Foot Stompin Saturday

Randomly, I found myself on Alberta Saturday night watching pro-skater Leo Romero's band Travesura play. To my surprise, it wasn't just a drinking event!

Part indie, part old country, part Desire-era Bob Dylan (arguably Bob's best era?), Travesura kinda floored me.  I'm not sure how long they've been around, and if the answer's "forever," then I apologize for my tardiness on this matter. As I've said elsewhere, I don't really follow Leo's skating, per se (I don't really follow anyone's skating, per se), but I shall, from this date forward, follow his career in foot stompin harmonica powered acoustic punk meets old country rock music. And you—you should, too.

(Oh, a quick Instagram convo with the band just revealed they gots an EP coming out at the end of the month. Keep eyes/ears peeled!)

Warm/Safe

Last week, my furnace broke and the house was an icebox for 24 hours. On New Year's Eve morning, there was nothing to do but watch, cheek in palm, as a dude replaced the furnace igniter and then asked me for hundreds of dollars.

Aaaanyway, the whole thing rekindled my love for my wood stove—its steady warmth and friendly, flickering light—which precipitated a peculiar childhood memory: how Little Me used to crawl beneath our kitchen wood stove (like the one below) in the afternoons after ski class, curling up there beside the cats with a baggy full of Cheezits. If I hadn't peed my pants that day, I'd still be in my long underwear. If I had (too often!), I'd be in my blue velour sweat suit. Either way, it was fucking heaven under there. Womb like. The warmest place in the house.

Big Me would kill to have a cozy, safe place of this caliber to curl up now and then.

Favorites 1.6.14

Cranberry cake: Pockets of ruby ensconced in golden cake. Dense. Soft. The sour balancing the sweet. The only way to eat cranberries.

The Tannery: When the moon is frozen in the western sky, it's nice to ride bikes through the cold night air to this bar on 55th and Burnside. Have you been? Small, softly lit, with communal tables made of wood. The cook steps away from sautéing mushrooms to turn over the record, a chocolate lab named Filbert lolls on a rug, and thick mason jars hold all the whiskey drinks.

Making your flight: The best! Not catching an ungodly early airport shuttle that gets waylaid by a traffic accident and rerouted hours' south—getting you into the airport a full hour after your flight's taken off, which relegates you to a late-night flight that gives you four hours to waste brain cells and money sitting there in Terminal C feeling sorry for yourself … yeah, not having this happen is totally the way to go! Especially when you are trying to travel from one locale to another.

Prince Avalanche: A quiet movie—but very, oddly funny. Plus, Paul Rudd's my boy.

2014 To-Dos

  Be calm: Can I get my wasted-angst numbers down to almost zero? Despite life?

Rebuild my kitchen: Cut open. Tear down. Sand. Repaint. Install. Make new. Or at least a LITTLE more like the photo below.

Eat more vegetables: Got this cool cookbook from my mommy—a vegetable-based recipe for every single day of the year. Seasonal and stuff. No excuses now.

Portugal: As in, go there.

Wintering

As I said before, I've banished all talk of taking stock and "last year at this time." Instead, I'd like to report about a simple holiday trip into winter last week. Four days with family, short and sweet. Planes and FWD vehicles. So-early wake ups—the sun still behind the peaks—just so I could catch a ride into the mountain with my dad. Hours of quiet out there in the cold, riding through the powder all by myself. The trees—the trees! How they looked all caked with new snow, like cakes, you know?

By Christmas night, I was ready for home, though. There is a statute of limitations on celebrating—on sitting around the kitchen table with everyone you are related to eating and drinking and talking, on going for walks just for something to do, on cookies. Yes—even cookies.

Lovely to visit, lovely to come home. Lovely to spoon with dog in bed and carry on with real life in a regular, non-holiday fashion. January 2nd, wherefore art thou?