Category: Travel

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about Pebble Beach, a bit late

We spent Labor Day weekend at Pebble Beach in a McMansion, or maybe it is just a plain old mansion, I don’t know, not having that much experience with mansions of any sort. I’d like to say it was a bit of a test of my ability to relax and enjoy myself and try to keep my Compact (environmental and frugal) ideals intact. I wonder if any of y’all have had this experience — where you’re so busy looking at the waste/energy usage/and whatever is the opposite of green and frugal that you can’t enjoy whatever it is? It feels very Puritanical in spirit to me…trying to “judge not” and instead, judging madly. I won’t say it’s a good thing, or a bad thing. It just is.

We were invited as guests to a friend’s guest house in Pebble Beach, which is a pretty fabu place to go no matter who you are. The 3-story house was SO fabulous that, as our friend Steve said, “I couldn’t afford the batteries for that house” — just the batteries alone, for all the TVs, full sound system, gas fireplaces in every room, etc. It was luxe to the max. To quote Jimmy Buffett, we were like “gypsies in the palace.”

I had to SHUT OFF the Compacty voice in my head or it would have made it impossible to have a weekend at all and made all of us miserable (Mr Husband asked me to let it go for the weekend). I have to struggle with the evangelical side of this passion here. BUT — the good thing is, this house was pretty energy efficient, encouraged recycling, etc. We didn’t use heat or AC, brought our own snacks for the ride there and back, didn’t go shopping, walked on the beach at Asilomar and collected beach glass, which I love, and admired the natural environment (we found a live starfish and saw a huge dead sea lion — yikes!). There wasn’t much else we could do except sleep, look at the ocean and knit. We did all of the above (but Mr H does not knit.).

Mr Husband was in heaven because of the TWO giant screen HDTVs (back to back on adjoining walls) plus TVs in every room. I thoroughly enjoyed the deep tub in our rose marble bathroom (each bedroom has its own private bath – x6) and took a couple of baths where I soaked and read — that is luxury to me, since we don’t have a tub here (the kids do but it’s full of kid-stuff and kid-juju, not very relaxing to soak in it).

The house was well supplied with a full bar, wine cellar, full refrigerator and pantry — fresh fruits and milk, etc for us — and a Viking 6-burner stove for cooking if we felt like it. They gave us robes and slippers and all the necessities like toothbrushes, etc. I didn’t quite feel up to playing the grand piano — it was all a bit intimidating. The view from our bedroom (as big as our living room at home) was of the Pacific Ocean, through a window as large as a 2-car garage door. We were just speechless. This house has its own elevator, sauna, hot tub, exercise room, library — un-freaking-believable that people actually live that way all the time!

We had such a good time, and were able to relax with our friends, had a good seafood dinner on the wharf in Monterey with our dear friends Steve and Stella. Thank you, Steve and Stella!

Now we will return to our normally scheduled programming.

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how I spent my last 10 days

We got home from our mountain vacation at fabulous Daveland a few hours ago and I have been trying to catch up — but with some 1,500 messages, my index finger on the mouse finally gave in. A pity, because all of the stuff I missed was really interesting but my finger says get over it and move on.

I spent some time on the quiet deck of the cabin thinking about the joy of stillness and wanted to say again that sitting still and not being busy (“Idle hands are the devil’s workplace,” of course) are a huge challenge for me. I’m always working off a massive to-do list and have a lot of trouble being here now. At least I recognize that, so I’m getting better — very slowly — at it. Still not comfortable without busy hands. Knitting helps a lot with this, though.

Withdrawal from my invisible Internet friends was a tough one, but it was very nice to sit on the deck of the cabin and watch the sun come up or go down, with fresh hot coffee or a glass of wine (respectively).

Green issues that came up: There is no recycling program in the area we stayed, and a bear problem, so no composting food. We had to take our garbage with us every day and toss it in a Dumpster. It was really horrid to have to throw away “good” compost. But we had to — there was nowhere to put it and after even one day it stank in the house. We dropped our cans and bottles in a recycle bin at the gas station, and I had to fight for that one bec family said it was easier if we just dumped everything in the trash. I couldn’t do that. Nope.

There is no cell coverage or Internet at the cabin so we were truly cut off, and I loved it (despite missing 1,500 fascinating conversations!). Whenever we ventured out and got within range, the teens got onto their cells nonstop, which drove me crazy. One daughter started asking when we were going home on the 2nd day, and partway through asked if her friend could come pick her up and take her home (to an empty house for 3-4 days…uh, right…not likely). Some of the confines of a smallish cabin and 6 of us did get a bit wearing — not so much to me but to the teens, definitely!

However, we cleaned up some junk in the river (North fork of American River) — including a large blue paint tarp that was clogging it up. I picked up lots of cigarette butts (that’s a filthy habit — shame on those of you who drop these. Please stop. Who cares if you smoke? Just don’t litter, please.) Lots of plastic bits, too. Yuk. I also scattered a large canister’s worth of alpine wildflower seeds around the cabin in hopes of adding some plant life to the area. (I checked with the local lumberyard and made sure they were native-types, not tropical beauties). We always try to leave the cabin better than we found it, and another thing I left behind was a reusable coffee filter rather than the bleached white paper ones we found there. Hoping to influence the next set of guests and our dear friends the Getzlers (thanks. Dave and Steph!).

We spent our days at the lakeside beach but I got a bad burn the first day so wasn’t in the sun much after that. Yes, I did use sunscreen, but I was reading and the way I was sitting and the reflection of the sun from the page onto my chest was apparently magnified so I’ve been blistered and am still not over it yet. Lots of aloe and sea plasma have helped. The best thing was not being connected to the phone and email (double-edged sword for me), and sitting in the deck chairs and endlessly knitting. I knitted a cotton washcloth for our kitchen, since I have been longing for some washcloths lately, and made headway on scarves for gifts. I finished one (very cute, pink and cocoa brown stripes) that’s been sitting around for 2 years and also did some needlepoint.

Mr Husband and I went on a terrific hike in the mountains above the cabin, and behind the cabin. Giant boulders, lots of brush underneath, evidence of many animals but none sighted besides dogs, beautiful clouds, the sound of the river, alpine meadows, cool dirt tracks, sugar pinecones, blue jays, and a chipmunk or two. Nice way to reconnect with nature and Mr.Husband of 1 whole married year (though it’s getting closer to 5 years of togetherness already).

We brought all our own food and still have some that didn’t get eaten. And we ate constantly! Luscious dinners, delicious lunches, fabu breakfasts, and each of the kids and us took turns in partnership making meals. Hands-down winners were Simone’s waffles with strawberries and bananas; Savi and Ana’s sub-sandwiches, and Mr Husband’s grilled London broil. Dessert was a toss-up between Mr Husband’s root beer floats or the Boy’s S’mores. All good. And I think I gained 10 pounds just eating and sitting. I re-start the exercise plan tomorrow. (oink)

I took one daughter with me to the thrift store in Tahoe. She scored some back to school clothes for herself, and I got a dozen half-pint Mason jars with all but 2 lids for $2.50. Woo hoo — at the local grocery store, it’s $10 a box or more these days. Found a darling vintage jacket for another daughter, plus some matching yarn to what I was knitting with on the deck, so I was able to add stripes to the scarf. The prices were very, very low and the stock was not picked over by the hip and fabulous as it is down in the Bay Area. I ended up buying a couple of holiday gifts for a buck each and happy to have them on hand already. That’s not “just shopping,” that’s planning ahead.

And finally, we stopped at a farm stand in beautiful rural Dixon on our way home and I got a lug of peaches for $15. Now I can put up some sweet honey peaches for the year. Yay! My garden got really ripe while we were gone and so I picked veggies today and will have my hands full with catching up tomorrow.

Idle hands…

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retreat

We’re going up to the mountains again next week for annual family retreat, aka vacation. Looking forward to it. I had grand plans of all that I would do on this vacation, but the bigger challenge is actually not in the doing. It’s in the being.

So I’m not taking my sewing machine or my laptop. I’m taking some books and some knitting and a notepad, to slow the pace enough that I can write a few thoughts, not catch the entire train.

Doing nothing is hard for me. Idle hands are the devil’s workplace, you know. I almost never have idle hands. I always have something cooking in my brain, while writing, emailing, working on projects, planning…always have lots to do.

So my practice this time will be to NOT do. To do nothing. Or, nothing much. To hang out, relax, enjoy, breathe slowly. Sip, not gulp. Walk, not run.

We’re human beings, not human doings. I have to remember that.

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the end, and the beginning

I think, I think Measure H passed — by 105 votes? That’s the last I heard, and we posted it to the Web but our story for tomorrow still says losing by one vote. At least we didn’t say it had totally lost in big letters. That’s a plus-one for us this week. However, there is a distinct disadvantage to a weekly cycle, mainly, that life goes on no matter when your press run is. So there we are.

Tonight our Mia comes in. Friday our Moni graduates. Our Ana got perfect attendance and a prize (tix to see the A’s) and a B average, which means she’s earned a TV in her room all summer. Our other ones are doing well, and so looking forward to summer. We’re down to one occasional sofa surfer, and that’s nice, but it feels quiet around here — if a houseful of 6 or 7 can be quiet, ever. But so it goes.

Just put a bunch of sliced apples on the dehydrator and whipped up a batch of cat food. Whipped up is an exaggeration — it bubbled in a crockpot all day and I just did the blenderizing and put it away. Ask me about this activity if you really want to know. I’m trying to pass the time until 10:30 when I leave for the airport. Not easy when I go to bed at 10 most nights. We’re going to Chico Saturday for my dear friend Catie’s wedding. Road trip! And we’ll do it the eco way, taking our own lunches and snacks and mugs and water.

The veggies are up and taking over. I seem to have more pumpkins than anything else and that is just not OK. I have one zucchini producing already and a crookneck squash right behind it. There are a couple of mystery squashes growing; my luck they will all turn out to be pumpkins. I also have a couple of gourds growing. Cukes, not so many. I think I have two, and they are very small and not blooming yet. I want lots of those but I may have blown that. May be too late. However, corn is a-coming in, 52 stalks so far and it’s about 3-4 inches high. Growing half an inch a day, it looks like. I also have an abondanza of tomatoes. If they all fruit, I have about a dozen bushes and will be swimming in red and yellow.

Grapes are coming along, though someone/something knocked a branch off. That is tres annoying. That’s months of growing, gone. I have some raspberries that will not likely bloom and fruit but I wanted it as much for the leaves for tea. So that’s actually OK. Any fruit is a bonus. Same goes for the strawberry patch — which is doing OK. We’ve lost some with hot spells and then chilly weather, but they are doing all right. I haven’t had much fruit, though. Raccoons? Maybe.

I thought I had finished putting the fourth grade’s poetry book together when I just realized that half the pages printed upside down. Damn! That’s a $50 loss in printing fees and I’ll have to go back and print it again. Before Friday! Such a bummer. Waste of paper, too. That’s all I have to say about that because I am so annoyed that I want to throw something. Grrrr!

And…looks like we’re not moving to the West End just yet. We are back on the market for another office. Other place didn’t work out, which is a serious bummer because I loved the space, the location, the cheerful color scheme, and all the potential. Sigh. We’re working with our good friend Kathy Moehring of WABA (West Alameda Biz Assn) to find us a better space. Watch for the announcement here…

And…had a great visit with my parents and Aunt Barbara over the weekend — truly fun and pleasant and good food and lots of laughing. Her only regret was that she didn’t get to see all the kids.

This begins to sound like a to-do-list in reverse. I-did-em-all, I guess you’d call it. Well, I did. And I’m justifiably tired but proud. What have you done lately? Drop a line and let us know.

Lesson recently learned: Get it in writing.

Another lesson recently learned: I’m happiest when I’m at home. And glad I have one.

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new yawk pix

ok, here are a whole bunch, not numbered but I will try to explain what they are afterward. I can’t seem to get the text to wrap areound the pix very well… First off, John Lennon’s memorial from Central Park. (Click on any to see them larger. And let me know if you want prints — I will send them.)

Then: random shots of stuff and such and windows and garbage and carousel in Bryant Park and people and things and shops and St Patrick’s Cathedral at night, nature and urban views and the like. Still life, except none of it was still.

That motion-y one above is an inside shot of Mia’s graduation at the theatre; it looked kind of artful, even if blurry, so I left it in. Happy viewing.