Tuesday, October 19, 2004

Washed away

I have written a few posts lately (slowly, slowly, as I normally do..I tend to backspace just as much as I type forward - I'm an editor at heart, not a writer) and then, upon clicking "Publish Post", the posts have disappeared into cyberspace (blogger error page), never to be written again. It does make one rather click-shy. I promise myself I will copy everything I write onto the clipboard before clicking, but hope springs eternal, and there it goes again.

One day, I re-wrote a short post three times, and it never did get published. A few days later, my anger subsided, and I went back to blogger, only to see the original post sitting there, saved as a draft.

This morning I wrote something clever (I'm sure it was clever) about waking up and hearing water - a waterfall? no. a shower? no. the dishwasher? oh. it's raining. (There, that was at least as clever if not more succinct than the way I wrote it this morning.)

There seem to be too many parentheses in this post, but I just can't bear the thought of taking them out and having to re-write anything again.

I'm remembering to copy this post before clicking....! Hold your breath!
Leah Brooks at 2:41 PM

Wednesday, October 13, 2004

Under Construction

It's funny how one project leads to another and another, and before long, you find that you have six or seven incredibly difficult projects running at the very same time! Due to our summer-long coughs, we decided to rip up the carpet in the bedroom and put in wood floors. Then we decided we might as well do both bedrooms - doesn't cost that much more! And, why not paint the rooms (not painted since we moved in 10 years ago), since the carpet will be replaced and we don't care if we drip on it? We might as well have the closet floored too, since it's always drafty through there and maybe a new floor will solve that. I guess that means we have to take everything out of the closet, then. We'd better go through all of those clothes and sort through them, get rid of the old stuff from the 80s that no one wears anymore.

So now, on any given weekend or weeknight, we have been moving furniture, shopping for paint colors, taping and priming the room, rolling on the color, cutting the corners in, packing stuff in boxes, hauling it out to the patio, praying it doesn't rain, sleeping in the office on the air bed, etc., etc.

In addition to all this, I'm getting ready to go to Indiana for the chorus competition, making booklets for the chorus, trying to make quartet learning tapes with our christmas music, editing learning tapes for the chorus' new songs that we'll be teaching after Indy, and working like crazy at my actual job (notice I put this last).

And won't it look good when it's all done? It had better look really good.
Leah Brooks at 10:24 AM

Friday, October 08, 2004

Some photos

It seems like I haven't put any visuals up here for a while, so I'll post a few images - much quicker than writing, and more poignant and immediate than words.



Jeremy and Aidan at the wedding. They look so like themselves: Jeremy at the ready, and Aidan a million miles away.



One of my favorite art cars at the "How Berkeley Can You Be" festival.



Dragonboat cutting through the mist at the International Championships.
Leah Brooks at 3:33 PM

Sunday, October 03, 2004

Whirling

This is one of those weeks that whirl past, full of so much social activity and fun that you just want to grab it by its colorful tail and pull it up short, to slow it down and examine it, to fully savor its variety and fun. One way is to record, by camera and word, the wonderful events. We jumped into the fracas on Thursday, with Barb's birthday. I took the day off and we tootled off to Napa, for a lovely fall luncheon at the clubby Rutherford Grill. This restaurant, on the outside, looks like the generic Napa eatery, a bungalow-style building landscaped with rosemary bushes and lavendar. But once inside, you get the feeling that you are in some smokey speak easy, or an Italian-owned club from the 30s with red leather booths and dark wooden beams. We sat at the bar and watched the big flat screen monitor that hangs over the kitchen like a piece of art. The little closed-circuit cameras installed on the ceilings around the place put up shots of the chefs at work, the orders being placed on the counter, a bowl of lemons or artichokes.

After lunch, we went to Villagio, a very fancy hotel in the area, for a pedacure in their luxurious spa. Spas have become quite the thing, haven't they? There we met Robin, who worked in the spa, and who became quite friendly with us as we discussed families, politics and culture. She had a back back, and shouldn't be working on people's feet! But she did a great job and we walked out with twinkle toes.

We had some time to drive around Napa and Sonoma, enjoying the beauty of a fall afternoon. The trees are looking more rustic than tired, now that a few leaves have turned color here and there. The vineyards had a softness to them, from the slanting light and the distant mist of fog at the coast.

Friday night, the rehearsal dinner for Eve & Steve's wedding. We met Marilyn, a lovely person from Long Island who was high-school friends with Eve. Saturday, the wedding was probably one of the most fun parties I've been to all year. Barb officiated at the wedding, and had written a beautiful ceremony. The children were wonderfully cute and perfect in every way (aunties are allowed to say so).

And just when we thought we would never eat or drink again, we went out to dinner last night, for Barb's birthday celebration at the San Francisco Ferry Building's MarketBar.

Leah Brooks at 6:35 AM