Julia – Page 4 – sunsetchaser

ho wah holiday

Last night my best friend and I found ourselves sans our respective significant others. Though Tammy and I became friends in high school while we were both perpetually single, since then we’ve never been single at the same time, and as a result it’s been more difficult to find time for just the two of us. She got married this past fall to a guy named Neal who, among other things, brews his own beer. More importantly, Neal’s the kind of guy every girl hopes her best friend will marry. So it’s okay that when I see Tammy it’s usually in conjunction with Neal — but it was still great to get a chance to have a girls’ night out.

In high school, Tammy and I frequented the now-defunct Mandarin Restaurant on the Carlisle Pike. It was in the boat-shaped building that now houses a mediocre Mexican restaurant. This and Taco Bell were probably our favorite spots. Anyway, I guess we’ve left behind the days when Taco Bell constituted a nice dinner, because last night we tried a Chinese place neither of us had been, Ho Wah in Lemoyne. Those of you who’ve been there probably know that Ho Wah doesn’t really constitute a “nice dinner” either, but, as I gather everyone else in the area knows already, the food was very good. I’m not sure how it differs from other Chinese food, but I do know it was better. Or at least that I enjoyed it more. (As a side note, I should mention that most West Coasters don’t like East Coast Chinese food, claiming it to be inauthentic. It might be, but I prefer it to the supposedly authentic West Coast Chinese.) It would, however, probably be better for take-out than for dine-in, as the service was pretty poor: I never got my soup, the entrees took waaaay too long to come out, and we had to make eye contact with the server several times before she gave us an opportunity to ask for boxes.

Ultimately, though, we did make it out of there with our leftovers and headed down to New Cumberland to the West Shore Theatre to see The Holiday. Before you say, “You saw what?” let me remind you that this was a girls’ night out. It was the perfect girls’ night out movie — predictable and sweet. And co-starring Jude Law. That’s important.

But more interesting to me than Jude Law was the overtly self-referential nature of the movie. Part of the movie is set in LA, and one of the main characters produces movie trailers. So right off the bat you’ve got elements of a movie about movies. Not that unusual. But there was also a character, a retired screenwriter, who named elements of the movie — in movie-speak — as they were happening. And there was the scene where the movie — which, at least at the West Shore Theatre, began without previews — interrupted itself with the green screen that alerts the audience a preview is about to be shown. What I’m saying is that this movie, in most ways just a typical romantic comedy, made a point to frequently remind the audience that this was a movie. Add to this the basic premise that by watching enough movies and living someone else’s life for two weeks you can change your own life — well, I think this may have been the first mainstream overtly postmodern romantic comedy I’ve seen.

This is not to say that it was, in any way, an intellectual or even thought-provoking film. But it did have Jude Law. What else do you need?

packing up

What is it about moving that makes even a much-wanted relocation so depressing?

When I first moved into my Westminster apartment, I was coming from two low-ceilinged rooms in my grandmother’s attic, where I’d lived for about a year and a half. The plentiful windows, ceiling fans, and large rooms of the new place made me feel like I was on vacation, even as I was scrubbing the former tenant’s grime from the floors.

A year and a half later, it’s my grime to be scrubbed from the floors. The apartment no longer feels like a vacation home, but more like the spartan, rundown, thin-walled hovel that it is. And yet today I found myself looking over the living room full of boxes feeling a little wistful, and not just because of all the work still left to do.

I’m moving in, as many of you know, with my boyfriend. We’ve been living together in a lovely little house since mid-November, so I figured it was probably time to have all my stuff join us. One of the problems, though, is that since the boyfriend came from a six-bedroom house, we already have more than enough stuff to fill our three tiny bedrooms. So as I’m packing, I’m thinking, “Where the hell am I going to put this?” One possibility is to put off the unpacking until after graduation and a subsequent move to a more permanent residence.

And that brings me to the other problem, not so much a problem, really, but the other reason for my wistfulness.

I, of course, moved to Westminster to go to McDaniel. I was excited, scared, and unable to see the other end of the journey. That would be the end of the journey I’m now rapidly approaching, and my time at McDaniel has been far more rewarding than I ever imagined it could be. The fear about what comes next is beginning to set in. So leaving the apartment, something I assumed I would do in late May, feels like the beginning of the end for this somewhat unexpected respite from the working world.

And that’s enough to make anyone wistful.

tradition

Monkey monkey monkey & Happy New Year.

I have been cooking somewhat obsessively lately. I’ve been spending way more time cooking than I have, say, blogging (duh). Additionally, while in Virginia Beach visiting family last week, I finished the book I was reading (The Echo Maker, by Richard Powers, which just won the National Book Award, indicating that it must have been a mediocre year for literature, because while I enjoyed the book, Powers’s tendency toward florid prose would keep me from giving it any awards), and picked up Julie and Julia at Barnes & Noble. This was a much better book, albeit slightly less, erm, intellectual. It’s about a woman who decides to cook every recipe in Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume One in a year. This is a woman who clearly cooks a lot more obsessively than I do. But she inspired me.

To make pork & sauerkraut because it’s New Year’s Day. This is, apparently, a tradition, although not one in which I have ever partaken before today. So, having no family recipe to use, I made the pork & sauerkraut recipe from Joy of Cooking, because I happened to have it with me in the car when I decided we just had to go to the grocery store.

It turns out that none of the four eating creatures who live in this house really enjoy pork, and only one of the four eating creatures enjoys overcooked vegetables, which, ultimately, was what I thought this dish tasted like. Not really in a bad way — I think if one enjoyed pork and sauerkraut, one would enjoy this — just in a stewed vegetables sort of way. I’m taking the leftovers to my dad tomorrow; I think he’ll appreciate them more than we did.

Anyway, I suppose this marks the conclusion of the holiday season. I’m a little relieved. This was, as I mentioned in the last post, a good one — my New Year’s Eve may have even broken my streak of horribly disappointing New Year’s Eves — but now I have three weeks before classes start and no high-pressure events in the interim.

I plan to play some Civilization, do some laundry, and cook a little food. It’ll be a good year.

that time of year

By now the guests have departed, the boyfriend is doing the dishes, and other than the cat who thinks he could write a better blog entry than I (as evidenced by his insistence on walking on the keyboard), I have peace for the first time since six o’clock this morning.

Though a long one, this was a good Christmas, full of family and food. We started at my parents’ house, opening presents and eating the breakfast I spent yesterday prepping, then moved to my grandmother’s house just a couple of miles down the road, where we opened presents with the extended family, laughed, and spent a few minutes remembering the cousin who passed away earlier this year. Since those few minutes in which we pulled rubber ducks from a stocking dedicated to her, my thoughts have returned to her and her immediate family many times. This is the kind of thing I wish I could write about, or at least wonder if it would be appropriate to write about, but know that I don’t have the words.

After the presents were unwrapped, Fred and I headed back down to New Freedom to get ready for dinner with Fred’s son and his girlfriend. I made the recipe posted in the last entry, but overcooked the meat in the interest of Fred’s tastes. Never again will I cater to his poorly developed tastebuds. The sauce was excellent, but the meat was a shadow of what I believe it could have been.

Dessert, however, was good, and if you have a cooking bone in your body I highly recommend making this Winter-Spiced Molten Chocolate Cake with Rum-Ginger Ice Cream just as soon as you can.

I have come to believe that anyone who can follow a recipe can at least pass her(or him)self off as a good cook. This is the kind of cook I am. I very rarely develop new dishes, but damn am I good at following directions. You’re welcome to come to dinner anytime between now and when classes start again. I’m always looking for an excuse to make something extravagant. Just please don’t ask about the rubber duck sitting in the living room unless you like your food extra salty.

for the sake of posting

Diego’s right — I’ve got no excuse for not blogging right now. Except that I don’t particularly have anything to say. I haven’t left the house since Sunday afternoon, when we went to Ruby Tuesday for an exceptionally mediocre lunch. Since then, I’ve mostly been doing laundry, putzing around on my computer, and watching TV. Not much blogging material there.

Most of my putzing has involved using iPhoto and iDVD, both of which I like a lot, though I wish they were a little more powerful/flexible. I suppose it’s all about the balance between power and ease-of-use, and I likewise suppose it’s no surprise that the Mac software falls on the ease-of-use end of things. So not much there for me to talk about.

Other putzing has involved looking for something to make for Christmas dinner for Fred, his son, and his son’s girlfriend. Being responsible for a Christmas meal has me feeling very grown up. Not quite sure how this has happened. Anyway, I’m leaning toward Epicurious.com’s Beef Tenderloin with Roasted Shallots, Bacon, and Port, but with regular steaks instead of the whole roast since there will only be four of us eating.

More difficult than picking a recipe, though, is not feeling guilty while trying to pick a recipe when the front page of CNN.com is this:

new houses

I wanted to write this post, titled “New Houses,” right after it was confirmed that the Democrats would be controlling both the House and the Senate. It was perfect timing, you see, because the same week I began inhabiting a new house in a little town called New Freedom. I spent quite a bit of time thinking about the clever connections I could make. But I didn’t write the post, and now all three new houses are old news, especially for those of you who also read Fred’s blog.

Instead of blogging, I spent most of November freaking out about my senior project, which I finally handed in (and presented) at the end of the month. McDaniel English majors usually write a 25-30 page critical paper, but last year I told my advisor I had no interest in writing such a paper and asked if I could do a creative project instead. After completing some negotiations with the department and a professor had agreed to oversee the project, I began writing a collection of poetry and a self-reflective essay to accompany the collection.

I’m glad I was able to do design a project that interested in me. But, I think it’ll be a while before I write another poem. Maybe I’ll recover over winter break. I hope so.

My last class ended at 4:30 this Thursday, I’ve got a final on Tuesday, and then a take-home final due on Thursday. Break is so close I can almost taste it.

I promise I’ll blog more frequently from mid-December through mid-January. Sorry this one is so boring. I don’t have time for anything more interesting right now, but I started receiving threats, so I figured I better post something.

adios santorum

So Santorum has lost, and by a huge margin. Whoo! I wonder which state he’ll live in now.

The thing is, although I was very excited about Santorum losing, I never did get excited about Bob Casey himself, as evidenced by my lack of discussion about it here.

Likewise, I would have been disgusted if Swann beat Rendell, not because I have any particular feelings about Rendell, but because Swann seemed like a joke.

Anyway, right now it’s looking like the Dems will take the House (107 to 88, as of 9:57 PM), but the Senate’s still a toss up. So I’m going to wait for the results for the polls about to close, then head off to bed.

Oh — I was just reminded of one other good thing — Kenneth Blackwell appears to have lost Ohio. Maybe 2008 will be less of a mess.

Thanks for voting, if you did. Even if you voted Republican. I can say that because it looks like it’s all going to work out.

miss me?

Miss hearing what I have to say?

Come out, this Saturday, to Sparky & Clark’s in York to hear me read at Poetry Brew:

Saturday, November 11th, 7:30pm

Sparky & Clark’s
284 West Market Street
York, PA 17401

I’m currently working on a collection of new poetry for my senior project at McDaniel, which means most of what I’ll be reading is brand new.

Even better than checking my blog for non-existent new posts!

oversight

The previous post (about Bayou) was, according to WordPress, my 300th post. I meant to point this out, but completely forgot while actually writing the post. The blog’s been up since September 2003, so I guess that means I’ve been averaging 100 posts per year. Clearly the average was a lot higher in the beginning.

Anyway, that’s all for now. I need to get ready to leave for West Virginia. Maybe I’ll tell you about it when I return.

bayou blues

About a week ago I stumbled upon the menu for Bayou, the new Cajun place in midtown. Unfortunately we didn’t make it there until today, two days after Sara Bozich wrote about it in her Thursday column. Sara seems to have had a great experience; mine was not as positive.

Before I get into that, though, I’d like to offer you the web-premiere of this tidbit of information: Bayou serves breakfast on Saturdays until 1pm. They don’t mention this on their own website, nor were the hours mentioned in Sara’s column. But now you know.

Wait wait, maybe I shouldn’t tell you that. Bayou tells callers that they serve breakfast until 1pm, and 1pm is what is posted on the door. However, today they stopped serving by about noon, because they’d run out of almost everything.

“We’ve never been this busy,” the two servers kept telling customers. “Usually on Saturdays we just have one person working, but today we had to call in reinforcements.” Sara’s opinion must be highly respected, as I think it should be.

When we arrived a little after 11 the restaurant was nearly full. Here’s a picture, taken by Fred and his phone:

We were able to get a table right away, though, and after just a few minutes we were even able to get a menu. Bayou’s breakfast menu is limited, but offers enough options that nearly everyone (barring those with unusual dietary restrictions, I suppose) should be able to find something to please them. As Sara mentions, Bayou serves beignets and caffe au lait, as well as an eggs/potatoes option, an assortment of coffee cakes, and a couple of other items. Today, though, they were out of beignets and coffee cake.

I ordered the Bayou Breakfast: two eggs, cajun home fries, and a cheese biscuit ($4) with sausage (another $4). We both ordered caffe au lait (apparently $4 for one, $5 for two — but I’m not clear on this). The caffe piece of the caffe au lait arrived in a small French press not yet pressed. A nice touch. The steamed milk wasn’t ready yet, though, and we waited several more minutes for it to arrive.

Many more minutes later, our breakfasts arrived. They looked good, although the waitress informed us that they were out of cheese biscuits and so we received an English muffin each instead. Additionally, there was no sausage in sight — instead we’d both been given bacon. I asked for sausage; the waitress apologized and said she’d bring some. Also, she said she’d bring silverware.

By the time we did get our silverware, the eggs were cold. The potatoes were also less-than-hot, but they were otherwise perfect. I can only imagine how good they would be if they were warm.

My sausage arrived after I’d finished eating, despite my attempts to eat slowly in anticipation. Kindly, the waitress offered to put it in a to-go box, and said she wasn’t going to charge us for it. It did, however, appear on the bill. Twice. She deducted one instance of it. We asked; she said something complicated that seemed to imply that we were somehow coming out ahead in this deal. While everything else about the experience was forgiveable, that’s just bad customer service and not a good way to get people to return.

But I will return. Maybe not for breakfast in the near future, but I’d like to go back for dinner because the food was good enough, and the menu interesting enough, that if the staff can get their act together, I think Bayou will be a fantastic addition to the Harrisburg dining scene. And eventually I will return for breakfast, because I’d rather go there than to Cracker Barrel and there are few good options for Saturday breakfast.

I will add this advice to any establishment: if you are written up in the paper, it is always better to over-staff and over-stock in the following days. If you lose a little money, it’s a shame, but that’s better than providing a mediocre dining experience, and far better than turning away customers because you’ve run out of food.