A small town summer evening

This is Main Street in Murphys CA, population 2,000. It usually doesn't look like this, because normally, there are cars lining the street. They must have cleared it for the photographer! Often it's this empty at midnight!
Murphys has a park, and on the first Friday of every summer month, there is Music in the Park. Although you can't see it in the picture, just beyond the picnic table is a stream, cold from snow melt, but shallow enough to warm up in the summer, shallow enough for little kids to splash and swim, deep enough for tubing. There's a bridge from the park to the town library. Tonight was Music in the Park night, with the three-piece band named Plan B. The drummer is a local insurance broker - I don't know the other two. They played '60's and '70's music mostly, but they didn't just copy the Beatles or the Stones, they played their music, so the sounds were different, fresh. Most of the park is lawn, but the area just in front of the gazebo is gravely black top, and on a night like tonight, filled with dancers from babies in arms to toddlers, to oldsters who danced as if they'd never stopped. The eight dollar dinner is always provided by a local purveyor, and tonight's was by the local Sierra Market, and was the best I've ever had at the park, chicken, tri-tip, deli salads, watermelon, cookies. I was with friends, of course, and the music was too loud for conversation, but the warmth of sitting with best friends - as well as the warmth of the evening - was a balm to my heart, so I could listen to words of love and not cry. "They're writing songs of love, but not for me," kept going through my head. Music is still piercingly poignant.


This is the Murphys that I will be sad to say goodbye to.

Alameda with Roxane

One of the new old friends from the reunion, Roxane, has a daughter who lives only a couple of hours from me, and Roxane was at her daughter's house last weekend. I drove on Saturday, Route 4, to 238 to 880, and off the freeways, finally, near the Oakland Airport, to Alameda. I went to the Coral Reef, where Roxane had left a key to her room for me at the front desk, and went to her room where she appeared a few minutes later. We knew each other through college, and only reconnected at our 50th reunion, and it is an amazing gift to be her friend today. We had supper at the Bombay Superstar, where I've been with my son a number of times. Here's the tea leaf salad!

Clockwise from the upper right corner: powdered shrimp, peanuts, dried garbanzos, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, roasted garlic slices, chopped red bell pepper, and at 12 o'clock, a lemon. The center is a bed of rice with the tea leaf dressing, which is in consistency like pesto, but a flavor unlike anything I've eaten. Salty, spicy, savory. They serve it like as it appears, and then toss it for you. All tossed, it's not as beautiful, but the flavors and textures are perfection. 

After dinner, we went across the street and browsed in a bookstore, that I thought was independent, but my son, Will, informs me that it's a chain of independent-looking bookstores! I practiced restraint, but Roxane found a few books to buy. Then we went to Tucker's for ice cream - it's famous, and rightly so. They had purple yam ice cream, which we tasted, but it had no particular taste at all except sweet.

After much conversation, and a night's sleep, we went to breakfast, and to the San Francisco Airport, nicely avoiding the Giant's game.

I drove home, reversing the route, and skipping Stockton, so you can add Routes 204 and 180 east, and leave out I5 north. If I were writing from Southern California, I would put the word "the" in front of the route number. The 580 to the 180. Southern and northern California are different states. 

Cupcake Wars

It has to be the biggest event ever in Murphys, California, at least since the brothers John and Daniel Murphys struck gold in 1848. 


My friend, Karen, went to LA to compete in the Food Network Cupcake Wars. Karen has a catering business and cupcake coffee shop, named Lila & Sage, that is located on Main Street in Murphys, now a bustling town of 2,000 residents. She invited 300 of her friends to a golf club restaurant, Camps, in Angels Camp, to view the show. I think everyone knew she'd won, but we all pretended we didn't.  My sister had seen it three hours earlier on the east coast and told me. We had fruit and cheese, and the finest of Murphys were there. Many beautiful women wore gowns (no man wore a tux); my friend Kate and I thought we might be overdressed in a summer dress! There were televisions strategically placed around the crowed room and at 8 o'clock, the show began. We watched breathlessly, and cheered enormously, as one by one, the four contestants, with their assistants, baked and presented beautiful and delicious cupcakes (where is smell-o-rama when you need it?), and as, one-by-one, the four were down to the final two, and the winner, Karen, of Lila & Sage, in Murphys, California! Then we all had cupcakes and all went home, replete with glitter, excitement, drama, tension, and the celebratory chatter of good friends.

Summer Days at the Beach

Today, with temperatures of 102, my dear friend, Gail, and I took to the pool. We were in the water all afternoon, chatting, chatting with others as they came and went. Mostly we had the pool to ourselves. (Why don't I remember a camera?) I am red as a lobster, and very very content. After the pool, we sat in the lawn swing and drank iced decaf, with Jenny Lind and XieXie. 


Memories. My first spring in Cambridge introduced me to the joys of sunbathing on the roof of Comstock Hall, and even more exciting, finding someone with a car who could take me/us to Crane's Beach in Ipswich. It usually was a weekend, and we inevitably sat in snail-like traffic for two hours there (and then back again). When we got to the beach, we would search for a beach-blanket-sized spot. The sand was literally covered in beach blankets, each with its own transistor radio, picnic basket, and, if you were unlucky, three or four kids. We would lather on the baby oil and iodine (which of course would immediately attract a layer of sand) and sit in the sun, with brief forays, picking our way though the blankets and towels, to the sea. I was red as a lobster back then, too. 


I looked up Crane's Beach, and found that today it costs $15 to get in - $25 on weekends. 


There was also a beach that we frequented in Manchester, called Singing Beach, named after the particularly squeaking sound of the sand as it was being walked upon. What did we wear on our feet in those days before flip-flops? I remember burning the soles of my feet on hot days at the beach. Singing Beach now is open to non-residents Monday through Thursday only, at a cost of $25.


Among my fond memories of those beach days is a stop at a fried clam shack. I often order fried clams when they appear on menus, and am always disappointed, for nothing will be as good as those stored in my memory. Howard Johnson's used to have good fried clams, but I bet they're not the same now.

Chocolate pizza

The chocolate pizza was store-bought, from the Chocolate Lady in Angels Camp, California. I've never attempted chocolate making. I suppose you melt chocolate, add spices (I picture it being continuously swirled in a large bowl set over warm water), then put the toppings in a mold (would they then be bottomings?), pour in the chocolate, add toppings on top, and drizzle with more chocolate. 

Chocolate and books

Here's the leftover chocolate pizza!

I may have lost track of what I've read since I last wrote about books. I hope not. 

I've finished The Plug-In Drug. It's aimed at parents with children, particularly young children, but I found it very apt for me. As I'm building a new life, I've used TV for escape - haven't we all, well most of us? Then the set was out for a month, got fixed a month ago, and I've watched only one hour in that month. The idea of losing my mind to the Plug-In Drug is kind of scary, and although I've not yet sold it, I may have a buyer, and I'm about to take the plunge. I think.

I also finished What Was She Thinking - Notes on a Scandal. That was the cosy I was thinking of. I loved it and can't wait to see the movie - which I can still do on my lap top, right? That's not cheating? It's not so cosy, but the characters are wonderful, and I'm sure that Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, and Bill Nighy (two out of the three are also in the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel) portray them perfectly.

Now I've started The Girl I Left Behind, by Judith Nyes. I'm absolutely mesmerized by her writing of her life in the world of national and international politics, the women's movement, the Viet Nam War.

July 4th Redux

We in Calaveras County celebrate July 4th on a nearby Saturday. There's a parade in Arnold, 20 minutes up Highway 4, and in Murphys, we have a big wingding of fireworks and music at Ironstone, Kautz Winery and venue for big name concerts and other more local events.  But we were not at Ironstone; we, Gail and I, went to Barbaranne's new house on five plus acres, a couple of hills south or maybe west, from Ironstone. Barbaranne was hosting us and her son, Kelly, for supper, games, and dinner. 


Before dinner, we talked and tried to solve computer mysteries. Barbaranne is very on top of all things computer; Gail is a teensy bit computer phobic; I am a moderately skilled user. We had a tablet going, we tried to get a desk top Mac going, we even preempted Kelly's computer for a while. Barbaranne served ice tea punch and chips and salsa and guacamole.


The next thing on the agenda was a game - Ticket to Ride. You might know it, but Gail and I didn't. It's simpler than it seems at first, involves strategy and some luck and its rules are interestingly different from many games' rules. We got tucked into the game, and then decided it was time to eat, while we played.


Barbaranne brought out chicken Caesar wraps, and the melon balls I had brought, and we ate and continued our game. We were waiting til dark when the fireworks were to start. The location of Ironstone from the house was plotted and we kept starting hopefully at the hilltops for the first rocket's red glare. It took a long time to get dark enough, so we started in on the dessert that Gail had ordered from a local chocolatier in Angels Camp. 


It was a chocolate pizza! They made the "dough" from a spicy (i.e. peppery) chocolate, and Gail had chosen a turtle topping - chocolate, caramel, pecans. Only the spiciness of the chocolate kept us from eating second helpings right then and there, I think, but we brought seconds home. Sadly, I can't get my camera to download right now (what's with that?) so I can't show you a picture of my slice. 


The pie was almost finished when we saw the first burst of fireworks. We went outside in the cooling summer night and had the best seats in the house for 30 minutes of ooh and ahhh! It was a spectacular view of wonderful fireworks display, with good friends, good food, beautiful country.


When the last burst faded, we went back and finished the game. Kelly won.

Long Driving Day

Better Blogs Before Breakfast?


It's 8:15 here in the Golden West, and I'm just home from a Murphys to Alameda round-trip lunch visit with my son, Will, for his 41st birthday. And with his girlfriend, who I just met for the first time. She lives near Bloomington, but in Illinois. I think. She flew out to surprise him. It took a scores of many fine actors to pull it off, but he was truly surprised.


We had lunch at the Bombay SuperStar in Alameda, and I had my favorite tea leaf salad. They bring to the table a plate of lettuce, finely sliced, and all around it are piles of comestibles - peanuts, toasted garlic, sesame seeds, soy nuts, shrimp dust, and a bowl of the tea leaf dressing. Next time I'll bring my camera. Ahem. Trust me, it's a beautiful plate, and the server mixes it all up in makes it not so beautiful, but absolutely delicious. 


Heavy heavy traffic this eve of the 4th, and a recently removed obsession returned. Thank goodness for cell phones, as I was able to call a friend who talked me down. I am truly grateful. Yes, I have a headset - no hands on phones in cars in California. I am grateful for cell phones, but mostly for friends.


So, tired to bed and more Fearless Jones, whose friend, Paris Minton, has gotten them into a real pickle.