Visitors

Last Friday night Hubby's parents came to town to visit. Since then it's been a whirlwind of playing tourist with them.

Saturday we drove through San Francisco and on the Golden Gate Bridge on the way to Sonoma where we had lunch in Healdsburg. I love Healdsburg with its town square, shops and restaurants. The in-laws checked out some antique stores and I checked out Midnight Sun and some cool jewelry stores around the palazzo.

Next we made our way to Sebastopol where we stopped in at the Antique Mall. I love browsing at all the old items, but my true weakness is for old books and this place has its fair share. Books published in the late nineteenth century are incredibly beautiful with the gold printing on the front. Not sure if they have any real value, but I love looking at them on bookshelves. Think I may be a bibliophile. I found a wonderful mahogany nightstand at Food For Thought Antiques, while not an expensive antique it's a great reproduction piece from around the 1930s or 1940s, plus proceeds from this shop help fund the Sonoma AIDS food bank. We all had fun trying to fit it into the trunk with all our luggage. In the end we had to donate two folding lawn chairs from the trunk to make it fit.

We stayed overnight at the Sheraton in Petaluma. Luckily our rooms were at opposite ends of the hallway so we had lots of privacy. We were so zonked that we ate at the hotel restaurant, which was surprisingly good.

On Sunday we got up relatively early for breakfast, checked out, and headed to Napa. MIL wanted to check the outlets and she did manage to buy shoes and some other things. Then we headed to St Helena for lunch, and then stopped in a couple of wineries. We were exhausted by the time we got back to our place around dinner time.

Hubby took his parents to San Francisco to do Fisherman's Wharf via the cable car yesterday. I had a quiet day at home. Today the in-laws rented a car and are off to visit Yosemite until Thursday. Hopefully the GPS software program that my FIL is obsessed with will not get them lost (it was telling them that the 101 didn't 'exist'). Hubby and I will try to rest up for their return on Thursday and our little overnight stay in Monterey on Friday.

Happy St Patrick's Day

Happy St Patrick's Day to one and all. It doesn't feel much like St Paddy's in sunny, warm California, and I forgot to wear green. March 17 is also the date when my late maternal grandparents were married in 1925 -- 85 years ago. Crazy, but I can still remember their 50th wedding anniversary celebration and how much I hated the dress I had to wear -- guess that's why I spent that evening at my paternal grandparents home.

Hubby and I spent last weekend in Big Sur for his birthday and Ventana Inn was amazing. The suite was beautiful with a wood fireplace and an incredible ocean view. We did not want to leave and joked about staying until we maxed out the Amex card. It was wonderful being in the woods as it was so quiet...except for the heater, and the couple in a hot tub a few doors down. The only disappointment was the restaurant, so if we ever stay again we'll go out to Nepenthe for dinner.

What Happened Last Night NBC?

Yesterday evening Hubby and I had the television tuned to NBC for the closing ceremony of the winter olympics in Vancouver. It seemed like an endless highlight reel from the past two weeks. Since we've viewed the games throughout we decided instead to watch 'The Amazing Race' on CBS and switch back and forth until they finally started the ceremony.

What a disappointment. In the past I loved when they showed the athletes walk into the stadium en masse, but NBC only bothered to show footage of American and Canadian athletes. What about the other countries? Then the athletes had on these sily white ponchos, so even if the camera panned through where they were seated you couldn't tell what country they were from. Sometimes you couldn't tell who were members of the audience and who were athletes.

The ceremony itself was underwhelming. I was hoping for so much more than William Shatner, Michael J. Fox, and Catherine O'Hara trying to be funny -- no wonder Martin Short did not make his scheduled appearance: he probably read the script and ran. Then there was Michael Buble singing 'The Maple Leaf Forever' with women dressed in short RCMP uniforms. It made me cringe and wonder how the RCMP could allow this to tarnish their brand. Guess they were going for campiness with the giant blow up beavers and moose. While they were trying to make fun of Canadian stereotypes, I fear it only reinforced these stereotypes to international audiences. What is an inside joke to Canadians loses something in translation. The most stirring moment last night was the choir singing the Russian national anthem; it was quiet, elegant, and beautiful. Sometimes less is more.

The strangest moment of the evening proved to be the jarring end to olympic coverage at 10:30pm for some Jerry Seinfeld reality show involving fighting spouses. So, if you wanted to keep watching the rest of the ceremony you had to wait an hour. We opted to watch 'Desperate Housewives' on the dvr and then we struggled to watch the rest of the olympics 'after party' for about ten minutes before we fell asleep. NBC really needs to revamp their Olympics coverage in the future.

Fireflies Parody

I am crazy about the Owl City song "Fireflies", and so I was searching for a video of it on Youtube. Still have not found an 'official' video, but I did come across the funniest parody of it. I am having problems linking to it here, but will try through Twitter.

Gymn Days

Given that Hubby and I will be flying to Maui in a week, I have been hitting the gymn hard the past couple of weeks. Two miles a day, five days a week for a total of ten miles. Could be much better, but I will work at it. Meanwhile, my feet are aching and I'm zonked most evenings.

Today at the gymn I noticed behaviour that irritates me to no end: a woman talked on her cell phone while on the treadmill. Very LOUDLY. Others in the gymn were wearing headphones listening to music or watching television, but one could still hear her. Do people have no shame? What about boundaries? Also, how can one workout effectively on the treadmill while carrying on a cell phone conversation? Grrr! I miss the days before cell phones when phone booths were tucked away in some private spot.

Sunday Night With The Cowboys

Hanging out on the sofa eating cheese puffs (man, are they addictive or what?) and watching the Cowboys battle the Eagles. Thinking about dinner but that would require getting my butt off this comfy sofa. Hubby is away on a business trip to Ottawa and spending time with his folks and I get to be messy. Not too messy, but I leave dishes in the sink and clothes on the floor. I'm in heaven since NBC is featuring the Cowboys game tonight. Football in HDTV is better than being at the stadium.

Get A Mammogram

For all the ladies out there, if you are in your late thirties please go to your family doctor and ask for a baseline mammogram. Doctors may not find anything and can use it as a base from which to judge your future mammograms. Don't forget to do the self-exam, but I think it's better to find something on an x-ray when it's tiny. I went for my first mammogram last January and they found micro-calcifications in my right breast, and I then went for a six-month follow-up and luckily nothing had changed, but I still need to go every six months. It doesn't hurt that much -- just a bit uncomfortable -- and the key is to discover a problem early enough that it can be treated and managed. Ladies, you have the power to ask/demand a mammogram, so get yourself to a doctor and ask for a mammogram.

Check webmd.com for breast cancer symptoms.

Gourmet Magazine, 1941-2009

Two days ago Conde Nast announced that it would cease publishing Gourmet magazine, and since that time I have been going through various stages of grief.

I was shocked that Conde Nast killed the oldest food magazine in the United States, and I am still in disbelief that they did it without a fight. Are there not other ways to salvage it, such as: increasing subscription rates, changing it to a quarterly publication while gradually increasing its presence online with podcasts. Their argument is that they still have Bon Appetit magazine, but it unfortunately is full of recipes, while Gourmet was so much more than that.

These past couple of days I have been feeling guilty over the past Gourmet issues I have recycled or tossed (after clipping favourite articles and recipes) in the process of moving across North America -- especially the December issues. Now I will be scouring used book stores and online for copies. The December issues were the first I bought off the newsstands and they are what got me hooked.

Anger consumed me yesterday as I found myself phoning Conde Nast to cancel all our subscriptions we still receive from them and asking for a refund on the remainder of my Gourmet subscription. If they cancel Gourmet then they do not deserve our loyalty or our cash. Damn you Conde Nast. I hope your other publications flounder.

Meanwhile, I have been sad these past two days knowing that I will no longer be receiving Gourmet in the mail every month. For almost twenty years I have lost myself inside pages of this magazine reading about fabulous travels, wonderful food, far-off restaurants that I might one day visit, and tantalizing recipes illustrated with photography sure to induce salivation. My favourite issue was always the December issue and I am disappointed that Conde Nast chose to end with the November issue instead of the Holiday issue.

My only hope is that in a few years, long after Conde Nast has forgotten about Gourmet magazine and the brand has dwindled to cookbooks, some small publishing house will have the courage to either revive it in a new transformation or recognize the need for a new magazine that caters to all that is the art of good living.

Glee

Think I've finally found a new television series to avidly follow. It's called Glee and can be seen on Fox every Wednesday. The story revolves around a high school glee club and it's full of humour with a dash of campiness not to mention the musical numbers thrown in every now and then. Now, the little high school I attended in Quebec did not have a glee club -- at least when I attended -- so I do not understand what glee clubs are, but I'm really loving this version of one. Tonight's episode is fabulous with Kristin Chenoweth guest-starring (I want the pink cowboy boots she's wearing during the Carrie Underwood number, but in red). Fingers crossed that she will be a guest-star in an upcoming episode.

Do Not Subscribe to American Vogue

Just off the phone with an operator at American Vogue and I feel ripped off.

Way back in June I received promotional mail from the magazine telling me "to subscribe so that I do not miss out on the upcoming September issue of Vogue." I had previously been a subscriber and had let my subscription lapse at the end of 2008as I had decided it was no longer worth it. Perhaps it was because Hubby was away on a business trip and I was feeling down, but for some strange reason I had a moment of weakness and sent in the promotional card to get a subscription.

Two weeks after sending in the card, I received the July issue. Initially I was surprised because I was under the impression that they would be billing me first and then beginning my subscription with the September issue. Also, I was disappointed because the issue was tinier than the fall LL Bean catalog, not to mention that loathesome (and husband-stealer) actress Sienna Miller was featured on the cover. A few weeks later I received the August issue. I did receive a couple of invoices, but as the summer was busy with activity and a couple of trips I did not get around to sending in the cheque until the end of August.

I kept waiting for the September issue to arrive, but it never did, and as the October issue is now on newsstands I finally phoned Vogue. It appears that they did cash my cheque on August 31, but "it takes 4-6 weeks to process the cheque"! So, they stopped the subscription, received my payment, but won't re-instate the subscription for 4-6 weeks, which is the October issue. Basically they have my money for a month before they will do anything.

I cancelled the subscription and asked for a refund as the ONLY reason I subscribed to Vogue was to receive the September issue. The reason I feel ripped off is because by adding my name as a subscriber in June they are 'padding' their number/list of subscribers that is used to sell advertising space in the fall issues. More subscribers means Vogue can command more money for advertising and lure more companies to advertise in the magazine.

That is it for American Vogue; I will not buy another issue. Now, I haven't given up on French Vogue (follow on Twitter: FashionWeekLive), or British Vogue, but they are difficult to locate on newsstands in silicon valley.

It's Always Sunny Here, With a Chance of Crazy Drivers

It's another sunny day in silicon valley, although it started it off with fog -- reminds me of the movie 'L.A. Story' where he pre-tapes the weather segment. I was actually happy when it rained late Sunday afternoon/early evening as we haven't had any major rainfall since mid-June. Strange as it may seem, I miss rainy days where you just hang out on the sofa watching movies or reading. Sunny days make me feel like I should be out doing stuff constantly.

We made it back from Lake Tahoe after hours and hours (and hours) on the California highway system. South Lake Tahoe was a bizarre combination of nature and casinos. Five minutes from the Heavenly Gondola is the Nevada stateline with a half-dozen high-rise casinos. The gondola ride up the mountain was amazing as you can see most of Lake Tahoe from the observation deck at the top. Must admit that I was freaked out by the height.

The great thing about staying around the Heavenly Gondola/Village is that you can walk to shops, restaurants, bars, and the casinos. Hubby enjoyed the double Crown Royal rye and coke at Hard Rock Cafe, while I found amusement at the nickel slot machines -- big spender that I am. At Harrah's Hubby decided to try his hand at roulette so he could get a casino chip as a souvenir for yours truly. The first night we had no idea what we were doing and just put chips on our birthdays! Although, towards then end I noticed a pattern on which numbers it landed on. So, the next night he decides to try again, and thims time he puts chips on corners and between numbers. Hubby did well, but he stuck with self-imposed limits and left the game when he got to a certain amount. I can see how certain personalities would become addicted to gambling, so you really have to go into a casino with limits as to how much you will spend, or just bring in your limit in cash and that's it.

Yes, the ride home from Lake Tahoe on Labor Day was insane. We had planned on going the 'short' route home via the southern highway to Sacramento, but the traffic jam was insane. It took fifteen minutes to get four blocks, so I convinced Hubby to take the northern highway. Guess we would have been okay except that I convinced him to stop at a restaurant for lunch. It was bumper to bumper traffic due to construction on the highway...although NO crews were working that day. Perhaps people get nervous driving in construction areas because the traffic jam suddenly ended when we left the area that was being re-surfaced. We did observe that Californians drive in the left lane instead of using it for passing slower moving vehicles -- of course Ontario people do that too.

The strangest thing in California is that people rarely use their signal lights when turning or switching lanes. We never noticed this in Texas -- although Dallas was peculiar because drivers would do U-turns in the middle of streets instead of driving around the block (this happened a lot in Uptown). No, in California people don't think it's necessary to let other drivers know they are turning. Also, California drivers do not know how to merge. Most of the time they don't look to see if a car is coming and they just merge into the lane assuming that the car in that lane will let them in. We use the horn frequently here, but then people take offence to that even though you're trying to avoid an accident. California drivers are crazy and drive with little regard to the other drivers on the road, and so driving defensively is a must to avoid collisions.