Friday Randomness
Sometimes I think my blog has turned into book reviews and randomness, with the occasional recipe thrown in. Was it ever anything different? I don’t know. I mean, for about 5 minutes in 2005 I wrote about local restaurants, but that didn’t last at all. So without any further ado, here is your random content for the week.
Earthshake*
Monday morning we were awoken in our absolute favorite way, a 2:55am earthquake. They’re unsettling, because you’re never sure whether that jolt you felt was the worst of it, or if they are going to get stronger. This one was a quick jolt, then some rolling, then it (thankfully) stopped. A 4.3 isn’t likely to do much if any damage, and we were able to go back to sleep. I later checked in with my cousin’s daughter who lives in Berkeley, and she said it woke her up, but her roommates all slept through it. Of course, all earthquakes remind me of the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989. I was in San Francisco at the time. That was the first earthquake I’d ever felt that scared me.
* When Maya was little, she loved the Land Before Time cartoons. OMG, they were horrible. She went from calling diplodocus and triceratops by name, to calling them long necks and three horns. Which annoyed me, but worse was the SHRIEKING from the young dinosaurs as they ran from danger. I would let her watch it while I cooked dinner, and UGH, that was horrid. Anyway, when there was an earthquake, they ran screaming and yelling ‘Earthshake!’
All Politics are Local
I was impressed by this effort. Scan the QR code with your phone camera, and it opens an email, already addressed to the appropriate people, addressing the issue at hand. The issue is electric bikes and scooters that speed along on our trails, which is getting dangerous. Maya and I had our phones with us, so we scanned, read the email to make sure it was accurate and actually addressed the issue, and sent it. We’ve gotten 4 or 5 reply emails from the city, the county, and the park district that is in charge of the trails. Democracy in action. In another example of local politics, I received an email from Meals on Wheels, asking that we speak up in support of a community grant to help them in their mission of feeding homebound seniors. So I wrote a letter to my county supervisor. That felt good, in the face of the shitstorm that is national politics right now.
Last Saturday’s protest was a good one. They’ve been moving to various locations lately, which is good, but means I wasn’t downtown to get my good bread, and now I’m out. Poo. I grabbed the photo from my local Indivisible group on Facebook. Our congressman was there, warning that we need to fight hard if we want to keep having free and fair elections, and that the current spending bill is even worse than the OBBB OBUB*. I’m always thankful to know that my representatives are fighting for the same things that I believe in.
*One Big Ugly Bill. I don’t talk about work much, but I work in payroll documentation, meaning when legislative changes come about that affect client’s payroll or reporting, I am on the doc team that handles that. Every time I come across the term ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ it makes me angry. I wish it were within my power to change it, but it’s not.
Autumn Weather?
Monday and Tuesday were hot, but then it cooled down nicely. October here is generally one of our best months, weather wise, so I’m hopeful that we are in for some low(er) energy bills. The screenshot was clearly taken on Tuesday, and did not take into account the thunder and rain we had late Wednesday night/early Thursday morning. Not a ton of rain by any means, but it came down hard for a bit. Kind of nice when you’re home cozy in bed.
Gift Shopping
My BFF’s younger son recently graduated from graduate school in the UK. Her older son graduated from law school last winter, and I sent him my traditional graduation gift, a check. Which still has not been cashed. To be fair, he lives in Arizona, and the check is in Pennsylvania, but he’s been there a few time and I’m sure it’s in his room. But I decided younger son was going to get a gift that does not mess up my checkbook balancing. A very traditional graduation gift is a pen, and when I mentioned this to BFF (Rosemary), she told me that he loves pens, so that would be a great gift. I don’t even know where to buy a nice pen without going online these days*, and I didn’t want to get him a plain black one. So I stopped in at a local consignment store, where I was happy to find this pen. I didn’t look carefully, it turns out it is from the Vatican museum gift shop. I am pretty sure he’s not Catholic, but his grandparents were, so I guess that’s OK. Rosemary is very into consignment shopping and has a little bookshop in an antique mall, so I think they will dig that it is ‘used’.
*Back in the early 90s, I was into Waterman pens. I think I bought them at Nordstrom, though certainly a nice stationary store would have them as well. But there are no nice stationary stores around here any more. When I look online, it looks like Nordstrom still carries them, just FYI.
Slop Bucket
We have a countertop compost bin that we use to gather food waste for our green bins, rather than having it go into the landfill where it would decompose and produce methane. It’s kind of gross, and we’ve been considering getting a different bin. Ours has small vents in the lid, which allow for a bit of air circulation and keep it from getting too smelly. Unfortunately, if not correctly used, they can also let fruit flies get in there and breed, which is ultra disgusting. I poked around online to see if I could find a better option, but it seems that having vents in the top with a carbon filter is the best. The key is to not let the food touch the filter, so it doesn’t need to be washed. If you wash the filter, it loses its shape a bit and the flies get in. So now I’m working on emptying it once a day. Anyway, I needed more filters, and noticed the picture of the company founder, described as ‘Famous Inventor’ on the back of the box. That cracked me up. Check out his ultra basic LinkedIn profile.
Neighborhood Photos
While on my morning walk the other day, I decided to take a detour through a street that has a couple of pomegranate trees, so I can see what the crop is looking like. I noticed this old fashioned mailbox, which has room for your daily newspaper. Seems quaint, doesn’t it? I guess it’s also for magazines and other big mail, so maybe it still gets some use. When I looked more closely at the photo, I noticed the stained glass window in the house, which reminds me of my grandparents’ house when I was a little kid. You certainly don’t see a lot of that these days either.
On the left we have a pomegranate tree that has a lot of fruit, and is looking great. This yard is pretty overgrown and has a lot of fruit trees, so it’s always fun to check it out. On the right, we have a pomegranate bush with zero pomegranates. I only know it’s a pomegranate bush because I’ve seen them there before, and once stole one. It is on the outside of their front yard fence, so maybe that means it was fair game?
One Thing a Day
Plugging along on my decluttering project, where I get rid of one thing a day for the second half of 2025. Here’s another thing of my mom’s that I am not going to get rid of. It’s ivory, made from walrus tusks. I have no idea how to play cribbage, and it’s unlikely I will learn, but I remember her playing it when we were kids. I’m also unlikely to wear the scrimshaw necklace, but I’m keeping that too.
Things I did give away were mostly books, but I also cleaned out some paperwork from my file cabinet, and took an old kindle I found to eWaste. My brother Richard sent it to me back in 2013. We were hoping that my Grandma would like it and could get the words big enough to read. It was used at that point, Richard already had a newer model. Alas, it was too confusing for grandma, so I brought it home and read a couple of books on it, but never really got into the eReader thing. I have the app on my iPad, so I can still read the books I purchased if I’m so inclined.
Since I mentioned at the start of this post that the beginnings of this blog was mostly (though not exclusively even then) local restaurant reviews, what better way to end than to tell you about the dinner we had last Friday at a restaurant we like, À Côté. According to their website, À Côté is a shared plates restaurant, and perhaps that explains the service we have received lately. The last time we went, they were pretty full, we did not have a reservation, so we sat outside, where I think they kind of forgot about us. They only have a couple of tables on the sidewalk. So we ordered drinks, an appetizer to share, and two entrees. Which all came out at once, except the drinks which came last of all. VERY STRANGE, and frustrating because that meant one course was going to get cold while I ate the other. This time was better, but still strange. We ordered drinks, an appetizer to share, and two entrees. Everything came out in the correct order, but Ted’s steak came out a good 20 minutes after my pasta. I was finished eating by the time his came out. We mentioned it to our waitress, and she apologized and was gracious, but did mention that they are mainly a shared plates restaurant. Hmmm. The thing is, their food is really good. We like the vibe (photo credit above to Ted). We have been there 8 or 9 times I think, and until the last 2, we’ve never had a problem with how the food comes out. The service is attentive, I could see her noticing that my food hadn’t come out and trying to get it taken care of. So we will be back, definitely, but next time we go I think we will make it clear at the outset that we are not sharing our entrees and would like them to come out together.
In case you’re curious what we had (all delicious!), we shared rock shrimp ceviche, then I had a wonderful roasted eggplant pasta dish with a spicy tomato sauce, and Ted (eventually) had steak frites. To drink, he had a Manhattan (bourbon, not rye), and I had a glass of white wine, a Palagrello Bianca, which is an Italian wine I had never heard of but was delicious. They have a very eclectic wine list, and I am never familiar with any of the wines, but I always enjoy them.
The cartoon above is credited to Nathan Pyle, and the photo of the protest was taken by a photographer who is there every week, John Weekes. I grabbed it from the local Irresistible facebook page.
What kind of randomness is going on in your neck of the woods?
32 Comments
AC
I don’t usually read book reports or recipes but I like the rest. I will just comment on pens. I am still using the pen that my daughter gave me at her wedding in 2008. I didn’t even have ot change the ink cartridge until this year, which tells you that I don’t use it often or at least not for long — just for little notes here and there, like grocery lists. BTW, keep on with the protests, eh.
J
Oh, I love that you use the pen your daughter gave you so often! And yes, I’ll keep on at the protests. Sometimes it feels useless, let me tell you.
Elisabeth
Yay for consignment/thrifted finds!!!
J
I was really happy about it!
Karen Meg
I love all your randomness , the snaps of life, perspective!! I remember news of that quake my sister’s boyfriend at the time was studying in San Fran and he was terrified . I can’t imagine having quakes a fact of life but I guess it’s part of your region. Like bad ice storms up here.
I love pretty pens too, such a thoughtful gift !
J
It was scary even for those of us who were used to earthquakes, I can only imagine how much more so for those who aren’t from around here!
nance
You always order exactly the kind of food I love. We’re so alike in that respect (and others as well).
I had no idea that pomegranates grew on bushes, too. Are they really bushes, or just pomegranate trees that weren’t pruned at the outset? At any rate, I think produce facing a sidewalk is fair game. I’d leave poms alone, however; too much seed vs fruit ratio for me.
I’m trying so hard to think of how you could repurpose the ivory cribbage board. Too thick for a bookmark; holes too thin for flower stems; I suppose you could affix it to the wall and hang some earrings from it? It’s too lovely not to be seen and appreciated daily.
J
Pomegranates grow on both bushes and trees, a fact that I never knew until I saw this particular bush and then looked it up.
Hopefully someday we can enjoy a meal together again, maybe at the lake…
Suzanne
I got a nice pen for a graduation gift back in the early aughts and it still works! And still writes very nicely. I love a good pen.
Pretty sure the first pomegranate I ever tasted was from your town! (A friend of mine used to get pomegranates in care packages from her mom.)
J
Your friend’s parents lived in Walnut Creek? What a small world! Pomegranates seem expensive to mail, but a care package from home is worth the money I guess.
Margaret
I still have a whole bunch of pens in my garage that were from my husband’s business. They probably don’t work and I should throw them away. That will be difficult to do! Earthquakes are scary even when you live in earthquake country. Shared plates means that every dish is shared so it doesn’t matter when it comes out? I don’t know that I’ve ever been to a restaurant like that–but if the food is good, it wouldn’t hold me back. John is much more of a meat eater than I am and loves big shrimp and I do not. We do often share plates though with a bit of negociation.
J
Yeah, I don’t know about the shared plates thing either. And this has never happened to us before, so I suspect the kitchen was just having a bad night.
Maybe keep one of the pens, and some for your grandsons and daughters, and donate the rest to Goodwill or something. They might use them?
Ally Bean
Cribbage is fun. Easy to learn. My dad taught me to play when I was about 7-8 y.o. As an adult sitting outside with a cold beer & playing it is a joy.
The mailbox + newspaper spot is a thing out of time. Interesting.
J
Maybe I should learn to play cribbage? Ted’s not really into games, but maybe he’d change his mind.
Nicole MacPherson
I don’t really equate “shared plates” with “two dishes coming twenty minutes apart” or “drinks coming later” but what do I know, I hardly ever eat out. Your pasta dish does sound wonderful though!
I will say I am a spider fan. I love those little guys! They do so much for us, and then people just squish them. They are trying so hard to eat all those pests we hate like mosquitoes, and we thank them by SQUISHING THEM (this is my husband, he hates spiders and squishes them, I save them and put them outside, although I think that’s called “killing them softly” in Canada in winter).
J
Yeah, I think the kitchen was having an off night. When I was a waitress I would not have brought the pasta dish out, I would have kept it under the heat lamp and nagged the kitchen until I got the steak. But the last time I worked in a restaurant I wasn’t even in college yet, so what do I know.
I’m the same way…I saved a spider this morning that was in our sink. Caught it and put it outside. Later I noticed a fly in the house and thought that maybe I should have left the spider to its own devices. But my husband would have squashed it, so I did the right thing.
Mark Petruska
I was living in Milipitas in 1989. Loma Prieta was far and away the worst earthquake I ever experienced. No wonder I didn’t hang around the Bay Area long!
J
That was definitely a bad earthquake!
Melissa
We went to a shared plate restaurant on Thursday with the kids, but we did do the share plate thing for the whole meal, so it was easy—although it’s always hard to work out whether you’ve ordered enough food. We almost ended up with an extra plate of dumplings, but we let the waitress know that we had already received both our plates of dumplings and that they must be for another table, which they were.
I’m glad the earthquake wasn’t severe. Since we are sitting in the middle of a plate, we don’t get a lot (and never really above 5 or so).
Acting locally makes sense, you are more able to affect change on a local level because there is less distance between the decisions and you. It is also a good way to keep feeling like you can make a difference during all the chaos.
J
Melissa, exactly…it makes me feel better with everything that’s going on, to be able to do SOMETHING.
StephLove
Keep up the good fight, and enjoy the good weather.
I would find regular earthquakes so unsettling, but maybe that’s because I am not used to them. I think I can only remember one in Maryland, and it was pretty mild, just things falling off shelves.
J
Goodness, things falling off of shelves is pretty big actually…
Coco
I didn’t know American also give money as gifts, I thought it’s a Chinese tradition. It’s so much simpler and useful right?! I love pens too but wouldn’t know what’s appropriate for a gift.
J
I remember getting red envelopes with a dollar or two from the Chinese owner’s little son when I worked in a hotel! Yes, money is a common gift for birthdays and graduations, even weddings. Some people are against it though and want to give a more traditional gift. It can be seen as impersonal to some.
Sarah Jedd
Perfect protest weather! Love the pen– that’s so cool. When we got married, we had our pick of competing stationary stores to choose from in town– they even all did their own engraving and hooked us up with a calligrahper for our envelopes. And now? All closed. Such a bummer.
J
Yeah, there are no stationary stores around anymore. 🙁 But if there were, would anyone use them? So much easier and cheaper to do it all yourself I guess.
Noemi
I for one love your book reviews and your random life posts. Thank you for going to so many protests. I love the QR code to email thing. I wish I came across one of those. I’d definitely send an email (I’d also love to write to someone about e-scooters being dangerous on sidewalks and in other areas. Grrr.)
I did not feel that earthquake. I didn’t even feel the aftershock the next day that my friend felt. I wasn’t here for the ‘89 earthquake (I lived in Hong Kong then) so I’ve never felt a big one. I wonder if I will someday.
J
You didn’t feel the earthquake? Well, my cousin’s roommates didn’t either, and it was in Berkeley, so I guess that makes sense. 🙂
Tierney
We missed the earthquake since we are out of town. But it sounds very startling!
J
Yes, as they always are, right?
Tobia | craftaliciousme
I love all the randomness to catch up on what is happening in your life.
My dad loves to gift pens. So much so that we each have a ton. But you can enevr have enough good pens, right?
I have never seen a pommegrant tree in my life.
J
Yeah, we have quite a few pretty nice pens laying around here as well. They do make a good gift!