Christmas 2009

Our new family had a great Christmas this year; Christmas Eve with my family, Christmas Day with my sister-in-law's family on Bainbridge Island. Very relaxing both days, and ate like a fiend (both days).

Scored on the goodies, too; my first pair of honest-to-god jammies since, probably, 1973 or so. I truly am middle-aged.

We are very lucky, indeed.

Beer and Brats. What could be better?

With more than a little time to kill, Miguel suggested we head out to Leavenworth for a brat and beer bacchanal.  Sounds good to me.

I drove to Miguel's house last Friday, and we headed out at 9 am.  First stop: Mickey D's for a little breakfast.  I rarely, rarely, rarely go there (I think it's the one of the worst of the big fast food places, 2nd only to Dairy Queen), but I do like the occasional Egg McMufffin or Filet o' Fish.  Bags of garbage delivered, we hit the road and ate as we drove. 

I've only been on Highway 2 during a non-snow season 3 times before, and each time I head out there, I'm always amazed at how beautiful it is.  River and mountain scenes, small towns barely clinging to existence, and depending on the time of year, leaves turning color before dropping to the ground. 

We pulled into town and got parked at 11:30.  Let's get this party started...  Let's eat!  The first place we found that could satisfy our beer/brat urges was a place called Munchen Haus.  I ordered Helga's Giant Kelbassi (1/3 pound, Polish, Beef & Pork).  It came with a small order of German Potato (What would Dan Quayle do here?) salad.  I was given one of those funny little vibrating coasters and was told it would let me know when my order was ready.  To order a beer, I was instructed to walk around the corner, into the patio, and order from the bartender there.  Doing as I was instructed, I walked into the patio and ordered a fantastic beer from Hirschbrau.  I don't remember what it was I ordered, but it was quite tasty.

When I was alerted to the fact that my dog was ready, I walked over and picked it up.  It was huge, and looked grilled to perfection.  The beauty part in all this was that they had the biggest selection of mustards I've ever seen.  If you know anything about me, you know I love my condiments!  They all sounded so good, but there are only so many condiments you can put on a dog before it overwhelms the link.  I went with three different flavors, one one each side of the bun, and one stripe down the middle.  I sprinkled some onions over the top of the entire dog, layered on some sweet relish, a quick squirt of ketchup, and a nice healthy layering of sauerkraut!  Now THAT'S a dog!  It was, in a word, fantastic.  Through the various layers, I could taste the individual mustard flavors, and found them to be some of the best mustards I've had.  The beer was equally good.  I don't remember what we paid for this meal, but it was money well spent.

After stuffing ourselves, we walked around the town.  Lots and lots of places to shop or eat, but not much else.  I guess in a small town that has made itself into a bit of Bavaria, it's not surprising that most businesses are geared completely around tourism.  We walked to the end of town and looked down into the valley were a small river flows past town.  We could see people in the park down below us, and people wading in the river.  With the mountains as a backdrop, the entire scene was idyllic.

OK, enough of that crap, let's get back to the eating and beer drinking.  Where to go, where to go...

Ah, let's head on up to the Italian place for a beer.  It seemed the entire building we found ourselves walking toward was geared mainly to the Italian side of things.  We walked into a meat shop that closely resembled some of the shops we saw while we were in Italy in 2003.  We left the meat shop and headed up the stairs to the Italian restaurant.  Nobody there.  Strange, but it was a little off the beaten path.  Plus, who goes to eat Italian food in a German town?  We got seated at the bar, and ordered a couple beers.  Nothing out of the ordinary, but they were good and cold.  Feeling a bit bloated, we passed on appetizers, and eventually got our bill, paid, and departed for parts unknown. 

Back out into the 92 degree heat.  It was definitely warm, but not miserably so, and the winds kept things comfortable.  We walked to the main square (if you can call it that), where artists of various flavors displayed their work (mostly photography).  We cruised through some of the stores that caught our interest, but nothing compelled either of us to buy anything.  This went on for a while before we decided to get more beer and possibly a bite to eat, though neither of us was hungry.

Are next haunt was a restaurant that is located in the basement of one of the buildings on the main drag, Andreas Keller Restaurant.  Upon entering, we stood and waited to be seated.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  We could see 3 other parties seated in a space that could hold quite a few folks.  There were a LOT of empty tables.  The waiter looked at us (the waitees), and indicated that he'd be with us shortly.  Define "shortly".  Finally, he gathered us and seated us in a booth, handed us a couple menus, and disappeared.  We peeled the menus and were appalled at the prices.  I can see slightly higher prices in a tourist town, but these prices were ridiculous.  Given that we weren't all that hungry, it came down to ordering smallish portions, so as not to damage our innards or our wallets.  I decided on the Red Cabbage, Miguel ordered the German Spatzle with mushroom sauce, with each of us selecting a beer worthy of our sophisticated palates.  And then we waited.  And waited.  And waited.  Finally, a staff member came by with some plates, forks, and a tub of what appeared to be stone-ground mustard.  OK, that's all well and good, but what if we didn't order anything that required the mustard.  Do they through it away, or do they take it back to the kitchen and scoop it back into the big mustard bucket?  And then we waited some more.  I told Mike we should leave, which he was willing to do, but I said let's give them 2 more minutes.  4 minutes later, we decided to beat feet and Mike stood up to go, when the waiter started heading in our direction.  Damn!  Now we were stuck.  We should have just told him we were leaving, but we stayed.  He took our order and, suprisingly, it wasn't too long before we had our beer and "food".  My red cabbage was a pile of mush.  I've had pleny of red cabbage in my day (and I love it), but it's never been mushy.  This slop was barely a step above baby food in terms of its consistency.  I didn't expect a huge portion (and in this I was not disappointed), but for $4, it was severely over priced (even if it had been properly cooked).  Miquel's portion of spatzle was no larger than my red goo, and to charge $5 for noodles and an extra $2 for mushroom sauce, was beyond the pale.  This is the kind of restaurant that can screw their customers over because they are likely first-time (and last-time) suckers.  Tourists from far away places will likely never make it back to town, and any tourist that does make a return visit to Leavenworth, would likely never come back to this pathetic excuse for a restaurant.  When the waiter finally returned with our bill, he circled our table 3 times within a 5-minute period, presumably to make sure we weren't skip out on paying the tab.  It was this final treatment that fried my ham.  Oh, and as it turned out, we didn't order anything that required the mustard they brought out to us.  What do you think they did with it?

Cut loose onto the streets of Leavenworth once more, we continued to walk up and down the streets, occasionally stopping into any store that looked interesting.  Once in a while we'd see a dog that would seem nice to meet, so we'd strike up a conversation with the owners and get to meet some cool pooches.  As we walked past one store, I looked in to see custom pancacke griddles.  One had snowflakes embossed in them (all the same design snowflake), so that wasn't too interesting.  Right next to it, there was a pancake griddle that had the heads of 7 different zoo animals.  Knowing that the wife likes pancakes, and we'd soon have a boy to make them for, I had to have it.   For $32, I thought it might be a little more expensive than what I might pay if I were to order it directly from the manufacturer, but I wanted to bring it home with for the wife.  (I did check the price when I got home, and I would have paid $35 for the pan, plus whatever shipping charges I might have incurred.  Shockingly, I got a better deal in the tourist village).

If you've been to Leavenworth for more than 4 or 5 hours, things start to seem a bit repetitious.  With the day winding down, we decided to grab one final beer before heading out. 

We headed back to the place where we started our day.  We skipped right past the hot dog spot, and walked up to the bartender.  I asked the gal behind the counter if they had beer XYZ and she said she didn't think they did.  One of the employees went to check to see if they had any kegs in the back, and when he returned, he reported that they had, in fact, run out.  Oh, well.  I ordered another beer (not nearly as tasty), and after consuming our pints, we got back on the road. 

All-in-all, it was a great afternoon, with only the one unpleasant experience at the Andreas Keller Restaurant. 

The traffic was light, and we got back to Miguel's house around 8:30.  After saying our good-byes, I pointed the wagon in the direction of home and pulled up to the house at exactly 9 pm.  It was a long day, and I was beat.

Oh, and the wife loved the pancake pan.

It's a new year...

and it's been pretty uneventful. That's another way of saying I'm bored out of my mind.

My wife had a childhood friend stay with us these last 4 or 5 days, and "The Thing That Would Not Leave" finally left today. We've done absolutley nothing, or the closest thing next to it, in all that time. I think we're both suffering cabin fever, but too drained to do anything about it.

Hopefully, we'll get out of the house and do something tomorrow. We're thinking of maybe getting out and hitting the Lucy Exhibit at the Seattle Center.

Then, if my life couldn't get any more exciting, my wife has some friends swinging through town on the way home to California. We'll probably get together for dinner. I like her friends (all of them), but it's usually like this for the holidays, at it gets to be a bit much.

As I type this, I realize it could be a lot worse. We are lucky to have the many friends we do, as opposed to those who have no friends, so I'll stop bitching here, and head back upstairs to finish beating my wife at rummy...

Have a great new year.

Future orphans

I went to a friend's mother's memorial today. It wasn't a memorial in the traditional sense (whatever that means), it was simply a bunch of friends and family gathered at one of the son's home. There was a table there with momentos of the deceased, and a kitchen table with some food laid out. There was little discussion of the departed; no mention made of the death, no announcement, no maudlin speeches.

I felt sad for my friend, realizing that he was now an orphan. I still have both my parents, and can't imagine what it will be like when they're gone. I try to avoid thinking about such things, but realize that I will eventually be in the same situation someday (barring some unforseen disaster). No offense to the folks, but I don't want to go before they do.

I'm sure there's probably a sense of relief now that his mother has gone, but both he and his brother said that there's a big void in their lives. The best thing for them, they realized, is to focus on the good times they had together as a family. Thankfully, my friend got married about 5 years ago and had a son earlier this year. His brother has been married for quite a while and has two kids. Having a family to lean on must help during times like this.

15 years ago

It was 15 years ago tonight, at about this time, when my ex's mother died.

My ex and I had broken up 4 months prior, but we were still in touch. I'd just gotten home from work and was getting ready to get something to eat when the phone rang. It was the ex. She was calling from her sister's house, where her mom had been moved when the hospital realized there was nothing more they could do for her. I could tell she was upset, so I asked if she wanted me to come up to her sister's place. She said she would, so I went.

Her mom had battled breast cancer five years earlier. We thought that it had been completely eliminated and that she would go on to live a long healthy life. Unfortunatetly, she started feeling a little under the weather, and repeated doctor visits came back with nothing more than, "you've got a cold" or some other dismissive comment. Eventually, she became progressively more ill to the point where the doctors took her seriously and gave her a thorough check up. The cancer had metastasized, and she was considered terminal. Over the course of a year, each time I saw her, it was obvious she was wasting away, but I remained in complete denial that she might actually die. I'm not sure what I expected to happen, but death seemed an impossibility.

So, here it was December 1, 1993, and I was driving up to my ex's sister's house. On the drive up, I thought that my ex might be overreacting, and that after a while I'd manage to excuse myself and go home. When I arrived, I found that all the family members had gathered and were visiting upstairs in the living room. While I can't say that everyone seemed happy, there wasn't a pervading sense of gloom in the place that I would have expected had her mother's death been imminent. So, like everyone else, I stayed upstairs and visited.

After about 1/2 hour or so of my arrival, a nurse came up from downstairs and said that the mother was close to passing and if we wanted to say our last goodbyes, now was the time. We filed downstairs and gathered around the bed where the mother lay. Her eyes were open and unblinking. There was absolutely no indication that she could hear us, and she certainly was unable to communicate with those in the room. Each of the four girls and their husbands/partners had gathered around the bed and took turns talking to their mother, telling her what a great mom she'd been, etc.

I couldn't deal with it and left the room and hadn't been out of the room but a few minutes, when the entire family came out of the room. It was over.

Maybe the girls had had a chance to prepare for the reality that was going to happen, but I'd been somewhat out of the loop once my ex and I had broken up. I never did come to any conclusion that she was going to die, even though the evidence was plain to see.

I'd never really be close to anyone who'd died before, so it hit me pretty hard. I walked upstairs to join the rest of the family and there on the walls were numerous pictures of the woman who had just died. Devastating.

The finality of death, is something that I've still never been able to grasp. Each time I go to a funeral or memorial service, the pictures of the deceased are the things I most struggle with. How can they be dead when I'm looking at all these pictures of them? I know it doesn't make much sense, but that's how I feel when I see them.

It's hard to believe 15 years have passed since that night. Unfortunately, there will be other nights like it in my future.