Pallottole

• Last night Hathor and I went to see The Taming of the Shrew at the Fort Walla Walla amphitheater.
  
• It was set in a trailer park, and although that might sound gimmicky, I thought it worked pretty amazingly; they threw in a few "beer me"s and "ka caw!"s, but you'd be impressed at how well the script fit without any modification.
• Earlier in the day, I had gelato with the Englishman before he flew to San Francisco--coincidentally, on the same flight as my aunt and uncle.
• I had coconut and mango lassi, and he had Japanese plum and strawberry.
  
• I almost always have coconut gelato when it's available; my favorite pairing with it is Nutella or something chocolatey, but I'm not consistently impressed with the patisserie's chocolate (though I am with almost everything else).
  
• Tonight I joined a local Italian conversation group at the Starbucks.
  
• I'd been invited by my friend Lidia, whom I ran into at the patisserie several weeks ago, and have since visited to meet her new puppy.
  
• Lidia is the woman responsible for the quote in this entry.
• Ironically, I'd just had my hair cut short again the day before I ran into her.
• It felt good to speak Italian again, and funny to hear Italian words held awkwardly in so many American mouths (including mine; I'm very rusty).
• Maybe I can find an Italian speaking group in Mpls.
• Tonight is rainy and cool in Walla Walla, and it feels pretty fantastic to have the windows open.
  

Mail!

It's been like Christmas around the 'Kitchen lately! Yesterday, my Christmas present from Ellen arrived. The packaging was beautiful, of course:

And what was inside was even better:

That's right, it's a scrolling LED sign with a pin on the back! She said she was hoping it would arrive in time for my Milwaukee conference, but I reminded her that it might be even more appropriate for my Pop Culture conference next month. I'd show it to you with something actually on the screen, but the batteries appear to be dead and I'm having trouble getting the back off to replace them.

Then today UPS delivered the brand new U2 album, which a little bird (David) had sent because they're my favorite band of all time. Awwww:

And finally, just when you'd think it couldn't get any better, the US mail delivered a huge fuchsia bubble mailer from Teri, containing this awesome T-shirt from their favorite gelateria in San Francisco:

Vuoi means "do you want to"; guess what cucchiaio means!

Finally, lest you think I'm the luckiest girl in the world, here is a picture of my bruised left hip, courtesy of my most recent biking misadventure:

The quarter was Ellen's idea, to demonstrate scale. So I'm clearly not quite the luckiest--but definitely feel very loved.

Lincoln

So a week ago Friday, I headed to Lincoln, Nebraska, for my first visit back since leaving in August of 2004. I lived in Lincoln on and off for five years,* the longest I've lived in one place since living with my parents in Auburn, where I spent six years.

It was my uncle Paul's idea. Most of the time I was in Lincoln, I lived with him and my aunt Teri, and stayed in their house even after they moved to Walla Walla. His business was having a 20-year anniversary celebration, and he suggested that I come out. At first I didn't think I could do it: school! my car! Heather's visit!

But then I realized that the timing was perfect--it was the weekend between my exams and Heather's visit, and I didn't have to be in class on Friday or Monday! In my head, it was a nine-hour drive, but when I actually looked it up, I discovered it was more like 6.5. I took the Bruise in for an oil change and check-up, and although it had some problems, the mechanics thought I could make it (especially as long as I didn't have to brake).

And then, Internets, I became seized with the joy of the road trip! My mom thinks this is genetic, and not from her side, but whatever the case, I was absolutely giddy to be on the open road, and of course to head back to Lincoln. We wanted to surprise Ter, so I couldn't post about it here, which was terribly trying, but we managed to pull off the surprise, so it was completely worth it.

I left Minneapolis on a beautiful Friday morning, which did, sadly, devolve into gross gray raininess about the time I hit Iowa. The drive was long, and tiring, and at the end I missed my exit and had to call Ellen to help me get to where I should be (which she did! I was so impressed!), but it was thrilling to be back in Lincoln, and especially to see Paul and a very surprised Ter. We met at one of our favorite Indian places in Lincoln; those of you who haven't been there may find this hard to believe, but Lincoln has really great ethnic food!

Actually, we did a lot of eating, all weekend. Saturday night I met up with Karen and Daniel at the Blue Orchid, and then Daniel and I went to Ivanna Cone (remember this dream?). Sunday, Paul and Teri and I went to a new place everyone was talking about, the Shadowbrook Salad Factory, for soup, salad, and gelato. Monday, Ter and I hit the Thai House, to this day one of my favorite restaurants ever, for lunch before I had to leave town. We also did both the downtown and the Prescott Mills, a couple of times. Oh, and hands-down the best part of ending up back in Lincoln Monday night was getting to visit Bread and Cup for dinner Tuesday (where, oddly enough, we ran into Ben!). I could write an entire entry devoted just to their pesto, let alone the entire dining experience, but let's just say it (and the swell jasper earrings Ter bought me) pretty much made up for my sadness at the reason I was back in Lincoln in the first place:

Ladies and gentlemen, the Bruise is dead.

I got as far as mile 66 on east I-80, which is about halfway between Council Bluffs and Des Moines--or the middle of nowhere--before my car died. To make a long story short, I called AAA and got towed back to Lincoln.** The next morning, my trusty local mechanic told me it was the transmission (our fingers had been crossed for CV joint, which the Mpls mechanics had noticed), and that he could put in a used one for $740. I think that's a really amazing price, but don't think I could have sold the entire car for that, even when it was running. It ran well, but according to the Mpls mechanics, desperately needed new brakes and was seeping various fluids, among other complaints--and was never any star in the looks department.

So, I rented a car and drove back to Minneapolis, arriving just hours before Heather flew in. We returned it the next morning at the airport, and now I'm car-less.

I am trying to be as genuinely thrilled about this new position as I wish I were. After all, I've hardly driven (with the exception of my teaching job last summer) since I moved here. I bike almost everywhere anyway, and this city has great public transportation. I sort of feel like I earned $750, with another $200 coming next month when my insurance would have been due--not to mention things like oil changes and mufflers and headlights and brakes and parking tickets and vehicle registration.

However, living as though you don't have a car, and actually not having one, are, needless to say, different in ways I'm only just beginning to fathom. I did laundry yesterday, and because I don't have a trailer or panniers yet, I stuffed everything into my big backpack and rode that way to the laundromat and back. It was suboptimal, to say the least.

In any case, it's a new adventure, which I suppose one has to embrace when one is disaster-prone. (You do realize that this is the second time I have been unable to leave Lincoln in my own vehicle? The last time I tried, when I moved to Bowling Green, the Popcan died, in Indiana. This time, I'm leaving the Bruise in Lincoln as a sacrifice to the automotive gods: I'm hoping this will be sufficient to grant me safe passage out of the state should I ever return to visit.)

It may be a while.

Oh, I almost forgot! Many (many) more pictures are here.

*I spent nine of those months in the Spokane area and another six in Florence
**It is true that you can sign up for AAA after you have a disaster, and they will still help you; they don't even charge more! In that way, it's delightfully unlike other aspects of real life.

Seattle report

So my adventure started with missing my flight. I was to have flown from Minneapolis at 9:20, have had a brief layover in Denver, and have arrived in Seattle at 2:03. Due to a series of miscalculations on my part, I arrived minutes too late, and the flight had been locked, so even though I didn't have any luggage to check, they wouldn't even let me try for it. To make a long and rather painful story (involving lots of nerve-wracking waiting on the phone and a preponderance of self-castigation) short, I was able to get on an 11:00 flight to Kalispell, Montana, with a connection that arrived in Seattle at 4:45.

That meant that I didn't get to spend a few hours in downtown Seattle with my sister before picking up our aunt, but we were still able to meet her in Tacoma for dinner as planned and I really was allowed off the hook much more easily than I deserved. Plus, I got to spend time in and outside of the tiny Kalispell airport (which the woman who made my mocha--$2.75 for a large!--called "the most mellow airport in the world," an assessment with which I agreed), where the air smelled great and the people were calm and friendly.

April picked me up at the curb and we headed straight for Tacoma, where I got to see my aunt's condo for the first time and she served us the first of the many wonderful meals I enjoyed that weekend. I'm not sure I met my goal of gaining five pounds, but I'd like to think my jeans are fitting a little better upon returning.

Back at her house in Port Orchard, we slept for about five hours (my third of these in as many nights) before getting up at the crack of dawn to head across the mountains. I was able to sleep for a few hours while Chris drove; we stopped in Ellensburg for coffee that made everything better.

The drive to and from Walla Walla--from 90 to 82 to 12--is, other than ones up and down I-5, probably the roadtrip I've made most frequently, and it was long, but comfortingly familiar (now that I'm not a college freshman headed back into collegiate purgatory, anyway) and beautiful.

When we arrived, we were plied with food and then headed for church where my grandma was delighted to have all her kids and grandkids in a single (very cozy) pew. Back home, we ate more, and then alternated talking and eating for the rest of the day. Joel also played his guitar and humored our efforts at singing along. I love my family.

I stayed with Ted and Heather, who joined us for brunch the next morning. My aunt Jan had cleaned out her closet, so I scored several sweaters and a T-shirt. We met up with some friends in town, did more eating and chatting, and had the best gelato I've tasted since Italy. We ended the evening playing video games back at the Swinjarnyars'. I tried the Wii for the first time, and found it very surreal, from the experience of trying to design an avatar that looked like me using fixed features to holding a controller that both acted as an extension of my own body and transmitted the sensation of contact directly into my hand. I have never felt like more of a cyborg. It was weird.

Sunday morning, we piled back into the car, this time with Joel (and all his Costa Rica luggage), and headed back across the mountains, dropping the latter at his car in Auburn before heading back to April and Chris's house in Port Orchard. April and I made brown rice and curry (I am very excited about this new tomato-garbanzo curry; this time we threw in a zucchini, cauliflower, and fried tofu: awesome) and we all ate it while watching Surf's Up. When it was over, she took me back to Sea-Tac for my 12:55 a.m. direct flight to Minneapolis.

I grew up in the Northwest, and it still feels like home--along, oddly, with most of the west coast and much of the Midwest. Although I'm technically back "home" now, I'm relieved I'll be flying to California in just a few short weeks.