picnickers packed up chairs, blankets and pic-a-nick baskets to head to safety.

But not to go home. If you know me, you know I love a good storm, especially on the water, which is how we ended up moving the truck to a better vantage point facing the river to watch the sky unleash its fury. Let's just say the drive home resembled nothing so much as driving through a monsoon with occasional roadside stops.

The after-affects of all that rain was on full display when my brilliant host suggested a walk at Hughlett Point Nature Preserve the next day. Whether walking on trails or a slightly raised boardwalk through forest and wetlands, we were surrounded by mosquito breeding pools standing water on all sides thanks to last night's torrential downpour.

But the payoff was emerging from that to - ta da! - a pristine sandy beach that fronted the Chesapeake Bay and had not a soul on it besides us. With nothing built anywhere nearby, it was like being on an abandoned island, with the warm waters of the Bay lapping at our feet as we walked.

There weren't even any footprints in the sand. When a small wave hit at just the right angle, it sent a drop of salty water flying into my open mouth, as if to make the moment completely unreal.

What we did come across was the equivalent of a sculpture installation: a dozen or so massive pieces of driftwood, most of which were still the size of full trees, albeit laying on their sides. It was unreal and beautiful, occupying almost the width of the narrow beach not long after high tide. A small part of the beach was closed to walkers because of nesting shore birds and the northeastern beach tiger beetle, whatever that is.

I have a new favorite place on the Northern Neck and I have my considerate host, ever the planner, to thank for giving it to me. Among other things.

There were breakfasts eaten on the deck overlooking Carter's Creek, a walk into town and a stop at The Local for drinks, a bagel sandwich (bacon and cucumber on an everything bagel, yum) and a look at local art, and more conversation than any other two people could possibly stand.

As for that mug, it now holds a place of honor on my desk, a reminder of a most memorable weekend and what could be considered my new life philosophy: "Keep calm and love an architect."

Nothing like stating the obvious. I mean, thanks, but both are already second nature.

Take What You Want and Leave the Rest

Being ridiculously happy seems to leave little time to blog.

It's not like I'm not still doing stuff because of course I am. After all, I'm me, so how could I not?

After a meal in service of my hired mouth, Mac and I went to the Basement to see TheatreLab's production of "Topdog/Underdog," marveling at the tightly wound performances of Jeremy Morris and Jamar Jones as brothers with issues in the Pulitzer prize-winning play.

The production clocked in at a hefty two hours and 45 minutes (I knew I had that padding for a reason) and I thought Mac might have to dip out at intermission because of having to go to work early tomorrow, but instead she admitted how sucked in she was by such compelling performances.

Props to first-time director Katrinah Carol Lewis for providing her actors enough room to the create full, albeit flawed, characters before us.

Granted, we walked out of there feeling as if we'd been beat up, but truly great theater is always affecting in some way.

I finally made it to Goatocado, notable for the killer Tuscan arepa (Oaxacan cheese, red pepper, greens, guac and corn in a corn cake) I ate along with a pomegranate ginger-ade, but also for the 50 minutes it took some hapless, young employee to hang the canvas triangles that provided the scant shade on a sunny, blue sky day.

After ten minutes, I was feeling his pain because he was out there in the blinding sunlight without sunglasses. When I questioned the wisdom of that move, he explained that he didn't like clipping sunshades to his regular glasses. But isn't it excruciating to be out here with no sunglasses?

"I'm thinking next time I get glasses, I'll get that kind that darkens in the sun," he explained. "You know, 'cause I don't want to get cataracts." How cute is that?

And for the record, he hung and rehung those triangles unsuccessfully and repeatedly, finally asking two fellow employees to help - one to hook the pieces and the other more knowledgeable one to direct - for over 50 minutes before they were hung properly. Meanwhile, customers like us who wanted to eat outside (inside was full) had a choice of minimal shade or no shade, not the best options on a bright June day at high noon.

Fifty minutes. Have I mentioned that I weep for the future?

Lady G had finally re-surfaced and since our last rendezvous had been March 30, we were in dire need of a blather. Her suggestion was Lemaire at the Jefferson, fine by me as long as we ate outside on the patio and not inside with the business stuffy clientele.

Our table afforded a view of Franklin Street and featured a music speaker that looked like a rock in the flower bed adjacent to us. Yea, it was corny and kind of Flintstones-like, but, hey, it worked, turning the miscellaneous noises of the city into background for the jazz that was playing.

Because our time apart had encompassed April and May, Lady G insisted that it was a birthday celebration and let me choose the bottle: Argyle Brut Rose from a winery I'd visited. And while it took an inordinate amount of time to arrive (it appeared to be our server's first night and he was doing his best, at least at joking with us), it was worth the wait.

When our young server made the rookie mistake of placing the stand holding the wine near the outdoor server's station rather than tableside and G's glass went dry, she did what any self-respecting woman does: walked over, took possession of the stand and bottle and set them in their rightful place within easy reach of us.

The five-top table of young millennial women next to us knew they were in the presence of greatness. "We applaud you taking control!" one called out as the others clapped.

Someday you, too, will just take what you want, grasshopper.

We swapped updates over chilled English pea soup, crispy fried deviled eggs with cornichons and red pepper jelly and Pernod-steamed mussels with apple, fennel and chorizo while we watched people sit down and wait 20 minutes for anything more than water. Luckily, we were in no hurry, not with all the life evaluating we had going on at the table.

At one point, our charming server arrived unexpectedly and a tad out of breath, smiling and saying apropos of nothing, "I've missed you both so." What can you do but crack up at that? At the very least, a sense of humor is essential in the service industry.

We ended the evening on my balcony, where Lady G's birthday gift to me - a bottle of Chateau Kalian 2015 Monbazillac, an organic dessert wine with gorgeous notes of orange and lemon, but also with nice acidity - was opened and sipped chilled as dusk descended on Jackson Ward.

As she does every time she's on my balcony, she commented on some of the high-up architectural details on the house next door. The kind of flourishes barely visible from the street, but striking from mere feet away on the second floor. The kind of thing an artist notices and that's what Lady G is.

She and I have been swapping stories and keeping each other abreast of where the bodies are buried for two decades now, and if that's not worth toasting, I don't know what is.

Check that. Also worth celebrating is finding someone who keeps me so busy talking, laughing and traveling that blogging is all but forgotten.

Sorry/not sorry. Happiness and devoted attention, I have missed you both so.

His Intellectual Trophy

It's not like you have to be head over heels in love to appreciate an unexpected romance.

Back in 2009, I went to see "Julie and Julia" expecting to come away with a fuller picture of how Julia Child became Julia Child. Instead, I was captivated by the love story between Julia and Paul Child and how devoted to each other they were, while the storyline about Julie was downright annoying.

The movie sent me straight to Chop Suey in search of a used copy of  Child's "My Life in France" so I could read more about how their romance and relationship began and flourished. I reread it five years later just to remind myself about that kind of love because I hadn't experienced it yet.

Tonight's film choice, "RBG," at the Criterion was based on nothing more than being a documentary dork and wanting to have a fuller sense of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's legal accomplishments. Really, that was it. That her life contained a major love story was a complete and utterly wonderful bonus to learning how she changed the legal landscape for women in this country.

And while I vaguely recall those landmark gender disparity cases she argued as a lawyer in the '70s, when you look at them in hindsight, it was a remarkable entity she was knitting together to enlighten the all-male Supreme Court about the realities of being a woman in a weighted society.

I'm sure my Mom would have been even more impressed with the fact that the Notorious RBG lived by her own mother's cardinal rules: Be a lady. Be independent.  In many ways, those two things were mutually exclusive during the first few decades of RBG's career.

But where I fell hard for the well-executed documentary was with her romance with her husband Marty. RBG was up front about why she'd been so attracted to him after a string of first dates that never turned into second dates: "He was the first boy I ever knew who cared I had a brain."

Can we just have a moment of gratitude for all the men astute enough to be drawn to a woman's brain back in the dark ages of the 1950s when women were expected to excel at housekeeping and motherhood, not forming opinions and reading law? And RBG wasn't shy either about saying, "Meeting Marty was the most fortunate thing that ever happened to me."

Call it mush, if you must, but I call that pure romance.

Clinton was downright blunt about considering her for a Supreme Court nomination, saying that he'd known within 15 minutes of talking to her that he wanted that mind on the nation's highest court. The interesting part was that, despite her legal accomplishments and days on the DC Court of Appeals (a feat accomplished because President Carter was determined to put women and minorities in judicial positions - go Jimmy, incidentally the first president I ever voted for), her profile was too low and her demeanor too reserved for her to be on anyone's short list for a judgeship.

Enter Marty who began a campaign for her to at least be considered and, lo and behold, she winds up in Clinton's sites, allowing her the opportunity to wow him with her keen mind. And I think we all know Clinton appreciated a good mind, even if he was, shall we say, distractable.

The documentary tried to unpack RBG's lofty place in popular culture usisng millennial lawyers and even her own granddaughter gushing about what a role model and brilliant thinker she is. But, of course, it's bigger than that. The Notorious RBG is cool in a way few 85-year olds could ever hope to be.

Which reminds me of a screened porch discussion I was having with Pru and Beau the other night after a sensational meal at Lucy's (snapper with the texture of lobster in a coconut/ginger sauce with jasmine rice and matchstick green beans and red peppers, oh-so tropical-tasting) and seeing the Golden Girls-esque "Always a Bridesmaid" at Swift Creek Mill Theater.

Favorite line: "I just want to met a man who hates all the same things I do!" Good lucky, honey, that's harder than it sounds.

And on that night, Pru was looking at the big picture, inquiring of us, "Is this the coolest you've ever been in your life?"

Beau didn't hesitate, announcing that he was most definitely at his coolness peak (have you seen that swoop?) and frankly, this is probably as cool as I can ever hope to be after so many years as a nerd. Maybe not full-on cool, but at least less non-cool than before.

But when I turned the tables, her disdain was immediately evident when I asked if this was her coolest period.

"Uh, no!" she said with all the conviction of someone who'd been breaking rules and breaking bad for decades, while Beau and I had been ensuring that we never colored outside the lines.

And RBG's been exhibiting her brand of effortless cool even longer than Pru.

Legal accomplishments aside, I'm even going to say that her storybook romance with Marty alone elevated her into the cool kids' club. Let's face it, most people never get lucky enough to meet their person, so when it happens, it's automatic cool cred.

Which means I may have a shot at cool after all. Thanks, brain.

Walk Away, James

I was so ready for a good walk on a beautiful day.

To start, I began by giving myself permission to skip Broad Appetit this year.

Which means when I finally set out to walk around 11:00, the festival was just getting going, necessitating me navigating past all things Broad Appetit. It didn't, however, stop me from giving props to a volunteer at Jefferson Street who'd come prepared with chair, boom box tuned to vintage soul, large thermos and lunch box. Clearly not his first Broad Appetit rodeo.

Downtown was deserted, making for an easy walk cutting diagonally through empty parking lots as I came down the hill to the still muddy brown river. The downside of walking the canal walk was hearing a pipsqueak of a tour guide explain to his group that the Street Art Festival murals they were standing in front came about as a way to deal with what he called "blighted properties." I almost interrupted his patter to suggest "neglected properties" was a far more apt term.

Tell me about the blight, son, because I recall zero blight. Know what you're talking about before you go spouting off. But who am I to stop some twit from foisting his misconceptions on visitors?

I'm just a walker who hasn't been on the pipeline walkway in weeks and was determined to correct that today. That the weather was perfect for being outside - overcast, 72 degrees and breezy, especially at the river - only validated what I'd known when I set out: that this was going to be a good walk. Even finding a "trail closed" sign at the end of the pipeline walkway didn't dismay me (though I did re-attach one side of the sign to ensure the closed message was clear) because looking at the pipeline surrounded by raging river ahead, I knew people didn't belong on it.

But walking into the wind, against the direction of the water flowing, is not my usual direction, so I especially enjoyed the fierceness of the river's energy walking west. Strangely, returning in my usual direction was anti-climatic after that.

Capital Square was shady and quiet, but things got livelier once I hit the bustle of Broad Street. Fellow walker and Valentine director Bill Martin paused long enough on his way back up Church Hill to entreat me to go to Broad Appetit, though he wouldn't tell me what he'd eaten.

"Do you have a husband?" a smiling man joked to me further on. "Because I'd like to discuss that with you." Crossing First Street, a guy smiled politely and leaned toward me. "If you keep walking like that down there (gestures with head toward Broad Appetit), you're going to cause a traffic jam." I don't care if he was making it up as he went along, I thanked him with a smile.

And thought to myself, ah, yes, the Broad Appetit crowd has arrived. My presence here is no longer required.

Pardon me while I get ready for the rest of my Sunday and the reason for my comment-worthy happy mood. Lucky me, I finally have my own compliment source.

Thunder Only Happens When It's Raining

Seeing the same movie twice in ten days? Oh, please.

Do I sound like I have any extra time? Au contraire. Is this an issue for me? Not for a second. So when I repeat a film so quickly, it's easy to assume that it's a slightly trashy guilty pleasure, likely something in the RomCom wheelhouse. Except no.

I mean yes, there's romance, but the real draw is the rarity of seeing onscreen women - ranging in age, mind you, from 65 to 80 - portrayed as smart, accomplished, funny and, most unlikely of all, sexual beings. It's four actresses giving effortlessly authentic voice to an age usually relegated to characters who are wise or cranky/funny, but rarely shown as objects of desire.

And I've got no idea how much work these actresses have had done, because it wasn't about their physical condition so it doesn't matter. It was about interesting women, none of whom were at their first rodeo and all of whom were fully formed characters. Like all my girlfriends and all five of my sisters.

It's ridiculous how refreshing it is to see such characters onscreen, even with the prerequisite reminders that oldsters aren't pros with technology (there's a difference in being adept and being addicted, just sayin'). Generally, you have to look at French films for sexual depictions of women of an age, something American films shy away from.

So, yes, I returned for another dose of age-appropriate romance and friendship but I'm here to say there's no shame in that and if there is, I don't care. If it happened more regularly, I wouldn't be so excited.

Besides, it's not like I didn't eventually head to Gallery 5 for First Friday and a little live music. And since it was after 9, the line in front of G5 was 20 people deep but what's a little queue time but a chance to talk to strangers?

The first words out of my mouth when a fresh-faced young woman joined the line behind me was, "Now those are impressive! Looks like something we wore to clubs back in the late '70s," referring to the silver lame gaucho pants she had on.

"Why, because they're comfortable?" she wanted to know. No, because they're glitzy and looked cool on the dance floor, grasshopper. That they were totally synthetic meant they were also hot as hell to dance in, so definitely not comfy.

Turns out she was from Nashville, here two years and liking it because Richmond has so many fewer addicts and alcoholics, at least according to her. "Here you smile at someone and if they smile back at you, it's a real smile. In Nashville, it's a mask to hide something." Deep stuff in line. Even so, she acknowledged that Richmond is not her forever place, though she senses someplace like Santa Fe or Morrocco is.

Unless you go there and decide to come back here like so many other people do, I tell her to laughter. She has a million questions about Gallery 5 shows and she's run into just the right person to fill her in until we made it inside.

First up was locals Fat Spirit, pulling from post punk, with some shoegaze and psychedlia thrown in and making me smile as I heard references to bands from multiple decades.  Some guy near the front kept heckling, insisting that he wanted to get onstage and sing a song. Finally, the lead singer told him to just stop asking because the sound guy had said no, but it had to be annoying.

During their last song, my Nashville friend tapped me on the shoulder and said bye. Godspeed, newcomer.

During the break between bands I went upstairs to see an exhibit about urban heat and vulnerability in Richmond via a series of colored maps showing areas affected. Living, as I do, in the center of the city, I shouldn't have been surprised to see a map showing that J-Ward rated the highest vulnerability to urban heat or another indicating how small its tree canopy is. And don't get me started on our high percentage of impervious surfaces.

My kingdom could use more green.

This wall full of maps only confirmed what I already knew: when it's hot in the Ward, it's far hotter than in many areas of the city. For the record, this is why I've taken heat naps two of the past three days.

Back downstairs, I found a prime spot to watch Philly's glammy Sixteen Jackies, a quartet with an eye for rock fashion. Joey, the lead singer, wore a gold lame top belted at the peplum over a three-tiered flounced black skirt. Oh, and pearls.

If he wasn't a former theater kid, he missed a golden opportuntiy.

One guitarist resembled no one so much as the Who's Roger Daltrey during his white t-shirt, shoulder length curls and sunglasses phase, while the other nailed the British invasion look with a dark, flowered shirt, white scarf around his neck and mop top hair hanging in his eyes as he played. The drummer was no more than a head of long blond hair flying side to side.

Adorable doesn't begin to describe them. The singer's voice was part sweet sing-song and part ferocious growl with everything in between set to highly theatrical charisma: swiveling hips, drops to the floor, belt twisting, grand arm gestures and moments of speed shredding.

Once the band had exchanged instruments, it took a while for the mostly young crowd to realize the band was covering Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams," but no time at all to see how singer Joey was masterfully channeling his inner Stevie Nicks for the song.

Now here you go again, but could there be a more age-appropriate way to spend a sticky June night than listening to a song from my youth sung by an earnest band of young Philadelpheans? Not tonight anyway.

It's just too bad the depiction of older woman as smart, accomplished, funny and sexual left out the part where they can't resist a little hip-shaking in a sweaty building if it means hearing live music. That kind of older woman.

Hopefully coming soon to a theater near me.