no one is feeling well

I didn't make it to that uptown university interview yesterday because I came down with a sore throat on Thursday, first one in a long time.  I e-mailed to explain, and asked if I could interview on Monday, but had no response.  The sore throat seems to be calming down, after a couple of bad days.

Also, something is going on with Barry -- in all probability, a bad reaction to one of his meds.  His new psychiatric med may have just come to full level in his system, though his symptoms seem to point more to thyroid problems, although his thyroid med was just increased.  Anyway, he's irritable, moody, can't sleep, paces a lot, that kind of thing.  He's been that way for a couple of days.  Unfortunately, both our general doctor and our psychiatrist are orthodox, and the general doctor won't be back in the office until October 4.  Not sure about the psychiatrist.  There are a few Jewish holidays over a week and a half, and even though there are some "off" days in that stretch, a lot of religious folks take the whole time off -- sort of like taking the week between Christmas and New Year's.  Our orthodox dentist will be in during the off days (Barry also has a gum infection, and has to see him next week), so we're hoping the psychiatrist is doing the same thing.  The general doctor did a blood test the other day, but we're not sure if he'll see the results before October 4.  This is one time we're not too crazy about having orthodox doctors.

He is driving me crazy.  When he can't sleep through the night, no one can sleep through the night.  I feel terrible for him, but there's nothing I can do and it's very frustrating.  I listen to a lot of complaining, and hold his hand in the middle of the night, but it's really wearing me down.  He's out at his therapist now, so I get a little break.

On another topic, I am having a bitch of a time trying not to hear about V.  One of the music blogs I read was raving about an out-of-town show he did recently, with several photos.  (In the music world, V. is obscure, to say the least, but a lot of those music bloggers know and love obscure music.)  I'm sure that's what made me dream about him last night -- dreamed I was very dressed up and going to a fancy restaurant, and there he was.  I avoided eye contact and left.  What a drag to dream about the SOB.

Barry and I are both having back problems, and are going to the chiropractor on Monday.  I haven't seen him in two years -- he's basically my chiropractor, but Barry's seen him once.  I haven't seen him in a couple of years, since I haven't been working and Barry kept putting off paying an outstanding bill to him.  I don't think I've written about him in this blog, though I have in others -- I adore my chiropractor.  He's a big, handsome, sweet dude about my own age.  We got to be pretty good friends -- in fact, the last time I saw him was when he made a brief appearance at my 50th birthday party (the one V. didn't get to).  I used to get the last appointment of the day, so we'd take our time and talk quite a bit.  When I was still in publishing, I used to bring him military history books, which is his thing.  We just got on beautifully, and I miss him.  I'd say our relationship was very affectionate and maybe a little flirty, even though he's divorced with a girlfriend (and five kids!).  We did get kind of attached.

jobs and so on

I never did hear from the collectibles place.  I'm guessing it had to do with the hourly rate I wanted, even though I said I could be flexible.  I can't imagine what else it could have been.  But I'm still determined to work in the collectibles field.  I've started educating myself online about different types of collectibles.  I started with vintage watches and am wishing I knew how to repair them, since eBay has a lot of decent watches going for very low prices because they need cleaning and/or repair.  That would be an awesome business: repairing and selling vintage watches.  I'll have to research how to learn watch repair.

I took a beading class on Saturday.  I get daily e-mail coupons from Groupon and Living Social, which provide discounts for local stores and services.  Living Social had one last week for classes at a small bead store in Brooklyn -- $15 for a coupon good for $45 worth of classes. I'd been to the store and hadn't been impressed (very small and high prices), but a couple of the classes looked interesting, so I bought the coupon and registered for a class on making wire-wrapped rings.  It turned out that I was the only person registered for the class, so I got a private lesson, and made two rings there, and three more at home.  Good skill, and I liked the lesson.  Since I learned almost all of my jewelry skills from magazines and books, I often turn up my nose at classes (the only one I took before this was on knotting, which I just couldn't figure out from diagrams), but this one was really useful.

I'm bailing on an interview today with a temp agency, with a long-term position that, now that I look at it, is most likely highly corporate.  Plus I'm getting enough nibbles on my applications that I'd like to stay available for interviews.  I have one on Friday, for a university job.  I have mixed feelings about it: the pay and bennies are probably quite good.  On the downside, the potential boss seems extremely formal; also, I screwed up and applied to a university where the commute would be appallingly long, maybe two hours each way.  When I applied, I confused it with another school whose campus is on 42nd Street.  There are a couple of universities I haven't bothered with because of a similarly long commute, and this should have been one of them.  Well, we'll see about it *if* I am offered the job and *if* the money is right.  (My idea of "right" for this job is anything over 40K with benefits and without frequent overtime.  I would consider another job "right" for a lot less pay if the commute were shorter.)

In the meantime, I'll continue to file applications and hold out a dim hope that the collectibles gallery has just been too busy to call and that I'll eventually hear from them.

new glasses, the old neighborhood, and former family...and maybe more

I have wanted new glasses forever.  I have been running around for somewhere around nine years in a pair I have grown to hate.  I'm not crazy about wearing glasses anyway, and don't wear them much indoors, since I'm just a little nearsighted.  Anyway, I got a 2-for-1 coupon from Pearle Vision and I decided to go for it, get new glasses and prescription sunglasses.  So I had an exam with an optometrist (who pronounced my eyes to be very healthy and my prescription unchanged), and picked out two frames, and chose the types of lenses.  I got kind of of-the-moment soft rectangular frames in a dark color for my regular glasses, and my sunglasses are a little larger and more square, sort of PoMo Wayfarers.  I spent $688 and saved $464.  It was pricey but a good bargain.  I could have spent $688 for just one pair.

The eyeglass store was in my old neighborhood, Brooklyn Heights.  I lived there from when I was about nine until I went to college (just shy of 17).  I also lived there for about a year, back in my parents' apartment, when I was twenty.  I don't think I really appreciated how beautiful and peaceful it was around there.  I really took it for granted.  It could easily be the nicest neighborhood in the whole city, along with parts of the West Village (though that section is much smaller than the Heights).  It's insanely expensive to live there any more, though when I was a kid, there were still reasonable rentals.  At this point, I think you'd pay around $2200 for a studio -- what Barry likes to call "tuchas gelt" (this literally means "butt money," and perhaps means something like "you'd have to have money coming out of your ass," which is pretty much how he uses it). 

I think a lot of the apartment buildings have probably gone co-op.  The last building we lived in went co-op, and my folks couldn't afford to buy it.  They borrowed enough money to make a down payment at the "inside price," and flipped it for much more.  They made $80,000.  My mother died soon after -- she had told my stepfather that she wanted to make a will, and he said, don't worry, I'll take care of the kids."  Guess who never saw a cent?  And when my stepfather died a few years later, he apparently left major insurance money to his sons, but nada for my brother and me.  It's many years since then, and there's nothing that can be done, but I was always sad that my mother was duped and my brother and I were ripped off.  We had gently approached the stepbrothers after their father died (one of them had just bought a co-op and one a new car, so they most have gotten tons of insurance), and said that we realized we were not legally entitled to anything, but we felt that we had a certain moral entitlement to something that might remain.  According to them, in the three years after my mother died, he had spent all of the 80K except for $1200 that remained in an estate account.  They agreed that we could split that, except that there was one medical bill still pending, which would have to be paid out of the fund if insurance didn't cover it, and they were waiting on the insurance company.  I believe they fronted my brother a few hundred dollars before the insurance claim was settled, but no more than that, and I never saw a dime.  And I haven't seen or heard from either stepbrother in almost 30 years.  Unlike certain people with whom I hope to eventually reconcile, I don't really want to know either of them.  The inheritance thing was only the last in a series of slights and nasty behavior.  (And for the record, my mother was wonderful to them, and they and any friends were welcome to show up for dinner any night -- the two of them even had keys to our apartment.) 

On another topic entirely:  there's a commercial on TV, I think it's local, for a lawyer named Roni Deutsch  who specializes in IRS problems.  She appears on her commercials and talks in a loud and abrasive way.  She yells, "Is the IRS calling you and asking for money?!  Do you owe thousands of dollars?!  Want to get the IRS off your back?!" and so on.  When she tells of the terrible things the IRS can do to you, like put a lien on your house, one of the terrible consequences she lists is "attack your paycheck."  The first time I saw this, I figured she misspoke. but when titles flashed on the screen with her list, it said "attack your paycheck."  Now I've had the IRS do just that to me, so I'm pretty sure, positive in fact, that the expression is "attach your paycheck," not "attack."  I'm guessing that *someone* associated with the making of this commercial noticed it, but was afraid Roni Deutsch would yell at them for correcting her.  I have to hope that not everyone on that shoot was too stupid to know that.  And you have to wonder about ol' Roni...do you really want a tax attorney who doesn't know the proper expression for when the IRS takes money out of your pay?  If *I* know that, she sure as hell ought to.

I also saw an infomercial recently -- I wish I could remember what it was for.  They showed it twice in a row.  The first time, the voiceover was done by Gilbert Gottfriend (talk about a loud and abrasive manner of speech!), and the second time, it was done by a woman who probably had a normal voice, though it seemed really soft after Gilbert.  Infomercials seem a little lost now that Billy Mays is gone.  Say what you want about Billy, but he was absolutely the best at what he did.  I'm kind of fascinated by infomercials.  I was flipping through a bunch late the other night, and came upon a local one for what seemed to be a voodoo church with several locations in the city.  They were talking Christian stuff, but also doing things like blessing glasses of water and driving evil out of someone by getting the persons shirt and twisting it, I guess to wring out the evil.  Also, the two guys were Haitian, which is why my first thought was that it was voodoo-ish. 

I met a really nice young man recently, although I'm reluctant to say how we met on this blog.  (Especially when job-hunting, I'm very aware of anything I post here or on Face-ity Book-ity.  So let's say that it involves an herbal remedy which is legal in some states but not (yet) in this one.  We had been getting some that was very ordinary, and had visited someone recently who had something amazing, which they get delivered.  I had heard about these delivery services, and that people usually learned about them by word of mouth, but the person who had it was a friend of a friend, so we didn't really feel we could ask to be put in touch.

I remembered hearing that a certain online bulletin board thingie had coded listings for these services, and had looked at them once or twice -- you find them by searching for a certain three-digit number which is generally associated with this remedy.  So we decided to give it a shot, and responded to a few ads; they generally ask you to e-mail your phone number.  One in Brooklyn responded, but wouldn't deliver to our part of Brooklyn (and his was two far to get to), but I realized he didn't advertise a premium product anyway.  A couple didn't call back, but one finally did, and he couldn't deliver but said that I could meet him in Manhattan, so we made arrangements.  (Barry was a little shy of being involved in this so I pretty much took the lead.  Both parties take something of a risk in this kind of thing, but it's fairly equal.) 

So the dude who met me is my new pal.  Our minimal size transaction went swimmingly, so we've now done two more of a larger size.  What he has is extremely great, the kind of thing that has names, of a superior quality.  And the guy is really sweet.  We've been meeting in a little deli, and the first two times, he asked if I wanted to get something to eat, and I begged off both times, mostly because it's a substantial trip back and forth. 

But I realized that he was being friendly, which I just didn't expect from a guy maybe in his late twenties.  Guys in their late twenties generally look at me and see old and fat -- actually, my face looks pretty young, but my hair is gray.  I'm not bad-looking but I'm certainly not thin.  Guys in their twenties look through me.  And men in New York are incredibly looksist in general -- men in their thirties and forties looked through me when I was thirty or thirty-five, because I was not thin and not tall and not bosomy (though my hair was dyed).  Outside of New York City, I am often the belle of the ball, especially among old hippie types.

Anyway, when I made my latest transaction, I sat down and had a coffee with this guy.  We talked about the usual New York junk, various neighborhoods and real estate, subways and buildings (he lives near an area where I once lived), my job hunt and his pending divorce and his kids.  We also talked a bit about Coney Island, and he'd never heard of the Mermaid Parade, and I told him about it and said I'd send some pictures.  He was a very nice guy to talk to and I was glad I'd stayed.

So I e-mailed him a link to some Coney Island stuff, and he sent back an e-mail thanking me, and all of this kind of love-and-peace stuff.  Thank God there are still young hippies.  And I guess it's nice to know each other a little, since I'll probably continue to see him now and again.  It makes me a little sad when younger people act as if or think that I'm irrelevant, since I don't think of myself as old to the point of being out of touch.  In fact, I still feel pretty young between my ears, which I guess is not uncommon.  My body's certainly older, but my mind is pretty fresh.  I think.

I still have not heard from the collectibles place, but I've kind of decided that this is what I'd like to do, regardless.  I've taught myself about a lot of these things, mostly on-line.  I know advertising collectibles fairly well, especially early-mid 20th century, and especially soda collectibles.  I know banana stickers and roller rink stickers. I know a lot about certain 1950s modern china.  I like modern a lot, fifties and sixties.  And I love old restaurant china.  I know a fair amount of entertainment memorabilia and also sports memorabilia.  But I think I need to know more about jewelry and watches, which is a bread-and-butter area.  And even some costume jewelry, and Mexican silver jewelry, which I adore.  And certain types of vases and other ceramics.  My specialty(ies) will eventually make themselves clear.

I guess the idea is to start buying items from flea markets and selling them online for a profit, and maybe eventually have my own online or even brick-and-mortar store.  I can't even imagine how much I would love doing this for a living.  I'm realizing that I know a lot more than I knew I knew, and that it's one of the things that I most enjoy.

I recently bought a used copy of Kalki, which I adored when I was young.  Also the second Stieg Larsson, and a Marge Piercy I haven't read.  Yay for buying used books at Amazon!

ready for cooler weather

I have my jewelry table all set up and ready for action, which mostly just entailed getting a new lamp.  It's just been too hot to sit anywhere in the living room that isn't in the direct stream of the air conditioner.  Actually, the computer isn't, but I can sit here for about an hour at a time.  But when I make jewelry, between the lamp and the intensity of the work, I sometimes sweat even when it's not terribly hot.

It's already getting cooler...I have to go out to the city, and am wearing jeans for the first time in a long while.

I have done most of the restoration of my hard drive, except for my Firefox bookmarks and my e-mail messages (I did get the e-mail address book, which was a relief). 

No word yet from the collectibles place -- I figure I'll hear by Wednesday, or not at all.  Fingers crossed.

huh?

I went to read my blogs yesterday, and was stunned to see that Bloglines is shutting down on October 1.  Bloglines was the first and only blog aggregator I've ever used, and it's been about three years now.  What stunned me was the reason that Ask.com gave for shuttering Bloglines.  They said that most information is now transmitted through social networking site rather than blogs.  I say, WRONG.

I belong to Facebook, and consider it to be much more on the entertainment side than a serious provider of information.  One of the things I hate most about Facebook is the character limit on posts.  I've tried to post things on Facebook that were "too long", and after trying to edit the post or break it down into two posts, I usually give up and write a blog post instead.  (And don't get me started on Twitter, which I gave up about a week after I joined.)  Facebook has been great to touch base with old friends, but most of the posts are either trivial or political.  There is some decent music and book and event information, but most of it doesn't come from experts.

I subscribe to about 90 blogs at this point.  The music and food blogs are written by experts, and I probably subscribe to about 15 music blogs and 10 food ones.  I subscribe to Dooce and to Scouting NY (written buy a NYC-based movie location scout) and the Mental Floss Lists blog, the No Reservations Crew blog, and a few gossip blogs.  I subscribe to Natalie Dee and XKCD (both cartoon blogs).  I subscribe to Regretsy.  I subscribe to a blog about the West Memphis 3.  I can't imagine trying to collate these sources on Facebook.

I moved my blog subscription to Google Reader.

I do know that Garland Jeffreys is playing the Highline on September 25, and thanks for the tip.  I'm actually Facebook friends with him and got an invite.  I've never seen him play live, but I'm still trying to decide if I want to spend 30 bucks on a standing-room show.  It takes a lot to get me to a standing-room show any more.  I have earned the right to sit.

I have to say that I do have some very cool Facebook "friends," most of whom of course I do not know.  One of the coolest has to be Archie Bell (of Archie Bell & the Drells).  When I was on MySpace, I was MySpace friends with David Strathairn, one of my way favorite actors since 1981, and even got a nice message from him. 

Which reminds me -- Gary Lucas once got an e-mail from Bono, something nice about the Jeff Buckley album that Gary produced, and he got really upset when his laptop crashed and he lost the e-mail.  I feel for him.  I've lost some wonderful e-mail exchanges from crashed hard drives, items on work computers, newsgroups to which I no longer belong, etc. 

I have to pay myself on the back because I was having computer trouble lately, and was smart enough to get an online backup service a week before my hard drive had to be wiped.  So for once, I didn't lose all of my music and pictures and written files.  Three cheers for Mozy. 

There are a few movies I wanted to have my own copies of, largely because they are favorites and I wanted the commentary and all of the other extras.  Yesterday, I got the third one I really had to have (after The Right Stuff and Apollo 13):  Boogie Nights.  Not only do I love the plot and the look, but it's wall-to-wall amazing actors.  Barry is out hearing some music with his friend Felix, so I may just watch it this afternoon.  I even bought a favorite, not-too-harmful snack: wasabi peas.

Had dinner with Lily on Thursday and Robin last night; sometimes it just works out that way.  Lily and I had Indian, but we decided to go with a dinner special, so I didn't get to eat anything very spicy like vindaloo.  But I'm always up for some saag panir (spinach with Indian cheese).  Robin and I went to Spring Street Natural, and I had some vegetable-stuffed lemon sole, which was good but not great.  Their big salads are much better.

thus and such

The interview at the collectibles place seemed pretty good.  They mostly handle (at least out of the store) watches, jewelry, and sports and entertainment memorabilia.  (I was told that the store only holds about 1/3 of the business' goods, and that is also silver, furniture, etc.)  The store is small and cramped and a little chaotic.  I was interviewed by a staff member right on the floor, and I think I impressed her, but the head guy was too busy to see me.  The bad news is that there are no benefits, there could be Sunday hours, and the pay may suck.  When I was asked what I wanted hourly, I said "close to 20," and she asked if I could be flexible.  I said yes.  But the truth is that without bennies, I can't take less than 18.

I really want to work there.  I realized when I was in there and looking around, and when I talked to the woman about my enthusiasm for and knowledge of collectibles, I realized:  I'm a serious collectibles junkie.  Truly.  I saw a tiny little bellhop uniform hanging from the wall and kind of gasped and asked the woman, "Is that a Johnny-the-midget-Phillip-Morris outfit?"  She said, "Well, I'm a little young to remember that...but I think you're right."  She looked mildly and pleasantly surprised.  I'm a little young to remember that, too, but I knew anyway.  I also gasped at the framed Al Jolson autograph.  Gasped at the Apollo 13 picture signed by the astronauts, and of course the signed Beatles poster.  Case of baseball cards and shelf of signed balls.  Signed baseball and basketball jerseys.  trays and trays of watches:  Rolex, Cartier, Mont Blanc, Movado.  Jewelry in the window.  Told the woman I could tell a ruby from a garnet, a good ruby from a bad one, and any of the above from glass.  The place is just all full of stuff I dig and understand.  Unless the boss is a total lunatic or bastard, I really would like to work there.

Two of my references have already e-mailed the uptown university, so I may get myself an interview there.

I broke down and bought the CD of Garland Jeffreys' first album today.  I used to see him many years ago when I was hanging out at the Folklore Center; he was friends with Eddie Diehl, who did repair work there, and would come to visit him.  I didn't know that he was a musician, but when I saw the album, I recognized him and bought it.  It wasn't on CD for a long time.  My favorite song on the album is Ballad of Me, and I've never been able to find an mp3 of it.

My second favorite Garland Jeffreys song is Jump Jump, which fortunately is on YouTube.



Oh, geez, they *do* have Ballad of Me:



Do we all know what "earworms" are?  A song you simply cannot get out of your head, whether it's one you like or hate?  The one that recently had me for a couple of days was "Little Green Bag."  I'm still not sure whether or not I like it, but it's one weird damn song.  The verse and the refrain (I'm not even sure which is which) seem to come from entirely different songs, and I'm still not sure I have a handle on the lyrics (they don't seem to be hard to understand, but I haven't quite been able to figure out what it's all about).  It was initially recorded by The George Baker Selection (who?  OK, I've been too lazy to look them up), by The Strawberry Alarm Clock (!!!) and recently by Tom Jones with the Barenaked Ladies.

OK, I did a little homework.  The George Baker Selection was a rock band from 1967 to 1978.  George Baker now performs as a solo act.  And he's Dutch, which makes the whole thing even weirder.  Maybe that's why the lyrics make no sense -- they're not in Dutch, but maybe they're kind of ESL.



More research.  Here are the lyrics:

Lookin' back on the track for a little green bag,
Got to find just the kind or I'm losin' my mind

Out of sight in the night out of sight in the day,
Lookin' back on the track gonna do it my way.

Out of sight in the night out of sight in the day,
Lookin' back on the track gonna do it my way.
Lookin' back

Lookin' for some happiness
But there is only loneliness to find
Jump to the left, turn to the right
Lookin' upstairs, lookin' behind, yeah!

Lookin' for some happiness
But there is only loneliness to find
Jump to the left, turn to the right
Lookin' upstairs, lookin' behind.

Lookin' back on the track for a little green bag,
Got to find just the kind or I'm losin' my mind

Out of sight in the night out of sight in the day,
Lookin' back on the track gonna do it my way.

Lookin' back on the track for a little little green bag,
Got to find just the kind or I'm losin' my mind,
Alright.

Lookin' for some happiness
But there is only loneliness to find
Jump to the left, turn to the right
Lookin' upstairs, lookin' behind.

Pa pa pa pa pa pa ....

----------------

I'm not nuts, right?  The music is weird and the lyrics are weird.

And now it's YOUR earbug, mwah ha ha!

the reason is you and upcoming interview

I went out today and was listening to my smitchik (I believe this is a Yiddish word, and I believe it means "little thingie," more or less -- this is what Barry and I call our mp3 players), and the song "The Reason" by Hoobastank came on. I don't know if I've ever heard any of their other songs, but I remember hearing it with V. once or twice.  He pronounced the music wonderful, but the lyrics mundane and basically awful.  V. would never like a song unless the music and lyrics were both great.  Me, I'll overlook lame lyrics; actually, I enjoy quite a few songs where I don't know the lyrics at all (think foreign languages -- in fact, think about that Miriam Makeba song I posted recently).  I don't even think the Hoobastank lyrics are that bad.  It's a very average and decent love song, and the music really carries it above and beyond.  But don't take my word for it.






I still can't figure out how to post music, if there's even a way, but I can post anything that has a video on YouTube.  It's a start.

Also, I did a web search for the place that's interviewing me on Tuesday.  They don't seem to have their own website, but I did find a few reviews on various shopping sites. I'm glad to know that the place mostly handles things like watches, jewelry, and autographs; I had expected something more like fine art and antiques.  But actually, the stuff they handle is much more up my alley.  Some of the reviews said the place was great, others said it was cluttered and the owner was rude.  Well, I'll see how it feels.

back in the saddle

Obviously, I was depressed and unhappy about not getting that job, especially because the second and third interviewer seemed to be indicating that I was far and away the best candidate.  It took a couple of days for me to start feeling better.  I was so, disappointed.

But my applications are finally starting the bear fruit.  I had a phone call and an e-mail the other day for one job where the person who called me didn't seem quite right; and an e-mail on the same day where the HR guy was such a prick that I canceled the interview.  (When I replied to his first e-mail, to let him know my availability for interviewing, I asked the guy to send the job description.  He e-mailed back with a date, but no job description.  I e-mailed back again a little later, asking again if he could send the job description so I could review it before our meeting.  He wrote back a nasty e-mail, saying that he had ignore my request, hoping that I could backtrack and find it on my own, "since research and problem-solving are required for this job."  I withdrew my application, figuring I'd be starting at a disadvantage, plus this was the person I'd be interviewing with.  Barry and a few friends have backed me up on this.)

But I'm now up for two other jobs: one at a university way uptown (I'd confused it, when I applied, for one with a midtown campus), and one for an art/antiques/collectibles firm. For the university job, I got an e-mail saying that my resume made the first cut, and she wanted to contact my references.  I guess they check references before deciding whether or not to interview.  The gallery is seeing me Tuesday.  They have three jobs open:  one for an administrative assistant, one for a customer service rep (who work would on the store floor and deal with customers), one for a person to do written descriptions of pieces for internet listings, and one to be a junior appraiser and work with the present.  I could easily do any of these jobs, but I really want the appraiser job. (In fact, when I initially e-mailed my resume, I said that I watch every appraisal show on TV.) If the atmosphere there isn't too stuffy, I think I'd like to work there.  I could get some new skills, and I'd love working with art and antiques and collectibles.  I'm going to check out their website, which I haven't done yet.

The brunch at Colicchio & Sons was incredibly wonderful.  The brunch menu has individual pizzas, rabbit sausage on polenta, mussels in broth, and a number of other lovely items. I ate a pork belly BLT (with heirloom tomato), which was so delicious I wanted to cry.  Then I had a peach tarte tatin with cream cheese ice cream; the tarte wasn't too exciting, but the ice cream was great.  (Barry got a raspberry shortcake with thyme sorbet, so I got to taste the sorbet, which was extraordinary.  The atmosphere was lovely and the service was wonderful.

The best part, though, was the company, and we sat and talked for a few hours after eating. They are terrific folks, my aunt and uncle.

After, Barry and I went to the Chelsea Market, which was right across the street.  It's a gourmet mini-mall, and we picked up nibbly things, like salami, cheese and olives, to have for dinner.

Tuesday, I quit my bad eating and went back to low carb and no sugar.  I had run a little wild with food this summer, and gained back around 7 or 8 of the ten pounds I had lost in the spring.

I recently started reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, since it's wildly popular.  I'm enjoying it a lot.  The other night, we watched the Swedish film based on the book, and it was wonderful.  They're making an American version, which I'm sure won't be nearly as good.  The Swedes have made films of all three books in the series (the author wrote three and then died), though the second and third are not available here yet.  I do want to read all the books, even though I'm not a big fan of mysteries.  But the characters are very compelling.