From the Past

11 Sep at 6:27 pm

Jacques Pépin’s Quick Delectable Fruit Gratins (à la Thompson)

I ended up finishing this piece on the twenty-fifth anniversary of America’s Day of Horror…9/11. Twenty-five years ago this day, widowed, I was living alone in an apartment in West Los Angeles. As was my custom, I was in the…

27 Aug at 7:51 pm

A Cautionary Tale with Bill Gates

Musings

So I was noodling around looking for something on my laptop and suddenly there was Leslie Stahl on “Sixty Minutes” reporting an amazing breakthrough in memory therapy. Something about research Bill Gates and his foundation had done with a Japanese…

20 Aug at 3:24 pm

Grown a Sweet Potato Vine Lately?

Enriching the Days

I have. It’s amazing. Darn thing takes off—fed nothing but water, air, and light. I had a couple of sweets in the veggie basket, one started sprouting. Nothing I had in mind to cook paired with sweets. I remember the…

11 Aug at 7:44 pm

Ellen’s Wooden Spoons–and Crème Danoise Masterpiece

From the Past, In the Kitchen, at the Table

I was young when Ellen came to my mother as housekeeper. I didn’t know it—realize it—then (as a teenager, my interests, I’m sorry to say, were too much taken up with my own life) that Ellen herself seemed barely out…

21 Jul at 4:56 pm

Summer Entertaining’s Large Luscious Three-Meat Loaf

In the Kitchen, at the Table

Do you also find these mid-summer days super for getting together with family, old friends, neighbors…happy reviving connections? July has brought my first-born grandson (whom I hadn’t seen in years) to our door…and soon good Los Angeles friends will be…

14 Jul at 12:54 pm

A Day on Crete!

From the Past

This from some time ago…vamping while I do a serious rewrite of our novel. Appreciate your kind indulgence… Earbud from my shortwave radio tucked in, in the middle of the night it has been lovely hearing the waves of unfamiliar…

28 Jun at 7:38 pm

Kindred Spirits ~ New!

Musings, Update

I had a good idea…to open up this page a bit, I thought to bring in friends (or people I wish were friends) that I regard as kindred spirits. I love the word kindred… it comes from Old English kinrædan, having to…

20 Jun at 9:57 pm

Blessings on My 91st Birthday

Musings

So yesterday I celebrated my ninety-first turn around the—what orb is it, moon? sun? gosh I forget…is that a sign of old age? Very like… It was a day-and-a-half. Began with my husband’s poem—oh, what a treat, having your very…

18 Jun at 11:55 am

Let’s Hear It for the Glorious Paramedics with the Santa Cruz Fire Department!!!

Aging Ain’t for Sissies, Update

Bill had just made his incomparable Scrambled Eggs with Cheese…I was sitting at my place listening to chatter about Marilyn Monroe and Louis Calhern in The Asphalt Jungle (remember my husband is a film historian)…Bill was telling the table (three…

9 Jun at 3:36 pm

America the Majestic, and Other Travel Tales

Around and About

I began writing these notes perched beside Bill in our bedroom on Amtrak’s Empire Builder--San Francisco to Chicago–just having rolled out of Havre, Montana. To explain: granddaughter (son David’s) Kate was graduating from Columbia University’s School of Social Work with…