gilt, gorging, guilt, and gouging

i write as i pull free of the sociogravitational pull of los angeles, in a dark plane shot with dusky yellow streaks of dawn slipping in through uncovered starboard windows. the 4 am wake up call did not come soon enough, and the dense fog on the 405 is redeemed by the blanket of textured moisture that swallows the sprawl from sight mere moments after tactile contact was broken. the labyrinthine molasses of the security checkpoints was not viscous enough to grasp me and bind me to the land. los angeles lies behind me once more.

a business trip is yet an exotic creature for me. though this is my third, it has been almost two years since the last, and any accustomization i may have achieved has since withered away. though plane flights are no longer the mystery to me they once were, life on an expense account still is. large meals bookended the excursion, with sushi and soba at kabuki on the front end and an outdoors meal of whitefish with capers in beverly hills at the back. though there are guidelines, and there are limits, skimping on a meal or two leaves one the option of acts of excess at others.

thursday night was the pinnacle of this conspicuous culinary condition. at maggiano’s, our party of four ordering the family meal option yielded four appetizers, four entrees, and two desserts. shrimp and angel hair arrabiatta, lasagna, chicken cacciatore, and veal parmesan, all in portions large enough that only the most highly coveted dishes were consumed in their entirety, languished on the table and eventually in the trash, as none of us had the means to store any leftovers. the faintest hint of incredulity in the waitress’s voice was magnified by my own internal sense of guilt into a heaviness that would have rested in the pit of my stomach had their been any space left there as she asked, time after time, if we wanted the leftovers boxed for preservation, and time after time, we waved her off. i normally think little of the proverbially starved children of africa, but the sight of and responsibility for such waste appalled me.

though not as personal nor as poignant, friday night’s excursion through beverly hills also left me with something of a sour taste on my tongue. this time a party of five, we bundled into a rented grand marquis and drove ourselves first to rodeo drive and second down the sunset strip. it is always something of a joy to stand amidst the iconic locations of this world, and while i would rather stand atop an alp or even peer across a hazy (albeit grand) canyon, i can now turn my nose up and the nose-upturning of the rodeo drive experience, and say that i have participated in the nightlife of the sunset strip. to be sure, i hate loud/trendy bars of the ilk of “saddle bags” no less now than i did yesterday at this time, but my notched belt again offers a sort of shallow-but-socially-endorsed comfort. that i am $9.50 poorer for 20oz of newcastle is acceptable, in this light, but still death cab for cutie’s “why you’d want to live here” echoed through my mind last night and inspired a listen today earlier in the flight.

though traveling and the accrued experience of different places offers its own subtle satisfaction, it pales in comparison to the sharp and dangerous pleasure of a big purchase. such purchases often fill me with anxiety, but this time enough deliberation had been made that by the time walked away with a brand new laptop, only excitement and happiness remained. i type on it now, in the plane, above snow-capped mountains, in seat 23B on this 757-200, with an exit row to myself. yesterday morning when i woke up early to check in (using this shiny new laptop), i selected a seat position that does not exist on the model i sit in now. standing in the security line below the stairway at LAX, hearing my name among a handful of others being ordered to report to the agents at my gate, i was skeptical. though others in my party were upgraded to first class, i consider this seat, with its spacious leg room and open seats on both sides to put my book and bag, to be a fair prize in and of itself. regardless, my isolation on this otherwise crowded plane allows me a chance to sit and to write my new toy/utility/gfit to myself.

so i return to madison, from the glitz of LA and the spending account to the infinitely preferable comfort of home, leaving behind the valets and turned down sheets for the ecstatic salutations of my puppy and the warm and deeply missed embrace of my wife. here’s to the business trip, but always more importantly, to its drawing to a close.

protective puppy parent

walking lucy tonight, i rounded a corner to see a bulldog sitting, unchained, about thiry feet down the sidewalk. the bulldog got up and started trotting towards us. some of you know how afraid i am of dogs, but i’m proud to say that my first thought was to get lucy up off the ground and out of danger. i scooped up lucy and walked sideways away from the bulldog, not showing it my back. i may have shouted at it a little as well, i’m not sure. the bulldog kept trotting towards us, but it was not running, nor was it growling or showing any other particularly evident signs of aggression (other than approach). at about this moment, a minivan pulled over to the side of the road (this was along segoe, a moderately trafficked boulevard), and a woman got out. she yelled something at the dog, and referred to it as “romeo,” then asked me if it was my dog. i replied that it was not, assumed that she knew the dog since she had used a name to yell at it, and went on my way. and then i found five dollars.

anyway, the moral of the story is that i actually properly handled an encounter with a strange, loose dog.

blak

it’s pretty hard to deny that BlaK is a pretty stupid name for a product, but let’s not lie to ourselves: i can only assume coke + coffee = nirvana, even if it is billed as “coke effervescence with coffee essence.” now i just have to see if i can get my hands on some of the strange stuff.

patio living

eating grilled burgers outside is far preferable to eating fried burgers inside. don’t get me wrong, i love burgers either way, but the one trumps the other to a pretty large degree.

lucy!

this morning we picked up our puppy, a border terrier we are naming Lucy. we’re pretty unbelievably excited about her. she’s friendly and energetic without being rude or obnoxious. you all are welcomed to come and meet her.

puppy coming soon

lea visited the breeder from whom we are purchasing a puppy. one of the girls on the outside of this trio will be coming home with us in two weeks.

fenced in

this weekend was a work weekend, with a twist — instead of spending it inside the building at a computer, i spent it outside doing some manual labor with dad. there is a certain satisfaction that comes along with tangible physical results that does not always come from more theoretical effort. add to the production the wonderful plants ringing the house and the freshly painted dining room, and you have a singularly productive weekend.

i posted some pictures if any of y’all are interested.

in recent tv news

lots of olympic watching was done over the past few weeks. i liked snowboarding, especially the snowboard cross. lea liked short track speed skating. i will now summarize the olympics. the best thing about the olympics: an american named ’seth’ won a gold metal. the worst thing about the olympics: dick button.

the new line of mcdonalds commercials for their premium coffee, in which people wake up to their lives, has a sufficiently dark enough undertone that i find them quite enjoyable. i loathe most mcdonalds commercials, including the still-running “add a little spice to your life” line.

trip-hop is still well liked by the people who pick songs for tv ads. the new victoria’s secret spot sports a portishead song, and some other commercial is playing hooverphonic’s “this strange effect.” it’s only a matter of time before somebody is gutsy enough to run something like tricky’s “christiansands,” which has a very cool sound to it.

shane, on survivor, is bat-shit crazy.

thunder snow

for some stupid reason, i decided to shovel off our sidewalk this morning. (it probably has a lot to do with the fact that many other walks were shoveled, which is directly correlated to the number of retirees that live on our block.) by the time i left for work, about twenty minutes later, the sidewalk already had a noticeable accumulation on it. the weather web page says 5-7 inches throughout today, and there were already 3ish inches on the ground from last night. snow, snow, snow, i guess. the creepy thing was a lightning strike with accompanying peals of thunder right before i left for work. walking to work means no snow days. sigh.

product placement works

i was behind a mini cooper in traffic today with the license plate ITLN JOB. this may not be as funny a license plate as BJ TAHOE, but it’s certainly more nauseating.

in related news, a google search for “BJ TAHOE” now turns up my site as the first hit, which i suppose is not very surprising, given that it’s not a very common topic.