TH and I both have Alaska Airline companion fares vouchers that we forgot about this year. We got an extension, so by the end of the weekend, we need to find two free weekends before December and find somewhere we want to go, buy and ticket these vouchers.

I am aiming for the most mileage bang for my buck and combined with good food. Looks like it may be Lobster pizza north of Boston and DC to see JK and family K and maybe a nice sushi dinner in Bethesda.

The bummer is that neither TH or I can use the hundreds of dollars in cancelled tickets we have right now on Alaska to ticket these vouchers. We have to use new money. I guess at least we should be lucky that Alaska lets us apply the ticket value to another ticket and you can also use that same money towards a ticket for another person. There aren't many other carriers that let you do this.

It seems that I have a second career as a travel consultant. Last night, I gave some ideas to our friends who are travelling to Rome for a few months and wish to upgrade on their Star Alliance partner (can't do it, bummer, must be on UA metal); my cousin who wanted to know whether his upgrade from World Traveller plus to Club on BA would give him a class of service (COS) bonus (not) ; and my office mate who wanted to know if all the Hawaiian flights he flew this year could help him up his status on Alaska (not, just add to your total mileage acrrual).

So, if you have an airline related question, drop me a line, but honestly, check out flyertalk and search for your answers. I think you have to register to search, but it is worth it.

Hey, that is how I met JK. I'll have to tell that story sometime, eh cupcake?

I have a trip to London planned in November. We traditionally go around Remembrance Day, but this time, TH is staying home and I'm hanging out with about 150 Flyertalkers. Well, maybe not all of them, but I'm sure I'll see a bunch, maybe even at St. John for lunch on Saturday. ;)

I usually stay with my Aunt or at the Churchill. However, dear readers, I'm not forking out 400 clams for a hotel room per night for this trip. I'm going to priceline the room and hope for the best. I have had decent luck in London and if it sucks, I'll add someone from Flyertalk who needs a room and then I'll just spend the weekend schleping on the Northern Line back and forth to N. Finchley. I could also use a free hilton night I earned last week or start using points from SPG, but I want to do that when I can splurge somewhere interesting and exotic and cheaper points wise.

I am also considering what we have gone through this past week with our friend and his currently transitional state of housing. I feel guilty about spending all that money for six luxurious pillows, a fine club room and some of the best damn hotel hospitality outside of a Ritz Carlton when someone you know is looking for housing on a night to night basis.

So, I will read the bidding boards for awhile tonight and see if I can find something that appeals to me. Good thing I know my London neighborhoods and am picky, but not too picky.

Other than that, I'm currently trying to clean up my office and finish up three things to get my plate scraped before I leave for the last fricking free weekend until September!

Yikes.

nm

You know its been a week when all four of your cars have been to the garage.

Mostly for oil, lube andfilters, but still.

nm

Essentially blackberry

Globe Thistle, July 2006.

Ack, today was busy, good busy, but busy nonetheless. I did get a chance to go out around 4 pm in the heat of the day to do my first blackberry pick of the year. We collect Nancy's half gallon yoghurt containers just for this purpose (usually from B, since she eats more yoghurt than us) and these get filled with some of the plumpest, sweetest and tastiest berries of the year. The smell of ripe berries, the bees, the lapping of the waves, oy what a way to end the work day.

Blackberries are my favorite berry. I have many fond associations with blackberries. The first recipe I ever published was for blackberry delight. I was in the 3rd grade at Three Points Elementary School on Evergreen Point and we each contributed a recipe for our class cookbook. I can't remember all the details, but I believe the recipe went something like" collect berries, add sugar, mush them together and add whipping cream and eat".

My recipes have a bit more structure to them now. I tend to still write them down on little pieces of paper and throw them into a notebook I take when we go to the Charlottes or when I lived in Rome. My crisp recipe adapted for Rome makes me smile when I see it. There were so many apples that fall and alpen meusli was cheap. We were desperate for a dessert to make and it was the easiest for all of us to make.

Blackberry crisp is much the same, simple and easy and a real crowd pleaser.

Adapated from Cooks Illustrated, sometime last century.

Blackberry crisp with a butter cookie topping

Pick some ripe berries (1 quart), rinse them and let the drain. Toss with sugar (1/3 cup) and 1 T of cornstarch. If you are inclined, add a bit of vanilla.

The topping I used tonight was one I hadn't tried in a while, but it was a keeper.

For a 8 * 8 pan, I combined 8 T butter softened, 1/2 cup of sugar and beat until soft. Then I added 1/2 t vanilla and 1/2 egg beaten. In a separate bowl, I combined 1/2 cup flour, 1/2 t baking powder and a pinch of salt. I mixed the dry ingredients with the wet and it made a soft dough.

Take the dough and sort of drop it on top of the crisp. It won't be even or pretty, but it should spread out.

Bake at around 25-35 minutes at 375 until golden brown and the blackberries burble.

This recipe is a keeper and I had any leftovers, I would happily have taken a picture.

nm

Fashionista - not

Bling. Don't you love the little details?

I'm okay with these if you are.

smooches,

nm

ding ding ding

My car is still dinging, my electric locks don't work and I'm still missing the crucial hour before 7 pm that one needs to visit the folks at Speakerlab to pick out a new car stereo.

I even called JK today while driving so I could share this joy with her.

Other than that, I'm exhausted and happy its cooler. We're all perkier.

Things are marginally chaotic here, we're dealing with a friend who is now "homeless" and needs social services and I'm realizing how hard it is to get such things if you are a white male who looks healthy. I can't imagine going through this without an advocate, they deserve superstar status.

I have lots of interesting things to say about all sorts things, but honestly dear ones, I'm too tired to deal.

Talk amongst yourselves, I have a very bouncy dog who needs a walk.

nm

dear asshole redux

Dear asshole,

I have had to drive a lot this weekend and the fact that I don't have a stereo is not such a problem, but the bigger issue is that my seatbelt indicator ding is continually on based on your fine ripping out of my stereo. I mean all the time, to mill creek and back all 30 miles.

Thanks for adding another 50 bucks to my installation bill.

nm

looooongmont or bust!

Had a great day in Longmont. Presentation went great. I got to see J from Miami (last time I saw her was 30 seconds in DC on her way back to Miami). The rest of the presentations were interesting and tonight was tons of fun. Katja whisked me away from my palatial digs and took me on a scenic tour of Longmont and off to Boulder where we had a yummy dinner at the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse where even my mom would be impressed with their take on Persian cuisine. It was the best meal I had eaten in weeks. Mmm.

Oh, what I ate? A persian type of cod and shrimp over a bed of saffron rice with herbs much like what you see in a sabzi polo with a nice gastrique of pomegranate juice. It was seriously yummy and I wish I could get a take out. Katja had a lamb kabob that looked good as well. She said it was delicious.

Anyhoo, then we meandered over to Pearl Street where I decided right then that I must now own a pair of crocs from the Pedestrian Shop. Are you hearing me JK? We had a very fun time picking out my new gold bling crocs with the new jeweled tibbits or it ribbits? That really jazz them up. I am looking forward to wearing them to the big Neema's wedding in August. I hope to find an lbd to match.

A nice cappucino later, my hostess whisked me back to my hotel where I checked in for my flight and decided that 15 emails from the last time I checked was too many. Tomorrow I will read a GAO audit on the plane and try to catch up on everything that has happened in my 36 hour absence.

Thank you Katja and the doode at the Croc store for making my trip to Boulder/Longmont so much more enjoyable!

nm

Running naked through security at the airport

Yesterday started out with a bang and just got better and better.

Not.

I left my folder with all my travel stuff on my desk. No big deal, really. I have all of it on email. Silly me, I needed another boarding pass, which required seeing an agent. The line for First Class and elites was relatively short, but not really since everyone was going to Australia on Qantas and had a 10 minutes minimum check in. So, I spent 25 minutes trying to get a boarding pass. The elite line at security was very short but slow, very very slow. I can't even imagine what the hold up was, but it took 10 minutes for the five people in front of me to get screened.

Note to all you out there, empty those pockets before you go through the metal detector and even I take my shoes off before get to the magnotometer. Also consider that a tank top and a micro mini and cork wedgies are not the best thing to wear on the plane in case of an emergency?

This, along with the doode in the airport club who insisted on putting his jacket on the seat next to his shit and looked hostile when I asked him to move it just added to my experience.

At least I made it to Longmont without too much trouble. I just sort of headed west and north.

nm

Miss B, this one is for you.

Jordan's life story on the big screen

dear asshole

Thanks for being so kind as not to not destroy my dashboard when you retrieved my moderately new
stereo from my old blue last night. I know it was kind of me to leave my windows down to make your job
easier. My guess is that you'll get 25 bucks for it and it may buy you a bit of meth or crank. I appreciate
that you didn't look hard enough in the car to realize my housekeys were all the way in the back.

I am no so much pissed at you, but at myself for not doing my normal routine last night because
I was so fucking tired, behind and not just caring. My guess is that if I had just spent the one minute longer to do my final round up, this wouldn't have happened. My bad, as they say.

So, I guess I get to go out this weekend and replace the stereo. Next time, I think I'll go
with something a bit less bling and with an ipod adapter.

Thanks dickhead for making my morning.

nm

beat down

Sorry for the radio silence, I'm beat.

Really. I have a one hour thingie in Longmont on Thursday and honestly, if I could do it via the web, I would. I, nm, cannot stand the thought of flying, driving and hoteling and then powerpointing.

What is up with that?

Anyways.

Check this out.

If you are in the Cascadia region, that is.

I'll give the espresso with cinnamon chip cookie a thumbs up, though at 430 calories, I'm eating them in fourths.

Had another self deprecating day around here. Must work on that attitude.

nm

Canadian musings

I really can't say much right now because I'm tired, but we had a great weekend sitting and reading books in dappled shade while listening to some amazing music in Vancouver.

The Canadians show great love towards music and Vancouverites towards their city.

I'll write about it tomorrow.

There were some really amazing highlights and then some things that really vexed me that I need to think about.

Anyways, we're all home now. E.dd is napping in the kitchen after a weekend learning that it is okay to sit and wait before you go barreling through the door and we learned that are things he needs to learn.

Laundry is churning, thermarests are back in their alloted homes until we do this again and once again, this week is about running around like bassets who know that their is a bisquit hiding behind their masters back.

sigh.

nm

Ernest says it all

Check it out.

Wish us all luck.

nm

oh so true

In the hopes of finding something on the old NIOC hospital today, I found this and man can I relate.

As my mom used to seay, we named you after a flower, trust me.

I hated my name growing up. I really did, it was hard to pronounce, I had a million nicknames and none of them I liked. I shortened it, which to led to other problems, I even changed the spelling so it wouldn't be so obviously anti-semetic. It isn't, its just the root is such a common one in Farsi.

My dad, my aunt and some other family members call me one pet name that I like and one dear family friend calls me one nickname that no one else calls me, but it was the name that was the easiest for Americans to pronounce when I was in nursery school. I will still answer to it.

Many of my friends have changed or anglified their names. I guess for what they do professionally- law, commerce, medicine it makes sense. But I have grown to love my name and if you mispronounce it, I'll gently correct you.

Unlike Houman or Who-man as it is pronounced, my last name is simple and awfully Italian.

Lucky me.

nm

headache humpday

Variety is the spice of life, garden hose nozzles, July 2006, Seattle, Wa.

God, I feel like toast. I am not getting it to work at work and I'm flummoxed. Who said data compression was fun?

Anyhow, life here just goes on. Managed to nail down a spa weekend for E. dd while we go off to BC for the VFMF. To tell the truth, I'm not charged about the line up, so maybe we'll just spend Friday night walking around downtown Vancouver and going to the RainCity Grill for dinner.

Or not.

I love Vancouver, but prefer it when its cool, rainy and not full of tourists. It will be cool, hopefully not rainy as we're outdoors all day and unfortunately, based on hotel occupancies, full of tourists.

Good thing I cashed in points for the Hyatt. That stay alone would be close to 650 USD plus with taxes for a not very exciting hotel room. No, the Sylvia is never ever available because the VFMF diehards book 330 days ahead of time.

At least I have a stack of book to read, mostly mysteries, but good for sitting with a canadiano and a polarfleece blanket and listening to Feist and Jane Sibbery.

nm

the worst of both worlds

Behold.

Can you imagine? It means you'll have to continue getting pedis in the winter in order to wear these.

Yikes.

monday musings

Sunflowers, Oxbow Ppatch, Georgetown, July 2006.

TH is out of town (Berkeley for the day/night) and E.dd and I had many things to do. We did go to work, which was passable but not thrilling. in the time I was optimizing grids and finding my data, I managed to get E.dd liscensed, paid my huge Amex bill, and did other financial things as well as figure out the best way to deal with my new summer scourge - the moth.

JK is a lucky girl, her dry cleaner in Bethesda will store her sweaters for the summer. We don't have that option here in the city. I tried calling some of the more bespoke cleaners in town and no one stores sweaters. I even called a fur storage place, no dice. They did make one suggestion, cedar infused plastic bags. It just seems strange, storing sweaters in plastic.

So, I am going the other route, I am cleaning most of the sweaters I don't wear in the summer and then replacing my plastic containers with cedar lined storage containers - both sweater canvas caddies and the storage containers.

Good sweater storage tips.

Containers I'm about to buy.

Other cool things are this bag that TH picked up at Heathrow on Friday. It was a gift with purchase with a magazine. I live for these things. This purse is so cute with all the hummingbirds and the magazine wasn't so bad.
TH also brought home the new and improved American Airline amenity kits. I have to say they are keepers. I have a few British Airlines ones (mostly club) and a few Cathay kits, but these are great- multifunctional, a shoe bag and a great cosmetic storage bag with detachable mesh pockets. You could even use it for storing electronics, which is what TH uses hers for. The temple spa products are still awful and will get donated.

Check it out.

front view:back view:



I took advantage of beauty.com's offer of free shipping including products purchased on drugstore.com without meeting a minimum dollar amount. I managed to pick up the paula dorf eyeshadow I thought I had purchased in NY, so stay tuned while I learn about eyeliners.

Oy.

Other than that, life goes on, I finally ironed the 40 napkins and 30 placemats that I had piled up while watching a doris day/james garner, The thrill of it all on my laptop. She cans catsup in the movie, she's my kind of gal.

later taters,
nm

Football remembrances of things past

From http://www.gazzetta.it/. Happy day in Italy.
I'm not a big sports fan, but I like football. I like it for various and sundry reasons. For example, I like that it is a world wide game. I like the fact the in So. Cal there are leagues devoted to Iranian women playing football, but I honestly, didn't pay that much attention to the world cup this year. I am happy to see that Italy won. Why? Because I had fond memories of being in Rome in late June of 2001 when AS roma won the Italian championship for their league and it was wild. I can't imagine what is like in Rome now.

That sunday in Rome was hot and muggy. TH decided that she would go up to the Janiculum hill in search of a breeze and an aqueduct. I went the opposite direction, towards the Spanish step to the French Consulate/Villa Medici which was hosting a Rodin exhibit. After the exhibit, I went wandering up towards the Villa Borghese. I couldn't help but notice how quiet Rome was that day. The streets were deserted and it was easy to move around. I did notice lots of people clustered around their cars listening to football announcers and once in a while a cheer burst out.

At the end of the game, there was lots of loud cheering and by the time I met TH near the Pantheon, things were getting crazy. We went back to our 5 story walk up apartment on the Vicolo di Governo Vecchio to change, and off to the Bar Pace for a drink and a meeting of Gaetano the basset in his AS Roma jersey. By the time we went for our farewell dinner at La Carbonara the Campo was filled with cheering and quite snockered fans. Our taxi took us to the airport bright and early the next morning, we passed by bedraggled fans by the Circus Maximus who were still whopping it up and realized that the city loved its team.

The second great football memory is being in Japan for the last World Cup. JK, a seasoned Japan traveler went with me, the novice and we had a great time. We wandered around Tokyo and did day trips to Nara and Kamakura which were fun as well. We spent a day in Yokohama after the World Cup, wandering around the vast city and having the most fun at the Ramen Museum.

All the world cup fervor has made me a bit sad. The trip to Rome was the last that we took on TWA before the service was discontinued and I am hankering for a visit to Japan just because its been so long. I know I'll have my chance soon and everyday I think of Rome when I wear my personal control device which hangs on a AS Roma lanyard. I'm lucky to have had these experiences.

nm

300 posts

and really not much to say.

Worked, picked up TH, came home, played with e.dd, aunt B. came over for some puppy love and we all went to burgermaster and then a walk through the trail by CUH. E.dd is behind me right now asleep and TH is heading that way. She managed to snag the last seat on the 12:15 out of ORD. Good thing or else, she would still be on the way home via Dallas.

Which brings me to a funny thing.

My office mate has been doing a buttload of travel - Anchorage and Honolulu, almost monthly. He is slowly attaining status on Alaska Airlines and I am giving him advice on how to proceed. I told him if he was 3000 short in December, he and I were flying to ORD and back just to make status. He thought I was insane, but maybe when his upgrade to ANC clears at 72 hours, he'll be thinking differently.

Other than that, TH brought me a stack of magazines, a loaf of bread from neal's yard, lots of cheese including a half fat farmhouse mature cheddar that is to die for and most importantly, herself.

Well, back to cleaning up and getting E.dd to bed.

nm