Archive for November, 2006
Thanksgiving is a favorite holiday of mine for many reasons, but primarily for the food. Now that’s not anything terribly new and exciting, I know. Ooooh! You like turkey and stuffing? How original….
But Thanksgiving dinner has a special significance for me. Growing up, I ate Indian food just about every night for dinner. My dad wanted Indian food when he came home from work and my Mom cooked it. At least until they stopped speaking to each other, but that’s an entirely different story. I loved it, I still love Indian food above any other cuisines, it just feels like home to me. The sole exceptions to this family routine were dinner at a friend’s house or the occasional pizza or McDonald’s (my mom now swears she had no idea back then how bad McNuggets were for us otherwise they never woud have passed my lips). When we went out to eat, we would end up having some sort of Asian food, Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese, which was great but not really that much of a stretch for those of us accustomed to spicy food. One thing is for sure, we never hung out at any greasy spoon diners and shoveled good ol’ American food into our faces.
When I moved to New York for college, I became good friends with another violinist in my teacher’s studio. J was Chinese (actually, I’m pretty sure she still is) and like me, grew up mostly eating the food of her culture. As we got to know the city better, on the nights we weren’t drunk, we would spend a lot of time at Tom’s Restaurant. If you’ve ever watched Seinfeld, you probably recognize this place. Tom’s wasn’t anything fancy but we loved it. This is where J and I would go for what we called our “exotic” American meals. We would order strange and fascinating things like Salisbury Steak, Reuben sandwiches and split pea soup. For us this was the most foreign food we could dream of. We had heard our American friends talk about it growing up and occasionally tried a few of these delicacies at their houses, but this was an opportunity to immerse ourselves in one of the few aspects of American culture that we had never fully experienced growing up in Asian households. Up until this time, Thanksgiving had been the only time we had tasted traditional American food and even then there were usually a few good curries on the table surrounding the turkey my mother had cooked. I have vivid memories to this day of watching my father carve our Thanksgiving bird, surrounded by ladies in saris. But the turkey had no cumin or cardamom, just plain bird, which I think, quite frankly, confused many of the sari-clad ladies. But now, I could order turkey dinner any day of the week, complete with mashed potatoes and gravy.
So, as our friends at school who had moved to New York from the midwest discovered sushi and tried eating Ethiopian food with their hands, J and I explored American diner food with great zeal. For years, I ate at diners all over New York and ALWAYS had an extra side of mashed potatoes and gravy. Eventually, I came to find my true love in stuffing, which is unfortunately hard to find at restaurants so I just poured what little spare money I had into my Stove Top habit (ah, the days of fast metabolism). Later, I would move on to study the finer points of Hamburger Helper and perfect the art of making Rice-a-Roni. I had watched ads for these things on TV for years, and never been allowed to try them. But now, free from the shackles of my parent’s house, I could go hog wild, running down the middle of Broadway with a bag full of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese.
I’ve moved on from the days of dinner in a box for the most part, but I still find turkey dinner irresistible. I have yet to actually cook one myself, but if I walk down the prepared food aisle in Whole Foods and see turkey, gravy and stuffing, I know that it’s all coming home with me. I have a feeling that once our son is a little older, I will probably take the plunge and cook the whole Thanksgiving meal, just so I can say I did it. And maybe I’ll throw a curry in on the side, just for nostalgia.
November 29th, 2006
Thank you for keeping my lap warm and purring like a small foreign car.
Thank you for being my first real pet. And for being a royal pain in the ass.
Thank you for still loving me even though I had a baby.
Thank you for every minute of every day.
Thank you for showing up and making it all even better.
November 23rd, 2006
Oh, the running, she is so, so difficult. I have discovered that when I’m really pushing (which doesn’t take much these days), my heart rate sometimes goes up to 200. This seems wrong, very wrong. I think I need to slow things down a bit. Which translates to - I haven’t ran in 5 days and am currently seated on the couch eating two, count them, two! different flavors of ice cream.
My mom is in town this week which, although it can be stressful because we tend to irritate each other, has been a help since she luurrrrves Ashok and will hold him all day long if asked. That means I get my hands back and get to practice, wash dishes, etc. etc. It’s strange how all the tasks I tried to put off pre-baby now seem like some sort of luxury. ooooh! I get to sweep dog hair up off the floor! Such fun!
It has been hot as Hades here lately. I do love Southern California but when it is 90 degrees three days before Thanksgiving, something is just wrong. This has been weird even for here-I keep dressing the baby up in cute cuddly outifts only to take him outside and realize that he is going to bake unless I strip him down right away. Poor child, running around L.A. in just a diaper. How will he live that down?
Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving…..I for one am looking forward to my Chocolate Pecan Pie. : )
November 21st, 2006
I noticed today upon looking at my blog calendar that I’ve quietly slipped into a once-a-week posting rhythm. Sort of sad, especially with NaBloPoMo going on and all, but ha! I throw the baby card in your face! That is my excuse for everything right now. Deal with it.
Which leads me to the next topic for which to make excuses: I finally ran this week. It was sad, sad and pathetic. But what could I expect really? It’s been about nine months since I last ran so I think my body experienced some mild shock. I’m not going to get into the details as they are far too embarrassing but suffice to say, I was not out for very long, I didn’t go very far (at all, seriously) and I am sore. I have to admit though, it’s nice to be sore from exercise again rather than from horrible wounds inflicted by childbirth. Anyway, my goal is to go out and keep at it every other day this week and see how it goes. Luckily, Ashok has adapted nicely to the jogging stroller and sleeps through everything. Since I can’t get him to take a morning nap anywhere in the house, I am going to count this time in the stroller as naptime. We’re multitasking.
Ashok was a dream last night-he only woke up once, ONCE! Of course my boobs were about to explode by the morning but I didn’t care. Sleep, blissful sleep! I had forgotten the simple beauty of it. I’m sure we’ll be punished tonight. Currently, he is being walked around the room by his father in what we have deemed The Monkey Hold:
I was walking around outside the other day with him like this, talking to one of our landscapers and she said” Well, look at you hanging out like a monkey in a tree!” The name stuck and since he is becoming more monkey-like every day and even dressed up as one for Halloween, the Monkey Hold was born At times, it is the only magical cure for His Fussiness. At other times, like right now (sorry Brian, I’m almost done, I swear), not so much.
OK, duty calls.
November 14th, 2006
Did you?
November 7th, 2006
This morning while I sat on the couch, recovering from my first night out in a long time (I didn’t get drunk, but our baby boy made sure I didn’t sleep well to punish me for abandoning him so callously) I watched the hour-long highlight show of the NYC Marathon on TV. First of all, I was disappointed that such a remarkable race only got a piddly hour on TV but I could change the channel and see a football game on every other station. I guess watching long distance running isn’t really appealing to everyone. Anyway, I enjoyed watching the finish in both the men’s and women’s elite groups, I always find it inspiring-they are just amazing. Then they turned their cameras to Lance Armstrong and followed him as he finished in just under 3 hours, accomplishing his goal. It was pretty cool-even though Lance is not always my personal favorite, I admire what he can do as an athlete and a humanitarian.
So I guess this is all leading up to the inevitable. I think it may finally be time for me to start running again. As long as I get cleared by my doctor this week I think I”m gonna try it. I’m terrified to think how hard it will be-although nothing can really compete with how it felt to play the violin again this week after 6 weeks off. This has definitely been the longest break I’ve had from the violin in my adult life, maybe even my whole life! I had a moment when I started playing for the first time the other day where I thought to myself, “Am I doing this right? Does the bow go in my right hand?” For the non-musicians out there, that’s tantamount to trying to remember if you’re right or left handed. It felt unbelievably foreign. I momentarily considered a career change (stay-at-home mom? chef? veterinarian?) and then realized that if I can just get through the first few weeks of getting back into shape, I’ll be ok. Here comes the epiphany-running should be the same, right? I should be able to get back into it after some pain and suffering at the beginning. And god knows running is a hell of a lot more natural than the contortions required of your upper body to play the violin.
My deadline for violin preparedness is January-that’s when I go back to work and I’ll be doing some chamber music concerts by the end of that month so I have to be ready (chamber music concerts require a bit more since I can actually be HEARD as opposed to orchestral work where it is more on the honor system since there are so many violins). I am reluctant to set any deadlines for the running, such as entering a race, etc. because I just don’t know how it will feel, it’s much more uncharted territory. Let’s just say I won’t be running any marathons by January.
Of course, the one little glitch with all these plans is that I am effing TIRED. Here’s some proof:
My eyes, I can barely keep them open. So all my plans may be for nuttin. Ashok, please let mommy sleep. She loves you.
November 5th, 2006
At last, he is taking a nap. It has taken me a couple of nap-less weeks to figure out that, duh, my month old son most likely isn’t going to send me an email requesting a naptime, so I should probably go ahead and just enforce one. So far, he’s been alseep for an hour and a half…..not bad.
Halloween was a good time at our place, as usual. We had a whopping 10 trick-or-treaters (5 more than last year) and Ashok got to try out his monkey costume, which although it was far too big, still looked cute:
Sorry for the dark picture, I guess we were all a bit too sugared up to operate the camera correctly. The dog was supposed to be in costume this year as well, but by the time we were ready to suit her up, she and a dog friend were already running around like wackos and we figured there was no point. Not to worry though, we haven’t forgotten our Lucy’s fondness for dressing up (see Exhibits A, B and C). She will definitely get in that costume sometime this week, and pictures will be taken, you can bet on that. I myself donned an orange shirt, which is about as close I as I will get to a costume anymore. Hope everyone had a fun night!
November 1st, 2006
