My SXSW

When last we spoke, dear reader, one day of SXSW was gone and we had seen exactly one movie after getting our badges and some advanced tickets. Of course, we had gone to the Texas Film Hall of Fame party and the pre-party before that. (See Connie Britton above left with Dana Wheeler-Nicholson helping with the live auction at the gala. They are stars in "Friday Night Lights," a TV show we love.)

Well, the weekend went well. We managed four films and a panel on Saturday and Sunday. Some peoples' schedules are much more brutal but with my persistent allergy/cold (I thought I was getting over it and then it morphed and bit again) and FFP needing to do some writing we couldn't do the death march. We met up with some Cinematic people including our friend Jette who were rushing about madly and our friend Christopher Holland of B-Side Entertainment said he had to wait until a lot of people left before he could see some films. A college sophomore from Baylor declared in the line Sunday night that it would be her sixth film. She should have the stamina for the nursing career she is going to pursue.

Saturday we got a few things handled and then went to the Convention Center theater and queued up for "45365." A man who turned out to be the three brother filmmakers' father handed us a matchbook with the times for the showings and the title stamped on it. The title (pronouneced four-five-three-six-five) is the zip code for Syndey, Ohio where the filmmakers grew up. The kids wanted to write about their home town which they had left behind for film work and college and finally decided to make a doc and make the town speak for itself through film of the place and some inhabitants. At first I thought maybe they needed to edit some stuff but gradually I realized the film was pitch perfect. They stayed out of the way and let the town and some residents speak. By the end we had figured out relationships, we wondered about backgrounds and what would happen next for people. We knew what events people looked forward to and how the seasons unfolded there. We found ourselves in a line for another movie later talking to other people who'd seen it about the various characters in it like they were from our own hometown or, at least, characters in a well-formed narrative.

We walked back to the condo for a quick snack and refresh and headed out to the movie "Objectified." It was made by Gary Hustwit, who made the movie "Helvetica" we so enjoyed last year. The movie is a documentary about the 'stuff' around us and how it is designed and the life cycle of all the things in our world. Very enjoyable. We headed to Taste after that to have a meal. Just didn't have another movie in us. The meal and wine were pleasant.

Sunday we sat around in our sweats for a while, doing some writing and taking in the Sunday paper and such. FFP made us a big breakfast of migas and toast which sustained us until we ate a meal in front of a movie at Alamo South Lamar.

We headed to the Convention Center and went to Christopher Holland's book book signing for "Film Festival Secrets." We wanted to see a panel on design with the director of "Objectified" and some designers and a New York Times magazine writer, Rob Walker, who writes a column about, well, stuff. There was a bit of time to wait so we got a cup of coffee and went into the day stage cafe where the Interactive conference interview of Nate Silver by Stephen Baker was being broadcast. Heh, we wouldn't have been admitted to an Interactive panel with a film badge. It was pretty interesting. Silver is the numbers guy behind FiveThirtyEight.com and Stephen Baker wrote "The Numerati." After this we went to the panel on design. It was packed. Like the movie "Objectified" it was a joint Interactive/Film event. There were lots of people with funny dye jobs and vintage clothes. Must be more of that in the online world than in film.

We decided when the panel ended to try the new (for this year's fest) shuttle and waited a few minutes to catch a bus at 4th and Red River. We were tremendously early for "Bomber" but it was worth the wait. It was a witty family drama about a mom, dad and son who go off on a quest to let the dad resolve the wounds of a mistake made when he was a teenaged kid in WWII. Around this hook we see a delightful bit of Europe and watch a family try to unravel the damages life brings and get down to basic caring.

When the movie (and our meal) was over we were wondering "could we actually see another?" We decided to try. We waited for the shuttle bus which came after a while and delivered us to 7th Street near Congress. We decided not to try going back to the house and had a cup of coffee and a snack at the Hidelout. Lines were long for the movie, "Women in Trouble," at the Paramount. There were many VIPs and celebrities but we got in, no problem, and got our favorite seats (left section orchestra, row T, two on the aisle). We were excited that Connie Britton was in the movie and another "Friday Night Lights" actress, Andriane Palacki. The movie was raunchy, irreverant, unlikely and laugh-out-loud funny. It was "Pulp Fiction" all is connected style without the violence. Well, there was a tiny bit of violence, nothing to speak of.

We were more than done when the movie was over, but people were queued outside for another. We got home just after midnight.

Yesterday (Monday) we were all about trying to have a reasonable pace. I was trying to get over whatever weird illness plagues me and FFP was up against some deadlines. We finally settled on seeing a shorts program at 1:30 at Alamo South and walking up there for our alleged exercise. Shorts Reel 1 seemed disorganized and theme-less. I know themes are hard to achieve in these things but this one had everything from a wordless narrative short of amazing physical comedy ("Sunday Mornings") to a documentary about cleaning up the 'chicken bones and newspaper' type hoarder's house ("Isis Avenue"). Those two were pretty worthy as was an over the top improv about therapy called "Countertransference." But all in all the reel left me hungry for coherence. But I was otherwise quiet sated with a three cheese grilled sandwich and fries and a Coke.

We walked home. (The walk home from Alamo is easier because it is mostly downhill.) We got a few things done and headed out for "The Two Bobs." It was a big deal movie for the fest, shot around town and with Tim McCanlies, writer and director. We'd gotten an advance ticket which allows first dibs in the badge line. We were surprised to see a good sixty or eighty people with 'cast and crew' tickets. All was utter chaos at the Paramount but we got in and got our usual seats. The movie was slapstick and predictable but great fun nonetheless with fabulous set decoration and many local folks involved. The game animation was great fun, a bloody sendup of the genre. I have to say I liked it. I was looking for friend Jeff Lofton who was an extra but missed his moments on the screen. (I think I was distracted by Turk Pipkin in drag in that scene.) We were going to meet the Loftons for drinks and dinner, but after all was chaos. We didn't have a mobile number so FFP went back to the place to find it. I waited around trying to spot them. There were such crowds for the next movie plus Leslie posing in front of the Paramount that I finally decided we'd missed them and started home myself. Then FFP called and he'd gotten them on the phone and they were in front of the Paramount. We converged at Taste, heard the end of Trevor LaBonte and Liz Morphis doing their set and ate dinner and drank, all six of us. Taste was deserted. If you SXSWers are looking for a place to dine, venture all the way to Cesar Chavez, it's not far, and grab some fab food and wine. They even have Yelp specials for SXSW.

And then bed. I developed a cough at the beginning of the meal which I contained with cough drops and decon and water (and OK some wine). It's heck being sick during so much activity. Today is St. Pat's day. Last night was chaos downtown already and music isn't starting until the end of the week. We are going to try to see two movies today. And perhaps get some errands done. If I feel like it, maybe house cleaning. (I don't have to be very sick to eschew that.)

What the 'L?'

Every place on Second Street has a S-A-L-E and that's the L from Estilo (with LB in there somewhere). I've been missing since Saturday from this space, it seems. I've been doing things, though, really.

We saw Austin Lyric Opera's "Rigoletto." I enjoyed it immensely. Well, as much as I enjoy any opera which is to say as much as I'm equipped to enjoy it. A lot anyway. I especially liked the soprano. I think it's so difficult to get stabbed and stuck in a tow sack and still sing an aria. I'm just saying. Yeah, I'm opera stupid but I'm working on it. Great production in our lovely new Long Center.

I watched TOO MANY sports on Sunday. I'm sports weary. I watched the Aussie Open Final (Federer-Nadal), a UT women's basketball game and the Stupid Bowl. I'm giving up sports until the French Open. I think I saw Roddick practicing on the fake clay tonight. Maybe not.

I did Dad duty. I took him to lunch, to church, picked up prescriptions, worked on his taxes, shredded stuff, took and picked up shirts at the laundry, got his garbage and recycling out, took his picture with his monster amarylis. I told him his sister died. I have been to his house three days in a row this week. I was out there a few days last week. Somewhat of a record during a time when he is doing OK, really, pretty much, health-wise. On Tuesday during my every morning call to him he said "My horoscope says 'The methods that helped you get through the day yesterday won't carry you into the future.' So I will have to do things differently." I didn't know he read his horoscope. I also didn't know he watched a string of old M*A*S*H episodes in the afternoon, but I happened to be there to catch him at it this week. Or maybe it's something new. Maybe he's fallen out of love with Rachel Ray and FOX news commentators.

I went to a memorial for a former co-worker who died.

I ate a bag of those Necco conversation hearts they have at Valentine's. I'm a sucker for those. They are crack cocaine for me. But I was disappointed because they have no quality control and half of them had no saying or had it printed in an off-center or in a blurred fashion. So, never again.

I cleaned our bathroom and did a few other chores.

I attended a board meeting at my country club. I'm going to slide off the board. Three years is plenty.

I played tennis. Yeah, of course. But I'm taking a break until next Tuesday and hope my strained back improves.

I attended an education thing about Ballet Austin's upcoming production of Stephen Mill's "Hamlet." I love this production. I loved the education thing where we saw some of the dance and heard about it. I bought the Phillip Glass music for it for the iPod. I like that there is an iTunes mix on the WEB so I can just buy the music. I never have enough time to listen to music. I also became a fan of Jeff Lofton and downloaded a CD his wife gave FFP. He's not on iTunes yet. He played a tune at Austin Cabaret Theater's open mike production with Jim Caruso and Billy Stritch. (Cast Party.) We are now lining up to hear more from him.

FFP and I walked down to South Congress and came back stopping at Vespaio, Cissi's Market and Taste and having some food and a glass of wine at each one. That was Tuesday.

I've been busy. Yep. I caught up most of the financial stuff for now although my taxes loom. I'm behind on reading. I think I'll go read some now. Just as soon as I see how many labels I can attach to this post.

Good Cheer

I usually wear only black and gray. But I wore my red jacket last night and we took some friends to a wine dinner at Four Seasons new Trio restaurant. I had what would soar into a bad screaming toothache but I managed to smile in front of the tree for a quick picture when we were leaving. This was around 9:30. I put up with the pain until midnight and then took some Advil. The good news is that my toothache is getting localized enough that I'm hoping that the endodontist can figure out what to do. The other good news is that it an OTC painkiller helps a little and makes it bearable. The bad news is cost and pain and all that. But around the BP house we've taken to saying "yeah, but it isn't life-threatening!"

It's December. I can't believe that. And so Christmas is really here before we know it.

I got FFP to shoot this picture because my niece wanted to make Christmas tags with pictures of the givers and recipients so her little boys could easily sort the packages and see pictures of the relatives that sent gifts from far away.

I'm not in a particular festive mood but visiting with our friends was a delight and we had a great meal, paired with Lamborn Family Winery wines. It is amazing to get away with friends, to gossip and to talk about truly important and also really trivial things. This couple is so busy that we were more than delighted to find a night we could spend together so pleasantly. My toothache couldn't even spoil it. (The wine might have soothed it a little, too.) The monkfish and persimmon salad was to die for, too, and the beef sublime. (I save my beef moments for truly good stuff.)

Today is (or was to be) the beginning of another month of blogging, courtesy of Holidailies. I was puzzled this morning to see I'd lost the linking button for the site. Don't know when I lost that from the blog. Then I tried to go to Holidailies but all the sites related to my friends Jette and Chip seem to be down. Just a small glitch, I'm sure. I discovered that the host site for their many sites is also down.

Anyway, here I am, writing next to nothing about nothing every day. I hope you all have a day of good cheer. And nothing wrong that is life threatening.

A Bottle of Wine With Dinner

FFP and I were talking about downsizing yesterday and I told him I had a new rule. Anything we had that was worth less than what we pay for a bottle of wine with dinner, that is easily replaced and that we haven't used in a while is fair game to get rid of and not look back. After all, if we find we need it after all we can just forgo the wine (or the meal out) and go buy it again. Crass? Not really. We will pass these serviceable things to the thrift store. Where they will be recycled at a price good for someone who wants it and benefit our charity.

Feed the Rich...Desserts

I was torn about where to post this entry. Here in my regular journal (which my husband says makes our lives an open book but I don't really think so)? Or in the Journal of Unintended Consequences, my other blog, which is intended to capture the chaotic results from well-intentioned (or not) actions? I decided to put it here because somehow I thought that would be less controversial. I'm not really raising an objection to feeding the rich. Everybody's got to eat, you know, to sustain life.

The photo is of a sausage-shaped big cheese (I think) at Mandola's Market, posing with some of its sausage friends.

Now, I consider myself rich. I don't have any debt, I can budget for things like 'gifts' and 'donations' and 'eating out.' I don't work. Yeah. The idle rich even. Hasn't always been so, but I was never as poor as my parents or grandparents once were.

I've noticed that, when you donate money to things or you entertain friends or do them favors or people think you are going to do them a favor or donate money, people give you free food and booze.

I have often wondered if you could just live off this free stuff. For weeks at a time. I'm not really trying to do that and, besides, it would probably require lining your pockets with zip lock bags as my friend SuRu points out. But yesterday when I got up I realized that for that one day I could probably get by on what was free. So I decided to try it.

Now first off, I'm not a 'breakfast is the most important meal of the day' person. When I get up in the morning, I'm not usually hungry at all. I want coffee. Black coffee. And lots of it. So in my experiment I decided that I would allow myself unlimited coffee made in my very own Jura-Capresso E8. (See this entry also.) Of course, there are no calories in black coffee. Just a buzz.

During the morning, I went to my club and rode the recumbent bike for thirty minutes. The bike claimed I'd burned 200 calories. Just before I showered I weighed on the fancy-looking digital scales from Sharper Image that we bought when we decorated our remodeled bathroom. (See photo of bathroom in my old journal...the scales fit in with that decor. Hmmm...maybe FFP is right about the open book thing!) My weight was 163.6. Seems like the scale said just over 160 a few days ago. But it fluctuates. Who knows?

Around 12:20 we headed downtown. We got into a huge traffic jam at 5th and Lamar caused by the city's urge to close a couple of lanes of W. 5th every weekend. Still we found a parking place and found a bus that was taking the media around for a tour of markets as part of the Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival. I figured...free food! While we waited for the bus to depart I took a quick swing through the Saturday Downtown Farmer's Market. (I imagined when we were living downtown how I would stroll through the market and buy some vegies and greens and goat cheese for the week.) I got a free taste of some delicious Hibiscus Tea. I saw that the goat cheese and honey people had those tiny plastic tasting spoons. But I figured a small taste would just send my juices up too high.

The bus headed out to Mandola's Italian Market near our house. For some reason they used the surface streets. As we drove by the University I saw some homeless guys digging in a trash can. I was feeling a little hungry myself. Several eateries on Guadalupe (Milto's, Ruby's Barbecue, Zen, NeWorlDeli) suddenly seemed very attractive. As we filed into the market to get a talk from one of the owners we walked by outside tables where people were scarfing late lunches (it was 1:15 by now) of pizza and salad and anti-pastas and all manner of stuff that was looking increasingly delicious. But there were no samples! The best I could do was to grab a little bit of cranberry walnut bread out for sampling by the general public. I listened to the owner talk about the operation (their own winery, imported Italian groceries, baking almost all their own stuff, very interesting actually, etc.) and tried not to feel too hungry. We were given a goody bag. It contained a jar of artichokes and olives and stuff in a tomato sauce, a pack of three or four baked crackers and some biscoti and cookies along with one of those napkin/cutlery packets you get with takeout. On the way out I looked at the bread sample basket...but all the samples were gone. Darn! In the bus, I ate one of the crackers and a little cookie of some sort. That took the edge off.

We drove back toward downtown and over to South Congress and were soon at Cissi's Market. This was feed the rich nirvana! I took a glass of the offered white wine but fortified myself before drinking much with chips on sample. They had some Austin Slow Burn Salsa Verde out, too. Then they started circulating with platters containing tiny bite-size hors d'oeuvre. Ah, heaven. Vanilla-poached lobster with Shiraz grits. Little pulled pork sandwiches on cornbread the size of pill boxes. They had a lot, too, so we were encouraged to have multiples. I began to think I'd survive on my free food diet. I sipped a little wine. I had one bite of lemon bar dessert. I'm not much of a dessert person. That would be my downfall on this regimen. A peek inside our goodie bag from Cissi's revealed a sack of coffee beans, giant home-style cookies and chocolate!

Next we went to Farm To Market Grocery. It's been there on South Congress for a while. A tiny space stocking a lot of food and a few gift items, it has 30% local products including flowers out front that are from the Hill Country. The people there were really nice and were passing out goat milk ice cream, sodas and water. And they gave us goody bags with a private label chocolate bar and a Butters Brownie. Now, as I said, I'm not much on sweets. I actually had eaten a Butters Brownie a few nights ago. (There was a sample in the media bag we got.) The goat milk part tempted me on the ice cream but I just ask others how it tasted.

We headed west of W. Mary and located the P&K Grocery. This place was ultra funky and hip at the same time. They had taken an old building, used antique fixtures where possible and had some antique glassware and china and collectibles for sale. They had a deli counter with hot sandwiches and other stuff. They make their own pimento cheese and hummus and hot dog condiments. They sell goat cheese on a stick (lolipops!). That made my stomach rumble. But they weren't giving them away. They were giving away little square pimento cheese sandwich samples and freshly made lemonade. Also deviled eggs but for some reason I didn't get one before we got on the bus. I'd regret that. That 1.5 inch square sandwich wasn't going to hold me long. And their goodie bag had samples of their hot dog condiments. Which would have been great if someone was giving away hot dogs!

When we got home, I had some coffee and water. I was actually a little hungry. The only free thing that wasn't sweet was some of those plain crackers and that artichoke concoction Mandola's gave us. So I opened it up and had a little of that with the crackers. Later a bag of caramel corn Cissi's gave us (a private label product with a light hand on the coating, not at all like Crackerjacks) called to me. As I always do with such products...I checked the calories in the entire bag...about seven hundred and eighty! They were pretty good, sort of salty and sweet, but I stopped eating after only a couple of hundred calories.

A few hours later, we dressed up and went to a house over near Lake Austin. The party was free. Well, if you don't count the hefty annual donation that had yielded the invitation. When I saw plates of food, I found the dining room and filled a plate with tender beef, roll and butter, green beans, roasted root vegies, roasted purple and white fingerling potatoes and rice. The offerings seemed a bit odd...no chicken or fish and a lot of starch but I wasn't complaining. I took some of everything and polished off all the carbs and a few ounces of the beef with a glass of free red wine. (I had finished a glass of white I'd gotten coming in.) Later I had a coffee and three mini madeleines.

At home Forrest ate some of the caramel corn and so I finished the bag. I was tempted to grab a cheese snack from the fridge, but true to my word, I stuck to coffee and what the world fed the rich today. Which seemed a little heavy on the sweet side. Let 'em eat cake, I guess.

As I finish this entry I'm waiting for FFP to come home. We might go to the Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival Fair. There would be lots of free food. And we have press passes. But jockeying for free food with thousands of other people and drinking wine outdoors on a hot day sounds less and less fun now that I think about it. I haven't eaten so far today. I've had my coffee, a bottle of water and a walk around the neighborhood. I'm feeling a little hungry. But not hungry enough to go for the chocolate and cookies left over from the free stuff from yesterday.

Barely Contained Chaos

I reached back to 2005 to find this shop window picture. Why I randomly stumbled across this on the computer, I don't know. (By the way, I recently discovered that the machine that is Google had magically made photo albums of this blog's photos and my other blog's photos.)

I am constantly trying to organize my life. My stuff. My computer. My files. My head. Get organized, I say. It doesn't happen. Lots of times I start with the little mess in front of my computer monitor (a 17 inch flat panel). Today I sifted through the pile and found:

- two receipts to be logged into my budget spreadsheet (done)
- a Prospectus for a mutual fund that arrived in the mail (dumped in recycling sack)
- an invitation for the dress rehearsal of the next presentation of Austin Lyric Opera (sent two e-mails trying to give it away as we have a conflict and also will see the actual production and that's enough)
- a sticky note reminding me to make a dinner reservation for dinner with an old friend (done)
- a sticky note with a phone number and some notes about a change to my country club's WEB site
- a shopping list for stuff for the event we hosted here Sunday (soda, still water, cocktail napkins, beer, limes, lemons)
- a note about some interest and dividends I'd noticed on my accounts online but not put in my QuickBooks versions of these accounts (done)
- a note about stuff to do for the event on Sunday
- a 'to do' and reminder list with about half the things checked off
- a piece of paper with numbers scribbled down where I was counting chairs for the event on Sunday (we had a play performed and needed chairs for all the guests)
- two business cards for people who came to the event on Sunday...I need to save the cards or info somewhere appropriate...maybe in my Access data base or my 'people' folder...leave on desk until I decide
- yet another scrap of paper with reminders of what to do at the last minute before Sunday's event
- menus from two recent dinners (one at our club where we entertained friends at a wine dinner featuring Australian wines such as a 2004 Massena 11th Hour Shiraz and one entitled 'A Cuban Night' bought at one charity's event and given to promote another charity and including food like grapefruit, snapper, and jicama ceviche and Spanish, Texas and Argentinian wines since, you know, Cuban wine is in short supply) which I consigned to the recycling bin concluding I'd never find them again if I wanted them
- A printout of an e-mail from the playwright whose play was presented here at Sunday night's event showing the guest list as he had figured it with my scribbles and checkoffs. (For the record: I believe four people who RSVPed yes failed to show up and one hopeful maybe did not as well. Three people who did not RSVP or not in time for this e-mail did show up. Which verifies my theory that the no shows generally about equal the surprise shows making the RSVP count more accurate than you might think.) Scribbled on the back of this printout was the food the caterer brought although I need not have done it because FFP went upstairs and printed it out from the e-mail. (The chef forgot to bring the menu cards.) The garlic crostini topped with hazelnut romesco and smoked shrimp were yummy, by the way.

But. I digress. My life is a digression.

Yeah, most of that stuff is now filed away or in the recycling sack that is always close at hand. But to write the last sentence of the previous paragraph I had to go look for an e-mail (because I couldn't read my scribbles on the menu thing) which took me on a digression through deleting e-mail and sent me to look at the WEB site of an actress we met recently and had drinks with the other day when I found an e-mail from FFP about it. (Margaret Turner's site is here.) The event on Sunday brought a lot of interesting people together to watch a play (and eat and drink a bit and talk to one another). People and their relationships to us are part of the chaos that boils around here. As witnessed when I contained that little pile of stuff in front of my monitor. Now...to clean up all the other areas of this office and get totally organized and get rid of some stuff. Yeah. Right.

Before I could finish editing this entry and post it someone dropped by to pick up chairs borrowed for the party. Then the mail came and the UPS guy came. I follow the edict of the organization specialists on mail and such. I immediately try to put the unwanted stuff in the recycling (our city recycles junk mail) and put everything else where it (more or less) belongs. That prospectus got saved from the recycling sack the first time because FFP said he might look at it. But as he left it here, I figured he wasn't really going to do it. Still chaos rules. But I think I'm getting closer and closer to, um, doing better.

It's Best to Have Rich Friends

Last night I was sitting at a table for eight with some of the 'lesser' donors for a nonprofit capital campaign we are involved in. I imagine all the couples at the table gave 'five figures' as they say but at other tables were the people for whom six and seven figures are not out of the question for multiple charities.


We were joking with some pals about being at the kid's table. Then one of the guys was wondering about the net worth 'in the room.'

"About a billion," I said. "With a 'b'. Even with us here."


I really think it was true. How do you really know though? But some of the people have given away my net worth several times over.


It's nice to have rich friends, of course. They have wine cellars with enough 1985 Cos d'Estournel (an esteemed Bordeaux) and old Montrachet to pour for forty people. And a bottle of champagne as big as a horse for the toasts and dessert. They have a domed room plenty large enough for forty or fifty people to dine. They have space to exhibit amazing weird art. The house was like a museum. Right after I arrived a woman who also has a house like a museum was commenting on a painting and said the stance of a hip hop guy in the painting reminded her of the stance of a Rubenesque naked woman in a painting her husband gave her. She was flustered because she couldn't remember the artist.


"Botero?" I offered.


"That's it! Of course." She said.


It's great to have rich friends. And if you can help them identify their holdings so much the better.


Honestly. It's better to have rich friends than to be rich. Being rich is such a responsibility.


It's all relative, of course. I know that most people consider me rich. I consider myself rich if only because I'm catching the glow of these friends.

I'm Still Here

I had a little setback over the weekend. It was supposed to be a weekend of catching up on things and enjoying the nice weather. You can read about the upset Saturday brought over on my Journal of Unintended Consequences.

We had a nice weekend nevertheless. Nothing was planned for Saturday. That turned out to be a good thing. Thursday's adventures on South Congress and downtown were fun. (I took the picture after dropping off my tax stuff to the CPA on Thursday in SoCo.) And we had a nice Friday. My dad and I made it to water aerobics (good for Dad) and I managed a pretty good workout after that. I had lunch with Dad and a friend and my friend and I went computer equipment shopping afterwards without buying anything. Always good. Friday night was a really pleasant event with fun people to talk to and good apps and good wine to taste.

And yesterday we were treated to hearing a world class string quartet play in someone's living room followed by a reception where we met some new and interesting people and had some nice apps. That was so old school elegant. It almost made me feel bad coming home to watch mindless television.

Today for the second week in a row I'm going to turn over a new leaf and be more productive. Only problem is that I've already wasted most of the morning and I haven't even gotten a workout.

Mooching and Treating

The new look for the Intel shell is oh so much more interesting, don't you think? In the background is the crane and the rising floors of the condo tower (360) where we hope to live one day. One down, one up. Actually many up you can't see in this picture.

Last night we almost made a perfect score in downtown Austin. We ate and drank freebies at a party at Cissi's Market on South Congress which is about to open. There was wine tasting, free coffee, delicious passed food and some food vendors purveying delicious desserts and olive oil and preserves. We had a party to go to at the sales office for the tower going up in this picture. It was a birthday party for the guy who is the local partner on the project. He was 34 and I said I had wine that old and found one to give him that was a '74. Close enough. So when I say we would continue mooching at his party it's not like we didn't take a nice present. That old Cab might even taste all right. But we had some time between the freebies so we went to Belmont and sat on the patio with some women. We'd met one of them, once. I didn't remember where. FFP did. And they bought us drinks.

After the birthday party we were still a little hungry. They had only sweets at the party and we decided to have a nightcap and some snacks at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse bar. Both the owners came over to chat. They didn't treat us, though, so, sadly, the whole evening wasn't a mooch fest. Out came the credit cards.

Today I was the treater, though, more or less. I have a regular irregular lunch with a friend who is a retired health inspector turned playwright. And it was my turn. We take turns. So I picked up the tab at NuAge Cafe. And in the evening, I had dinner with a friend of mine at 34th Street and she chipped in $20 but we had a glass of wine each, I had two apps, she had an app and an entree and I tipped Karen (our server) generously so I picked up a little more than half. I felt sorry for my friend who was out $3000 on surgery for her standard poodle who had jumped around and twisted her stomach. Second time it happened. First time they claimed they tacked the stomach to the abdominal wall. Guess it came loose. I picked this poodle up at the groomers the other day and I'm glad it didn't happen on my watch. She jumped around like crazy at the groomers and at home although she sat quietly in my car in between. My friend also found out that her rental duplex might be sold out from under her.

Did I have a point with all this? Oh. Yes. Mooching and treating...it's supposed to balance out. I can't honetsly tell you which end of the thing I'm on. Sometimes things are up, sometimes they are down. Kind of like the buildsings.

Downtown Living

Yesterday we made the decision to try to move downtown. In this picture you see a balcony we would like to be standing on in a little over a year surveying downtown Austin. The building at 360 Nueces is called 'The 360' and it's up about eleven stories and our desired location is there on ten. The building's WEB site is here, but I warn you...it's an annoying one.

Getting closer to this decision made me want to go home and throw away 7/8 of my things. There is so much we don't really need. Of course, when I got home I was exhausted from making decisions and worrying about the future and I went out and had bacon and eggs and then goofed off and read the paper, went to the gym and generally avoided working on my taxes.

Spent a pleasant evening looking at friends' remodeled house and then dining at Restaurant Jezebel in downtown Austin. Yummy food accompanied by my new favorite wine...a 2005 Siduri Pinot Noir.

We were downtown within view of our building under construction again today at the crack of dawn. My blog entry on the Intel Shell Implosion is here.

I Already Feel Behind

I always feel this way on New Year's Day. It's a holiday. What kind of a way is that to start a productive year?

Oh, it's not like I couldn't start on my resolutions. And it's not like I have a hangover. The bottles shown are the result of me starting (one more time) to look through photos on my computer with the idea of doing a purge and winnowing. I didn't consume any of these last night. They were actually consumed (by me and five friends) in the summer of 2000.

I did have two Manhattans, expertly mixed by my husband, to accompany a dinner of sushi (bought already made at Central Market), talipia, steamed vegetables and fruit and cheese for dessert. Yes, we stayed in. And while I don't have two drinks every night it's hardly an overindulgence in my book for a evening spent reading and watching TV coverage large groups of people gathering to mark a clock tick. No, there is no reason I shouldn't have been up, bright and early, accomplishing things. I wasn't, though. My dad called at 8:30 while I was making the bed. He wondered why I hadn't already made my welfare call of the morning.

So, here I am, a couple of cups of coffee and an hour later, some things taken care of on the computer, ready to start my New Year by picking up a few things for my dad and going over there to see what I can do. I have a long list scribbled on a pad in front of my computer of things that need accomplishing...for the year end, month end and just general needs. And I'm already behind.