Our Big Trip Weeks 13 to 14- September 7 to September 20

Sunday, September 7:

The beginning of football season (except for the faux pas mentioned in the last update). Football has always been fun for our family. We never really enjoyed any other sports at all, but we always liked football. When we were younger, on Sunday we would get out a piece of paper and write our picks for the day. My sister Kirsten (Patriots/Eagles fan), who is 10 years my junior, was so young that she would ask what color each team wore and pick that way.

"Ok Kirsten, green or red?"

"Wed."

And the Chiefs would go on to beat the Jets. She did quite well most of the time. Well, now she is older and doesn't need to pick games based on the color of teams jerseys. She is learning much more about football, because she has to. She has to because she is living with Bob D'Haem (Lions/Eagles fan). Bob is a big football fan. "So am I," you think. Oh, no. Bob REALLY likes football. Bob likes football so much that Kirsten decided she had to become a big football fan if she wanted to be a part of Bob's life between September and January. So, on Sunday, their place becomes a sports bar, complete with cardboard football helmet yard ornaments, FOUR televisions with a different football game on each, team logo street signs and posters on the walls and a kegerator (a beer keg in its own fridge). No one is allowed into the house unless wearing a football jersey. So I (Rams fan) borrowed one of my father's (Packers fan) Green Bay Packers jerseys and headed over. I had a fun time with Kirsten, Bob and the other Bob, Bob Cane (49ers/Eagles fan) (though that may not be the proper spelling of his name (his last name)) . Unfortunately this picture came out a little blurry- I was out of batteries in the camera and couldn't re-take the picture. Kirsten's Bob is wearing the Lions (light blue) jersey. The other Bob lived with Bob #1 for a long time, and still visits often. Kirsten made bruschetta and we all watched football and had a great time. At halftime, we participated in the traditional halftime activity of racing ATV's out to the ATV pit behind their house and back. I came in third out of, well, let's just say less than four. But I bet if we'd have had a plowing competition I would have won.

Monday, September 8:

This afternoon my sister Lisl (49ers/Patriots fan) came down from New Hampshire, where she lives, with Dean (someday-to-be Rams fan), her 2 year old son. YES HE'S REALLY CUTE NO I DIDN'T TAKE ANY PICTURES I JUST FORGOT THAT'S ALL TIME GOT AWAY FROM ME LEAVE ME ALONE I'VE TAKEN MORE PICTURES THE LAST 3 MONTHS THAN MOST OF YOU TAKE ALL YEAR. It was great to see them. Lisl is always a lot of fun to hang out with, and it was great to see Dean. The last time I saw him he was only 6 months old, so he didn't remember that.

Thursday, September 9:

Today we celebrated my father's birthday, though it's not officially until September 18. We wanted to celebrate when we were all around. So we made a German dinner of rouladen, spicy cabbage, roasted potatoes and sauerkraut. We finished off with some German (of course) Chocolate Cake. "Boy," you must be thinking. "You must love your dad very much to spend so much time fixing such a complex and varied feast." Thank, you, yes we do. Now, a rundown of the menu for you hungry folk who ask us to write more about food. The red cabbage had onion, green apple, vinegar, and a mixture of various spices that made it kind of tangy. The potatoes were red potatoes roasted with a little oil, garlic and rosemary. Rouladen is a little more complex. You take a thin piece of steak about 4"x12" and lay it out. Then you spread a little mustard on it. Next, lay a piece of bacon on that. Then, you take some onion pieces and lay them on top. Finally, you take a dill pickle slice and place it along the short side. You then roll the pickle up in the meat and tie it with a string. Lastly, you brown the rolls in a pan with a little oil, then add enough beef broth to cover the rolls halfway. Simmer for an hour and enjoy. I've been eating this for many years and I really love it. Beth says she found it repulsive at first, but she enjoys it now. My dad loves all this stuff, and he was glad to have Kirsten, Lisl, Beth and me around as well as Dawn and Matthew. We had a fun night. I won't tell you how old my dad is, but here are a couple of hints: the second number is a zero and the first rhymes with "hicks."

Friday, September 12:

We left Plato at Kirsten's and made our way up to Summit, New Jersey, where our friends Walter Englebert (Bills fan) and Susan Jordan (Garrison Keillor fan) were getting married the next day. We stopped off along the way to visit Beth's cousin Laura and Chloe, who by now was a week old. It occurs to your humble narrator that while there was a picture of Chloe with Beth on the website, but not even a picture of Laura with her new daughter. This is a difficult situation. We have in our extensive archives a picture of Laura the day after the birth, but we are not sure how Laura would feel about such a picture being disseminated, despite our belief that she looks lovely in it. Anyway, we here recognize our oversight but must plead that we had our reasons. We arrived in Summit and checked into The Grand Summit Hotel. We then went over to the rehearsal dinner. We were not in the wedding, but we got the skinny about when and where the dinner was and crashed it. We figured that given the vast distance we had traveled to get to the wedding a dinner wasn't too much to ask. And the food was dee-lish-us. Walter actually requested that I ask the blessing before the dinner, and went to great lengths to explain how Beth and I had come all the way from San Francisco for their wedding, which, of course, made them look very loved, so I earned my dinner anyway. As for Beth, if it wasn't for her, we wouldn't have been invited to the wedding in the first place, so I guess that by providing a chance for me to exercise my oratorial skills, she earned her dinner as well.

Saturday, September 13:

After a wonderful raw fish lunch at Monster Sushi in Summit, we all put on our fancy duds to watch Walter and Susan get hitched. I make a big deal out of the fancy duds because this wedding was the only reason that I brought a suit, tie, black shoes, etc. on the trip. So the newlyweds should feel very special because I will wind up carrying a suit around for six months because they got married. The ceremony was solemn yet fun , and the reception was an event not to be believed. They had a 35-piece band (almost) that played all kinds of great tunes, the hotel ballroom was elegant and then there was the food. Ohh, the food. They were serving up some fine, fine grub. Hold on, though. Isn't this a cool picture I took of the glasses, candles and flowers ? Anyway, the appetizer round was more food than most weddings serve for dinner. My favorite part was the baby shrimp and scallops sauteed in a garlic butter sauce. There was pasta, roughly a thousand kinds of cheese, veggies and fruit, cold seafood (oysters, shrimp, etc.) and more. Beth actually asked if this was dinner already. But it was not. Dinner started with lobstercakes as big as grapefruits, and continued with a baby spinach, pear, walnut, and feta cheese salad, followed by lobster and Chateaubriand (a super tasty cut of beef). Then came the dessert. They had something called a Viennese Table. When they said table, I asked my friend Karen McFadden if that meant some kind of buffet. She said yes and I was out the door and at the table (which was in the hallway outside the ballroom). I, I am proud to say, was the very first guest to sample the dessert selection, which was INCREDIBLY unselfish of me. Look, no one likes to go first in situations like this and people wind up simply standing around looking uncomfortable, right? So I bit the bullet and let everyone else off the hook, because that's just the kind of helpful guy I am. The girls had a great time at the reception and the guys documented that fact . We then went up to Dave Heitzmann's room for an apres-reception party, where the groom and his friend Chris entertained us with their rendition of "Danny Boy," which apparently has eleven verses .

Sunday, September 14:

After sleeping too late to attend the free brunch at the hotel, we wandered down to the lobby where we found a surprisingly alert Walter. He asked us what we were going to do next and we told him we didn't know. Being the intrepid adventurers we are, we find planning to be boring and redundant. Walter cordially invited us to transport his and Susan's wedding gifts back to Hoboken, which we agreed to do. After getting there, we accepted the cordial invitation to stay for the night, and then accepted the cordial invitation to stay as long as we wanted. This was a generous invite on Susan and Walter's part, but they had a secret motive. You see, they knew that we were traveling and had no schedule, and they knew that Beth would love to see the south of France (where they were honeymooning), so they wanted to extend a free place for us to crash for a few days to distract us from joining them on their honeymoon. They have a great place in a building that used to be a church, so their apartment has stained glass windows and nifty angles. We had some darn fine pizza and watched HBO's Sunday night line-up, which Beth and I hadn't ever done, not having HBO. It was great to visit with the happy couple after the formal stuff and frenetic wedding pace was over.

Monday, September 15:

We were welcomed to Hoboken in grand style by the township itself. When we got up in the morning we found a welcome card from the department of parking tucked right under our windshield. I went down to the department of parking and traffic to thank them personally. So, I paid the ticket and requested a temporary parking permit. By the time I got back to Sue and Walter's, it became apparent that we had made such an impression on the township that they wanted us to stay. In fact, they wanted us to stay so badly that they put a boot on our car so we couldn't leave. While I was flattered by this obvious display of affection, we needed to get the boot removed from our car so we could transport our honeymooning hosts to the airport. So I walked back down to city hall (in the pouring rain) and gave them $100 (which Susan had insisted upon paying, because she felt as though it was her fault we were so restrained) to un-boot us. Finally, we were free to get the newlyweds to the airport, which we did. That evening, we ate at India on the Hudson, an Indian (oddly enough) place on Washington Street in Hoboken. It was a little spicy for Beth, but overall quite tasty. We then returned home to find a refreshingly violation-free van.

Note from Beth: Today, as Karl and I were becoming intimately familiar with the joy of Hoboken's parking regulations, our sister-in-law Jeannette became intimately familiar with the joy of childbirth . Tom called us this afternoon to announce that he and Jeannette are the proud parents of a baby girl named Emma Leigh. She weighs 8 lbs 12 oz, and is 21" long. Congratulations Jeannette and Tom!

Tuesday, September 16:

Today Beth went to Brooklyn to see her friend Peg Galella and her husband Vaughan Scully. Your humble narrator was tired and had been socializing like crazy lately and just felt pooped. So I stayed at S & W's and read and napped. Beth said she had a wonderful time.

Wednesday, September 17:

I thought it was unusual to find Beth sitting in the hallway in front of the closed apartment door. After I inquired as to her strange activity, I discovered that while we were in the hallway in front of the closed (and, you may have guessed, locked) door, the apartment key was very safely tucked inside, where no one would be able to steal it. Our cell phones, etc. were also in the apartment. We thought we were sunk. But Beth took it upon herself to use the Hoboken network we had begun building. She went up the street to the church that Walter and Susan regularly attend. The pastor there, Fred Lentz, had presided over the wedding. So Beth got the lovely woman who answered the door, named Peggy, to let her in and used the church phone to call a locksmith. For a nominal fee of only $58.30, the locksmith broke into the apartment for us. He said he needed to see some ID that this was our apartment, which it wasn't. While we were waiting for the locksmith I made the most of the building by running up and down the stairs inside to get a bit of a workout. By the time the locksmith got there, I was all sweaty and out of breath, so Beth asked me to kindly go away, so as not to look suspicious asking someone to let me into an apartment. Beth took care of our belonging at the place by telling the locksmith that there was a kettle of (what used to be) water sitting on the stove on the left front burner about to start a fire. Having corroborated this circumstantial evidence, the locksmith left. I would have broken into the apartment myself, having just broken into a house the week before with the old credit card between the window panes to slip the lock trick (I won't tell you whose house, because I don't want a lot of our readers to show up there with credit cards in their hands. But we were supposed to be there). However, I didn't have my wallet (or lock-picking kit) with me, so I was helpless. After we got all that worked out, we trekked over to Manhattan. Our first stop was Bloomberg, where we met Raquel Cano-Schneiderman, a good friend of Beth's. Beth found it very exciting to sit in the lobby at Bloomberg (where she worked for many years) in a T-shirt and shorts. Raquel took us out to eat at Cubana Neuvo Latino, a scrumptious Cuban restaurant. Raquel's husband is Rob Schneiderman, a very talented jazz pianist. Raquel and Rob are in a similar position as Beth and I- professional woman, artsy man. So it's good to see how they have handled situations that Beth and I are now going through. We really respect them and their opinions a lot. They are a very peaceful and well-adjusted couple, and always have something positive to offer in the wisdom and perspective department. Beth then wanted to go to Bliss, which is apparently a high-fallutin' salon. She got the lube, oil and filter while I wandered up to Washington Square, where the chess players hang out. I sat down and played with Richard, who has been playing in the park for 13 years . He beat me. Then he beat me again. He followed that up by beating me twice more. Once I could maybe have won, but didn't. We then returned to Hoboken and ate at a place called Pitagrill, where they serve generally light and healthy food. It was here that I had the greatest dessert of my life. It was called an Oreo Bar, and it consisted of Oreo-like filling surrounded by Oreo- like, but lighter and less dense chocolate cookie stuff. Look, I said the food was GENERALLY healthy. Oh my, it was good. I could have eaten THREE of them. That, dear reader, is a clever literary device used by us writer types called foreshadowing.

Thursday, September 18:

We went back to the big city today, to meet more friends. Umesh Patel, who hosted a dinner for us on our very last night in San Francisco, was in New York on business. We met him at the W on Union Square and he took us to the famous Gramercy Tavern. That was some fine English food. It was a lot of fun to catch up with him. We then went back to the W for some lounging. The W, as you know, is a fashion hub. As you can imagine, I caused quite a stir in my "Wrinkled Look Shirt and Sandals With Socks" outfit. You'll probably see that very ensemble on magazine covers next month. After Umesh left for the airport, Beth and I abused our welcome by going to the "water closet" in the W, which you had to take the "lift" to access. We then journeyed uptown to Broadway and 49th to meet another Bloomberger, Paul Salerno, who treated us to dinner at Ruby Foo's. Unbeknownst to me, we waited for a table for much longer than Paul had been instructed he would need to wait. It seemed to me that we were only waiting for about twenty minutes, but it turned out that it was about an hour. Time flew while talking to Paul, so I was unfazed. Apparently, however, Paul had been told that the wait would only be 10 minutes or so. So he checked on his status a couple of times, but never acted upset or rude. Anyway, all I knew is that we were talking to Paul, then we were sitting at a table, then we were eating some fine, fine dim sum, then Paul was paying the bill, then the waiter surprised us. He announced that due to the big problem with seating us, dessert was on him. As I stated, I did not realize there had been any seating problems, so I was completely surprised. Meanwhile, as we were eating our yummy dinner, Hurricane Isabel had unfortunately knocked a tree down in Paul's yard, so he wanted to get home to his wife, Kirsten, and daughter, Ryan. Paul had to split. When the waiter brought our complimentary dessert, however, he still brought three dishes. So (and here comes the foreshadowed about event), Beth and I were left with the difficult and terrible task of having to eat three tremendous desserts.

Friday, September 19:

We awoke, packed and hit the road. We headed north to Middletown, Connecticut, twenty minutes northeastish from New Haven, to the abode of our good friends Noah and Kate. Noah and I went to college together. He is a fantastic jazz pianist and the most talented, well- rounded musician I have ever had the pleasure of working with. He is also a great guy and has helped me a great deal with my musical endeavors. You should go immediately to his website, www.noahjazz.com. If you don't think you like jazz, you should go anyway, because it's fun to read his website, and maybe you'll find out that jazz is cooler than you think. Beth is not really a jazz fan, but she enjoys Noah's music a lot. She actually made sure we brought an older album of his on our big trip. Anyway, he just recorded an album with Ron Carter and Ben Riley. If that doesn't mean anything to you (which is okay), type either of their names into an internet search engine and you'll see just how important these guys are. They are legends. I was fortunate enough to write the liner notes for the album. The reason that I'm calling the record so important is that it's a benefit album for The Ehlers-Danlos Foundation. Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome is a condition that is caused by a problem with collagen. It manifests itself most prominently as a weakening and stiffening of joints. Noah has EDS, and it causes him great pain and stiffness a lot of the time, as well as signifigantly curtailing the activities in which he can participate. My opinion is that Noah could someday be listed among the all-time jazz greats were it not for the fact that he can't play as often as he would need to to gain the exposure and name recognition needed to be so enshrined. Noah cooked us a delicious vegetarian dinner and we had a relaxing evening visiting with him and Kate.

Saturday, September 20:

When I wrote about dinosaurs a couple of months ago, Noah wrote me to say that Yale University has a remarkable dinosaur exhibit, which he would be glad to take me to. Today was the day he learned to regret his words. We went to the Peabody Museum and saw many cool dino-specimens, including a turtle that was roughly twelve feet long with a shell that was eight feet wide. It is known as Aechelon Ischyros, or "Really Superbig Terrapin Gosh You Wouldn't Believe It," and this particular specimen is the only one of this species. There were also many Triceratops specimens as well as some large sauropods and the skull from a crocodile-like animal that was roughly as big as Rhode Island. While I dawdled in the room-o-dinos, Beth and Noah began their trip through the museum. I caught up to them at a very important exhibit . Beth then spent some time in the hall of minerals (she's a geology fan) and we finally all caught up and took off. I was going to put a picture of me next to the Dodo sign in here, but after actually reading about the fate of the Dodo, which was not in fact a stupid bird, but just not equipped to deal with mankind, I got rather sad, and chose not to. We then went for pizza at Frank Pepe's Pizzeria. Noah threw down the gauntlet by saying that it was the best pizza in the world. Actually, I think he said country. Anyway, we realized that pizza can not be judged as a sub-category of food, but a family. There are many different types of pizza, and each can have its champion. This pizza was thin crust, but not so thin as to be crunchy. It must also be noted that it was brick oven pizza, which is yet another sub-category. The bottom line is that it was so good that Noah (who is not a big guy), Beth (who is a demure, nibbling female) and your humble narrator (who is equivalent to at least one and a half Noahs and not nearly as demure as Beth) finished a large AND a medium pie, proving Noah's hypothesis that this pizza place defies the laws of physics, in that a group dining therein will finish all food placed on the table, even if that is physically impossible. The previous sentence, by the way, was a staggering 84 words long. After our gorging, we wandered around the Yale campus. Of particular interest was the Rare Book Building, the proper name of which escapes me. The "windows" are made of thin slices of a particular kind of rock (the name of which also escapes me I know I'm a third-class reporter at best) that allows light to pass through . Cool. We also saw the secret society to which our president once belonged. I was gonna join, but the front door was locked. Yale is indeed a beautiful campus, and it looks to be using its annual $10 billion check from the government quite well. New Haven seems to be halfway between Princeton, NJ and Berkley, CA (where the campus is) sizewise and financially, and quite possibly politically as well. We then went apple picking and finished up the night at an Indian restaurant, and NO I can't remember the name. Look, owners of things, if you want to be included in our webpage (and who wouldn't?) you're going to have to give me a business card. I just can't remember everything all the time.

Karl's Kompliment Komposing Klinik:

It has come to your humble trivia question moderator that many of you are entering the trivia contest simply to get your compliment. Many of you mention your compliment-to-be when submitting your trivia answer. This is very, very sad. You should enter the trivia contest for the adrenaline rush that comes from crushing your foes, not for some external validation. Hence, we proudly offer the quadruple-K. A compliment, as it appears in this journal, consists of no less than five and no more than seven parts:

1)The name of the individual.

2)a comma.

3)a descriptive fact about the individual. (OBJECTIVE)

4)a comma.

5)a nice thing to say about the individual. (SUBJECTIVE)

OPTIONAL:

6)a comma.

7)another nice thing to say about the individual. (ALSO SUBJECTIVE)

Remember, section three should be a fact about the person. By putting a fact about the person first, you establish familiarity. If you just write a compliment such as "Jim is good at digging," Jim may very well think that you are using some sort of generic sentence and sticking his name in it. On the other hand, if you establish Jim as the only person who could be receiving this compliment, it carries much more weight, as in the following example: "Jim, my cousin who is currently serving a 50-year stint at Sing Sing for tax evasion, is a good digger, and I hope to see him and his dirty fingernails soon, even though he isn't up for parole until 2032." There you have it. Now, practice writing your own compliments. I know that some of you are already quite good at complimenting yourselves. In fact, if you come up with a really great compliment, send it on in, and we'll stick it up on the WWW. Good luck and happy complimenting. Witness the compliment machine in action below, as you humble narrator compliments a complete stranger.

LAST WEEK'S TRIVIA CONTEST WINNER: Mary Szmutko was the first to correctly identify New Jersey and Oregon as the two states that do not allow citizens to pump their own gas. Special credit goes to John Renwick, who, through massive amounts of research, discovered (among other things) that it is illegal in Liberty Corner, New Jersey, for a couple parked on lover's lane to accidentally beep the car horn.

MARY'S COMPLIMENT: Mary Szmutko, a friend of Beth's mother Maureen, is an astute student of obscure law and a fine, fine driver (if she is so current on petrol policy she has obviously not lost her license due to a large collection of moving violations).

THIS WEEK'S TRIVIA QUESTION: What is the name of the quartet that Noah Baerman co-led in the mid-90's? QUESTION 1- Is this a shameless way to promote Noah's website? Yes. QUESTION 2- Did Noah put me up to this? Absolutely not, and he will be mildly (at least) embarassed that I am doing it. The reason I am doing this is that the way we as Americans are exposed to music is controlled by really rich record executives who tell us what to listen to, and if I can expose fifty readers of this website to a new artist, perhaps so much so that six or eight of them purchase this artist's music, I think that is a good, good thing.

COMING NEXT WEEK: Another day or two with Noah and Kate, a trip to Kingston, NY to visit our friends Shannon and Jenn, Beth's cousin Dan's wedding back in NJ and the baptism of our niece, Emma.